PGA Tour Is Headed To Myrtle Beach For New Event Starting In 2024

The PGA Tour is finally coming to one of the hotbeds of recreational golf: Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.

The Myrtle Beach Classic will debut in 2024 at The Dunes Golf and Beach Club, a semi-private club on the Grand Strand with more than 800 members and a Robert Trent Jones Sr.-designed course. Sponsored by Visit Myrtle Beach, the tournament will have a $3.9 million purse.

A date for the event hasn’t been announced, but the Myrtle Beach Classic will be part of the PGA Tour’s 2024 FedExCup regular season as a full-field additional event played the same week as a “Designated” tournament. As part of the PGA Tour’s classification system, there are 12 designated events (excluding the Players Championship and the four majors) with elevated prize money, no cuts and smaller fields that showcase most of the tour’s top players. While some of the designated events are fixed on the PGA Tour schedule, a handful haven’t been determined, giving other tournaments and title sponsors a chance to be assured of an elite field.

The PGA Tour has committed to holding the Myrtle Beach Classic for at least the next four years.

“(It’s) an exciting new playing opportunity for our members in one of our country’s most recognized and visited destinations,” said PGA Tour President Tyler Denis. “With its incredible passion for golf, the Myrtle Beach community is a natural fit to bring this tournament to life.”

The Myrtle Beach area is one of the more popular tourist destinations on the East Coast, particularly for golfers and families, boasting more than 90 golf courses in addition to 60 miles of beachfront and over 2,000 restaurants across 14 communities along the northeast coast of South Carolina. There are more than 6 million golfers within a 500-mile radius of Myrtle Beach, according to the National Golf Foundation, one of the highest-density destination golf markets in the country.

“The Palmetto State has the weather, the landscapes and the variety of courses that make us the perfect destination for every kind of golf vacation,” said Duane Parrish, Director, South Carolina Department of Parks, Recreation and Tourism. “Hosting PGA Tour events gives us an unparalleled opportunity to share that allure with golf viewers around the world. This four-year partnership is a huge win for Myrtle Beach golf and for the greater tourism industry, and it will undoubtedly inspire countless trips to ‘The Beach’ and to South Carolina as a whole.”

While the PGA Tour has never held an official tournament in Myrtle Beach, The Dunes Club was the site of the tour’s Q-School Finals in 1973. That year, Ben Crenshaw took medalist honors as a three-time defending NCAA champion. The next month (November 1973), the future World Golf Hall of Famer won in his first start as a PGA Tour member, becoming just the second player at the time to have done so.

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