A single player doesn’t really have too many considerations with regards to green fees, but will experience some issues. Muirfield only permits bookings from fourball parties. You’ll be prevented from playing.

Although we wouldn’t advise you to ‘push it’ too far, as we always prefer to encourage nailing things down early, but there can be little doubt that single players enjoy a lot more flexibility to operate over later timeframes than larger groups, and stand a much better chance of sneaking into tee-sheets. It’s one of their big advantages

A single golfer would still be advised to observe the same booking timeline as a larger group for the early opening and selling out courses like Royal County Down or Royal Portrush though

Scotland, Ireland, and North-West England are seriously rich for quality non-golf visitor attractions in close proximity to their top courses. You can bring non-golfers along safe in the knowledge that they won’t be missing out.

As a single golfer though we’ll need to be strategic about how you share the vehicle. This will impact where the non-golfer is able to visit. In truth though, there’s a good synergy between golf and visitor attraction. We won’t be forcing one to bend something in that isn’t really there. Golf doesn’t dictate to non-golf. They co-exist quite well

The only sub-regions where we come under pressure on extended stays are Ayrshire, and to a lesser extent Aberdeenshire. It’s possibly fair to say that south-west Ireland will eventually stretch a non-golfer too, as it requires more roadwork than the others

Single golfers get penalised. Hotels either price per room, per night, or per person, per night. In the case of the latter, a single person reservation will nearly always draw a ‘supplement’ on the occupancy. This is better than the per room rate, but it’s never pro-rata. It tends to be about 85% of the double occupancy rate.

We could mitigate this a little bit by using single rooms or B&B’s, as they don’t tend to be as punitive as hotels, but we can also damage the experience too if we over-do the trading down to compensate. We usually see single golfers decide to enjoy extra space that single occupancy affords.

Faraway Fairways wouldn’t discourage anyone from using a budget business hotel under single occupancy. The UK has a particularly good provider who have a very comfortable bed as standard. This can often restore the price per person parity on a double occupancy

Seating capacity is rarely a problem with a golfing party, luggage however is. A single golfer will normally generate one significant luggage item plus a golf bag. This is below the threshold for a medium saloon car. It means we don’t need to use a more expensive estate car or large saloon, so can make a relative saving on a smaller hire category vehicle, but it’s still more expensive per person with no one to help share the cost burden

The smallest car that would work would be a ‘hatchback’. We advise that you don’t use one of these though. They can be under-powered and aren’t really ideal for the type of driving we’ll likely be doing. The next category up, ‘medium saloon’, is fine. This is what we’d encourage you to use. We need some ride comfort and the ability to sustain an effortless motorway speed

Single golfers can’t enter the ‘open’ St Andrews ballot. It’s that simple. They have to use the singles ballot instead. If we can form a two ball however, then we can enter it, as well as entering the singles ballot for a draw against the same tee-sheet 24 hrs later

We will nearly always succeed in getting a single golfer paired with at least one other single golfer to form a two ball of mutual convenience. Once we commit to this arrangement though, we are obligated to stick with our partner for the ballot until such time as you both agree to stand down.

In other words, should we win a singles ballot and play the Old Course independently, whilst our application to the open ballot has failed, then our stepping down might transform our playing partner into an ineligible single golfer again meaning they can no longer contest open ballots. It’s slightly different if we’re one player in a fourball coalition, as reducing our numbers to three doesn’t prevent our entry

For More Information on the Ballot, CLICK, the button below

The old walk up rule was really designed for single golfers but was clearly being used by fourballs and two balls who had failed with their primary ballot applications, so effectively squeezing the single golfer a bit. The new singles ballot redresses this balance

Strike rates on the singles ballot are higher than any other ballot. A single golfer is particularly favoured therefore (and especially if they’ve made a paired application to the open ballot 24 hrs earlier too)

Unlike the open ballot, a third party can’t enter the singles ballot for you. I’m afraid you’ll need to do this in person yourselves by presenting to the Old Course pavilion between 09.00 and 17.00 the day before play. The process takes about 2 mins to complete.

Results are notified to you by text message at about 18.00 later on the day of entry. You’ll be given a confirmed tee-time or a standby number. A very low stand-by number (single digits) can often be treated as a guarantee of play. A ‘no-chance’ number at least allows us to plan for the following day. A ‘maybe’ number (typically 10-20) is the one that will challenge us to make a decision, that itself is likely to evolve as the cards get played during the day

Singles strike rates are relatively good though. Anyone seeking to prosecute a singles ballot strategy over 3 or 4 days would expect to succeed on the balance of probabilities

For More Information on the Singles Ballot, CLICK, the button below

Single golfers can’t prebook any of the other courses under the management of the St Andrews Links Trust (SALT). This isn’t as serious as it sounds though, and actually affords us quite a bit of operational flexibility albeit it does transfer the burden to the Golf Tour Operator (GTO)

The SALT hold back some of their tee-times, and only finally release them for sale the day before play at 07.00.01. When we say one second past seven, we mean it.

Faraway Fairways sits there with a preloaded number, a countdown clock on-screen, and are armed with a knowledge of how long it takes our phone to complete a dial out sequence from the moment we press the ‘call’ button to when it hits the SALT’s switchboard.

We dial at 06.59.54 and immediately press #1 on hearing the ‘W’ of “Welcome to St Andrews links, the home of golf”.

We don’t engage in small talk now. The objective is to get the tee-time quickly before one of the other call-handlers assigns it to someone else. “Single golfer on the Jube, please” might be all we say (if booking the Jubilee course)

You can do this exercise yourselves, but it’s probably best to ask ourselves to do it. One day we’ll fail (that’s inevitable) but so far we’ve always succeeded in landing in this one second window and the first ten calls waiting in the morning

For More Information on the ‘other’ St Andrews Courses, CLICK, the button below

Single players do benefit from flexibility and we find that we’re able to slot you into a tee-sheet much later than larger groups. There’s often a gap somewhere.

This is particularly true of somewhere like Kingsbarns or Dumbarnie, and if we were going to be honest about it, Carnoustie as well, although that might be the difference between something being 50/50 (a single) and something being borderline impossible (a fourball).

More often than not, a tee-sheet will spring a leak on it each day as someone fails to make it. A single golfer who wants to play somewhere and is prepared to be patient to do so, will usually prevail on the day if they’re prepared to roll the dice and lay a siege to the starters hut.  In most cases however, this shouldn’t be necessary as we’ll have succeeded in getting them rearranged anyway

Muirfield only permits bookings from fourball parties. A single golfers who wishes to play Muirfield will be prevented from doing so, and needs to apply to a little known reserve list that might get called much nearer the time

Nearly all of the more popular courses reserve the right to allocate another other golfers to your booking to make up a fourball if needed