This will be you first experience of the slopes and the speed which make you have to take car on every shot. Long (of the pin), even when you find the green, is trouble.

Hole 2 is an uphill four which needs a little power. The water in front of the green at the 3rd is outstandingly beautiful and the difficulty lies in judging a pitch to the right level. Hole 4 is gently uphill but needs plenty of club to get back to the flag or a very purely struck fade when the pin is behind the hollow guarding the green. If there is a very good birdie chance, it’s the short par four 5th which a long straight tee shot can find. You then walk back and play uphill, across a small valley to the well-protected 6th.

The 7th is a spectacular medium length par four needing two excellent shots to find the green, set on the top of a rise and all carry from a good tee shot. Once again, go long and your nerve will be severely tested. Its followed by a long par three and one more five at the 9th, with a well-guarded green.

The walk to the 10th winds downhill for a few hundred yards before you are presented with the start of a run of seven very strong holes. Straight hitting is a must here, and again at the 12th and between them is the gem which is the 11th. This short par three needs a perfect shot to find the top level of the two tiered green, and anything missing the green will find trouble.

You are now back at the top of the course and face a pure and classical design of a four, something which has been mimicked by the moderns, usually as a poor reproduction. 440 yards long, a good long tee shot is a must but if the wind is pushing you towards the OOB right, its more than fearsome.

This leaves you with a medium to long iron into a green which is set slightly across the line of the hole, a big green with a bunker right and two bits of sand left …. further left the ground slopes rapidly down to seas of heather and gorse, trouble that comes back towards the fairway for over 100 yards to create a ‘no-go’ area to make the hole.

You can then have huge ‘hang time’ as you launch your tee shot down the 14th. When the pin is right, you don’t go anywhere near it for fear of missing right. With a pin left, you need to be bold to get close.

The 15th is the last of the threes, again downhill to a very big green. Hole 16 goes back into the same direction as the 14th, this time 80 yards longer and a very good two shotter where the green again has its own defenses to go with a trio of cross bunkers.

The reputation that goes with Broadstone is of it being one of the best par 70 courses around, for any standard of golfer, a place where if you play to your handicap, you will have done well. From 10 to 16 is great great golf and add to that much of the front nine and you have the reason why people know they face a challenge when they come here to play. 17 and 18 both offer some respite but you can bogey both with any poor shot selection.

You have options on every hole, your driver will be used lovingly (not sparingly) if you want to set yourself up for a good score, and you must take your best short game along with you to have any sort of chance of beating 70. This is a classic.

Problems – points of note. There were one or two bunkers which looked a bit ‘repro’ and some of the larger ones were machine raked. So many older courses have destroyed all that made them great using naff machines where design and testing has been negligible in producing something which the green staff just use faster and faster and with no care whatsoever. Big acres of sand can be managed by machines if the whole course is designed for automation. Classics are different.

Overall, you must put Broadstone at the top of any tour listing. Its that good.

For our review of the town and our accommodation suggestions, go to the Golf Tour review for Bournemouth