Our last blog post – a wee bit back now – looked at how the daily ballot works. For anyone heading to St Andrews this year without a guaranteed advance tee-time, the ballot is going to be the main way to secure a time to play golf on the Old Course.

We've had a detailed look at the allocation of ballot tee-times for the St Andrews Old Course over the two full years before Covid and have come up with some statistics that may be of interest to golfers looking at entering the daily ballot.

We're not giving any magic formula here to success – but we may give you a clearer picture of the process and why days differ from each other. Our analysis here is on the open ballot, not the local ballot for local residents and club members. So what does the analysis tell us?

In 2019 over 9,000 slots were available to golfers for the Old Course open daily ballot between the start of April and the end of October. From those slots a total of 7,800 golfers were allocated tee-times, which works out at an average of 51 golfers per day the ballot was operational.

Figures were fairly similar for 2018 and 2019 over the same period.

Variations by month

Averages can hide some major variations. In 2019 the most golfers playing the Old Course through the ballot in one day was 120, on a Saturday in July, and the minimum was 22, on a day in October.

This makes sense when you consider the difference in daylight hours across the year. The first Old Course tee-off is 06:30 from the end of April to the end of August, and the last tee-off in mid-June is as late as 17:50. At the start of April the last tee-off is 15:30 while in September it's around 15:00. Once the clocks change in October the last tee-off is just before midday, greatly reducing slots.

It's also important to note that September is always low for ballot availability due to competitions and course closures during the month.

Our analysis showed the open ballot slots (tee-times x 4) by month in 2019 as:

• April - 1620
• May - 1440
• June - 1580
• July - 1728
• August - 1584
• September - 348
• October - 892

Variations by day of the week

Ballot slots are not distributed evenly across the week. Most Thursday afternoons on the Old Course are reserved for a mix of open and local ballot slots, and normally the majority of Saturday tee-times are shared between the open and local ballot.

On average there are 17 open ballot tee-times on Thursdays between April and October and 24 on a Saturday. The Saturday variation is from a low of 11 up to a high of 35 tee-times.

This compares with the remainder of the week when the average is 13 ballot times, with a variation of a low of 7 in a day, rising to a maximum of 22.

Or, to highlight the Thursday / Saturday difference another way, the percentage of available tee-times each day that were allocated to the open ballot in 2019 were (between April and October):

• Monday - 24%
• Tuesday - 23%
• Wednesday - 22%
• Thursday - 30%
• Friday - 22%
• Saturday - 43%

So, what do we know?

All this analysis unfortunately can not give you a clear picture of your chances of success as the St Andrews Links Trust, which manages the Old Course, does not publish information on the number of people applying for times each day.

Clearly it all comes down to supply and demand, the more golfers that apply beyond the number of times available, the more will be disappointed. The process is, quite simply, a lottery. No one can predict in advance the demand on any given day.

The best advice, based on the more chances you give yourself, the greater your likelihood of success, is therefore, quite simply:

• Apply as many days as you can during your stay in the St Andrews area
• Don't limit the time of day you're available to play.
• Check busy times on the St Andrews Links website to make sure you're not planning to enter the ballot on a day it's not available.

Further information:

• The Old Course, St Andrews
• Detailed information on entering the St Andrews Old Course daily ballot
• All the ways to secure tee-times on the St Andrews Old Course
• How do walk up times on the St Andrews Old Course work?
• Single golfers on the Old Course
• Browse our suggested accommodation in St Andrews
• The St Andrews Links Trust

Published: 02 February 2022