About SCOREGolf

SCOREGolf

Overview

SCOREGolf is a Canadian golf media brand based in Toronto, Ontario, built around a quarterly magazine, a daily news and features website, and television and video programming devoted to the game in Canada. Published since 1980, it is one of the longest-running consumer magazines in the country, and its owners describe the magazine as the largest-circulated golf publication in Canada. Its best-known franchise is the SCOREGolf Top 100, a biennial ranking of Canada's best golf courses that has been published since 1988 and that returned in the summer of 2026 for its 20th edition. The brand is co-owned by the Toronto media company Torstar and the national golf retailer Golf Town, which acquired it together in 2021, and its longtime editor, Jason Logan, continues to lead the editorial team.

History

SCOREGolf began in 1980 as the program for the Canadian Open golf tournament. It was published by Canadian Controlled Media Communications (CCMC), a Toronto company that had been founded as the official publisher for the Toronto Blue Jays baseball club. The magazine's founders were Kim Locke, who served as publisher, and Charles Cipolla; its first editor was Lorne Rubenstein, who would become one of Canada's best-known golf writers, and its art director was Ron Bala. The first edition featured an interview with American golfer Tom Watson, setting the template of Canadian coverage mixed with international content that the magazine has followed ever since.

The title grew steadily through its first decade. It began publishing four times a year, rose to five issues a year by 1988 and six by 1990, before settling into a pattern of five issues a year plus a newsstand-only annual preview issue. In 2000 the name was shortened from SCORE, Canada's Golf Magazine to SCOREGolf, reflecting the company's expansion beyond print into a website, video, radio and television. The editor's chair passed from Rubenstein (1981–82) to Lisa Leighton (1983–86), John Gordon (1986–91) and Bob Weeks (1992–2012), with art director Gord French providing visual continuity across decades. Weeks stepped back from his editorial roles in 2015 to work full-time at TSN, while continuing to contribute a column and television work to the brand.

In 2020 SCOREGolf marked its 40th anniversary with a special issue ranking the 40 most significant moments in Canadian golf over the previous 40 years, compiled by four of the five editors in its history and topped by Mike Weir's victory at the 2003 Masters. A year later, in January 2021, CCMC sold the brand: Torstar Corporation and Golf Town Limited announced an equal joint venture to acquire SCOREGolf magazine, its website, its television and video production and its course rankings. Kim Locke stayed on as publisher through the transition, and Torstar took over advertising sales. Torstar itself had been acquired in 2020 by NordStar Capital, the investment firm of Jordan Bitove and Paul Rivett; after an arbitration process, Bitove took ownership of Torstar in November 2022, and he is credited as publisher of SCOREGolf in its 2026 Top 100 presentation.

Content and Coverage

The magazine publishes four issues a year, mixing instruction, equipment coverage, travel features, interviews and long-form storytelling about Canadian golf at every level, from the PGA Tour to municipal courses. Its website publishes daily, carrying tour news, commentary from Logan and longtime contributors such as Rick Young and Lorne Rubenstein, a Canadian golf course guide, video instruction and travel content. Recent coverage ranges from PGA Tour policy changes and Solheim Cup reporting to course-architecture features on Canadian designs.

The Top 100 ranking remains the brand's signature editorial project. For the 2026 edition, 95 panellists evaluated courses across the country against criteria including beauty, strategy, challenge, design and fun factor, with each course requiring at least 10 ratings to qualify, and the results were counted down in a seven-day video series beginning July 22, 2026 before receiving an 18-page section in the magazine's summer issue. BDO Canada came on board as presenting sponsor for the 2026 edition. Cabot Cliffs in Nova Scotia retained the number one position in 2026, with neighbouring Cabot Links second, according to the published ranking. In alternate years the magazine publishes its Top 59 ranking of Canada's best public courses. Since the 2026 cycle, SCOREGolf has also disqualified clubs whose membership policies are not gender inclusive from Top 100 eligibility, a rule stated by publisher Jordan Bitove in his introduction to the ranking.

Beyond print and web, the brand has long produced broadcast content: SCOREGolf TV has aired on TSN with weekly summer programming and one-hour specials, and a 90-second SCOREGolf Radio segment has been syndicated nationally. The brand also operates weekly email newsletters that include access to digital editions of the magazine and member contests.

Audience and Reach

SCOREGolf addresses Canada's large recreational golf community. When Torstar and Golf Town announced their acquisition in January 2021, they cited an estimated six million Canadians playing the sport and 300,000 people working in golf-related businesses, describing golfers as a demographic of strong interest to advertisers. Golf Canada reported earlier in 2026, as quoted in national newspaper coverage of the new-courses scene, that 8.5 million people participated in a golf activity in Canada in 2025, and the country counts roughly 2,100 courses, about 90 per cent of them open to the public. Against that backdrop, SCOREGolf's owners bill the magazine as the country's largest-circulated golf title; no independent current audited circulation figure is published, and the magazine's reach claims are presented here as its owners' own descriptions.

Digital Presence

The brand's home is scoregolf.com, which carries daily news and features, the complete Top 100 and Top 59 archives, course guides, instructional video and travel coverage, updated through the 2026 season. The Top 100 countdown was released across SCOREGolf's digital and social channels in July 2026 ahead of its print presentation. Newsletter subscribers receive the weekly SCOREGolf newsletters and access to digital magazine issues, and the site cross-promotes Golf Town's LeaderBoard membership program, reflecting the retail partnership in the brand's ownership. The magazine maintains active social channels under the SCOREGolf name, and its television content continues to extend the brand beyond the printed page.

Ownership and Organisation

SCOREGolf is co-owned by Torstar Corporation and Golf Town Limited through the equal joint venture the two companies formed in January 2021 to buy the brand and its related assets from Canadian Controlled Media Communications. Golf Town, part of the Sporting Life Group, is described by the partners as Canada's largest specialty golf retailer, and the partnership was explicitly aimed at growing participation in the sport as well as developing integrated advertising opportunities across Torstar's newspapers, digital properties and the magazine. Jordan Bitove, Torstar's owner since November 2022, is credited as publisher of SCOREGolf in 2026. Editor Jason Logan, who joined the company in the early 2000s and became editor in 2012, leads the editorial operation; the magazine is headquartered in Toronto.

Contact and Availability

SCOREGolf magazine is published four times a year and is available by subscription and on newsstands in Canada, with digital editions accessible through the brand's newsletter program. The magazine's offices are in Toronto, Ontario; a current business directory listing places the company at 5397 Eglinton Avenue West, Suite 101, Toronto. Readers and advertisers can reach the brand through scoregolf.com, where newsletter sign-up, subscription information, the course rankings archive and contact routes for the editorial and advertising teams are maintained.