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Which specific golf courses did President Barack Obama visit or play at between 2009 and 2017?
Executive Summary
President Barack Obama played golf frequently between 2009 and 2017 and visited a wide but not exhaustively documented set of courses; public trackers and contemporary reporting list hundreds of rounds and identify scores of specific venues including military, private club, and resort courses across the U.S. and Hawaii. Major compilations and news reports document repeated play at Andrews AFB and Fort Belvoir near Washington, multiple Hawaii courses during vacations, rounds in Palm Springs and Massachusetts, and visits to private clubs such as Robert Trent Jones Golf Club, while many single-round locations remain recorded only in logs and press reports rather than centralized official lists [1] [2] [3] [4].
1. A president who golfed everywhere — what the round-count records reveal
Contemporary tallies show President Obama logged 333 rounds during his presidency, an aggregate compiled by sports and news outlets that illustrates how widely his golf activity was distributed across years and geographies [3] [5]. These counts underpin location-based reporting: journalists and independent trackers cross-referenced White House schedules, pool reports, and local press to attribute many but not all rounds to specific courses. The numerical focus of those accounts explains why some reporting emphasizes frequency and cost estimates rather than a comprehensive venue list; aggregate summaries capture the scale of play but necessarily leave some courses unnamed or only sporadically documented in the public record [1] [5].
2. Repeated play near Washington — the military and club venues documented most often
Multiple sources record repeated presidential play at military courses and nearby private clubs, with Andrews Air Force Base courses and Fort Belvoir Golf Club among the most frequently cited venues for rounds during Obama’s tenure, reflecting convenience and security logistics for a sitting president [2] [4]. Reporting also notes games at Woodmont Country Club in Rockville and at Robert Trent Jones Golf Club in Virginia, the latter documented as at least one round and later membership—indicating both temporary presidential visits and post-presidential affiliations [4] [6]. These patterns reflect how security, proximity to the White House, and event scheduling shaped the most commonly reported locations.
3. Vacation rounds — Hawaii, Palm Springs and island resorts appear repeatedly
Vacation itineraries feature prominently in course lists: reporting ties Obama to Kaneohe Klipper, Luana Hills Country Club, Mid-Pacific Country Club, and other Hawaii venues where he played while on holiday, including the December 31, 2016 round documented as his final presidential outing [2] [3]. The Palm Springs region is repeatedly mentioned in contemporaneous coverage for hosting 16 rounds across five courses over several presidential trips, though many reports list the region rather than naming every individual course [3]. Resort and island courses also show up in regional press — for example, Farm Neck and Mink Meadows on Martha’s Vineyard — indicating vacation-focused play beyond official Washington-area venues [2].
4. Local city and private-course appearances reported in scattered accounts
Press coverage and later profiles list additional one-off or occasional sites including Grande Oaks in Fort Lauderdale, rounds at West Palm Beach’s The Park, and play at The Floridian National in Palm City where Obama was reported to have played with notable golfers during his presidency [7] [6]. These accounts are often localized pieces in regional papers or sports outlets and sometimes focus on individual outings or celebrity pairings rather than comprehensive logs, meaning they add confirmed venue instances but do not create a complete catalogue of every presidential course played between 2009 and 2017 [7] [6].
5. Why no single definitive public list exists — limits of sources and competing agendas
No single authoritative public database lists every course Obama visited while president because reporting draws from White House schedules, pool reports, local news, and third-party trackers, each with differing completeness and motives; some coverage emphasizes frequency and cost (political framing), while sports outlets emphasize totals and club contexts [1] [5]. Trackers compiled after the fact list scores of courses and many specific locations (including Andrews AFB, Fort Belvoir, several Hawaii and Palm Springs courses, Farm Neck, Mink Meadows, Robert Trent Jones, Woodmont, Grande Oaks, The Park, and The Floridian) but also note gaps and unspecified entries, so the best available public picture is a patchwork derived from multiple sources rather than a single official roster [2] [4].