Australian courses make world “most bizarre” list

POSTED ON December 20, 2022 @ 5:40 pm

EDITOR NOTE: A great case study in viral marketing as these two courses continue to get traction every couple of years as international news platforms search for more content to publish at the end of the year. Hey, it’s free and still immensely valuable! Look at young Scott Wagstaff image on the video;)

You’d be hard-pushed to call golf an extreme sport. It is a low-risk game played at a leisurely pace in mostly scenic, but ultimately ordinary, locales.

Emphasis on most, because in various pockets around the world golf is taken to extremes.

No less than two Australian courses have made the list of ‘The most bizarre golf courses” around the world, can you guess which ones…

Carbrook Golf Club, Queensland

Finding the water with your ball during your round could snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. At Carbrook Golf Club in Australia, jaws might just snatch your ball.

Long believed to be a local legend, rumors of bull sharks in the water hazards at the Queensland-based course were proven to be true in 2011 when general manager Scott Wagstaff uploaded footage of a finned local circling just off the greens.

The arrival of the bull sharks – considered by many scientists to be the most aggressive shark species – is the result of heavy flooding during the mid-1990’s, Wagstaff told Golfing World in 2012. According to Wagstaff, the sharks entered the course’s lake after the nearby Logan River overflowed, and have remained there ever since.

Today, they have become a part of the course’s identity. The club’s logo features a shark, its youth program is coined the Junior Shark Academy, and the “Shark Lake Challenge” is staged as a monthly tournament.

The long game

Nullarbor Links

One hole down, just 17 more and 863 miles to go. At Nullarbor Links in Australia, the world’s longest golf course brings a new whole meaning to “the long game.”

Starting at Ceduna in the country’s west, players stop off at holes spread across nearby towns and roadhouses along the Eyre Highway before finishing up their round – often days later – in the western city of Kalgoorlie.

Taking on the challenge has become a bucket list item for golfers around the world. Each year the Nullarbor Links stages its “Chasing the Sun” tournament, traversing the entirety of the course.

Source: CNN