Officially opened in 1964 Sotogrande was the first course Trent Jones designed in Europe and is blessed with his design philosophy, which consists of building courses perfectly integrated with the natural surroundings which are a great challenge to the better players, but accessible and enjoyable for everyone.

The origin of the Real Club de Golf Sotogrande is intimately bound to the creation of the urbanization of Sotogrande in the early 1960´s. Its founder, Joseph McMicking, chose this enclave in the South of Spain to develop the best residential area of the time and as the nucleus and backbone of this ambitious project, the Real Club de Golf Sotogrande was founded in 1964.

If something truly characterized McMicking it was his vision of the future and his desire that Sotogrande would last for many, many years. This was why he laid the foundations of his project in completely unknown parameters of quality in the Spain of those days. It is no wonder that he called in the most prestigious designer of the time, R. T. J. to design the Real Club de Golf Sotogrande course.

It was the express wish of McMicking that Trent Jones personally choose the land on which the golf course would be built within the enormous property in which the urbanization was located. Sotogrande was the first work of the designer in Europe and marked a landmark in the construction of courses on this side of the Atlantic, not only by the magnificent design which the master Trent Jones realized, but by the innovations that surrounded the project: it was the first course in Europe to be seeded with Bermuda 419 and first to install a totally automatic system of irrigation. In 1965 the Clubhouse was inaugurated having been built by the architect Luis Gutierrez Soto.