The Club at Viniterra (New Kent, VA on 09/22/12)

When I played Spring Creek last week the fella that I got paired up said that he played Viniterra and said that it was a classy course so I figured that I would search out a time on golfnow. I ended up playing a late morning round here on 09/22/12 from the black tees at 7312/75.3/142 for $45. As I start typing these reviews sometimes I will get distracted looking at other courses that a designer has worked on and that is the case here. Come to find out, I have played 3 or 4 other Rees Jones designs (who designed the course). A couple of his other courses that I have played are Poppy Ridge (where I practiced weekly for many years) and Equinox. Equinox is a resort course so it was not too difficult, but Poppy Ridge is challenging and Viniterra turned out the same way. I will go on record and say that I played the wrong tees and should have played the blues, but I am not letting that affect my review. From the “get go” the course has a very modern feeling. The distance from the back tees is over 7700 yards and many of the holes are separated by quite some distance. I got the feeling that Jones designed this course to host some sort of tour event, like a Nationwide Tour event, as it did not seem pleasant to play for me as a 4 handicap or the average golfer. Difficulty wise, it reminded me a lot of Wente Vineyards in Northern California, just in a different area of the county. Like most courses in Central Virginia Viniterra was tree lined and had many minor elevation changes, but I thought the toughness came from all the blind shots and that most putts inside 10 or 15 feet had a good cup or two of break. The first thing that noticed was that the tee shots consistently seemed to play uphill so it felt like I was hitting it a shorter distance off the tee. I do not think that was the case as the course did play firm and fast, but I felt like I had to try to get as much as possible out of each drive. In addition, while I could typically find a golf ball when out of position, there was so much mounding that normally I had a blind or semi-blind shot to a well bunkered green. On a couple of the holes, for example #5 and #6, the lines were very tough to pick. Most fairways resulted in an uneven lie, the greens had a lot of undulation, and there were many forced carries. All of these features are fine if used on occasion in my opinion, but it really was a tough course and would have been even from a shorter set tees. The 7th hole, a shorter downhill par 3, was my favorite hole partly because it was scenic and partly because it felt like a scoring hole compared to the other ones. To me, all the other par 3’s were forgettable especially on the back nine with #15 and #17 being both about the same yardage and playing a bit downhill. The course was visually pleasing as each hole was set in the woods in natural setting (it was well bunkered too) and therefore no other golfers or homes were a distraction. The condition was fantastic with my only complaint being a few ball marks in the greens, but for $45 the maintenance was much better than average. Viniterra would not be my first choice to play in the area because it left me with the feeling that no matter how good I play as a 4 handicap I will not put up a decent score here, even from the proper tees.

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