Played Los Verdes on Wednesday ridiculously early with a buddy in from out of town who really wanted the SoCal experience. With no tee time, we arrived right at 6am and luckily were sent out right awa... Continue »

Played Los Verdes on Wednesday ridiculously early with a buddy in from out of town who really wanted the SoCal experience. With no tee time, we arrived right at 6am and luckily were sent out right away in the biting cold and wind. Unfortunately we had to bypass the first hole to meet up with our twosome but it was worth not having to try our luck with the waiting list any longer.

It may have been the cold, but I've never had so many three-putts in a round, and even one four-putt - I was hurrying and not taking my normal time. But the greens were also crazy fast and rolling for days. Forget about stopping your approaches on the greens too unless they were Jason Day trajectory. The wind, speed and crazy rolls made putting a monster for all of us. But the greens themselves are in very good shape.

Fairways were mostly playable with lots of GUR areas, some mud, and some dried out sections where watering appeared minimal. Tee boxes were pretty chewed up in places but generally okay. The rough was a mixed bag throughout - thick grass, mulch, dirt and some very playable. It was so cold and early that it was hard to judge the sand, but it played just fine. Of course it can always be fluffier green side.

POP, the devil at LV, was a non-issue starting out so early. We kept pace with the group in front of us for the most part and were rarely pushed, which resulted in a sub-4 hour round - inconceivable! Still some tough holes at LV that no matter how good your tee shot is it won't be rewarded (looking at you 9 and 13). Of course par on 15 and birdie on 16 was a treat that saved what would have been a terrible round from all the putts on the front 9.

My friend from Costa Rica was thrilled with the views and layout at LV, but of course I told him despite the cold and windy weather we got pretty lucky avoiding the typical 5.5-6 hour round. I enjoyed shooting my best ever score there and knowing next time with improved putting can do even better.

Back out again today and POP was right on 4 hours. Course sustained lots of tree damage during Mondays winds. Course has dried out considerably with the recent winds, sun and low humidity, making the ... Continue »

Back out again today and POP was right on 4 hours. Course sustained lots of tree damage during Mondays winds. Course has dried out considerably with the recent winds, sun and low humidity, making the fairways very fast and of course on L V that will amount to some bad areas to hit from on missed shots. Found the tee boxes, sand traps to be in great shape. The greens will hold shots and are in great shape, but are very fast when it comes to chipping/putting (fastest I have seen in a long time but fun/challenging). Customer service excellent at all levels.

POP today 4 hours. Would have been faster but we got behind one of the groups who is "slow" even though they go off early on Fridays. Personally, I wish they would just play later and stay out of ever... Continue »

POP today 4 hours. Would have been faster but we got behind one of the groups who is "slow" even though they go off early on Fridays. Personally, I wish they would just play later and stay out of everyone's way. Not a good sign when the 3rd group off falls a hole behind? And they did not seem like they cared about being behind? Greens were in great shape today. Fast, firm devoid of divots (yeah). Tee boxes good. Bunkers good. Fairways (nope). Muddy from to much water and as they had recently been punched, there were many "plugs" laying around that you had to walk through. Many of the greens had muddy footprints (not good). Very few of the fairways had good grass coverage, so most of the day you dealt with thin and sometimes wet lies. Not much rough anywhere anymore after the summer water restrictions. Customer service excellent at all levels.

Let me first say I have never played Los Verdes in under 4 hours. Today was the exception. Even with the light fading we did manage to play 18 holes -- we played the front 9 twice. More about why... Continue »

Let me first say I have never played Los Verdes in under 4 hours. Today was the exception. Even with the light fading we did manage to play 18 holes -- we played the front 9 twice. More about why later. Although I cannot say anything about the back 9, I can however tell you about the front 9 since I played it twice. Greens are FAST. They look like they healed reasonably well from aeration. Skirts around the greens are healthy. Sand in Bunkers both fairway and around the green complexes are stocked well. Fairways are pretty lush. The thing that got me was the rough or lack of it. There was none. If there was it was cut to the height of the fairways. I am talking THIN lies even slightly off the fairways. I don't know if this is part of their water savings program all I can say is that the rough is practically nonexistent. The fairways though had good coverage. Pace of play for first front 9 was desperately slow -- around 3 hours. We came to the 10th hole to see a back up of at least 3 groups. I wanted none of that. The front 9 had no one except a lonely single teeing off. I then decided to talk to the starter and ask if we could replay the front 9. Thankfully he said yes and we were off to the races. We caught the single twice on an otherwise empty front 9. We finished the front 9 in an hour with light just fading and with enough light to unload our bags and walk to the car. You read that right, 1 hour for a foursome in carts for 9 holes. The second time around was glorious fun. Although we were unable to finish all 18 holes getting in this version of 18 (two front 9s) was still fun. Recommend this place? While your mileage will vary this course is always in good shape. So of course I would recommend it. Just keep the ball in the fairway.

Weather was very cool this AM and that allowed us to play in a POP of 3.5 hours. Course is in good shape, though we had some condensation to deal with but we were pleased to see maintenance out mowing... Continue »

Weather was very cool this AM and that allowed us to play in a POP of 3.5 hours. Course is in good shape, though we had some condensation to deal with but we were pleased to see maintenance out mowing the greens (it helped). Fairways are in decent shape, given what they have gone through this summer. You will still find a bare lie in some areas to deal with. Tee boxes are fine. Sand traps as well. Some areas have rough growing back in with the cooler weather if you miss the fairway. Greens have healed very fast from the recent aeration in Oct and chipped/putted and held shots really well all round. Customer service excellent at all levels.

Played this morning in a nice 3.5 hour POP. Customer service excellent as always. Course is greening up with the current weather patterns. Many of the fairways are filling in nicely. No issues with an... Continue »

Played this morning in a nice 3.5 hour POP. Customer service excellent as always. Course is greening up with the current weather patterns. Many of the fairways are filling in nicely. No issues with any tee boxes; no issues with any bunkers; fairways provided good roll and there is no rough to speak of, but you will find hard pan and dirt areas if you leave the fairways. The recent aeration of two weeks ago, is barely visible (nice work) and the greens were chipping, putting and holding shots very nicely. Shame they have to now do the other 1/2 of the greens tomorrow and Wed?

This was a painfully long round last Saturday. Played as a single at around 1:30. The course was packed. The round ground to a painful 5+ hours and we didn't even get to finish. We did manage to m... Continue »

This was a painfully long round last Saturday. Played as a single at around 1:30. The course was packed. The round ground to a painful 5+ hours and we didn't even get to finish. We did manage to make it to 16 before the little bit of light left us.

Greens are OK. They were bumpy, slow. Greens look like they are coming along before the second round of aeration. I understand why they do what they do but sometimes I wonder why they want to prolong the agony of aeration longer than it really has to. But I don't make those kind of calls and I understand why do they what they do. For those of you unaware they punch 1/2 the greens one week. Wait 2-3 weeks then punch the other 1/2. So instead of taking advantage of the heat for hot weather grass that can heal faster in hotter weather they make you play really OK to mediocre to really painful conditions for twice as long. I could be wrong about the hot weather grass being so close to the coast but if it is hot weather grass then well I think it's silly.

Just pray for cooler weather if it is cooler weather grass for the greens so conditions will improve faster I suppose.

Greens are OK to really bad. Putts do not hold their line. Folks rarely fix divots, or rake greenside bunkers. Fairways have good coverage. Rough is thickish. Tee boxes are flat just a little squishy in some places.

With the shorter days I have to say playing a round of golf here is not my cup of tea. May be back but I know of several courses where I can play quickly. The only redeeming factor are the views and for the money that's about all it's worth at this time.

Played this AM in a nice POP of 3 hours. Course is getting ready for green aeration so not much in the way of maintenance today. Let's just say the course was playable and leave it at that. As they wi... Continue »

Played this AM in a nice POP of 3 hours. Course is getting ready for green aeration so not much in the way of maintenance today. Let's just say the course was playable and leave it at that. As they will only do 1/2 of the greens T/W and 1/2 in two weeks, it will be a few weeks before one can review the course fairly. Customer service excellent at all levels.

Played today in 3.5 POP. Fairways had some areas of thin lies, others not so it was a 50/50 mixture regarding lies. No tee box issues (clean, level, tee friendly). No bunkers but heard no complaints n... Continue »

Played today in 3.5 POP. Fairways had some areas of thin lies, others not so it was a 50/50 mixture regarding lies. No tee box issues (clean, level, tee friendly). No bunkers but heard no complaints nor saw any. Rough virtually non existent as most of those areas are dry or dirt after the dry summer. Greens, though not punched yet, were in good condition and chipping/putting very nicely. Customer service excellent at all levels.