Wyboo Golf Club (Manning, SC on 11/19/16)

I’ve been busy golfing as winter closes in! I had one last trip scheduled, a week in Florida, and that was for Thanksgiving. I may play in December somewhere but I’m not one to battle the cold weather so my 2016 golf is coming to a close. To my readers in warm places, make some birdies for me!

I’ve still got some reviews to catch up on from previous courses, but I started out this trip with a 12 hour drive from Charlottesville to Central Florida. Because it was a travel day, it didn’t matter how late I got to my parents house so I broke up the drive with some golf! As usual I had some courses in mind and Wyboo was one of them. My only preference in this case is that the course be within 450 miles from my destination in Florida, so that I could make the final leg of my journey without stopping. I called the proshop as I was getting some breakfast and they told to come on out. I got started about 1:45pm and finished just after the sun set!

On this trip, I was eyeballing courses in the Santee area. I’ve passed through the town multiple times, but never stopped for golf. Before my trip, I’d done some reading about golf in the area and found many positive comments. That surprised me and peaked my interest. I won’t bore you by sharing all that I found, but this area has become known for its value golf. There are probably at least 10 courses that can be packaged together without spending too much coin! Would I do a golf trip to the area? Good question, and you can read that later on, but first onto some thoughts about the course!

Wyboo is about 10 miles off I-95 and on the north side of Lake Marion. While the course is in a community on a finger of the lake, the course doesn’t have any lake views. Considering the homes that I saw when pulling into the parking lot I expected more of them to surround the course, but the serene setting turned out to be one of the biggest surprises about Wyboo! The homes only come into play on the 9th hole, or maybe on the 1st if you hit a terrible one! Much of the course plays through the pines, deciduous trees, and around a group of lakes.

The other thing that I liked about Wyboo is that I found it to be very playable! It encouraged me to freely swing the club which is something I love. The course is open off the tee and while you have to drive it straighter on the back, it should let you get loose without ruining your scorecard! I hadn’t touched a club in two weeks and spent 6 hours in the car so, as you imagine, I didn’t have much command of my swing. I heeled my first drive, topped my second shot, and clanked an iron on the second hole. I only ended up +1 thru two holes, hitting it terrible! Don’t think you can get away hitting it like the whole round, but Wyboo gives you plenty of space to fiddle with your swing and play your game!

Wyboo is a Tom Jackson design where the biggest difficulty is going to be the distance. I played the blue tees which are 72.0/132/6908. The par 3’s are on the longer side and there are three par 4’s over 440 yards. If you hit the driver 260+ then Wyboo shouldn’t be any trouble for you. For an average hitter like me, I had some longer clubs into the greens. The fairways are wide and while the greens are small, they are some of the flattest greens that I’ve ever putted on! If I could tweak one thing about the design, I’d add some slope to them!

I was impressed with the conditions and to be honest, wonder where the money to maintain the course comes from. I paid $27 to ride and even saw it listed for $10 an hour before I got to the course! I set my expectations low and couldn’t have been happier. Wyboo provided an exceptional value! Between some cloud cover, the low angle of the sun, and the yellowing bermuda grass my pictures don’t do the maintenance justice! The area got a significant amount of rain from last month’s hurricane so the conditions were soft, but playable. I had good lies in the fairways and the overseed was just starting to grow. The greens were almost flawless; they are Tif Eagle and were slick. The tees were longer, but they were being overseeded too. The rough was short and I even managed to cleanly hit a 3 wood from it!

If Wyboo is representative of courses other local courses, I wouldn’t mind playing some of those. Would I take a golf trip to the area? Probably not, because at six hours Santee is probably too far for me to justify the drive. Let me explain! Six hours gets me to Myrtle Beach and so many other locations with a mixture of good and great golf. From what I can find, there is a lot of good golf here, but not much great golf. I don’t consider myself a course snob, but I do like to mix in one or two premium courses on a golf trip and I don’t see those premium courses here. If Santee was three hours then I’d be looking to book me a golf package though!

I’ve rambled a bit so I’ll close by saying that Wyboo is a good course at a great price! There isn’t much flashy about the course, but there isn’t much wrong with it either in my opinion! If you are looking to break up your drive for the cost of a tank of gas, I’d recommend it.

#1 (441 yard par 4):