Woodcreek Golf Course - $
5880 Woodcreek Oaks Blvd. • Roseville, CA 95747 • (916) 771-4653
Map/Satellite Image · Driving Directions
5880 Woodcreek Oaks Blvd. • Roseville, CA 95747 • (916) 771-4653
Map/Satellite Image · Driving Directions
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 Surveyor Report: 5/4/2006 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Woodcreek Golf Club is owned and run by the city of Roseville. I guess that makes it a muni. However, this is no stereotypical muni. The only muni giveaways are the potential for slow rounds and the low prices. The man that designed Woodcreek, Robert Muir Graves, also designed my favorite golf course, La Purisima, near Lompoc, CA. At Woodcreek you’ll find some of the same design elements and tendencies that he used at the very demanding La Purisima, though softened enough to make the course a little more accessible for the average golfer. That said, Woodcreek is no pushover, and Mr. Graves has successfully laid out where we should hit it, and makes us pay just enough when we hit it elsewhere. He really gives us his best stuff on the five or six shortish par 4s. The first hole looks benign enough from the tee, but the traps at the top of the rise are easily reachable. Two is a placement tee shot. Lay it back to your favorite wedge distance and try to forget about the water fronting the green. The third is a dogleg left par 4 that is trickier than it’s yardage would suggest. The deceiving looking tee shot takes you over a stream directly at some bunkers that look like they’d be easy to reach, but they’re actually up near the green and a little left of the ideal line. Don’t try to cut the corner—you’ll be trapped by a huge oak. After the straightforward par 3 fourth is the funky par 5 fifth. It actually plays a bit like the one funky par 5 at La Purisima where you hit a tee shot straight out, take a left turn and attempt to cut off as much of the corner as you dare. Here the green is definitely reachable in two, but your second is blocked by a big oak. So, either hit that 4- or 5-iron sky-high, hit a hard cut around it, or bail out left but short of the green. Watch out for those big oaks on the right off the tee on number six…they attract golf balls, and unless you hit your driver really high with a hook, lay back on the semi-blind seventh. Eight is a great par 3, with a little water to make you worry, and some big oaks to get in your way. The double-dogleg ninth is more open than it looks from the tee, and the water trouble is really only in play on your lay-up. Ten is a long par 5 that tightens it’s grip the closer to the green you get. An exacting lay-up is required to get in position to attack the pin. The eleventh is a short par 4 that another high hook driver might reach. Otherwise, hit your lay-up straight and stay out of creek trouble on the left. Twelve is your chance to go for it. The fairway bunkers are placed to catch a lay-up, and a solid driver should leave you in good shape right in front of the green, if not on, putting for eagle. On the thirteenth, the course’s wetlands preserve comes into play. You can’t smash it off the tee without risk of getting into the preserve. And even when you set it up right, it’s tough to hit this elevated green. On the long par 3 fourteenth you come back over the wetlands to a green guarded by an oak, and thankfully Mr. Graves left us a bailout short and right of the green. Let one rip long and straight on fifteen and again on sixteen. With a great drive and an exceptional second shot, the green is reachable, but the numerous bunkers to the right and the creek just over the green should give you pause to consider the consequences. Seventeen is a gorgeous, wedgeable par 3, but the bunkers and the green’s tiers provide thought-provoking defense. And finally, eighteen gives you room to bomb it, but a long slicer could get to the water that runs up the fairway to the green on the right. Woodcreek is in pretty good condition right now. The fairways and rough are nice and lush, and not beat up. The greens are still very slow from the wet winter, but I imagine they’ll pick up speed as things dry out. The day I played, the greenskeepers were mowing down the long grass and weeds in some of the places where balls often end up, which should save a few balls from separation anxiety and save players from empty wallet syndrome. The sand was nicely raked out and playable and though a few tees could still use some leveling, they were in pretty nice shape. The clubhouse has what you need. It’s the place to get a club or two, a glove and some balls, a pit stop for lunch at the turn and then to get a drink to nurse your wounds when the battle is over. Overall, Woodcreek is a steal for the price. The layout is excellent in it’s own right, and even more so when you remember what you paid for the round and that we’re talking about a muni here. It’s a great course to strap on the clubs and walk, which is becoming harder to come by these days. Yeah, you do see some houses and hear the road on a few holes and you can have a slow round if you’re playing prime-time, but at Woodcreek, the many positives far outweigh the few telltale muni-isms. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
