Golf Course Reviews
Golf Course Reviews: California, Arizona, Nevada, Texas, Oregon, Washington, Colorado, Utah, Florida, Hawaii!A tale of two nines. Played the blacks. Front nine is borderline tricked up, "views" oriented golf, with very small landing areas in many of the fairways and crazy undulation. It is a beautiful course but believe they should make some of the fairways a bit more playable. The third hole literally demands you land your ball almost into a hillside with anything but a massive cut. Landed a perfect draw in the middle of the baked out fairway only to discover it had bounced over the wall and out of play.
The back nine is absolutely stunning in my opinion and about as good as it gets for a non super premium course. Peaceful, serene, and more straightforward actual golf.
Great place to work on your tee game and driving but make sure you bring some extra golf balls.
Greens were running medium speed and well. Fairways a bit bare but greener than most Ventura County Courses, Tee boxes are over seeded and decent but a bit uneven. Will be back again.
The back nine is absolutely stunning in my opinion and about as good as it gets for a non super premium course. Peaceful, serene, and more straightforward actual golf.
Great place to work on your tee game and driving but make sure you bring some extra golf balls.
Greens were running medium speed and well. Fairways a bit bare but greener than most Ventura County Courses, Tee boxes are over seeded and decent but a bit uneven. Will be back again.
Play here frequently out of it being the only course that is convenient. Really a shame that this is considered the "gem" of the LA municipal golf courses. San Diego has Torrey North and South, San Fran has Harding Park, and we get Rancho. The layout is absolutely phenomenal and could host championship golf with a lengthening of a few holes and the hiring of a qualified superintendent. Tee boxes and fairways are in mediocre shape.
Now let me get to my biggest gripe. The greens. It is a shame to classify this as the best golf course in the LA municipal rotation. The city doesn't even have a "superintendent" for rancho. I've been told they utilize under qualified lawn cutters out the LA City "Gardening Department". Greens are almost always spongy, filled with tufts of grass that knock your ball off line have excessive thatch and way too much organic material vs. sand under the greens. They rarely cut the greens tight and why I would guess they average a 6-7 on the stimp. What a joke. And they actually think the LPGA would consider coming here.
Pace of play is horrendous 80% of the time. The minuscule tee time spreading and rate increase they did has really had little effect. You have to "get lucky" when you time your play. A Saturday afternoon with an SC/UCLA home game or pay extra for the last tee times prior to a rate reduction which makes you feel like you are being strong armed. They have NO MARSHALL making assessments of what groups are causing pace of play issues and to issue warnings. LOL. Frequently have clowns that hit their drive 150 playing the back tees waiting for the green to clear from 250 and grinding over 2 foot putts like it is to win the masters.
The range is just ok. They put in grass when they did the remodel but it has not been open once since that I have seen. Why would you not corner off a few boxes and allow patrons to pay extra to hit off the grass if you're going to have it. Chipping green is a joke with bare spots all over the place and no practice bunker. There is one at the par 3 course but the "gardening A-team" can't keep that green healthy enough to stay open very frequently.
Bathrooms and locker rooms should have been remodeled years ago. Usually filthy and smell like rancid piss.
Do yourself a favor and make the drive to better courses in the valley or down the 10 freeway as you will usually make up for the drive in pace of play and quality of course you are playing. Rancho has become complacent with their built in monopoly on public golf in LA and doesn't seem concerned about making efforts to improve. Really shameful for a place that hosted the LA open in the golden age of golf.
Now let me get to my biggest gripe. The greens. It is a shame to classify this as the best golf course in the LA municipal rotation. The city doesn't even have a "superintendent" for rancho. I've been told they utilize under qualified lawn cutters out the LA City "Gardening Department". Greens are almost always spongy, filled with tufts of grass that knock your ball off line have excessive thatch and way too much organic material vs. sand under the greens. They rarely cut the greens tight and why I would guess they average a 6-7 on the stimp. What a joke. And they actually think the LPGA would consider coming here.
Pace of play is horrendous 80% of the time. The minuscule tee time spreading and rate increase they did has really had little effect. You have to "get lucky" when you time your play. A Saturday afternoon with an SC/UCLA home game or pay extra for the last tee times prior to a rate reduction which makes you feel like you are being strong armed. They have NO MARSHALL making assessments of what groups are causing pace of play issues and to issue warnings. LOL. Frequently have clowns that hit their drive 150 playing the back tees waiting for the green to clear from 250 and grinding over 2 foot putts like it is to win the masters.
The range is just ok. They put in grass when they did the remodel but it has not been open once since that I have seen. Why would you not corner off a few boxes and allow patrons to pay extra to hit off the grass if you're going to have it. Chipping green is a joke with bare spots all over the place and no practice bunker. There is one at the par 3 course but the "gardening A-team" can't keep that green healthy enough to stay open very frequently.
Bathrooms and locker rooms should have been remodeled years ago. Usually filthy and smell like rancid piss.
Do yourself a favor and make the drive to better courses in the valley or down the 10 freeway as you will usually make up for the drive in pace of play and quality of course you are playing. Rancho has become complacent with their built in monopoly on public golf in LA and doesn't seem concerned about making efforts to improve. Really shameful for a place that hosted the LA open in the golden age of golf.
Was practicing out here and decided to give it a go. Got out for a "twilight rate" of $90. LOL. 2:00 PM on a Sunday and the course was completely dead aside from a few people playing a tournament. Pace of play is phenomenal. Waited maybe two times and did not wait until hole 16. Santa Ana Winds were blowing 20-30mph absolutely whippin through the canyon which made the longer holes on the front nine extremely tough. Tee boxes are nice and seem to be getting more water than the fairways. Fairways are bordering baked out. One notch above hardpan. Greens were ok. Maybe 9 on the stimp and got much slower as it got later in the day. For the price I really wasn't impressed. If you are going to charge this kind of rate you better be watering the fairways sufficiently and cutting your greens TIGHT. Most of the holes are the same look. Heavily bunkered in the landing areas with desert hazard surrounding the edges of the holes. It is a good test of golf and great place to practice but I am not coming out here again unless they lower their rates or offer significantly discounted golfnow rates. As others have mentioned I am not sure how a property that is this expensive to maintain can sustain itself unless they figure out how to drive traffic up.
Played in a tournament 9/3 and 9/4. Overall the course is in fantastic shape. Didn't play before the changes but the new native areas and added bunkers provide a good challenge for the relative shorter length on the scorecard. Additionally, some serious undulation to some of the greens. Only gripes is that there is WAY too much sand in the bunkers likely from the newness. For the tournament they should have been watered down. Every ball I hit in the bunkers plugged to the point of the ball hardly being visible. Additionally, very difficult to get check on the ball due to so much fluffy sand. Shots in the bunker ended up being a full 2 stroke penalty instead of a stroke to stroke and a half. Greens are in great shape but a bit of inconsistent speed from one green to another. I think all this will sort itself out over time and make this a great track. Would play here again anytime.
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