Golf Course Reviews
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First time out (at) Elkins this year. Greens putted SLOW, best thing I can say is that they held iron shots very well. There are numerous greens where the fairway grass is overtaking the intended green's grass. The fairways and rough are lush and well maintained. Even though the rough isn't high, it will grab your club because it's so thick. Numerous tees need alot of work, unlevel and not well maintained. The traps looked to be in good shape.
First time out (at) Olivas in several months. Nice links layout where you get the ocean breezes, especially in the afternoons. The fairways and tees were immaculate, lush and well kept. The greens were a bit bumpy and chewed up by Olivas standards, good, but far from great. Traps were well maintained and appeared to have fresh sand, I had 2 "fried egg" lies out of my 3 misadventures into their vast bunker system.
2nd group out a little after 6A and finished (at) 10A on 8/25/10. Greens rolled well. Staff out early soaking problem areas of the course. Also noticed there are a few areas that were recently resodded (12 fairway up near the green) that is coming along nicely, stakes removed and fully playable now. Considering this course reportedly gets roughly 90,000 rounds a year, it's usually in good to very good shape.
Recently aeriated the rough, tee and fringe areas, so there are alot of plugs currently that come into play. the course is still quite playable, greens rolling nicely. Again my complaint is the lack of sand ibn parts of the sand traps, there are areas where you will hit hardpan in a trap, very inconsistent, they NEEd more sand in the bunkers.
Played in GK outing 8/13/10. I'd have to rate this course by category:
The good: The greens putted well & the course overall was in decent to good shape. Clubhouse and staff were a +. Beautiful scenic views and a really cool LONG wooden bridge over a canyon.
The bad: The layout of the course. 7 (SEVEN) par fours between 320 and 350 yards from the back tees? None of which was really what you would consider a driveable par 4 for a longer hitter? You could tell the designer had to tuck fairways and greens around hills, canyons and boulders, resulting in many quirky holes where the best play is constantly bumping the ball 100 to 200 yards down the fairways. That's fine to break up a string of grip it and rip it holes, but not for almost the entire course!
The ugly: It seemed like every other tee was 300 yards from the previous green. Far too many target golf shots required. Too many blind shots down hills or around corners where you had no idea what was there unless you had previous course knowledge. A perfect example of ruining a perfectly good mountain and canyon area and trying to turn it into a golf course.
It was amazing that I only incurred ONE penalty stroke AD when I was pounding drivers over trees & over hills to blind landing areas on these short, tight par 4's. I personally have no interest in hitting a mid iron off SEVEN par 4 tees and a wedge into a small green. I can practice that at a decent driving range facility, which by the way, this course does not have.
The good: The greens putted well & the course overall was in decent to good shape. Clubhouse and staff were a +. Beautiful scenic views and a really cool LONG wooden bridge over a canyon.
The bad: The layout of the course. 7 (SEVEN) par fours between 320 and 350 yards from the back tees? None of which was really what you would consider a driveable par 4 for a longer hitter? You could tell the designer had to tuck fairways and greens around hills, canyons and boulders, resulting in many quirky holes where the best play is constantly bumping the ball 100 to 200 yards down the fairways. That's fine to break up a string of grip it and rip it holes, but not for almost the entire course!
The ugly: It seemed like every other tee was 300 yards from the previous green. Far too many target golf shots required. Too many blind shots down hills or around corners where you had no idea what was there unless you had previous course knowledge. A perfect example of ruining a perfectly good mountain and canyon area and trying to turn it into a golf course.
It was amazing that I only incurred ONE penalty stroke AD when I was pounding drivers over trees & over hills to blind landing areas on these short, tight par 4's. I personally have no interest in hitting a mid iron off SEVEN par 4 tees and a wedge into a small green. I can practice that at a decent driving range facility, which by the way, this course does not have.
The greens are rolling nicely, quicker than the last time I played here. Both the fairways & tees were decent, a few problem areas, but good overall. The rough is hit and miss here, the mature oak trees are the real issue on wayward shots, not the rough. Other than the colder temps & dew, the only real drawback with early A.M. play is there are constantly maintanence staff whizzing all around doing their thing. Most are good & realize they are there to provide a service to the golfer. However, can't say much for the guy mowing the fringe on #17 today while I was trying to make a 5 footer to keep my round going. Stepped back, looked at him, so at least he quit actively mowing, but the motor still going 20' away isn't that much better. Can you tell I missed (badly) that putt?
Played on dawn patrol with JohnnyGK. It's tough to rate and judge when you start out playing a few greens with dew on them and then get freshly mowed greens. On all the greens after they were mowed, they really rolled nice. Sand traps well maintained. Tees were mostly lush/well maintained, a couple they were working on/watering. Numerous areas of the fairways were being heavily watered as we played, so that bodes well for players in the immediate future. The rough is grown up in many spots and can be quite punitive in the places that are grown up, especially in the A.M. when wet. Pro Shop and maintenance staff are always very friendly and efficient here.
The greens are smooth and putted very well, consistent speed and break from green to green. The fairways and rough are both much improved over previous summers here. The tees are so-so considering the condition of the rest of the course, several are unlevel and many have more divot damage than you would expect if they are regularly maintained. I was going to comment that the traps are all freshly raked with nice, smooth sand....until I was in the front greenside trap on #9, and discovered that barely an inch below the nice looking sand was hardpan. Definitely could use alot more sand in that particular bunker, otherwise, course conditions were ++ today.
Went out recently and played a few holes with my significant other on a Sunday afternoon. The course is NOT in good condition, even to go and practice your short game on. Numerous tees had more dirt area than grass. The greens were bumpy and slow. Fairways - rough were very hit and miss. Traps were either raked or unraked dirt mostly, I didn't see much sand. A bucket of balls (at) a nice range would be time - money better spent than trying to play this cow pasture.
First time playing here in over a year, out on dawn patrol with JohnnyGK. We walked 18 in around 3 1/2 hours. For a 5,000 yard course, Westlake has several holes that would compare favorably in length/difficulity with holes you would expect to find on a much tougher 6,500 to 7,000 yard course. Very impressed with the condition of the course overall. The greens rolled nicely, a tad slow with the morning dew before mowing, but they were SMOOTH and consistent. The fairways were lush and well maintained. Several tees were closed due to maintanence, but the rest were in decent shape. The rough was freshly mowed and looked nice as well. The only negative was that there were several holes where they had consistently mowed the rough with tractors around mature trees without anyone weedwhacking around the trees, resulting in areas where there may be 15-20 trees with 2-3 ft. high circles of grass around them and a few ft. away it was almost like fairway. It becomes a pace of play issue where balls can easily be lost that may be only a few yards off the fairway.
First time out (at) Buena in over a year, was impressed with how much better the fairways are. Traps had new sand, tees + rough nicely maintained. The greens putted OK, medium speed, very firm. The problem on the greens here is the sheer amount of pitch marks that go unrepaired. You could fix 50 per green and barely make a dent in the total.
Challenging layout with tee choices for multiple levels of golfers. The fairways, tees, rough and especially the sand are well maintained overall. The greens are a mystery to me, especially on shorter putts. The greens here get bumpy in many places and the poa makes the ball fish tail on it's path to the hole. It's really noticeable as the putt loses speed when you play later in the day here. Several of the lakes are either dry or substantially down, which totally changes the difficulity and visual effect on several holes.
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