Glenwood Golf Club (Richmond, VA on 07/27/13)

I was shooting for a 36 hole day at two different courses yesterday so I booked an early time on Golfnow at 7am for $40. I don’t think I saved anything booking through Golfnow in this case, but some courses don’t allow singles to book through the course website so most of time I check Golfnow before the course website. I don’t have to pay the Golfnow reservation fee because I book enough tee times through them throughout the year so it ends up being the same price anyway. Finding a tee time early on a weekend morning for a decent price is a challenge so I knew going into my round that the course probably wasn’t worth $40. Normally when I play 36 holes in a day I try to play one average course and one nice course to try to keep the cost reasonable. I found a good deal for my afternoon round so I could afford to take a bit of a hit here.

The course is confined within a residential area and it didn’t seem like a great neighborhood so the course wouldn’t be high on my list of courses to play if in the area. In terms of the course location it reminds me of Swenson Park in Stockton, CA. However, I don’t have many standards when it comes to playing different courses and the neighborhood didn’t affect play at all.

The perimeter holes have out of bounds along one side which could come into play but the interior holes were pretty wide open. For the most part the fairways were generous and the course is going to play pretty easy. I played the Gold Tees which are as far back as it goes and the course plays 70.0/114/6464. The course does play as a par 71 with only three par 5’s, but there are enough short par 4’s that I’d say losing a par 5 doesn’t have much affect on the score. The main challenge is on the approaches into the small greens.

Because of the layout, many holes run parallel to each other and are separated by trees. However, there are still are a couple memorable ones created by some doglegs and elevation change. The first few holes blend together and are nothing special but the course starts to show some character on the 5th. The 5th is a 415 yard par 4 that moves left and has a tee shot that plays to the bottom of a little valley before an uphill second shot. The 6th is a 403 yard par 4 that plays back down into the valley and then across some water before I think the 7th (a 218 yard uphill par 3) plays as the toughest hole on the front and maybe even the whole course. The 9th is another 403 yard par 4 that plays downhill to a green that sits at the very bottom of the hill. The 2nd shot is played off of a severe downhill slope so that makes it tough to judge the distance. I found the back nine more interesting to play and a bit tougher. The 10th is a pretty, downhill par 3 which is framed by some trees behind the green. The 11th is a the third par 4 on the course that plays 403 yards, but the difficulty comes from having to shape a tee shot from right to left. The 12th is a short par 5 that offers a chance for a good score before the 13th plays as the signature hole. The 13th is a mid length par 4 that plays from a chute of trees to a fairway that angles to the right. The 2nd shot needs to avoid trouble short and left of the green. The course closes with four par 4’s and the last is a short but tight one that plays down a hill. It offers a chance to close out the round with a birdie if a tee shot ends up in the fairway.

The condition of the course was about as I expected, and I didn’t expect much. The greens and tees were cut longer so many of the putts had to be given a whack to get it to the hole and it wasn’t always a clean stance when teeing off. To complicate things around the greens, some of the greens had been aerated and sanded and the others were a bit beat up. However, the conditions of the greens did get better as the round went along. Because of the average conditions and the location I would put the course on the avoid list. It is the type of course that someone would end up at only because they had a last minute opening in their afternoon and were nearby. I will say that the pace of play was great because I got out so early. I played my round in a little under 3 hours but it was good that I went off early because there were foursomes stacked up on the 1st tee when I was teeing off on the 18th.

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