How Would You Rate A Course...

[haidenbaker]

A few months back I played a round in Tasmania, Australia at Barnbougle Dunes. The course is so aesthetically captivating but yet very unforgiving. I'm not a top golfer by any means and do swing a few balls wide now and again... so as you can imaging my score was a little higher than I am normally used to. So in one hand the course was so nice but the other hand it was not a course I could shoot my best score on.

 

After getting back home to the Gold Coast and having a few rounds on my usual courses I felt quite the reverse of the experience in Tasmania. I was shooting much better scores but the courses that I was playing were no where near as 'nice'.

 

The other feature that always comes to mind is the green fee's. I think Barnbougle Dunes was like 3 times the costs of the courses I play at home...!

 

Now if I eliminated the green fees from the equation I think I would sacrifice the good scores and in turn lose a few more balls to regularly play at Barnbougle but if I incorporate the x3 green fees, I would definitely be more inclined to stay at home.

 

I guess what I'm trying to get at by the above is how would you rate a course? As in what aspects would you use to give it an overall ranking or define the appropriate course for 1) the social golfer 2) the seasoned golfer and 3) the pro... or something similar.

 

Here is a few that I have mentioned above that we should be able to add onto:

1) Green Fees

2) Aesthetics (aww factor)

3) Difficulty, which could probably be broken down further like:

• Layout, length, water
  
• Unforgiving-ness...
  
• Undulation / Flatness of greens and fairways
  

[haidenbaker]

P.S. This is what we spent 'some' of the day doing at Barnbougle haha...

 

[mwmgolfx]

Here's my criteria for what it's worth
1) Friendly welcoming staff that makes you feel they want you to have a good time (priority criteria)
2) Reasonable pace of play - 6 hours is never acceptable, 5 is marginal
3) No "clown" holes, ie ones that make you feel that the only thing missing from the hole is a windmill and clowns head - good example Blind shot to a par -3 that has a big boulder in the middle of the green and slopes severely from front to back with deep bunker in back
4) interesting memorable holes
5) challenges everyone no matter what tees are being played but is fair from everywhere
6) decent condition - that doesn't have to be like Augusta but can be brownish but no weedy fairways or greens, for example

And is it worth the cost? Was the experience there worth what you paid? I paid $500 at Shadow Creek and had wonderful time. Paid $100 at another course and felt i was totally ripped. So it's way more than the price

Lastly after playing it, would I play it again and go back and would I recommend others to play it.

[Johnny Biarritz]

Well, I have a fairly standard system for how I rate courses.
Standard 1 to 10 scale based on anticipated travel distance and cost to play. A 10 is a course that is pretty much perfect and one I wouldn't hesitate to tell someone to travel any distance necessary and spend however much necessary to play. Move down to a 5 and you have a course that I consider, by itself, worth a 4 hour drive, one way, to play and one where I wouldn't feel ripped off paying $75 to play. Just saying, if I feel a course is worth a drive of 4 hours just to play and drive back, you know, a 12 or 14 hour day straight, that's a pretty high quality place. Then there is the 1 which is a course I simply wouldn't recommend to anyone unless it is the only course around and they really, REALLY want to play golf.

Inside those numerical values, there are other criteria that I use:
1: Variety of Design- Does the course have long and short holes, meaning a 125 yard par 3, then a 225 yard par 3; a 295 yard par 4, then a 500 yard par 4. You get the idea. Then do the holes move in a variety of directions? Meaning does the course have a balance of holes playing left, right, and straight?

2: Flow of the Course- Basically does the excitement of the course build like a roller coaster or a great movie to a climactic finish or does it just kind of "mosey" along like a long road trip through Nebraska, never getting the blood flowing? Pebble Beach is a great example of flow, the course starts off by easing you into the round, builds to the great holes down on the ocean, then gives the player a break before the awesome finish down by the ocean on holes 17 and 18.

3: Course Conditioning- Self explanatory.

4: Ease of Walking- Again, self explanatory. Courses that are easy to walk will be boosted in my scale, just because I almost always walk when I play.

5: Atmosphere- Tournament history, rankings and so forth? How "cool" is the course/club?

I don't really take into account the staff and that sort of thing. I don't care if the course has balls out in stupid little pyramids on the course. The attractiveness of the beverage cart girl doesn't affect my opinion of the course (though I don't mind hot girls driving carts). Big clubhouses, guys waiting at the bag drop with their hands out, the quality of food in the clubhouse, and cost of the round do not affect my opinion of the course itself. However, I won't hesitate to tell you if the staffers were D-bags or if they charged $100 for a $30 golf course and I felt ripped off.

[mdgboxx]

Not boring, [i]i.e.[/i] no two holes look the same.

Just as important: Do I want to play it again?

I joined a club, two years ago, on friends' word of mouth only. 1½ months into the season, I already knew that I wasn't going to be there this year (2012). 18 members from that club, (confirmed) so far, chose to join my new home course for next year (2013)

[adamjstl]

As an admitted golf nut, I have an entire list of all the courses I've played and a top 25 list as well. The system that I came up with is much different than most. I simply go through the course, hole-by-hole, and rate each one on a scale of 1-6.

6: Memorable. Wow factor. Risk-reward. The hole is positioned well in the flow of the course.

5: A very good hole. Probably only missing one aspect of a great hole.

4: Solid. Scenic with a boring design. Or a risk-reward hole with marginal aestetics.

3: Average.

2: Bad hole. Positioned poorly in the course. No strategy. No scenery.

1: Garbage in every aspect.

Now, you think what about conditioning, clubhouse, Golf Digest rankings, etc...

Conditioning: I've found that virtually all 4.5 star type courses are in either very good or great shape.

Clubhouse: Nice to look at, but all it does is make your round cost more.

Golf Digest/Golf/Golfweek rankings: Take these with a grain of salt. I've played some the best-in-state and top 100 courses and thought "What the hell??"...

Now, I will use those types of factors to break ties. If two courses both score a 72, the one that's "nicer" will get the nod.