Wanted to get some swings in with a couple of competitions coming up, but heat restricted what would be possible. GKer Itslikeimsayin scored a great deal at Arrowood, one of my SoCal favorites and a l... Continue »

Wanted to get some swings in with a couple of competitions coming up, but heat restricted what would be possible. GKer Itslikeimsayin scored a great deal at Arrowood, one of my SoCal favorites and a location known for cooling ocean breezes. We teed off on time at 1150 on Labor Day, Monday 9/7/20, joining a couple other singles and playing in just under 4.5 hours with more waiting on the back nine. Started on #10 for “front-side maintenance”. Comfortable carts with ball washer and lots of pep even though they had just been recycled from earlier rounds. Shark Experience GPS (but $10 more for single rider cart). Active starter and saw a marshall on the course a couple times. Quite a bit of maintenance activity early in the round but workers were aware of golfers – very nice. This is one of my favorite courses and I like the layout. The course is very green overall with a variety of grasses sometimes giving the course a mottled appearance. Greens had good coverage, were soft and very receptive. However, this is probably the worst overall ballmark problem I have ever encountered on any course. Some courses have a few holes where you hit a lot of short iron approaches that show lots of ballmarks – at Arrowood every green had dozens of new and old ballmarks. You literally had to do repair work on every green to give yourself a reasonable route to the hole. There were recent marks fairly easily fixed, but many of the older damage had dried edges and craters that were resistant to repair. This was the most disappointing aspect of the entire experience today. Fairway lies were generally good and coverage was good, although pretty dry and thin in some areas. Rough was mostly cut short and playable near the fairways, and more variable if you strayed too far away. We saw some very deep footprints in the sand that players had made no attempt to smooth, and I had a bad experience in a footprint when I forgot the “lift, smooth, and place” COVID rule. Tees were set up very wide and no problems finding a spot to tee up, although some tees could use a smoothing out. COVID stuff in place around the clubhouse – masks needed except at the grill, handle your own bag, carts assigned soon before your tee time. $8 for a small bucket on mats at the driving range, but the mats were in good condition. Pin positions use a 6-location wheel which seemed to result in a lot of “back” pin locations today. Always recommended – but, please, fix your ballmarks, people!!!