Thirteen venues.
One longest day.
The road to Shinnecock.

Walton Heath is golf's quietest cathedral. Twenty-five miles south of central London, on a chalk-and-sand plateau in Surrey, it has hosted the Ryder Cup (1981), five European Opens, the 2011 Senior Open, and most recently the 2023 AIG Women's Open, where Lilia Vu won on a composite of the Old and New courses. It has appeared in the World Top 100 every year since rankings began in 1938.

The Old Course, built by Herbert Fowler in 1904 — an amateur golfer who was Tom Simpson's friend and whose work would later include Saunton and The Berkshire — plays firm, open, and exposed. Heather and gorse line the corridors. Greens are small, often elevated, and demand a Scottish-style ground game. There is little forgiveness for a high, soft American flight; this is a player's puzzle that rewards low, running approaches and precise lag putting.

"The first really fine inland golf course designed from start to finish by an amateur golfer."— Tom Simpson, on Walton Heath

For 2026 Final Qualifying, expect a composite layout drawing the strongest 18 from the Old and New, similar to the 2023 Women's Open setup. The wind off the heathland defines the day; even on a calm morning, gorse takes errant shots permanently.

Dallas Athletic Club carries a piece of Jack Nicklaus's competitive history. The Blue Course hosted the 1963 PGA Championship, the searing-hot Texas major that delivered Nicklaus his first PGA title — a two-stroke win over Dave Ragan in conditions that pushed players to their physical limits. Twenty-three years later, the club brought Nicklaus back as an architect: he redesigned the Blue in 1986 and the Gold in 1989. Chet Williams added further renovations in 2015–2016.

Today's Final Qualifying setup will use both the Blue and Gold across the 36 holes, a format DAC has run for years. The Blue is the showpiece: 419 Bermuda fairways, bentgrass greens, and a signature 5th hole — a 428-yard dogleg right with a waterfall fronting the green that Nicklaus added in the '86 work. The Gold is the more strategic of the two, playing slightly longer with more water carries on the back nine.

Founded in 1919 in downtown Dallas and relocated east near I-30/I-635 in 1954 due to freeway expansion, DAC has been a fixture in Texas amateur and professional golf for a century. May 18 in Dallas means heat — historically into the high 80s — and the firm Bermuda fairways will run.

Hino Golf Club sits in rural Shiga Prefecture, tucked between Lake Biwa and the Suzuka Mountains, about an hour's drive east of Kyoto. The 36-hole facility opened in 1972 and has emerged in the last several years as the USGA's preferred site for U.S. Open Final Qualifying in Japan — a recognition of both the King Course's championship test and the JGA's reliable tournament operation.

The King Course plays 7,035 yards from the tips at par 72, draped across rolling foothills that produce considerable elevation change. Tee shots demand both length and directional discipline; the Japanese designers of the early 1970s favored corridor-style routing through stands of Japanese cedar and pine, and Hino is no exception. Greens are slick, small relative to U.S. championship standards, and contoured to reward conservative ball-striking.

This is the international-eastern gateway to Shinnecock. Many of Japan's top amateur and professional players who don't already have exemptions begin their U.S. Open journey here, joined annually by Korean, Taiwanese, and occasionally Southeast Asian players who travel in.

Hawks Ridge is the late Bob Cupp's "consummate achievement," in his own words — a 550-acre exercise in dramatic Cherokee County, Georgia elevation, towering pines, and routing decisions that draw frequent comparisons to Augusta National. Founded in 1999 by childhood friends Mike Nixon and Joe Jillson, the club was acquired by Fort Worth-based Escalante Golf in 2024, an ownership change that has translated into noticeably elevated conditioning ahead of 2026.

The signature hole is the 15th — a 308-yard drivable par 4 with a cascading waterfall running the length of the right side of the green. It's photo-shoot material on any sunny morning and, when the pin is back-right, an exercise in nerve. The closing stretch climbs back toward the clubhouse with three demanding par 4s.

Hawks Ridge has hosted U.S. Open Final Qualifying eight times before 2026 — making this its ninth selection. That track record matters: the USGA returns to sites that perform, and the conditioning team here knows the U.S. Open setup standards.

Lambton G&CC is one of golf's quiet cathedrals north of the border. Founded in 1902 and routed in 1903 by Tom Bendelow, it sits along the Humber River valley on the west side of Toronto. Over the next century, nearly every major architect of consequence touched the place: A.W. Tillinghast, Harry Colt, Donald Ross, Stanley Thompson, Robbie Robinson, and Graham Cooke. Rees Jones completed a comprehensive three-phase restoration in 2012, sharpening the Bendelow/Ross bones and modernizing the conditioning.

The course hosted the Canadian Open four times — 1907, 1910, 1925, and 1941, with Sam Snead winning the latter. Lambton's first captain, George S. Lyon, won Olympic gold in golf at the 1904 St. Louis Games; the club's 9-hole Valley Course, completed in 1904, is reputed to be among the first courses designed specifically for women golfers.

For 2026 Final Qualifying, Lambton represents the lone Canadian venue and the natural gateway for Ontario, Quebec, and Maritimes amateurs who can't easily reach a U.S. site.

The Lakes G&CC in Westerville, Ohio, just north of Columbus, is one of the more interesting design stories in the rotation. The course was designed by Ed Sneed — yes, that Ed Sneed, the PGA Tour pro who came one stroke from winning the 1979 Masters before losing a sudden-death playoff to Fuzzy Zoeller. Sneed turned to course design later in his career, and The Lakes (1990) is one of his marquee credits. The course rates 74.1 with a slope of 134, making it one of the more demanding tests in the Columbus area.

True to its name, water hazards come into play on multiple holes, with bentgrass running tee-to-green and strategic bunkering that punishes tee shots placed on the wrong side of the fairway. The Lakes has been one of the OGA's most reliable Final Qualifying sites for nearly two decades.

Woodmont Country Club opened its North Course on July 26, 1950, designed by Alfred Tull. Arthur Hills handled a comprehensive 1999 renovation that replaced all 18 greens, and Joel Weiman returned in 2018–2020 to redesign the 18th hole and rebuild every bunker on the property. The result is a Maryland parkland test that retains its mid-century character while playing to contemporary U.S. Open Final Qualifying standards.

Woodmont has hosted Final Qualifying since 1987 — among the longest tenures of any current FQ site. The club has its own significant history: it was founded by Jewish business leaders barred from other Washington-area clubs of the era, and that founding story has informed its identity for three-quarters of a century.

The new 18th hole — a Weiman creation completed in 2020 — has become the conversation piece of any round at Woodmont. Players finishing their second 18 typically have one hard, do-or-die finishing hole that decides whether they're packing for Shinnecock or for home.

The BallenIsles East Course is a layered story: opened in 1964 as the PGA National Golf Club's Champions Course, designed by Dick Wilson and Joe Lee, host of the 1971 PGA Championship that Jack Nicklaus won (his second PGA title), and then — five decades later — comprehensively renovated by Nicklaus Design and unveiled in January 2023. The architect who won here in 1971 returned to reshape the place he conquered, expanding the championship yardage to a beefy 7,474.

The course was originally commissioned by developer John D. MacArthur as the PGA of America's headquarters layout. The PGA later moved to PGA National's Champion Course when relations soured, and the property was renamed BallenIsles in 1988. Beyond the 1971 PGA, the East hosted the 1971 World Cup, the Senior PGA Championship from 1966 to 1973, and the first-ever PGA Tour Q-School.

Water comes into play on roughly half the holes; palm and pine framing creates dramatic visual corridors. The Nicklaus 2023 rebuild reshaped greens and bunkering throughout, with particular attention to the closing stretch.

The Purchase, New York Final Qualifying site is unique on the 2026 schedule: two clubs hosting jointly. Century Country Club, a Harry Colt and Charles Hugh Alison classic opened in 1926, sits across the road from Golf Club of Purchase, a Jack Nicklaus modern opened in 1996. Players will see one of each in the 36-hole format — a Golden Age design and a contemporary one, separated by 70 years and a stretch of Westchester County roadway.

Century plays par 71 at 6,807 yards. The signature stretch includes a 563-yard par 5 at the 11th and a daunting 451-yard par 4 at the 5th, the No. 1 handicap. Golf Club of Purchase plays par 72 at 6,876 yards, with strong closing par 4s that have decided more than one qualifier over the years.

Walter Travis recommended the 175-acre Fairchild property purchase for Century back in 1922, and the pairing of his vision with Jack Nicklaus's modern design makes this stop arguably the most architecturally diverse single Final Qualifying site on the entire schedule.

Gaston Country Club is a hidden Donald Ross school — Ellis Maples, the original 1958 designer, worked under Ross before launching his own practice, and his Ross-rooted strategic principles run through every hole here. In 2003, Kris Spence — a noted Ross restoration architect based in Greensboro — brought the course back toward its Golden Age character with a restoration that re-established broad fairways and re-articulated bunkering. Three reachable par 5s define the round.

The course has hosted the 57th NC Open (Carolinas PGA), the 59th NC Amateur Championship in 2019, and Wells Fargo Championship qualifying, among other events.

Del Paso Country Club is the oldest country club in Sacramento, founded in 1916 by Scotsman John L. Black. Herbert Fowler — the same Herbert Fowler who designed Walton Heath — added enhancements around 1922. Rick Phelps did work in 1998. But the transformation that defines the modern Del Paso is Kyle Phillips's comprehensive 2006 reimagining: a strategic, ground-game-friendly layout that's widely regarded as one of the best classic-course modernizations of the 2000s in California.

Del Paso has one of the deepest USGA championship pedigrees of any Final Qualifying site. The club hosted the 2015 U.S. Senior Open, the 1957 U.S. Women's Amateur, the 1960 U.S. Senior Women's Amateur, the 1976 U.S. Women's Amateur, and the 1982 U.S. Women's Open — five major USGA championships before the Senior Open made it six. Multiple U.S. Open Final Qualifiers round out the résumé.

The Phillips-rebuilt par 3s have drawn particular praise. Mature oaks frame the routing, but the greens contours and short-grass surrounds make the place play firmer and more strategic than its California parkland peers.

Springfield Country Club is one of the most original and largely unaltered Donald Ross designs in the country — and one of the shortest tracks on the Final Qualifying schedule. The club itself was founded in 1898, but the current Ross routing dates to 1922, draped across a hilly Clark County site with strong par 3s and a dramatic finishing stretch. Don't let the 6,684 yards fool you; the Ross greens and the elevation changes mean par is a genuine test here.

Springfield has hosted U.S. Open Final Qualifying since 2008. It's one of Ohio's two FQ sites in the 2026 rotation, sharing that honor with The Lakes in Westerville.

The course is famous for what locals call "one of the wildest first holes in Ohio golf" and a par-3 set that routinely decides qualifiers. Length isn't the test here; precision is.

Emerald Valley sits in Creswell, Oregon, on the west bank of the Coast Fork of the Willamette River, draped across what was originally a 160-acre dairy farm. The clubhouse is converted from the original dairy barn. The course was built by Eugene developers James Russell and Marv Ruby starting in 1967 (front nine), with the back nine opening in 1968; the architect of record was Bob E. Baldock. Dan Hixson — who would later design Bandon Crossings and Wine Valley — refined the layout in 2002.

It is, for a long stretch, the home course of the University of Oregon men's golf program. It has hosted the Oregon Open and PNW PGA events. It is also the westernmost Final Qualifying site on the entire 2026 schedule — the last to start, the last to finish, and the venue from which "Golf's Longest Day" earns its full literal name.

River-side holes on the back nine are the visual highlight. Tall fir and pine framing defines the corridors. The Willamette Valley microclimate means cooler temperatures and the real possibility of rain even in early June.