Played 11-7-22 with John, Alex, and Matt, mid morning on a really nice day in Palm Desert, getting around the course in around 4 1/2 hours with some minor waiting. Tee boxes were in good condition, lu... Continue »

Played 11-7-22 with John, Alex, and Matt, mid morning on a really nice day in Palm Desert, getting around the course in around 4 1/2 hours with some minor waiting. Tee boxes were in good condition, lush and level, with some being a little shaggy, but just coming out of overseeding so they are probably letting them fill in a little more before they start cutting them a little tighter. Fairways were in real nice shape, green and lush with great lies and decent roll out. Rough was in good shape, not to long and very easy to hit from. Bunkers were in good shape, well groomed with a nice layer of white sand that was nice to hit from. Greens were in great shape rolling very smooth and true at medium pace and playing semi soft. Great club house and nice practice area. Customer service has always been great here as it was when we played. Highly recommend.

Second round of the Birdie Chain Battle + GK Guru Round on Monday 11/7 at the always exceptional Indian Wells Golf Resort. Both courses already open from Fall overseeding. We chose the Players Course ... Continue »

Second round of the Birdie Chain Battle + GK Guru Round on Monday 11/7 at the always exceptional Indian Wells Golf Resort. Both courses already open from Fall overseeding. We chose the Players Course because it was further along having reopened 3 weeks ago and no longer requiring cart path only restrictions. The Celebrity Course had just reopened from overseeding a few days prior, looked fantastic as well, but still cart path only.

We had 7 of us. Great time! I was joined by rgm2525, alex326, mpisarski01, gary00, nutnbutcup and sr129. Unfortunately mark_6m had an emergency and could not make it. Thanks guys for coming out!

IWGR is already IMO the Disneyland-ish facility of golf in the desert. Even the clubhouse has a “Space Mountain” kind of look. Clean modern design with many attractions like the best well stocked clothing proshop I’ve ever seen, a laser show/putting course “Shots In The Night”, new large covered driving range nearing completion (range is still open but on grass), fantastic food truck, excellent dining, cascading water fall bag drop/valet parking and now for the winter season an ice rink!

OK but what about the Players Course? It’s a fantastic layout as expected but what impressed me more was what wonderful condition it was already in this early in the season. Greens were smooth, medium fast and mostly firm. Fairways overseeded rye on an excellent bermunda base, almost perfect. Rough was in the process of going dormant but still had some color and played mostly lush/short. Bunkers all in great shape, quality sand and well groomed. Tee boxes lush but on the shaggy side in some cases. Outstanding overall conditions for November and should only get better.

Check out the photos I just posted. What a fun day with beautiful weather and GKer company :)

Also look for my Facebook, Instagram and Tik Tok posts about the round. Thanks!

Highly Recommended!

Thanks to Johnny for setting up a Guru round and thanks to Indian Wells Golf Resort for having us out. Always an enjoyable round playing with Gary and Steve in my group. The club house and pro shop ar... Continue »

Thanks to Johnny for setting up a Guru round and thanks to Indian Wells Golf Resort for having us out. Always an enjoyable round playing with Gary and Steve in my group. The club house and pro shop are very nice. There is a nice grass driving range with balls included. The staff was all friendly and willing to help. There is a small self parking lot but valet parking is free. Golf bags are shuttled down and placed on a cart. I like that there are water and ice machines out on the course and a plastic cup is on the cart. Great service and amenities all around.

This was my first time playing at Indian Wells Resort. I found the Players course layout to be quite enjoyable. Nice mix of Long and short par 3s and 4s. The cart GPS hole layout was very helpful at times. You can't always see the landing surface. The hole layout screen also shows the distance to the carts of the group ahead. There a plenty of tee box choices to suite your game. Look forward to playing the course again. Some course knowledge will definitely help the scoring next time around.

The greens were in very good condition. Rolling smooth with medium/fast speed and held well struck shots. The fairways had great coverage and allowed for some rollout on drives. The rough is getting winter thin so most lies were decent. The bunkers were well groomed and had a decent amount of sand. The tee boxes were reasonably level and had good coverage. A nicely manicured course all around.

Played on 11/7 just before the storm made it over the mountain and it was a beautiful 75° day with light winds. Course just opened up from overseed and was not CPO which was nice. I have played here m... Continue »

Played on 11/7 just before the storm made it over the mountain and it was a beautiful 75° day with light winds. Course just opened up from overseed and was not CPO which was nice. I have played here many times and prefer it over celebrity because it has 4 par 3's and 5's like a standard course. Normally the course is covered in flowers but they were in the beginning of the season so they have not got around to planting them for the season. The course is still beautiful and worth playing but could be better when the flowers are in place.

Conditions were very good as usual for this course and as expected for the rack rate for winter golf in Palm Springs. Tee boxes were level and plenty to choose from but I did notice the par 3's were a little chewed up. Fairways were fully lush and very few problem areas which none of them are in normal play areas. Rough was a little off color compared to the fairway but was lush and not overly penal. Greens were medium speed and firmness and rolled very smooth and true. Sand traps around the greens were fine and our group sure hit a bunch of them today. Fairway traps were a touch more firm but that is to be expected.

The entire facility here at IW is top notch with the service a step above. The driving range was open but the back mats and concrete was being worked on as well as a lot of maintenance going on putting up Christmas Décor. The carts are all staged and have the Shark Experience on them which is fine. Overall I highly recommend playing here.

Last day of the So Cal trip was at the ever popular and scenic Indian Wells Players course for a fun GK outing and the birdie chain on the line. IW just came out of overseeding with yesterday being t... Continue »

Last day of the So Cal trip was at the ever popular and scenic Indian Wells Players course for a fun GK outing and the birdie chain on the line. IW just came out of overseeding with yesterday being the first day of lifted cart path only restrictions. Course was in great shape as always. Greens rolled extremely smooth at a nice medium-fast pace. Green complexes aren’t overly complicated and are more on line with what you would expect at a “resort” course. Greens easily held well struck approach shots.

Fairways were excellent as well. Good solid coverage from side to side and I did not notice any thin or bare spots on the course. As good as the fairways were, I have seen them better and would expect them to improve in the next couple of weeks and move up from the 8 range into the 9-10 quality rating arena.

Bunkers are big and plentiful at Indian Wells. Luckily they have high quality sand in them making them predictable to escape from. Tee boxes were flat with ample coverage.

Customer service is top notch at Indian Wells and the pro shop is the BEST, bar none! My only complaint (other than my birdie putt on 18 stopping 3” short), is that we caught the course in between flower seasons and the flower beds were empty.

Indian Wells is my go to course whenever in Palm Springs. It is always a highly recommended course.

11/7 guru outing on a balmy somewhat breezy am following a rather slow 4somw waiting almost every shot for a 440 POP but heck nic3 day, good views and even better company thanks to Steve and Wade. ... Continue »

11/7 guru outing on a balmy somewhat breezy am following a rather slow 4somw waiting almost every shot for a 440 POP but heck nic3 day, good views and even better company thanks to Steve and Wade. Course just opened to no CPO so there were a fair number of unfilled divots but it was evident that staff had been making the rounds to catch up. Fairways in really good shape providing excellant lies. Rough was minimal and in come areas dry and whispy. Tees lush and level. Bunkers well groomed but depth of sand tended to vary requiring attention prior to swinging. Greens rolled very smoothly medium fast with some tricky reads as topography definitely was an influence but often hard to detect. Great staff easy check in. Carts have interactive GPS. Really nice DR with grass and quality balls. Practice green replicated on course conditions. Fun day in the desert. Thanks Johnny for setting it up.

I played here with the GK guru's and had a great time. I played with Gary and Wade who are fun guys.
Everything about the staff here was great. From the bag drop where they took my bag and had it wa... Continue »

I played here with the GK guru's and had a great time. I played with Gary and Wade who are fun guys.
Everything about the staff here was great. From the bag drop where they took my bag and had it waiting on my cart to the starter who took our group photo and sent us out.
The practice range is grass with pyramids of good quality balls. Nice practice putting area also.
We waited on the group ahead on a few holes but pace of play was still just about 4:15.
Course is in very good condition right now. Tee boxes good, Fairways good coverage with a good amount of roll out.The rough was cut pretty short but if you got too far off line there was waste areas to deal with and that could be anything from sand to heavy brush. Water comes into play on several holes.
Bunkers have decent sand and were well raked.
The greens rolled true and at medium/fast speed.I had a tough time putting and kept seeing breaks that just didn't happen for me.
We had geat weather all day with sun, some high clouds and very little wind.
Overall another great day with GK'ers and thanks again for Johnny setting this up.

Played the Players Course on Wednesday January 26th. I had never played the course, so I went out with no expectations. The rough had been allowed to go dormant so it was brown. But I don't mind that.... Continue »

Played the Players Course on Wednesday January 26th. I had never played the course, so I went out with no expectations. The rough had been allowed to go dormant so it was brown. But I don't mind that... because the brown grass was mowed down and not overly long. The tee-boxes and the fairway fairway grass was perfection. Like a nice green carpet. The greens were very consistent but super difficult to read. It took me until the back nine to figure out that no matter what I was seeing, there was not going to be a break in the putt. The pro shop staff and the on course personnel could not have been nicer. Country Club service all the way. And the restaurant for after golf food and libations was as nice as any place I have ever been. Father Cheeseburger says highly recommended and I will definitely return.

Played in the outing Sunday and its been a few years since I played here. Between the old age and the beers I have consumed over my life some of the holes I had forgotten. Given the summer I thought... Continue »

Played in the outing Sunday and its been a few years since I played here. Between the old age and the beers I have consumed over my life some of the holes I had forgotten. Given the summer I thought it would be drier out here but things were much more lush and greener.

Greens are definitely resort type so they are not that fast to me. However they were in really good shape. I didn't see much in the way of ball mark damage and don't remember any bad areas. Greens rolled smooth but just too bad I could never get the right read on them.

Fairways were great. I don't remember any bad areas and I did find a damp area after driving near a drainage but overall certainly really nice to hit from. Provided some good roll after well struck drives.

I didn't think the rough was too penalizing but the area outside the rough more the native area was forget about it.

Tee boxes were great. I didn't even remember too much divot damage on the par 3s either. Good thing about the design is there are several tee options making it playable for everyone. Tipped out at 7300 yds and I think they averaged about 400 yds difference between them.

Bunkers probably needs some attention. I thought they were pretty compact and one I was in certainly needed to be raked.

Course is one of the better courses in the area and I put this pretty high on my list if I was visiting. Views are fantastic, the course is a solid test of golf, conditions are always great and the staff is super helpful. Thanks JohnnyGK for setting this one up. I was way too dehydrated to stick around. Hopefully next time we'll catch a break with the heat.