With the southwest, the east coast and the Northern Ireland links experiencing high levels of demand, not just for next year when The Open returns to Royal Portrush, but for 2026, it’s now Donegal’s turn to reap the rewards of a golfing boom.
McGinley insists that if Donegal was a stock, he’d be buying it right now.
Gil Hanse and Jim Wagner, arguably the world’s number one design team, started the ball rolling by reimagining Donegal’s Narin and Portnoo links in 2019.
Then Tom Doak, another golf course architect of world renown, added to the buzz by creating the St Patrick’s Links for the Casey family at Rosapenna Hotel and Golf Resort in 2021, catapulting the course into Golf Magazine’s top 50 in the world.
Unlike other venues, which limit visitor numbers due to their memberships, Rosapenna has no such restrictions and, therefore, never reaches for the “sold out” sign you might see at Royal County Down, Royal Portrush, Ballybunion or Lahinch.
Donegal Golf Club’s stunning Murvagh links course.
But they still did 13,000 visitor rounds on the St Patrick’s Links alone this year, with many visitors staying on-site to play the Sandy Hills and Old Tom Morris courses, too.
“Portrush is always going to be a magnet for the north, but we don’t know if the increase in visitors is the post-Covid boom, the St Patrick’s boom, or the general construction boom that’s happening in Irish golf right now,” said Rosapenna’s John Casey.
He points to the wave of renovations and the construction of Curracloe Links in Co Wexford for the Neville Group as a sign that things are on the up right across the country The Doak/Hanse Effect, to coin a phrase, has undoubtedly been felt at County Sligo, where income is now €1.5 million, and at Donegal Golf Club, which has also significantly increased visitor numbers.
It’s now around the €500,000 mark and the club is excited about increasing that exponentially over the next few years thanks to McGinley’s course renovation project and the arrival at the end of the month of new general manager Lynn McCool from Glasson.
The former Ryder Cup captain was at Donegal Golf Club – a 64-year-old Eddie Hackett creation measuring a testing 7,453 yards from the tips – for the soft launch on Saturday of the first phase of work on the 16th, 17th and 18th holes.
The redevelopment programme is being financed from club funds, not borrowing, and carried out in phases over the next four years with work on the iconic par-three fifth – Valley of Tears — already underway as part of phase two, which is due for completion next summer.
It’s a million euro project but it’s not a drastic overhaul of what Hackett created, and Pat Ruddy modernised, but what McGinley likes to call the next evolution of a links that is as good as any in the country, spectacularly located in lap of the Bluestack Mountains on Donegal Bay.
“The feedback from members and visitors from the first phase has been extremely positive,” said club President, Brian Boyle. “And we think there’s a really exciting future here for Donegal Golf Club.”
For McGinley, who is also working with Portsalon and Dunfanaghy golf clubs, Donegal is an exciting opportunity for him and his right-hand man, Joe Bedford, to show off their design prowess.
“Golf is now more popular in Ireland than in Scotland in terms of turnover and green fees,” said McGinley, whose father, Michael, is from Dunfanaghy and whose late mother, Julia, was from Rathmullan. “Obviously, the southwest of Ireland is becoming very busy and expensive. So we’re seeing a lot of people starting to migrate up the Wild Atlantic Way and the next frontier is Donegal.
“It’s a special place in so many ways, but golf has been somewhat underdeveloped over the years, and there are amazing canvases here. And this is probably the prime canvas in the whole of Donegal.”
McGinley is a traditional, minimalist designer with a penchant for opening up vistas by raising tees and greens to bring in sea views.
“I don’t believe in funkiness,” he told his Donegal audience on Saturday. “I don’t believe in huge, big slopes and greens like you have at Augusta. I’m a believer in golf being fun, fair, challenging and aesthetically beautiful.”
When it comes to Donegal Golf Club, he’s modernising the links and making it more playable for the member and visitor.
Women were often an afterthought in bygone days but McGinley has paid particular attention to the forward tees and made sure they are raised and well-placed to best show off the challenge ahead.
“Golf courses get a little bit outdated,” McGinley said. “Things move over time. They have to be brought to a new level. So this is an evolution, not a revolution, of all of that Eddie Hackett and Pat Ruddy did here.
“It’s not a case of going in and blowing stuff up. But I do want to make a hole really playable and fair for all standards, not just the standard that I play at, but for handicap golfers.”
McGinley is not charging his usual design fee but investing his time and expertise in a share of increased green fee revenue.
“A high tide raises all boats, so I’m happy to defer my fees along the lines of the future success of the club and more people coming to visit,” he said.
Rather than competing against Rosapenna, Portsalon, Dunfanaghy or Ballyliffin further north, McGinley sees Donegal as a whole.
After all, it’s the county where he spent his childhood summers learning the game and he’s excited that designers like Gil Hanse and Tom Doak have come to Donegal.
“Gil Hanse, probably the number one designer in the world, just for him to walk in the door is several million dollars before he puts a spade in the ground,” he said.
“He redesigned Narin and Portnoo here in Donegal only five years ago and it’s phenomenal. Then you have Tom Doak at Rosapenna. His name is recognised everywhere.
“I’ve said it before, and I still say it – If Donegal was a stock, I’d be buying it.”
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