A North Carolina club pro has just achieved an impressive feat: he’s played every single golf course that has ever hosted a major championship — 118 courses in all.
According to a story by the Philadelphia Inquirer, 60-year-old Joey Hines, the Director of Golf at Cape Fear Country Club in Wilmington, N.C., began by playing “quality courses” in 1990. When he realized how many of those courses had been U.S. Open venues, he decided to play them all. There are currently 50 different courses that have hosted a U.S. Open, and he completed the list in 2011.
At that point, Hines decided to expand his endeavor to include all of the other major venues, which brought Augusta National, 14 British Open sites and 70 PGA Championship courses into the fold. Of those sites, Hines had 50 more unplayed courses on his radar.
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How did he manage to get on all those courses? Hines relied on his member network for help accessing some of the more difficult tee times, and played rounds with fellow club pros, members and course maintenance workers. He even played through a throat cancer diagnosis last year, and is feeling great in recovery.
The final stop on Hines’ list was the Shawnee Inn and Golf Resort, in Shawnee on Delaware, Penn., site of the 1938 PGA Championship. Though his list is complete for the time being, Hines plans on continuing to play new venues as they come up. Future venues Royal Portrush and Harding Park have already been checked off his list.
“If the good Lord is willing, maybe I’ll try to do the Ryder Cup courses next,” he told the Inquirer. “That could be a little more challenging. I don’t think I’ve missed more than four or five of the U.S. courses, but I’d have to go to Ireland, England, Spain, Italy, France.”
It sounds like Hines is already up for the challenge.
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