I stayed local on Friday and ended up playing one of the many nine-hole courses in The Villages. One of my goals at the beginning of the year was to play 25 new nine-hole courses! I’m pretty close, but I’ll likely come up a few short of that goal, even after this trip.

Sarasota isn’t far from where my parents live and I ended up joining a threesome, a family from New York. They were beginners and from what they told me, they really enjoyed playing Sarasota because they thought it was one of the easiest courses in The Villages. And, out of the courses I’ve seen so far, I’d have to agree with them!

I’ve played ten of the nine-hole courses in The Villages (there are 40+ I believe) and without a doubt Sarasota is the easiest of those. I don’t mean that in a bad way either.

Sarasota is a par-3 course and most of the par-3’s are short, even from the back tees. It tops out at 1,180 yards with six of the par-3’s playing between 110 and 132 yards. The remaining holes are all around 160 yards.

Additionally, there aren’t many forced carries on Sarasota and I found the greens to be less contoured than the average green complex in The Villages. If you want to play to the over-sized cups, you can do that here as well. Overall, the course has a friendly, family feel to it.

The conditions were solid, consistent with what I’ve come to expect for a course in The Villages. The greens rolled well, just at medium pace. The tees had a nice overseed to them.

Personally, I found Sarasota to be a good course to work on my short irons. If any of the residents are looking to bring their non-golfing families out to play then I’d think Sarasota has to be near the top of the course list!

Course Pictures (click any picture to scroll through the gallery):