The crew at The Judge
I’ve been lucky enough to visit Alabama numerous times and play on many of the courses on the state’s Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail. But not all of them, yet. That may require a few more visits. Or one really long one. Takes some time to play 468 holes.
I last wrote about the Trail here in 2018 and it’s worth rerunning one sentence from that piece: “All the works of the Pharaohs of Egypt had nothing on the early years of the Trail, when there was a construction crew of over 700 building 18 golf courses at seven very different locations all at the same time.”
The Trail, opened in 1992, has now crossed the three-decade mark, with 26 courses at 11 locations running the length and breadth of the state. It remains the perhaps unsurpassable model for other such trails other states have tried to adopt, with lesser degrees of success. It also remains a boon to traveling golfers looking for great golf at bargain prices.
Along with a few other traveling golf writers, I revisited the state this past fall to have another go at some Trail courses and one other—since it should be noted that good golf in Alabama is certainly not limited to the Trail.
We started in Birmingham and meandered in a southerly circle over to Auburn, piling up birdies, bogeys and others, while stuffing ourselves with barbecue and other local delicacies, and reminding ourselves of some of the mind-boggling statistics and history about the Trail.
Ross Bridge second hole
The Quick Skinny
Like other southern states, Alabama has a less than sparkling racial history, taken note of in five stops along another worthwhile path within its borders, the U.S. Civil Rights Trail. Interestingly, it was a golf-related racial incident that ignited the idea for the Jones Trail, prior to the 1990 PGA Championship.
The tournament was set to be played at the Shoal Creek Golf and Country Club in Birmingham (as it had been in 1984) when owner Hall Thompson clumsily said Blacks were not admitted at the club, and wouldn’t be. That set off a public relations firestorm, and not so incidentally revealed racial discrimination at other U.S. clubs. But in Alabama the Championship was on the verge of being moved from Shoal Creek when Thompson relented at the last minute and admitted a Black member.
Dr. David Bronner, the head of the Retirement Systems of Alabama, said in a 2013 interview, “We started looking at doing the Trail… around the time Shoal Creek was giving us bad publicity across the world. That’s the reason I built it…. I wanted to give the people of Alabama something to be proud of… [and] to promote tourism to the state … and recruit industry.”
Roger Rulewich
The Trail has done both in rather spectacular ways, contributing to a $24 billion travel industry (from $1.8 billion in 1992), which in turn convinced companies like Mercedes and Hyundai to establish production plants in the state. Still, the sheer audacity of the Trail construction plan at its inception struck some as crazy. The course design firms of both Nicklaus and Palmer turned overtures down.
Trent Jones was still a name architect of note at the time, but he was largely retired. However, his right hand man, Roger Rulewich, became the man behind the scenes. Rulewich, now retired himself from his own firm, concedes he’ll probably be best known for his work with Jones, and that’s fine with him. He thinks the Trail is probably his greatest accomplishment.
And he still looks back on those early days in wonder: “It was unbelievable. It was incredible. For several years I spent half my life down there, and it was probably the most exciting time of my life.”
Golf on the Grand Scale
The excitement is now for visitors to enjoy. No RTJ Golf Trail site is more than two hours removed from another, and with so many routings in the varied terrains of the state there is bound to be something unique wherever one winds up teeing off, from the northern highlands to the southern coast.
The Trail courses are generally characterized by broad fairways and huge greens, but plenty of trouble can await the unwary. The courses aren’t easy, though some have been softened over the years. Such was the case with our first round, at one of the original sites of the Trail, the Valley Course at Oxmoor Valley, renovated in 2021, with some approaches opened up and greens resurfaced from Dwarf Bermuda to TifEagle Ultradwarf.
There are always a plenitude of tees at Trail courses, so a judicious choice should make rounds the pleasures they’re meant to be. The Valley Course 6,034-yard white tees are still a hearty 130 slope, so my foursome opted to move up to the 5,297-yard gold tees—a 124 slope.
Barry Cronin and the found ace.
It worked out well for Barry Cronin, whose ball we thought we’d lost on the par-3 fourth hole, characterized by a mounded green running down behind to a creek. But the only reason we thought we’d lost Barry’s ball was because it was in the hole. An auspicious beginning.
Most of the Trail sites were originally built with a full scale par-3 short course also available, and such was the case at Oxmoor Valley. But here, too, change has come. What was once a 147-acre tough and hilly 18-hole par-3 course has been completely revamped into a 14-acre nine-hole very short course (911 yards from the “tips”) called The Back Yard. The emphasis is less on challenge and more on conviviality and fun, but it will give your short irons a workout.
The Back Yard at Oxmoor Valley
So it went for four more days and four more Trail courses, all standouts, all in great condition. The Ross Bridge Resort Course near Birmingham, in particular, was actually brand-spanking new, thanks to a previous maintenance mix-up that had managed to kill off all the greens. A total renovation was undertaken of both greens and bunkers and other softening touches here as well.
The new look was unveiled in mid-October and quite a look it is, to my mind the most dramatic of the full hand of Trail courses we played. It’s also said to be the fifth-longest golf course in the world for those insane players who might want to try it from the back tees, a mere 8,168 yards.
The Senator, 17
On toward the state capitol of Montgomery, the tricameral of courses at Capitol Hill in Prattville are the Legislator, Senator and Judge. We played the latter two, the Senator a treeless links-style course with thick grassy rough in place of gorse, all wide-open to the wind, of which there seemed to be plenty. High mounted greens tended to reject any short shots; general advice is to take an extra club.
“Prepare to be judged….”
Running along the Alabama River backwaters the Judge course is a visual stunner, with some thought-provoking elevated tees right from the get-go, and a big marble slab proclaiming, “PREPARE TO BE JUDGED.” There’s plenty of water here, too, and an island par-3 at the sixth. Overall it deemed me guilty of poor putting.
The Judge 13
We wrapped up our Trail courses on The Links at Grand National, a grand 54-hole site if ever there was one, have hosted numerous pro tournaments and with the Lake Course and a Short Course adding to the fun.
Now, the Links Course isn’t one, with its plethora of carries over bunkers and wetlands to elevated and often tiered greens, but what’s in a name? The home hole is said to be the strongest finishing hole on the entire Trail. It is a doozy, requiring two carries over water for your GIR. I found it satisfying just to three-putt for bogey.
Long carry at The Links at Grand National 18
Side Trips
Our one non-trail course was also a delight, Ol’ Colony Golf Complex, a Tuscaloosa municipal course that hosts an Epson Tour event and has a teeming number of participants in its Tuscaloosa Junior Golf Academy. There are seemingly an equal number of lakes to negotiate (but really only 25 acres of water). It’s a 2000 design by Jerry Pate who, yes, won the U.S. Open in 1976, but is perhaps better remembered in these parts as winning the U.S. Amateur while still a member of the Crimson Tide golf team. The team still practices at Ol’ Colony.
Quiet time at the Bryant-Denny stadium
Speaking of the Crimson Tide, and presuming that visitors may want to do something other than play golf, the University of Alabama offers one tour each weekday of the Bryant-Denny football stadium, and it is a marvel to see.
But then one has to give equal time to the Auburn Tigers, and daily tours are also given of the Jordan-Hare stadium, and on Fridays from 4 to 6, visitors can see the pre-game locker room setup for the football team.
To ease one’s aching bones from too much golf, there’s yet another trail—the RTJ Spa Trail—at six of the luxury Marriott and Renaissance hotel properties that are aligned with the Trail and which are part of the many available golf packages.
Dreamland
Two quick food recommendations: In the world according to barbecue, Alabama is underrated, if stops we made carry any weight. Which we certainly did after gorging at Saw’s Soul Kitchen in Birmingham one night and the original Dreamland Bar-B-Que in Tuscaloosa another. Go for the meat, stay for the banana pudding. [More on AL BBQ and its white sauce here, at Golf Travel Wire.]
Useful websites for those ready to roll: rtjgolf.com and GolfAlabama.org. Or go all in on the Trail because, yes, there’s an app for that.
This story originally appeared, in somewhat different form, in the Golf Oklahoma 2024 Directory and Travel Issue.
