Peerless | The National

Peerless

Canada’s best private golf club.

Don’t take our word for it—SCOREGolf’s raters have consistently ranked the club as the best in Canada, while Golf Digest rates the course in the Top 100 in the world. Golf is our focus at The National—it is at the centre of everything we do. Since the course first opened in 1975, The National has been perennially rated as the best in Canada. Always carefully maintained under the watchful eye of the co-creator of the course, Tom Fazio, The National remains one of the great pure examples of golf anywhere in the world. Every hole is unique, challenging, and testing. That means every round you play at The National will be distinct from the last one. That’s what timeless golf is all about.

Test yourself against The National. Test yourself against the best.

SCOREGolf 2014: #1 Course in Canada

Rolex World’s Top 1000 Golf Courses: Best in Canada

Golf Digest 2016: #66 in the world

The National is timeless. It’s one of those very rare courses where the natural landscape combines with human knowledge and intelligence.

—Ben Kern

In my experience, The National examines the driver like almost no other course. It’s a thrill to try to thread the ball into the slender fairways.

—Lorne Rubenstein

Golf is the only language spoken here.

—Al Balding

Clubhouse

Luxury and elegance at its finest.

Completely rebuilt in 2008, The National’s clubhouse is a reflection of its great golf course—elegant and classy. With a spectacular view overlooking the 18th hole, and providing easy access to all of the club’s facilities, the clubhouse at The National is the perfect spot to take in a pre-round breakfast, chat with friends over lunch, or have a libation after a game while watching fellow club Members play in. Play a casual game of cards in the Fazio Lounge, named after the club’s two founding architects, or enjoy a meal in the dining room. Regardless of your choice, you’ll find The National’s clubhouse to be the perfect complement to the club’s incredible golf course.

1972

Gil Blechman, along with partners Irv Hennick and Harvey Kalef, buy Pine Valley Golf club with the intent of building what Blechman called a “real golf club.”

1973

Blechman hires George Fazio and his nephew, Tom, to design the course. Construction begins. “What I wanted was a course you play a U.S. Open on in a week’s notice without gimmicking it up,” Blechman said. “That was the mandate I gave to Tom.”

1975

The course, which cost nearly $4-million to build, has its official opening. Al Balding is hired as the club’s pro and is given $100,000 annually to “develop outstanding young players.”

1976

Ben Kern, a former PGA Tour player, becomes the club’s second head professional.

1979

Trevino birdies the last four holes of the CPGA Championship to shoot 67, still the competitive course record.

1987

Gil Blechman sells the course to the members.

1995

Nick Faldo wins eight skins and $160,000 to better Ben Crenshaw, Nick Price, and Fred Couples at the Export A Skins Game. Faldo makes an eagle on the daunting par 4 seventh hole with a 4-iron.

1996

Norm Hitzroth becomes The National’s third head professional.

2003

Ben Kern Pro-Am, celebrating the life of the club’s second head pro, starts. It is the only tournament at the course played from the back tees.

2005

Adam Brown becomes the Club's fourth head professional.

2008

A remarkable new clubhouse opens.

2010

Changes made to several holes, including rebuilding the 16th hole.

2013

Renovations made to the practice facility.

2014

In 2014 Tom Fazio returned to The National to help the club celebrate its 40th anniversary. The club had changed throughout the years, and the course had matured, but Fazio said, at its core, The National was still very much the same as when he helped design the course four decades earlier.