Yas Links Abu Dhabi

Few golf courses in the world can claim they were built on a barrier island between a Formula 1 racing circuit and the Arabian Gulf, but Yas Links Abu Dhabi is exactly that kind of place. Designed by Kyle Phillips and opened in 2010, it stands as the Middle East's first genuine links course — not a links-style layout with a few pot bunkers sprinkled in, but a course that genuinely earns the name, with firm, fast fairways, fescue-style rough, and the constant presence of wind off the water. Phillips studied the great Scottish and Irish originals carefully, and the result is a course that feels surprisingly authentic despite sitting in the Gulf.

The European Tour has made Yas Links a regular stop, and it plays as demanding as it looks, particularly when the shamal wind picks up across the exposed back nine stretching along the shoreline.

Abu Dhabi itself has become one of the world's more serious golf destinations, and Yas Links is the centerpiece of that claim — a course with real design integrity in a city that doesn't do anything at half measures.