Claudia Laurent

Golf writer, Golf Handicapp · 2 September 2026

510 yards down the floor of a slot canyon, and for every one of them there is nowhere to go but forward. The rock stands sheer on both sides and close enough that the fairway is barely twenty yards across, so the miss you spend your whole round worrying about, the one that goes sideways, simply is not available here. That sounds like a relief and it is not. It means three shots in a row that have to be straight, and no way to shorten the hole, bail out, or play round anything. Look at the light on it. The fairway crosses band after band of sun and shadow thrown down by the walls, and each band is further away than the last, which is how you can tell quite how long a walk this is. Judging distance in that striped light is genuinely difficult, and the safe play is to trust the yardage rather than your eyes, because the canyon flattens everything and makes the green look nearer than it is. The cart path runs the whole way along the foot of the shadowed wall, which in country like this is the only route there could be. There is no wind down there either. The walls take it out, so every excuse has been removed before you start.

This hole is not real. Like every hole in the collection it was conjured with AI, a golf daydream rather than a course you can go and play. The thousands of courses in the Golf Handicapp app, however, are very real.

This one is make-believe. The thousands of courses in the app are not.

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A par 3 played from a tee on the floor of a narrow orange sandstone canyon, straight across still dark water that fills the canyon floor, to a small island green with a single flag reached only by a low timber footbridge coming in from the right, sheer rock walls close on both sides and pale rounded sandstone domes stacked against a deep blue sky behind

The Ribbon

Par 3 · 199 yards

A long par 3 played steeply downhill from a ridge tee across a deep rainforest gorge, to a green on a shelf whose front edge falls away down a sheer mossy cliff to a river running white over boulders far below, a pale cart path traversing the far wall on a cut ledge behind a stone parapet, cloud hanging inside the gorge and a neighbouring green visible on flatter ground away to the right

The Lost Serpent

Par 3 · 215 yards

A short par 3 on an immaculate parkland course, played across a small stream to a green with a deep shadowed hollow running the full width behind it at the foot of a huge steep bank of rough grass, white raked bunkers cut into the mounding either side, the turf lit brilliantly by low sun while an enormous black shelf cloud fills the sky behind with rain falling in the distance

The Anvil

Par 3 · 127 yards

A par 3 played at night across dead still black water to an island green lit by four floodlight towers, the luminous green turf and its single flag the only colour in an otherwise black frame, the whole lit island mirrored perfectly in the water below it

The Lantern

Par 3 · 165 yards

About the author

Claudia Laurent · Golf writer, Golf Handicapp

Claudia writes about the World Handicap System, golf scoring and getting more from every round for Golf Handicapp. She is a mid-handicap golfer who logs every card, the good ones and the ones she would rather forget.

This image is AI-generated. Published 2 September 2026.

The Slot

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The Ribbon

The Lost Serpent

The Anvil

The Lantern

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