British golf journalist Kevin Brown experienced that first-hand when he played with Trump on his Balmedie course in 2012. He said he was taking in the scenery on the second hole, when one of the other players in his foursome told him that Trump had asked if he could “get a move on”.
“He was more focused, head down, motoring on ahead of us,” Brown said. “Most of the time, he was just playing his own game and obviously thinking about stuff he had to do.”
After the round, however, Brown spoke to Trump for nearly an hour about his connection to golf. He said the future president’s passion was clear.
“He’s nuts about golf,” he said. “He knew the background and history of the game. It was impressive.”
Trump, a real-estate developer turned politician, has played golf since his college days and bought his first golf property, Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach Florida, in 1999. Trump Golf currently owns 11 courses in the US and three in the UK, manages several others and has plans for new resorts in Oman, Indonesia, Vietnam and Qatar.
Golf clubs are a prized possession for Trump – and not always a profit-making one. According to filings with the British government, Trump’s Balmedie course lost $1.83m (£1.35m) in 2023 – its 11th-straight year running a deficit. Turnberry, on the other hand, reported about $5m in profit.
Trump has at times clashed with local authorities over land use and sought to restrict construction of wind turbines off the coast of his Balmedie property.
While his US courses have hosted major professional tournaments, he has long wanted Turnberry, which he will visit this weekend, to be the site of a future British Open Championship. The historic course has hosted four of the prestigious competitions, but none since Trump purchased the property in 2014.