The two revolutionary icons were playing the gentlemen's game in fatigues and combat boots. And they weren't playing well.

Che Guevara shot a 127, besting Fidel Castro's 150 on a par-70 golf course.

Their 1961 round, played a month before the Bay of Pigs invasion, was the beginning of the end for golf in Cuba - soon the communist government had eliminated the sport from the island almost entirely.

Only one 18-hole course remains, the Varadero Golf Club 136km east of Havana. Over the weekend, it hosted two one-day pro-am tournaments featuring half a dozen Cuban golfers paired with wealthy foreigners.

Organisers say the events are small steps in a campaign to bring golf back to Cuba, a country that is both the best and worst imaginable place to play.

The Tourism Ministry says it would like to build 10 new courses around the country and attract high-rollers from Europe, Canada and even the United States should Washington ease its 48-year trade embargo.

Investors in Europe and Canada have long clamoured to build courses, presenting plans that include luxury hotels, apartments and health spas.

But those proposals have remained stalled for years, with not even one foreign-financed project having broken ground. Cuba is "the sand trap from hell", said John Kavulich, senior policy analyst at the US Economic Trade Council in New York.

"The conflict is imagery versus profit," said Kavulich, whose group advises US businesses on trade with Cuba.

"Concerns about the image of golfers in the workers' paradise. And, if accepted, how does Granma [the Communist Party newspaper] explain the obese US golfer with poor clothing colour co-ordination, running about in their Caddyshack-like golf cart, betting one each hole?"

It does indeed seem hard for Granma to stomach golf, with its refined decadence. But Antonio Zamora, a Miami attorney and expert on Cuban real estate, said the Government has overcome old ideological concerns and sees the sport as a way to get foreigners to visit the countryside, rather than simply staying in Havana and other cities.

The state-run tourism concern Palmares is developing golf, but Zamora said it has moved slowly because it plans to build courses in clusters of three or more, enticing players to stay in particular areas long enough to try all courses.

"There's been a lot of work done. This is not just 'blah, blah, blah'," Zamora said.