Played here Tuesday, Nov. 23 with a 6:40 tee time booked directly from the "Deals" tab on their website for around $38+fee. Unlike Angel Park, this on... » More

Played here Tuesday, Nov. 23 with a 6:40 tee time booked directly from the "Deals" tab on their website for around $38+fee. Unlike Angel Park, this one wasn't paid in total in advance and I paid the remainder at check-in. Starter was very proactive and called me by name when I arrived, and than paired me with another single when we were both there early. Playing partner was a Scotsman who'd just arrived in town the night before. Interesting that he plays the real deal at home and chooses to play Royal Links when in Vegas. We were first off the tee and set our own pace, finishing in a little under 3:30.

Sadly, the starter also confirmed the news in the previous review -- the course has been sold and he expected they'll be closed within 3 weeks. What a shame because it's playing great right now.

Greens are very good; smooth, medium firmness and sneaky fast. Full shots stopped quickly. Really fun to putt with lots of contours, and on this day the pins were in some really borderline positions, which made things extra challenging. Fairways are green and quite nice, framed beautifully by lighter green and sometimes golden-hued bermuda rough. Rough was not too penal just off the fairway, but get a little further offline (or if your drive didn't carry to the fairway) and you could find some really thick, deep bermuda that made it difficult to find balls, and then there's the really deep stuff that's maybe 9 inches and almost assuredly a lost ball. Bunkers were inconsistent. One my playing partner was in was very hard packed while the couple I was in were quite good and better than expected. Gold tee boxes were good.

The course is playing super fun right now and in no way does it seem like they're throwing in the towel, maintenance-wise. They were watering the course when I arrived and it's in great shape right now. If you're in the vicinity, I strongly recommend one final farewell -- especially at those absurdly low "Deal" prices on their site.
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Played here this morning with a 6:35 time from the "Deals" tab on their website homepage. Amazing rate of like $39 or so. Check in went smooth, starte... » More

Played here this morning with a 6:35 time from the "Deals" tab on their website homepage. Amazing rate of like $39 or so. Check in went smooth, starter was rearranging players a bit but set me up with a twosome and we were off the first tee about 5 minutes early. After the first few holes, the group in front created a good buffer and we rarely had to wait until we caught them again at 17. Total POP wonderful at 3:30.

Conditions-wise, there's not much to say except everything is near immaculate. I'd say 9s across the board. Greens are smooth, medium-fast to fast, medium firmness and accepting of full shots. Fairways are great, just a notch below immaculate. Rough is lush rye about 2-3 inches deep; can cause some difficulty in hitting shots cleanly. The two bunkers I was in were good. Black tee boxes were nearly perfect, no complaints.

Second time playing this course. I really enjoy it when playing from the Black tees. Good mix of score-able holes and demanding holes. Almost made eagle on the par-5 6th. Hit a good drive and an excellent 3-wood from about 225 to about 8 feet, and just missed the putt. Fun times! Highly, highly recommended at those "Deal" prices.
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Played here today at 11:40 with mpisarski01 for our GK Cup match. TeeOff.com “Deal” time where we paid $54 each after 20% promo code. They’ve sold the... » More

Played here today at 11:40 with mpisarski01 for our GK Cup match. TeeOff.com “Deal” time where we paid $54 each after 20% promo code. They’ve sold the land where the old practice putting green was located to the Mt. Woodson Castle, so they have a tiny practice green near the clubhouse and then another short game practice area elsewhere across the parking lot (maybe near the 7th hole somewhere?). We saw lots of twosomes out on the course, which seemed odd, but we were paired with two other guys and we followed a twosome initially until they played through a foursome who then was directly in front of us. We waited a bit on every tee but pace was good at around 4:20 total.

Conditions are really good, but aeration begins this week. Greens are mostly smooth, sometimes a little bumpy, sneaky fast and very soft. Full shots stopped quickly and the greens sometimes showed footprints when you walked around. I did notice a couple bare spots around the edges of one or two greens. Fairways are firm, fast, and really great, with consistent coverage of bermuda that I think was convincingly dyed green and Matt eventually thought was not dyed. It’s sort of a light green and seems too consistently all the same color to not be dyed, in my opinion. They provided really nice lies and tons of roll on any slopes. On No. 17, I hit a poor drive and had to just punch back into the fairway, and the ball kept rolling and rolling until it stopped just outside a greenside bunker at the bottom of the hill. Crazy! Rough is a mixed bag of deep bermuda where the ball sinks down in, thin patches, bare spots and everything in between. They had re-sodded an area right in front of the 10th green that was marked as GUR. Definitely a premium on hitting the fairways because you don’t know what you’ll get in the rough. I think I was only in one bunker and it was pretty thin, but not terrible. Blue tee boxes were mostly good except No. 9, which was really thin and had barely any grass between the markers.

Definitely recommended other than the aeration taking place soon.
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Played here this morning with a 9:10 tee time. Saw a single time pop up on Friday night and grabbed it for $45.50. Paid $5 more for a push cart rental... » More

Played here this morning with a 9:10 tee time. Saw a single time pop up on Friday night and grabbed it for $45.50. Paid $5 more for a push cart rental. The whole group was four singles and we started a few minutes late, but pace was fantastic for a weekend muni, and practically unheard of for a Rancho Park weekend. We finished in just about 4:10, even with minor waits to tee off on most holes. Two of us walked, and two others had single rider carts. The last time I played any LA City course, the practice putting greens were still closed due to Covid, but they were open today, which was great.

Conditions are mostly quite good. Greens were the highlight, mostly smooth, medium fast and medium firmness. Fairways had good coverage of light green/yellow/brown grass and provided mostly good lies. They look a little shabby but play good. Rough was a little deeper and less consistent, meaning you might get a tough lie or a fluffy lie or who knows what. Saw a few areas roped off as GUR. I was only in one bunker and it was a thin layer of loose sand over hard packed sand underneath; not great. Black tee boxes varied from hole to hole; some were good, some were thin, others seemed to be more clover than grass, etc.

Definitely recommended if you can get a tee time. One of the guys in my group was a walkup who had been on the waiting list and got out in just over an hour. BUT… he also told me he tried that a couple weeks ago, showed up super early and was the first one on the list and didn’t get out until after 1:00 p.m.!!!! Greens showed no signs of aeration at all, so I don’t know if they’ve already done it and healed or maybe aren’t doing anything this fall.
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Played here today with a 1:20 tee time for $45 direct from the course website. Check in was smooth but getting slotted into the lineup could’ve been h... » More

Played here today with a 1:20 tee time for $45 direct from the course website. Check in was smooth but getting slotted into the lineup could’ve been handled better. There wasn’t a starter but they said just talk to some of the staff, who told me things were running mostly on time. But around 1:15 I still hadn’t been paired with anyone and there were clearly two groups lined up to tee off on the first tee, so it looked like I was going to get a late start. Then I noticed the group waiting to tee off next only had two players, so I asked the staff if I could join them. The guy working there said yes – if the people on the tee agreed to it, which seemed weird to me. The staff should be making these decisions, not allowing golfers to play any size group they wish. Anyway, those guys were cool and said yes, so I joined them and ended up teeing off right on time. Good thing, too, because the pace was pretty slow (4:40 total) and if I’d teed off two or three groups later, would’ve probably finished in the dark.

Conditions were decent and very much a mixed bag. Greens are definitely the highlight; they were medium-fast to fast, a little bumpy, and accepted full shots well. Lots of spots around today’s pin positions just kept rolling out, and it's very difficult to get the ball to stop on any downslopes. (The practice green is currently half all dried out and half lush, but both rolling pretty good. The on-course greens were more like the lush side.) A couple greens had some problem areas with small bare spots here and there. Fairways had mostly good coverage but were quite thin, leaving tight lies. Rough had lots of bare/hardpan spots and was otherwise thin. Bunkers were mostly terrible, completely hard packed and seemingly neglected, but then on around the 15th hole, a few were really nice. Hopefully that’s a sign that they’re working on them or better yet, refilling them entirely. Luckily most of the bunkers I was in were fairway bunkers, so the hard pack didn’t hinder my play as much. The greenside bunker I was in I just chipped like I was hitting off hardpan; seemed impossible to try to hit a normal bunker shot hoping to get under the ball. Blue tee boxes were decent but lumpy.

I had only played here once many years ago (around '92, I wanna say) when this was still a 27-hole facility. Now it’s 36, and I don’t really remember if I had played any of the holes I played today. It’s one of those very generic looking Ted Robinson designs, but it was more interesting than I remembered. It also seems more difficult than the rating, with tons of water coming into play and firm/fast conditions meaning balls can easily run into those penalty areas. If it was in better condition, it would definitely be more enjoyable. Thankfully the heavily contoured greens are in pretty good shape, making things fun and interesting when putting. You definitely don’t want to be on the wrong tier of some of these greens. Considering the Palms course is currently closed for overseeding, hopefully the current conditions on Lake are “end of summer” conditions and this course will get the same treatment next. I only played here today because it was convenient to something else I was doing in the area, but now the completist in me wants to come back and play Palms when it re-opens from overseeding (definitely didn’t look lush yet, though). If anyone is interested in joining me for a GK Cup match, let me know.
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