Laid out within 640 acres of Westwood, Beverley and East Riding Golf Club is inhabited not only by budding Tiger Woods but also dogs, walkers and most distinctively, cattle. Andy Mortimer went back to nature to find out more about Yorkshire’s oldest club . . .

A view across the Beverley course

I’ve frequently heard a round at Beverley and East Riding Golf Club described as “playing the game as our ancestors did”. As the region’s oldest club – it was formed way back in 1889 – it certainly has none of the sweeping fairways or perfectly-trimmed greenery of East Yorkshire’s newer courses. But if the manicured bunkers and picturesque ponds are missing, what remains is a style of golf so enjoyable and so different it’s easy to come away asking why the game ever changed in the first place.

Giving me the lowdown is secretary Mike Drew, a former Withernsea, Bridlington Belvedere and Driffield Golf Club member. Chatting to him over a coffee before our round, he proved the perfect ambassador for the club. Call it “insider knowledge” if you will – I thought it might give me an edge when we got down to playing in this, my 11th, East Yorkshire course review.

“To play here you need accuracy above anything else,” he told me. “Unlike a lot of newer courses where fairways run side-by-side, if you miss the short stuff here, all you are left with are acres of pastureland where grass can grow up to six or seven inches high.

“You will also find yourself chipping to the greens a lot because they are so small and while we don’t have many bunkers and, in truth, it’s not a difficult course, believe me, nobody murders it here.”

Wise words maybe, but looking briefly at the scorecard I felt myself wondering at the time how hard it could actually be. For one, it’s a short course – at 5,696-yards off the men’s tees, it’s a par-69. Add in the fact there are very few bunkers – only on the first, third, 11th, 13th, 15th and 18th holes – and only a few more trees, and you initially feel confident about scoring well.

But, as I was soon to learn, it’s not what isn’t part of the course that makes it so hard, but what is . . .

For a start, it’s built directly on to common land – Beverley’s famous Westwood, one of four pastures to the east and south east of the town that are overseen by Pasture Mastures, who are elected from among the Freemen of Beverley each March.

The fairways are simply strips cut out of the long grass while the greens are built in a similar way. The club doesn’t own or rent the land but is instead granted leave to cut certain areas of the Westwood by East Riding Council and the Beverley Pasture Masters, So, bar trimming the fairways, greens and some rough, they can do nothing.

Applications to put in new tees and bunkers have to be agreed by all parties and despite a couple of notable changes over the years – mainly to do with stopping golfers shooting near the Newbald and Walkington Roads, which run through the land – the course has stayed much the same for years.

This means all of nature’s hollows, bumps and pits it put into the Westwood remain and it is here where the difficulty lies. A course designed by nature is always going to be as hard as one that man deliberately designed to trouble you.

I was to be playing with secretary/manager Mike, Beverley captain Peter Robertson and vice-captain Mark Humphreys. The polite “hellos” were all done by the pro shop before we crossed Walkington Road to the first tee and the 336-yard par four first.

Andy Mortimer in full swing

Peter, a former Army man who served as a mechanical engineer in India and the Far East in the 1960s, was the first to mention the wonderful views the members enjoy over the historic town of Beverley. He said with some pride: “You will struggle to find better views on a golf course in East Yorkshire. If you look past the first you see Beverley Minster while to your left you’ve got the racecourse which, when it’s open and full, looks fantastic.

“I joined here about six years ago after I gave up playing rugby and cricket (Peter is also a former Hull and East Riding rugby union player and pace bowler for North Ferriby Cricket Club) and I think it’s a great course.”

We all teed off on the first confident enough in our own games. Paired up in a little mini-competition, I was on Peter’s team but keen to talk first to Mike to whom I had a couple of questions about the quality of the course in front of me. I had noticed even this early in the round that the fairways were not as well trimmed as they maybe should be and there were no visible markers indicating distances to the green. Mike, however, quickly dispelled my fears.

He said: “This winter has been the worst we’ve had in terms of rainfall in my nine years at the club and we’ve not been able to work on the fairways or greens as much as we would like. It is normally in much better condition that it is today and it will improve massively this spring.

“When it comes to measuring distances to the green, we do have small markers in the fairways but we aren’t allowed to plant bushes as most courses do. But when you get used to playing here you soon realise that doesn’t matter. You never play the same hole the same way twice because as it is so open the wind makes club selection very difficult. I’ve played the par-three sixth with anything from an eight-iron to a driver off the tee.”

With this in mind I measured up my approach shot to the first green with great care. Each green is fenced off from the Westwood – and the cattle that roam there during the summer – so I tried to shoot as centrally to the green as I could. Three-putting, I left with a five, along with Peter, while Mike and Mark shot respectable fours. As we took the short walk to the second tee, Mark, a former newspaper editor, reassured me the wire fences around the greens would rarely affect play.

He said: “If you land near the wire fences and they impede your swing you are permitted to move the ball backwards without penalty while if you hit them with your ball, you can retake your shot. They are just there to keep the animals from going on the greens as we do have a lot of cows, dogs and walkers on the course.

“It’s important to remember, too, that nobody has ever killed a cow by hitting them with a ball. The problem is when you are concentrating on a shot and suddenly you hear one behind you – it can be a bit off-putting! You just have to try to be as accurate as you can.”

Thankfully, accuracy is one of the best parts of my game so as we progressed through the course I was finding it manageable. The par-threes were my favourites on the first nine, with the fourth a lovely little hole, lined to the right with trees and a road and with a very steep bank to the left preventing you from straying too far towards the fifth tee. After this, the sixth is probably the stand-out. Another par-three – at 179-yards off the men’s tees – it isn’t anything spectacular on the scorecard but what that doesn’t show is a wonderfully-designed hole stretching over a steep drop of gorse bushes and trees to a small and undulating green. It’s worth playing, if only for the view from the tee, but it’s also one of Mike’s favourite holes.

The Beverley course at its best. Here is the view from the sixth tee

The Beverley-born former timber merchant said: “The sixth is such a good hole because depending on the wind you can take so many different clubs to it. A lot of people get worried because of the gorse as well, so it’s certainly not easy. Another favourite of mine is the 14th, even though it’s not one that I play that well. You drive over bushes from an elevated tee so you need a very accurate drive – it’s a good golf hole and certainly not easy despite what people might think.

“We’ve often had good golfers come here, look at the scorecard and ask what the course record is, but they don’t ask again when they get back into the clubhouse after their round.”

After the first nine come a nice collection of short par-fours, all fairly straight and similar in style, but not in the slightest mundane. Almost like a links course with its lack of bunkers and trees, Beverley is very open to the elements and with such undulating fairways I often found myself in trouble, even after a good drive. This I noticed more than others on the wonderful 14th.

One of the few at Beverley to run side-by-side to another fairway, it is a 337-yard, par-four shooting from high up on the tee down into a valley, between some randomly-placed gorse bushes and back up to an elevated green.

You must climb and fall at least 20 feet on your way up and down the fairway and even after a straight drive down the middle I found myself in a hollow and struggling to shoot straight to the green. I ended up taking six and wondering just how on earth I ruined such a beautiful hole – something I felt Mark, Mike and Peter in some ways were taking for granted.

Mark said: “It is beautiful on every hole here and each one is so different. You don’t think about it when you play here all the time but when you play with someone new you realise you are in the middle of the Westwood and 640 acres of land. The rough never ends.

“It’s a strange feeling for people who are used to playing tree-lined fairways in small areas. When people play the course for the first time they all say it is so different.”

And different it certainly was. Impossible to describe every hole, I have to, nonetheless, mention my favourites which were the aforementioned 14th and the 15th – a mammoth dog-leg right par-five which travels around trees to the right and on to an almost bare, but very undulating, green.

Sometimes golf courses need lots of thinking and design to get them just right, but at Beverley almost the opposite has had just as good an effect.

Verdict: Beverley and East Riding Golf Club is one of the most distinctive courses in the region. At only par-69 it is one of the shortest, but what it lacks in length it makes up for in some wonderful design, imaginative layouts and some of the most beautiful views you will see on a golf course in Yorkshire. As you cross Walkington Road to the 18th tee, just look over the clubhouse to Beverley town centre and the Minster – it’s a view to brighten any poor round! The greens are protected by fences to stop cattle encroaching but they rarely interfere with play. Beverley Golf Club is on The Westwood, Beverley. For more information, call: (01482) 868757.

Membership fees: Full male subscription is £449 and £370 for ladies – both fees can be paid in instalments. There is a short-term, reduced, joining fee of £200 for male golfers while it is free for ladies. Junior membership is £50. There are currently 566 members with room for more admissions.

Green fees: Weekday, £17 per round and £24 per day; weekend, £24 per round and £32 per day.