Bethpage Red

Bethpage Red is the course the regulars actually play. A.W. Tillinghast laid it out in 1935, a year before the Black went in next door, and but for that more famous neighbor it might carry the fame itself—Tom Doak wrote that had the Black never been built, the Red’s run of muscular doglegs “might have received similar acclaim.”

It’s the same 1930s WPA parkland and the same big-scale, wasp-waisted bunkering as the Black, only aimed at rhythm and recovery instead of pure punishment. Forested opening holes give way to a wide, fescue-strewn plain through the middle of the round before the land tilts home. Both ends bite—the uphill par-4 1st is often called the hardest opening hole in golf. Out-of-state visitors pay under $100; New Yorkers play a Tillinghast championship course for about the price of a cart.

The bunkering

Tillinghast’s wasp-waist

The Red wears the same rugged, big-scale sand as the Black next door—wasp-waisted bunkers pinched at the middle, fescue spilling over their lips, set into the natural rolls of the land rather than bulldozed in. It’s the Tillinghast muscle that made his name, and the reason the Red gets called the Black’s little brother rather than an also-ran.