What Is The Torrey Pines Course Record?

For the first time in its history, Torrey Pines will host the Genesis Invitational in 2025. That’s because the PGA Tour has been forced to move it from its regular home, Riviera Country Club in Los Angeles, due to devastating wildfires that affected the city in January.

Torrey Pines will become the 12^th host of the event since its inception in 1926, but it is already a very familiar PGA Tour venue.

The San Diego municipal course comprises two layouts, the North Course and South Course, and it is the permanent home of the Farmers Insurance Open, which uses both across its four days of action.

In the opening two rounds, the field is split, with players using the North Course for one round and the South Course for the other, before the final 36 holes are played entirely on the latter.

It was during the 1990 tournament, then called the Shearson Lehman Hutton Open, when a new course record was set by Mark Brooks at the North Course in the second round. The American carded a round of 61 including nine birdies and one eagle, before finishing T19.

Brooks, whose career highlight was winning the PGA Championship six years later, had the course record to himself for 17 years until he was joined by Brandt Snedeker after the first round of the 2007 Farmers Insurance Open.

His 61 was also highlighted by nine birdies and an eagle, but once again it wasn’t enough to give him the title. Snedeker finished three behind winner Tiger Woods.

On the subject of Woods, it is his record that players will need to surpass to rewrite the history books with a new South Course low score at the Genesis Invitational.

The South Course is the most well-known of the two Torrey Pines layouts, while it is also longer and tougher than the North Course. It was used exclusively in both editions of the US Open it hosted, in 2008 and 2021, while that will be the case for the Genesis Invitational, too.

Woods has held the South Course record since the first of his eight wins at Torrey Pines, in 1999. Back then, he shot eight birdies and an eagle on the way to a 62 in the third round before winning the title by two over Billy Ray Brown.

To muddy the waters slightly, there has been another course record at the South Course on a markedly different layout to the one achieved by Woods.

That came after extensive renovation work in 2001 by Rees Jones, which was carried out with the hope of being chosen for a future US Open, with changes including lengthening the course, adding new bunkers and reshaping greens. The renovation achieved its aim, because in 2002 the “New” South Course was awarded the 2008 edition of the Major (again won by Woods).

The same year as the announcement, Greg Chalmers set a “New” South Course record of 63 following his fourth round, which included 10 birdies and one bogey on his way to finishing T13.