There are golf trips. And then there is Bandon Dunes. Perched on the rugged cliffs of the Oregon coast, Bandon Dunes Golf Resort has earned its place as the undisputed home of links golf in America. Every year, the resort hosts the Bandon Dunes Links Championship -- a 72-hole, four-ball strokeplay tournament that lets amateur golfers experience this extraordinary destination in full competitive mode. Four world-class courses. Two intense days of golf. One unforgettable week. This is not just an event to enter. This is an event to chase.
What Is the Bandon Dunes Links Championship?
The Links Championship is Bandon Dunes Resort's flagship amateur competition. The format is fourball strokeplay -- two-person teams competing over 72 holes across four consecutive rounds, packed into just two playing days. Day one sees teams tackle Sheep Ranch and Pacific Dunes. Day two moves across to Bandon Dunes and Bandon Trails. With 68 two-person teams divided into flights, the competition is fierce, the handicapping is tight, and the atmosphere is electric.
Flight winners receive a commemorative trophy, with first and second place in each flight earning Bandon Dunes gift cards. But the real prize is something money cannot quite buy -- the bragging rights of saying you competed at Bandon Dunes and held your own.
The Schedule
Arrival Day. Teams arrive and settle in. Practice rounds are available subject to course availability (additional fees apply). The evening kicks off with the Welcome Punchbowl Reception -- a fitting start at a course named after one of its signature holes. Check-in, a putting contest, and optional skins sign-up set the tone for the days ahead.
Rounds 1 and 2 -- Sheep Ranch and Pacific Dunes. The opening day of competition pairs two of the most celebrated courses in American golf. Course rotation is determined by flight seeding, so teams know exactly where they stand before a ball is struck.
Rounds 3 and 4 -- Bandon Dunes and Bandon Trails. The back half of the tournament takes in the original Bandon Dunes course and the inland masterpiece Bandon Trails. The day closes with the Awards Dinner -- a proper celebration with drinks and recognition of the top teams across all flights.
Departure. Four days. Four courses. Memories that will last a lifetime.
The Four Courses -- A World-Class Rotation
What sets the Links Championship apart from almost every other amateur event in the world is the sheer quality of the four courses in the rotation. Each one is a masterpiece in its own right.
Sheep Ranch -- a clifftop gem above the Pacific
Sheep Ranch
The most recent addition to the Bandon Dunes portfolio, Sheep Ranch sits in its own dramatic world on top of the cliffs. Designed by Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw, it is a walking-only, caddie-only course with no rough, no out-of-bounds, and an ethos borrowed from the purest Scottish links. The ocean is visible from every single hole. There is nowhere else quite like it.
Pacific Dunes -- consistently ranked among the world's best
Pacific Dunes
Designed by Tom Doak and widely regarded as one of the top ten courses in the United States, Pacific Dunes is the course that announced Bandon Dunes to the wider golf world. It weaves through a landscape of towering sand dunes and coastal heather, with ocean views from almost every tee box. Wind, elevation change, and fescue rough make it as challenging as it is beautiful.
The original Bandon Dunes course -- where the legend began
Bandon Dunes
The original. Designed by David McLay Kidd and opened in 1999, the Bandon Dunes course set the template for everything that followed. Firm, fast, and links-pure, it runs along the edge of the cliffs with the Pacific Ocean framing hole after hole. Golfers who have played it for twenty years still find new ways to lose shots -- and still come back for more.
Old Macdonald -- a tribute to the father of American golf course design
Bandon Trails
Designed by Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw, Bandon Trails moves away from the clifftops and into the forest and duneland interior of the resort. More sheltered than its siblings, it rewards precision and strategic thinking. Vast greens, tumbling fairways, and some of the trickiest pin positions on property make it a firm favourite for those who like to think their way around a course.
The event is listed as hosted at Old Macdonald -- the fourth course at the resort, designed by Tom Doak and Jim Urbina as a tribute to Charles Blair Macdonald. Old Macdonald is a classic-design feast, with enormous greens, massive strategic bunkers, and a Biarritz hole that will live long in the memory. Golf Digest called it "the hottest course in America right now" when it opened, comparing it to the great links of the west coast of Scotland.
The Package -- What Is Included
The Links Championship is an all-inclusive package tournament, not a pay-as-you-go competition. The entry fee covers everything you need for a first-class golf week.
Included in all packages:
- Three nights lodging at Bandon Dunes Resort
- Four 18-hole rounds of golf
- Welcome Reception (putting contest and skins sign-up)
- Two lunches
- Awards Dinner and drinks
- Tournament gifts
For a resort of this calibre, the pricing is genuinely competitive. A regular stay at Bandon Dunes with four rounds of golf would cost a similar figure without the competition structure, the meals, the gifts, or the electric atmosphere of a competitive tournament week.
Why This Belongs on Every Golfer's Bucket List
Most bucket list golf experiences are passive. You play a famous course, take some photographs, and go home. The Links Championship is different. It puts you in competition over 72 holes on four of the finest courses in North America, surrounded by like-minded golfers who have travelled from across the country and beyond for exactly the same reason you have.
The mental and physical challenge is real. Playing 36 holes a day on true links courses -- where the wind shifts, the greens firm up through the afternoon, and your score from the morning round is already public knowledge -- demands everything a golfer has. Pairs who play well together, communicate well under pressure, and manage their rounds intelligently will thrive. Those who go in hoping to ride their partner's hot round for two days will find out quickly that 72 holes has a way of finding out the truth.
And yet the setting is so spectacular that even a rough round on Pacific Dunes -- dropping shots into the gorse, three-putting greens the size of a carpark -- is still one of the best rounds of golf you will ever play. That is the Bandon Dunes effect.
It is worth noting that the 2026 field is already full. The championship fills on a first-come, first-served basis, with registration opening in late summer each year. A waitlist is available once the 68-team field is complete. If you miss 2026, now is the time to plan for 2027 -- register your interest on the Bandon Dunes website to be notified when the next registration window opens.
Event Details at a Glance
Plan Your Trip to Bandon Dunes
Bandon Dunes Golf Resort is located near the town of Bandon on the southern Oregon coast, approximately four hours south of Portland and just over an hour from Coos Bay Regional Airport. The resort is a self-contained destination -- lodging, dining, spa, and practice facilities all on site. Bring your caddie vouchers, pack for all weather, and leave the motorised buggy mindset at home. Bandon Dunes is a walking resort, and that is part of what makes it special.
Whether you are targeting a podium finish or simply chasing the experience of competing across four of America's greatest courses, the Bandon Dunes Links Championship is an event that will stay with you long after the scorecard is signed. Start planning now.
