LPGA Hall of Famers. Financial managers. Tour and travel operators. Photographers. Golf course architects. British and U.S. Amateur winners. A woman who has played every Top 100 course in the world. A legend who has won all four majors.

They are all among the 100 voters from 17 countries who evaluated a ballot of 464 candidates to determine our Top 100 Courses in the U.S. and the Top 100 Courses in the World.

We have no specific criteria that our raters must follow: they tell us what constitutes "greatness" in a course. Still, among the architectural elements they consider are design rhythm, variety of terrain and holes, setting and conditioning, and how well the course tests a player's full arsenal of skills. Our panelists determine how much value to assign to each characteristic.

Each course that places in the top three on a panelist's ballot earns 100 points; spots 4-10 earn 85 points, followed by 11-25 (70 points), 26-50 (60 points), 51-75 (50 points), 76-100 (40 points), 101-150 (30 points), 151-200 (20 points), 201-250 (10 points) and 251+ (0 points).

Any course that received a "remove from ballot" vote has 10 points deducted. Architects on the panel are not permitted to vote for their own original designs, and course owners cannot vote for their own properties.

Here is the full list of our panelists:

Amy Alcott, California

Joe Andriole, Florida

George Bedard, Canada

Prakash Bhandari, India

David Bonsall, England

Malcolm Campbell, Scotland

Steve Carr, England

Mack Clapp, California

David M. Clarke, New York

Tom Clasby, California

Dick Conway, Pennsylvania

Jim Corcoran, Virginia

Ben Cowan-Dewar, Canada

Tom Crow, Australia

Bob Cupp, Georgia

Robert Currey, Massachusetts

Gordon Dalgleish, North Carolina

Beth Daniel, Florida

Mike R. Davis, New Jersey

Tripp Davis, Oklahoma

John R. Dempsey, North Carolina

Tom Doak, Michigan

Joann Dost, California

Jim Finegan, Pennsylvania

Gregg Foster, California

Noel Freeman, New York

Marvin A. French, Arizona

Dana Fry, Hong Kong

Jim Furyk, Florida

Chris Goodwin, Canada

Frank Harris, Florida

John Harris, Minnesota

Walter Harris, Ohio

Gary Hart, Arizona

Philippe Hermann, Switzerland

Alan Heuer, New York

Dave Hilfman, Texas

Richard Hills, England

Mark Hissey, Wales

Bill Hogan, Texas

Rich Hoover, Pennsylvania

Kenny Jastrow, Texas

Terry Jastrow, California

Rees Jones, New Jersey

Sunil Kappagoda, Florida

James Keegan, Colorado

Mike Keiser, Illinois

David McLay Kidd, Scotland

George Kim, South Korea

Ortwin Klang, Germany

Norman Klaparda, California

Samm Klaparda, California

Mike Klemme, Oklahoma

Herb Kohler, Wisconsin

Laurence Lambrecht, Rhode Island

Jeffrey Lewis, New York

Gary Lisbon, Australia

Quentin Lutz, Ohio

Eamon Lynch, New York

David Mackintosh, Argentina

Joe Marengi, Texas

Thomas McBroom, Canada

Bob McCoy, Massachusetts

Peter McEvoy, England

Kevin McGrath, Ireland

Steve McHugh, California

Dick Michaux, Colorado

Kelly Miller, North Carolina

Adrian Mitchell, England

Brian Morgan, Scotland

Ran Morrissett, North Carolina

Adrian Morrow, Ireland

Dee Nakamoto, Japan

Greg Nathan, Florida

Masa Nishijima, Japan

Jim Noyes, Colorado

Paddy O'Looney, Ireland

Kazunori Ohtsuka, Japan

Peter Oosterhuis, North Carolina

George Pappas, New York

Joe Passov, Arizona

Harrie Perkins, Texas

Hal Phillips, Maine

Gary Player, South Africa

Russell Playford, North Carolina

Gary Post, California

Mayumi Ishii Post, California

John Preschlack, Illinois

Tom Ramsey, Australia

Ron Riemer, Illinois

Cabell Robinson, Spain

Justin Rose, England

Jay Roth, California

Lorne Rubenstein, Canada

Pat Ruddy, Ireland

Mitsutaka Sado, Japan

David V. Smith, California

Charles Tadge, Ohio

Sho Tobari, Japan

Daniel C. Ulmer, Kentucky

Chick Wagner, Pennsylvania

Peter Webster, Ireland

Par Widmark, Sweden

Michael Wolveridge, Australia

Guy Wuollet, TK

Hiromi Yanagisawa, Japan

Tom Weiskopf, Montana