Played my first 18-hole round in more than 14 months at Laguna Woods Village GC on Thursday, May 1 at 1:08pm, then got out again around 2pm on Thursday, May 15. Sunny days with steady and occasionally... Continue »

Played my first 18-hole round in more than 14 months at Laguna Woods Village GC on Thursday, May 1 at 1:08pm, then got out again around 2pm on Thursday, May 15. Sunny days with steady and occasionally blustery winds and shirt-sleeve temperatures. We sold our house in Mission Viejo last year and moved to this gated senior community, but this was my first chance to get out as we finally think we have stabilized my wife’s health issues. The course is within the confines of the Village and is thereby quick to get to and back.

There’s a total of 27 holes over 3 nine-hole courses – various combinations of 2 nines can be played. The course dates back to 1964 and is a David Rainville design. [There’s also a walking-only 9-hole par-3 course I haven’t seen yet.] Blue tee distances on the nines range from 2,626 to 3,110. It’s all kikuyu all the time for turf, which right now means less runout in fairway areas and quicker stops in the rough areas. However, most fairways are wide and the rough is currently cut fairly short. Greens on the 3 nines were aerated over the last half of April – depending on which 9 you were playing, you would encounter greens with visible hole indentations and a light scattering of sand, up to almost fully-recovered greens that showed little evidence of the maintenance.

Fairway coverage was generally good. Tees were generally set pretty wide, except on a few of the shorter par-3s where the box was small, but all tee boxes could be dry, patchy, and hard to put a peg into in some places. Most of the greens have sand bunkers in front or along the sides; fairway bunkers are fewer and frequently not really in play. Sand in the greenside bunkers was pretty firm but generally adequate for good escapes, although one of the ones I found had almost no playing layer.

Distances on the card are not long, but the turf conditions and many holes playing uphill and/or into the wind dictate greater distance requirements. There is some elevation change across the course and occasionally within holes. All par-4 and -5 holes have a striped post at 150 yards COG, as well as plates at 100 and 200 yards COG. Par-3 tees usually feature SCGA yardage plates at the card distances.

Greens are mostly pretty flat without much tiering. Speeds were maybe medium-slow, likely as the aftermath of recent aeration. We’ll see if they get faster as summer comes on. As a result of the punching the greens were pretty soft, and so easily accepted most shots.

I was surprised that the course was not listed on GK and no reviews have been posted. There aren’t that many listed GK members in the LWV zip code, but the surrounding codes in South OC have a combined hundreds of members. The fact that it’s a private layout (all residents are members) contributes, but guest play with a member is allowed.

After a long layoff. My game was very inconsistent, especially my iron play. I hit a few good drives, escaped well from the sand a couple times (shocker!), but I didn’t make any putts, carding a 44-48=92 and then a 44=46=90 and really being exhausted from this unusual activity. Need to build my endurance back up while I work on re-finding my swing.