Golf in Afghanistan
We have 1 golf courses in Afghanistan in our golf course database.
When considering golfing in the dry country of Afghanistan you may wonder what condition a golf course would be in. Fairways are dry and rocky, not a patch of grass can be seen. Each golfer is actually issued a swatch of grass to put under your ball for when taking fairway shots. The “greens,” or should I say browns, are made of oil and sand and packed with a roller. (It looks more like a baseball field than a golf course.) But, don’t let this discourage you. Locals are out on the courses daily, and they don’t even take notice of the dry conditions. The sport is enjoyed as if the courses are in top dollar condition.
There is a nine hold course in Kabul, Kabul Golf Club, which many locals enjoy. The game and the course represent optimism in the country.
Kabul Golf Club
Different from other golf courses in the Middle East where desert golf is a new trend, the greens at the Kabul Golf Club are actually brown to black due to their composition of a mixture of sand and oil (which keeps the sand from blowing).Plans for a modern irrigation system are moribund due to lack of funds.
Mainly affluent Afghans and foreigners frequent the course. The 2005 entrance fee for The Kabul Golf Club is 750 Afghani ($15 US Dollars) and a year membership is $300 (15,000 Afghani). The club is run by Mohammad Afzal Abdul (also called Mohammed Bashir, its director and golf pro, who worked as a caddy at the course as a young man before fleeing into exile in Pakistan.Business has dropped off since opening as international agency staffing has declined.
Originally six holes, the course opened in 1967 during the reign of Mohammed Zahir Shah, was closed in 1978, and reopened in 2004. During these three decades it has undergone several changes. It was relocated to its present site in 1973 after the king was overthrown in a coup d'état and completely closed following a 1978 communist coup. It was reopened in 1993 but closed again in 1996 when the Taliban regime banned sports. After the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan, the course was used as an area for military training in the removal of land mines. In the process of restoration to its present state, three Soviet tanks and a multiple rocket launcher were removed by a nonprofit agency.
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Famous golf quotes
Golf is not a game of good shots. It's a game of bad shots.
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FORE! Lee Westwood ball ends up in a woman's shirt !!!
Lee Westwood hooked his drive on the 13th hole into a crowd of folks at the Ritz Charlton Golf Course as a part of the Accenture Match Play Championship.
This is maybe not news but where the ball landed is incredible..... The ball somehow made it's way into a woman's shirt as seen in the video below.
What would have been funnier is if the lady would have taken a run towards the green and dropped the ball there or even dropped it in the hole :)
Did you know
Steven Ward took 222 strokes for the 6,212-yard Pecos Course in Texas on June 18, 1976, but he was only 3 years and 286 days old at the time!
