Playoffs Road Trip: Food, fun and golf in the Big Apple

text size

Cohen/Getty Images

The New York City skyline can be seen from the 14th green at Liberty National Golf Club.

One car, four weeks, more than 2,000 miles and 32-plus hours of driving. It's the PGA TOUR Playoffs for the FedExCup road trip. Modern conveniences like, say, airplanes make that sort of drive-time crazy, but we can dream about the romance of the open road, can't we?

Whether you drive or fly, though, you'd be hard-pressed to find four better cities in America to spend the dog days of summer. From New York, to Boston, to Chicago, to Atlanta, there are endless must-sees, including, of course, the four venues for the Playoffs, which begin this week at Liberty National, just across the Hudson River from the Big Apple.

The Barclays

Liberty National is a story unto itself, a former swath of sewage and sludge and garbage. It was an eyesore that's now eye-popping, complete with views of the Manhattan skyline and the Statue of Liberty that are worth nearly every penny of its $129 million price tag thanks to the design of Bob Cupp and Tom Kite and the dreams of so many others.

So what else is there to do while in town for The Barclays, the first of the four stops on this month-long journey?

"If you go, you gotta go check out the new Yankee Stadium," says J.J. Henry, a native of Fairfield, Conn., a leafy suburb about 40 miles outside of New York City where Henry's parents still live.

Sure enough, the Texas Rangers will be in town Tuesday through Thursday (followed by the Chicago White Sox on the weekend), and Henry will be there. He works with psychologist Fran Pirozzolo, who used to work with the Yankees during the World Series years in the 1990s and now helps the Rangers.

You might also want to go island hopping, from Manhattan to Long Island, and sleep overnight in your car for a tee time at Bethpage Black, site of this year's U.S. Open. The Red and the Blue are worth checking out, too. Both are A.W. Tillinghast designs, just like the Black, but are often overlooked. Add the Yellow and Green courses and you have five to choose from.

"If you're a fan of classic courses, there's no better collection in 40 square miles anywhere in the country," Henry says of the New York area.

One place to play golf isn't a course at all. It's the Chelsea Piers Golf Club, complete with a four-story driving range that extends into the river and where, instead of buckets, balls are automatically teed up for you at a rate of $50 for 323 of them in off-peak hours. But hey, it's "the city."

"You also have to get a New York deli sandwich and you really can't go wrong with the pizza," Henry added. "It's pizza you just can't get anywhere else." Some worthwhile pizza places: Lombardi's, John's, Grimaldi's and Patsy's. Delis: Katz's, Carnegie Deli and Ben's.

Next stop: TPC Boston in Norton, Mass., for the Deutsche Bank Championship.