Stoughton is a small town located at the junction of Highways 13, 33 & 47 and in this placement has been given the name The Crossroads of Friendship.
Spend a day in Stoughton and experience rural Saskatchewan for yourself.
A round of golf on Stoughton’s nine-hole par-34 course can be a great start to your day.
Nestled on a neat little triangle of land on the eastern edge of town, the natural landscape complements the irrigated fairways, grass green, man-made moguls and planted evergreens and shrubbery. It makes a picturesque stroll even if you don’t golf.
Danielle Hoffman, president of the Stoughton Golf Club, said that their opening day is set for May 1.
“We just took the tarps off Saturday and some of the greens look really good,” states Hoffman. “The odd one may not look as good but it's early in the season so hopefully they'll come around by early June.”
“Some of the fairways have irrigation but not all of them,” explains Hoffman although it’s on their wish list to have all of the fairways irrigated, but they are limited to water. They use a dugout so water is always limited for them.
“We've had quite a few dry years,” says Hoffman. “Because we have grass greens we always make sure they are looked after first with the available water…the fairways are second on the list.”
Hoffman goes on to explain: “We get a lot of runoff from the town and Taylor Park as they pump down the pond there to the golf course.”
“During the winter when the town does snow removal they dump the snow at the golf course by the dugout so we get that runoff too.”
“We do what we can but we are limited.”
Stoughton Golf didn't open their clubhouse last year due to COVID-19.
“We also sold our carts at the beginning of the 2020 season because when our board started there was still not a lot of action for the golf course,” explains Hoffman. “We weren't sure how our year was going to go and we don't have a very big budget so we were concerned. We knew we needed to keep our greens alive and wondered about where we were going to get the funds so we sold our golf carts at the beginning of the year. The decision was made not to open the clubhouse because we couldn't have tournaments.”
“Last year we thought we could save some money,” explains Hoffman. “We ended the 2020 season in the black which was nice because that does not happen very often.”
This year the club has new carts in already. They did some repairs in the clubhouse, put new flooring in, and they’re also putting in a walk-up ice cream window on the south side of the building.
“Hopefully that will draw in a little more as well,” says Hoffman. “We took last year to figure some things out.”
Stoughton Golf Club’s memberships remained about the same last year as normal, an average of between 80 to 100 members.
“We might have lost a little bit of foot traffic…we didn't have a lot of walk-on golfers last year,” states Hoffman and adds “Fingers crossed that this year will be a better year.”
The Club holds regular events such as Ladies Night Tuesdays and Men's Night Wednesdays. Thursday mornings is open golf where a golfer comes out and is paired up with another golfer. They play best ball. It tends to be mostly seniors take advantage of this golf although it is open to all ages.
The Club will hold their members’ tournament, open tournament and the Harvest Classic tournament.
Other clubs in town such as the Swimming Pool and the Day Care each usually have a fundraiser tournament. Some years the club was lucky to have 20 or more entered in some of the tournaments but they are hoping people have the itch to get back out golfing after more than a year in lockdown.
Stoughton Golf course has many features to entice a golfer to play a round.
The grass greens are very nice, it’s a challenging course but not too challenging .
“We play to every skill level,” says Hoffman. “It’s also a walkable course which is nice if a person wants to get out for some exercise.”
This year the club is thrilled to offer something new and exciting - junior lessons taught by a pro out of Midale.
“A lot of the kids that are registered have parents who are golfers,” explains Hoffman.
This year there are 12 golfers registered, ages six to 15.
They are running two classes consisting of eight lessons over eight weeks.
Hoffman is hopeful this is something that the club can offer every year.
“The nice thing about our course is that it is easy to get onto especially during the week,” explains Hoffman. “It’s a reasonable price for a round of golf. When the course is at its prime, it’s a very nice course.”
Hoffman says one of the best reasons a golfer should try a round at Stoughton is:
“You’re never going to feel rushed at our course. The members we have are very welcoming! We’re always excited to have new people come out and try our course.”
“We have a couple who come from Weyburn faithfully every day and play 27 holes.”
The clubhouse is staffed and we’re ready for business.
