An easy walking course with good views and subtle greens
Round £18. Par 67. Value (out of 5) – 2.5
Scoonie is a short and straight forward parkland golf course located on the eastern side of Leven on the Fife coast and has good views out to the Forth Estuary and across to the North Berwick coastline.
It is one of 7 courses managed by the Fife Golf Trust which was established in 2011 to take over Fife Council’s directly managed courses. This is becoming a common practice by Local Authorities in Scotland to manage golf courses. The actual Scoonie Golf Club was formed in 1951, and welcomes visitors to their catering and bar facilities.
Originally a 9 hole course it was extended in 1936 with James Braid doing the re-design, albeit it’s unclear what Braid’s exact design changes were, since the course lacks sophisticated course architecture one normally expects from a Braid course in my opinion. Parts of the course in fact seem quite immature with small trees aside wide open fairways, and therefore feels much younger.
Having said that, there is still sufficient to keep one interested at Scoonie. The greens are subtle and true, with a few of them being very large. I suspect not many visitors, of any standard, will fail to 3 putt at least once during a round.
The course is a little imbalanced with an outward par of 35 with only one par 3, and inward par of 32 including 4 par 3s. There are no par 5s on the course.
My favourite holes were the short par 4 2nd, which had a steep upward incline to the green, where it is better being long on the approach, the short uphill par 3 13th and the final hole which has a lovely green and well positioned front bunker.
On the day, I played poorly on a course which is relatively easy, with a SSS of 64 versus the card of 67 off the yellow, scoring 31 points.
Scoonie is ideal if you’re looking for a fairly easy walking course, with no major hazards coming into play.
Some Facts
Course Type: Parkland
Par 67 (0 par 5s, 13 par 4s, 5 par 3s)
Distance (green!) 5133 yards
Moly’s Gross Score 92
Stableford 31