A golfer is made, not born. If the passion takes you, you want to play wherever you are: at home or the other end of the world. And it makes no difference whether you are male or female.
Created in Scotland many centuries ago, at the beginning it was a game that was only for men. Just try putting together the initials of the English words Gentlemen Only Ladies Forbidden and you will have a precise picture of the situation. So was it at its creation, but fortunately it is now open for everyone.
A precise, rigorous game full of rules, except those that determine the size and shape of the course. The important thing is, with the smallest number of shots possible, to get a ball of 42.67 mm diameter and dotted with dimples, into a 120 mm diameter cylindrical hole, placed in the middle of woods, brooks, sand bunkers, at a distance 300 or 500 meters from your first shot. And do it 18 times!
Being in the mountains or on a deserted island in the ocean makes no difference. A true enthusiast just goes to play wherever he is. He brings his golf shoes, shirt and trousers and his left hand glove (unless he is left-handed) with him in his suitcase. He will find the rest on the location, whether it be Patagonia or one of the many fields near Rome, among the majestic remains of the Aqueduct Claudio or on the banks of the Tiber.
Acquasanta Rome Golf Club
By birth, the Roma Acquasanta Golf Club is the first golf club in Italy, and as for origins they can be said to be among the most noble. Nestled in a wonderful corner of the countryside that has been kept through the ages, between Via Appia Nuova and Via Appia Pignatelli, Acquasanta has an intriguing and mysterious history embedded in the times of Numa Pompilio.
According to legend, the second king of Rome came across the beautiful nymph Egeria, his lover, in these places, in the Wood of the Camenae. When Numa Pompilio died, the nymph despaired and wept so much she turned into a source of water, the same source that gave name to the Club (Holy water) and which, still active today, can be seen about 500 meters from the club. And it is in Egeria and Numa Pompilio’s area where, almost three thousand years later, golf is still played.
But those who first appreciated the “golfing qualities” of this area were not Romans. The most recent history of the Club in fact began in 1903, when representatives of the embassies in Rome, the first to play the game in the Capital, probably on the lawns of Villa Borghese or Villa Doria Pamphilj, nurtured their desire to play on an out-and-out golf course and found the perfect place for their needs in the land owned by the Prince Torlonia. The 18 holes of the Roma Acquasanta Golf Club are surrounded by amazing panoramas: on the one hand the view of Claudio Aqueduct, on the other the Mausoleum of Cecilia Metella, on the western horizon the Basilica of St. John Lateran and the dome of St. Peter.
Over the years, nobody has remained immune to the charm of Acquasanta, and all the Roman and international nobility as well as the most famous names in industry, politics, art, culture and cinema: Vittorio Emanuele III, Gary Cooper, Ingrid Bergman, Gianni Agnelli, Duke of Segovia, Agha Khan… have passed along its historical path. Everyone has played here, immersed in History.