Bethpage Black: You too can play where the 2025 Ryder Cup is being held

By Jacob Lev, CNN

(CNN) — WARNING! The story you are about to read will not result in any lost golf balls or bogeys. But it will possibly give you the itch to play golf.

From its name and the ominous sign that greets golfers at the first tee box to the many professional tournaments hosted, Bethpage Black represents the many challenges the sport of golf brings to its worthy players in both fun and frustrating ways.

Despite seeing golfers like 15-time major winner Tiger Woods lifting trophies on the premises and its rank as one of the most difficult golf courses in the country, there is something that separates it from other iconic American courses: It is open to the public to play.

Whether you find yourself visiting or are a resident of Long Island, you too can join in the chaotic challenge of golfing the 18-hole course in Farmingdale, New York.

Of course, that is, if you are up for it.

A public course only for ‘highly skilled golfers’ – or is it?

No matter what level you are, or you think you are at golf, the appeal of Bethpage Black is one a golfer might overlook despite the infamous placard being the first thing to you see before teeing off.

“WARNING The Black Course Is An Extremely Difficult Course Which We Recommend Only For Highly Skilled Golfers,” the sign reads.

Now that might make some immediately reevaluate their life choices but not Ian Schwartz, an avid golfer and vice president of a textile and furnishing company.

Schwartz, who grew up on Long Island and played collegiate golf in the Northeast, has played Bethpage many times and had a stark warning for someone looking to make the journey to play the course.

“If you wake up early, get in line, you have the same opportunity to play the course as anybody else,” Schwartz told CNN Sports.

“Now, whether or not you’re going to enjoy yourself is another story.”

Bethpage State Park has four other courses to offer – Red, Blue, Yellow and Green – but Black is the hardest.

Schwartz called Bethpage his “home course.”

“The aura of Bethpage was always part of my childhood,” Schwartz said. “The company I used to work for was in Bethpage also, so like, I used to go from working in the warehouse to hitting balls at Bethpage.”

Schwartz first played the Black course in high school, recounting good times with his friends, but it wasn’t just about the actual act of golfing that makes it so special.

A golfer can either make a reservation for a tee time on the phone days before or go a step further and get to the course in the wee hours of the morning and camp out in their car until it’s time to claim a tee time in the pro shop.

“You’re really going to put yourself through that process, which is part of the experience,” Schwartz said on camping out for a tee time. “Like people talk about camping out, which is cool. Like you and your boys can bring an egg sandwiches and have a couple beers and hang out. It’s almost a golf trip within itself.”

Schwartz ran through all the courses he’s played in the past whether it was Pebble Beach or Olympic Club in California or Shinnecock Hills Golf Club, a few hours east on Long Island in Southampton.

But there was one thing that separated Bethpage Black from the rest – affordability.

It is under $100 for New York residents and – while the price increases for out of state residents – it is way under than most of the notable courses in the country.

“I’m an amateur golfer. We all have the same privilege of getting to play a professional course that the greats get to play. It isn’t kept just for them. And no course does that better than Bethpage Black, especially because it’s affordable,” Schwartz said.

“Look, Pebble Beach is public. Pinehurst (No. 2) is public, but you have to spend hundreds and hundreds of dollars to play those courses.”

But what makes the course so hard?

According to Schwartz, it’s all about the length while adding the back nine are the “nine hardest holes in golf.”

“If you can’t hit the ball far, long and straight, it’s just going to be a hard golf course before you worry about the rough, before you worry about the putting, before you worry about the chipping,” Schwartz said.

To play where the greats played

The 2025 Ryder Cup isn’t the first notable tournament Bethpage Black has hosted.

In recent years, the course held the 2002 and 2009 US Open, the former of which saw Woods win after leading wire-to-wire over professional golf great Phil Mickelson.

And that is one of the main appeals of playing the course, according to Schwartz.

“What makes golf so special, and Bethpage Black, so special in particular, is that I can play basketball. I can’t go play at the (Madison Square) Garden. I can’t stand where Patrick Ewing stood or Michael Jordan,” Schwartz said.

“I can’t go play baseball at the same stadium as Derek Jeter or Juan Soto or David Wright, right? But golf, I get to walk on the same ground and play the same exact course as Tiger Woods or Rory McIlroy or Phil Mickelson or Jack Nicklaus.”

Starting on Friday, the course will play host to the 12 best Americans and the 12 best Europeans, a group that includes Scottie Scheffler, Bryson DeChambeau, Rory McIlroy, and John Rahm.

But after the Ryder Cup comes and goes, majors in both men’s and women’s golf will be returning to the Island in the near future starting with the 2026 US Open at Shinnecock.

“I think that says a lot about what Long Island has to offer. You know, the golf community,” Schwartz said.

Last week, it was announced the KPMG Women’s PGA will be played on the Black Course in 2028, while the PGA Championship will go to Bethpage Black for the second time in 2033.

In recent years, many new golfers have started taking to courses around the country as they learn to love the game. So, what does Schwartz think a new, high-handicap golfer would shoot at Bethpage Black?

“A million,” he said laughing.

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