Sagami Country Club

About the club

The course at Sagami Country Club is one of Japan's oldest, having been designed in 1931 by Rokuro Akahoshi, one of the founding figures in Japanese golf. Akahoshi is known for winning the very first Japan Open and for being so far the only player to have done so as an amateur. The club is located in Kanagawa, a suburb some 5 miles from downtown Yokohama, the sprawling port city that has merged with Tokyo and is home to the US Navy's 7th Fleet. Akahoshi's course remains essentially as he conceived it, in large part because the encroachment of surrounding development made it impossible for the site to expand. Some tees have been adjusted and netting added in an effort to prevent out-of-bounds shots from raining down on the surroundings. To play at Sagami is to travel into back in time, an effect bolstered by the quaint wooden clubhouse.