Ireland’s green queen

Royal Portrush Golf Club’s longest serving manager, Wilma Erskine, explains why Northern Ireland’s Causeway Coast is golf’s perfect playground.

It’s almost 40 years to the day since an unknown 27-year-old woman walked through the doors of Royal Portrush Golf Club for the first time as its new manager.

Few, if any, of those who met Wilma Erskine, OBE, BEM, that day would have known just how significant her appointment would prove to be, not only for the fortunes of the club but for Northern Ireland’s golfing heritage.

Born just 17 miles away in Ballycastle, Wilma was not a well-known local, or a man of prestige like her predecessor, Squadron Leader Eric Wainwright, yet her almost four decades in charge of the club has seen her hailed by many as the woman responsible for bringing the Open Championship back to Northern Ireland in 2019.

This was the first time since 1951 that the Claret Jug had been contested on the Emerald Isle, yet such was the success of the event, it is set to return to Royal Portrush next summer.

Hosting the Open at Royal Portrush was the crowning moment in Wilma’s career.

But her connection to the sport remains strong after she became brand ambassador for Valor Hospitality’s five-star luxury hotels, Dunluce Lodge, which overlooks Royal Portrush’s fourth fairway, and Seaton House at the Home of Golf, St Andrews.

She said: “Bringing the Open Championship back to Royal Portrush really was the culmination of a career’s worth of hard work.

“It might sound easy to say in hindsight but honestly, when I started, my ambition was to return the club to its former glories with perhaps a dream of the Open Championship returning someday.

“Looking back now, I think my appointment at Royal Portrush must have been greeted with some shock.

“I think those in charge saw my business background as manager of Portadown Golf Club and Massereene Golf Club – and they decided to give me a chance.

“It was a male-dominated industry and traditionally the job would have been given to a retired military man, but I didn’t think of myself as a woman in a role, I was there to do a job and I did that job.”

Taking a methodical approach to the task at hand, Wilma worked with the club committee to grow the club’s membership.

A task made harder by the economic realities facing many in Northern Ireland in the early 1980s and coupled with the fact that for many, the golf club on the shores of the Atlantic Ocean was their second club.

“It was a tricky situation. Our members tended to be members of two clubs, predominantly clubs in Belfast like Malone Golf Club or Belvoir Park Golf Club and naturally, if they could only keep one, they chose to keep the one closer to home,” said Wilma.

“I had to get to grips with the culture of our club and the needs of our members and set about making changes slowly and subtly.

“I decided quickly that I was going to become a presence at the club when we were at our busiest, there was no point in me being in the office Monday to Friday and then come Saturday being nowhere to be seen.

“I made it my mission to get to know everyone and make sure they felt they could come to me with any issues. The majority of members supported me, and we began working with all the relevant stakeholders – Golfing Ireland, The R&A, the government and local councils to bring tournaments and exposure to Royal Portrush.”

In 1993, for the first time in 33 years, the club hosted The Amateur Championship and went on to host the Senior British Open from 1995 to 1999.

The increased exposure brought a prestige to the club that allowed it to increase its green fees, which allowed for improvements to the course and clubhouse and, in turn, these improvements led to an increase in coverage which led to a further increase in green fees.

“It was all one big circle and once we got into that rhythm, it really put us on a path to apply for the Irish Open,” says Wilma.

“The club established a Championship Committee in 2007 to encourage both amateur and professional tournaments and honestly, it all just seemed to fall into place.

“Stakeholders gave us great support – the CEO of the DP World Tour, George O’Grady’s family originated from Portrush and the tourism minister at the time, Baroness Arlene Foster, saw the bigger picture and gave us great support.

“It was around this time too, that we had a professional golfing boom in Northern Ireland.

“Darren Clarke, Graeme McDowell and Rory McIlroy were all coming to the fore and The Irish Open in 2012 at Royal Portrush had the largest attendance figures in history.

“We were gaining momentum, this was the moment we realised we could achieve our goal of hosting The Open, so we kept going and a lot of people, including these golfers, were championing the idea of hosting the Open Championship here.

“The R&A’s CEO at the time, Peter Dawson was very supportive, I think he could see outside the box and could see the benefits it would bring, not just to the club but to the wider area as well.”
Steadily moving up the golf course rankings and with more eyes than ever focused on the Northern Ireland golfing scene, Wilma and the team finally brought the Open Championship to Royal Portrush Golf Club in 2019 and worked their socks off to make sure it was a success.

Wilma says: “I knew it would be important to work well with the media, so I put the time in to doing that and it paid off.

“There is no doubt the media loved that Open Championship.

“It took a lot of effort to bring it here and it was a long road with a lot of money invested to make it possible, but everything came together at the right time to make the Causeway Coast the perfect playground of golf.

“And, perhaps most importantly, the tournament was viewed as a great success by The R&A.”

Approaching her 35th year in the role and with a house in Spain and her husband, Ross, retired, Wilma decided to bow out on a high and bring her time at Royal Portrush Golf Club to a close.
Such was her impact on Royal Portrush Golf Club and the game of golf in Northern Ireland, Wilma was awarded a BEM in 2013 and an OBE in 2020 for services to golf. She was also awarded an

Honorary Doctorate of Science from the University of Ulster in 2020.

However, not one for simply taking up knitting or pottering about the garden, Wilma is now working as a brand ambassador for Valor Hospitality as the international hotel management group prepares to open the five-star Dunluce Lodge on the Causeway Coast early next year.

Dunluce Lodge offers 35 luxury suites to choose from and is the perfect retreat for anyone eager to embrace quintessential Irish hospitality and traditional charm. Guests staying at the hotel will enjoy captivating views of the famous Dunluce Links at Royal Portrush Golf Club.

And, with an onsite putting green designed by renowned golf architect Martin Ebert, a small and intimate spa and fitness facility and complimentary private transfers to the nearby helipad, and clubhouses at Royal Portrush and Portstewart Golf Club, Dunluce Lodge promises to be the definitive five-star location on the Causeway Coast.

Wilma is also the brand ambassador for Seaton House, Valor Hospitality’s soon-to-open five-star hotel in St Andrews, Scotland.

The luxury hotel, Seaton House, will be a golfer’s paradise, situated near the first tee at the world-famous Old Course where the first ever game of golf was played around 600 years ago.

Providing all the comforts of home with a highly personalised service, Seaton House will be a sanctuary nestled within easy reach of the charming coastal town’s centre and providing stunning views across West Sands beach. Seaton House will also be home to Ondine St Andrews, a fine-dining concept from renowned Scottish chef Roy Brett, who already operates Ondine Oyster & Grill in Edinburgh.

“The opportunity to work with Valor Hospitality on Seaton House at St Andrews and Dunluce Lodge in Portrush is very fitting, especially as Dunluce Lodge is a legacy project of the Open Championship in 2019.

“It is being developed by Americans who came to Northern Ireland prior to The Open – they fell in love with the area and decided to make an investment in it.

“There are no other five-star hotels in the area, I know people have flown over and stayed at five-star hotels in Belfast and made the 120 miles round trip to play golf here.

“This will be a destination on par with the area’s world class golf courses and will offer an unrivalled level of discreet luxury in one of the most beautiful places on earth.”

To book your visit to Dunluce Lodge visit www.dunluce-lodge.com or to book a stay at Seaton House visit www.seatonhouse.com