Has a lot of challenging shots that leave you feeling satisfied. It isnt overly long like Gold and has a lot of holes that can allow beginners a chance. lots of woods if you are a fan of that. multiple pin placements on many holes which makes for a different feel. enough spread between holes that you dont have to be afraid of hitting someone on a different hole. there were some new tee pads going in so it will now have multiple tees as well. level concrete pads.

hole signs were in need of some repair. i believe the local crew was already in the process of putting some new ones in. a few spots could use some pea gravel or crushed lime stone to keep you out of the mud paths. a few holes you will find it hard to see where your disc is going which may cause some locating problems. the sharp dog leg right (hole 7 i believe) really takes a lot of shots out of your hand because of the mando. it is a long 2 if you get it.

great course, clean park. located near 3 (4 if you count silver/gold as two different) courses. lots of people in the area to help you out. good crew there to keep it in shape and fun to play. if you have a full day bring a group of people and some coolers with food and drinks and play all 4 courses...would be a great way to have a doubles tournament in the summer. the additions for worlds definitely make the course tougher, it will be interesting to see how well the pro's will do. it is now longer, but much more fun was added as well.

This course is my favorite of the four in this fantastic disc golf complex. The course primarily plays through hilly woods, with lots of tight shots and some fun elevation changes. Where there are good hills, they are used well to add interest and challenge to the course, as well as offering some nice views of the park. There is a great mix of open grassy fairways surrounded by trees and more technical holes where errant drives will leave you playing plinko in the trees.

This course has a great variety of lengths, from ace run holes to legitimate par 4 holes that will test your distance and shot placement. There are lots of different types of shots needed to score well here, birdies are available but you'll have to navigate lots of left and right turning fairways to get them.

This course feels the most polished of the four, as it's made up mostly of the original holes. All holes have concrete tees and signs showing distance and hole layout. The design of the course makes navigation pretty easy throughout, and keeps things varied and interesting throughout the round without a whole lot of repetition.

Though this course has better drainage than the silver and blue courses, it still can be a bit swampy after rains, and the wooded hillsides can get a bit slick. Some of the signs seemed a bit inaccurate, hopefully that gets taken care of before worlds comes to town.

There is some fun elevation, but there also were a few too many very flat holes in the mix that took away a little of the fun factor. The first couple holes don't seem to fit with the rest of the course, and would seem more at home on the blue course, I'm not a fan of filler holes to start the course.

This is a great course, that offers challenges for any level of player. More experienced players will have a lot of fun shooting for birdies, and testing their accuracy on the wooded holes, while newer players won't be too overwhelmed here.

I recommend this course most out of the four here, and it would be worth a trip to play by itself. With the others onsite, this complex is definitely worth a drive to come play.

My home course! 2010 Pro Worlds! Nice mix of shots, some long, some technical. Good group of locals.

It's getting dark too early. We played a day/night (glow) doubles thing, fun! A lot of complaints e.g. bugs, poison ivy, lost discs, and parking fees are not an issue this time of year.

Hole #1: Hole is at new pin position now. About 305 feet tucked on the right guarded by a tree and high grass. The hole is more challenging/fun, I think.

Hole #2: Tucked on right off big fairway about half way up a good sized hill. Trees on right. Beware of drives from 14's tee at the top of the hill. Fun flick/anheiser. Putt for duece.

Hole #3: Short, narrow cool little shot. No problem, usually. Tree jail on left, prison on right.

Hole #4: Aceable short uphill. Trees if shot is high. New tee is available.

Hole #5: Big hyzer or thread down the middle. Many, many trees. Dueceable.

Hole #6: New hole placement. Now its a 300 foot hole with guard trees protecting the pin, which is tucked to the right. Requires decent drive and good putt.

Hole #7: Hard 90 degree dogleg right. Usually an easy flick, good approach, putt for three.

Hole #8: First big, open field bomber hole. Finishes left in trees. Tough three. Huge deuce.

Hole #9: Thread through trees over ravine. My buddy hit chains this year. Get it over, get a two.

Hole #10: Fairway becomes quite narrow with oaks in landing area for average arms. Calls for a big drive and good approach/putt. Straight and long. Trees in putting area.

Hole #11: Deuce hole, lots of trees. I usuall try a skip hyzer down right side finish left. Shorty hole.

Hole #12: My one and only ace! Five years ago. Tricky trees in fairway. Not very long. Sidehill green.

Hole #13: I flick this hole left side finish right. It wants a strong drive. Toughest putt on course. Sidehill lie. Guard trees. Skippy. Windy sometimes. Ugh!

Hole #14: Signature hole. Downhill with big fairway. Hole tucked in narrow glade in tree grove. I've it two-ed it once. A new (longer) hole position is poured and will be moved soon.

Hole #15: Short uphill I go right at with 2X Barry Champ Beast. Very two-able. Keep low to take trees out of it and maybe skip to basket.

Hole #16: New hole postion 30 ft longer and slightly right pin is now guarded with trees. I love this new position! It is a straight shot through a medium-wide fairway with many trees in that fairway.

Hole #17: Big long hole. Fairway narrows at top of uphill. The open again for a sometimes windy putt. Tough three. Don't five it!

Hole #18: Driveable 400+ hole in field with only a few trees. New hole position makes it 30 feet longer now. Duece or par and the round is over. Yay.

See the review by Texconinite below, I can't agrue with anything he said.

Lots of variety on this course, so many different shots are required...open, wooded, short, long, left, right, uphill or downhill.

The red baskets, red tee signs and red benches make it extremely easy to navigate. Once you find hole 1, a map probably isn't needed.

#14 open downhill shot to a protected basket.

This course inspired the other courses at LL, so "hats off" to it.

Somewhat too tight in places for my enjoyment; after playing more than 20 years, I'm tired of hitting trees. About half of the holes have lots of small diameter trees to avoid not only off the tee but also down the fairway and near the basket.

The dogleg on 7; I don't mind slight doglegs but a 90 degree turn thru tight woods isn't very fun.

One design flaw; hole 2 shoots over/around the tee of 3.

Although a good course overall, I don't think it is championship worthy. Adv or pro players should go play silver/gold course(s).

Lemon Lake is a terrific complex for DG, 4 courses with other park amenities such as good restrooms, picnic tables, a snack shop in summer all in a clean park enviroment.

I played this course in 1999 or 2000
when it was new, now again in 2009 & 2010 It has aged well.

-so beautiful
-short and technical with an occasional let 'er rip hole
-trees perfectly used
-signs, benches, baskets, RED. Loved it.
-peaceful setting
-all cement tee pads
-variety
-a few mandos, if I remember correctly

-no pro pads
-just a few give away holes
-short, I wanted more!
-kind of a lack of elevation/risk reward basket placements
-MAY be a bit to easy for pro level players, but still fun

wow. SURPRISE! After so much talk and then eventual let down of the hype of the gold/silver course in this park I got to play the little gem that is the Red course! This is also what the locals were playing and still having fun with!

You start off on one of the two throw away holes. Basically in the open and to a basket by some trees. blah. then all of a sudden you turn and head into the amazingly manicured grove of bushes and perfectly spaced trees. This is when you know how cute this course is while still being technical.

shots include hyzers, bombs, layups, dinks, thumbers, you name it. probably one of the best laid out courses for the available land space I have played. Even hole 14 offers this illusion of bombing it down a huge hill into a great basket location (parked it).

I had a blast here and ended up shooting a -10 first time through, but that was with the help of locals helping me out with the best lines.. This might make it seem a bit too easy for skilled players but I know they will have fun the whole time playing it.

SUMMARY: PLAY THE RED COURSE. it will surely make you smile. is it the most technical or hardest at this park? Probably not. Is it the most fun, yeah, without a doubt.

This is the oldest course on site at Lemon Lake, and probably the most fun. There are some really unique holes, like a fairway that goes 100-150 feet straight ahead, then does a 90 degree turn to the basket another 100-150 feet away. It's a tight course that opens up in places, but holds you in the woods for most of the round. This course really takes a variety of shots to do well.

Very beautiful course that is very well maintained.

These are really the basic cons I had with the complex, as they were the same for all 4 courses.

The signs didn't seem very accurate with the distances.

Navigation was tough were they didn't place "Next Tee -->" type signs.

we sometimes found ourselves throwing at the wrong pin because the one we were supposed to be throwing at was blind and there was another in our line of sight that we supposed was the alternate pin position.

None of these issues were a huge deal and all could be solved with a course map and/or getting more familiar with the course.

I really can't enough good things about the time we spent at Lemon Lake this weekend. The locals we met were the best. Everyone we talked to were so friendly and welcoming that we left knowing we would come back just because this is a place that fosters great discing and great discing attitudes. As soon as we got there we asked an elderly gentleman at one of the lodges where to find the first tee, and we ended up sitting there shooting the "fecal matter" with him for about 15 minutes about the course, the area, and the gun he had in his back pocket (he was teaching a hunting class). They love to met out of towners and finding out where they come from. By the end of the weekend we were getting some, "hey, are you the group from Aurora?" type stuff.

This complex has many things to do other than discing on site, but they never interfere with your game and are only seen once in a while. The area is very secluded and private. I loved this place. I almost wish I could rate Lemon Lake as a whole so I could give it 5 stars.

They have the 2010 Worlds here next year and they will do a fantastic job with it.

What I personally like and how this course stacks up in my list of 18 hole courses:

1) Holes with good risk/reward. Fair, but harsh punishment for bad decisions or execution. == A-
(Many great holes that will turn a deuce run into a bogey with poor execution. Also several holes that force you to think and make choices on how you want to approach things to get a great score....or play safe. The only way to get a better grade that this course is to have more par 4's and 5's - like hole 17.)

2) Holes that have rewarding birdie opportunities for me. I throw 300' accurately, 360' max. == B+
(Out of the 18 about half are a perfect challenge for me and a perfect reward for executing well. The other half are either too short where you expect a birdie all the time (but these holes are still interesting/technical), or too long where par is routine and birdies can never be expected - hole 10 & 18 in the 440' range are like that.)

3) More wooded than open - lots of variety of shots required caused by hole shape and topography == A-
(Lots of shots required - bring your full arsenal! My favorite holes are 14 & 17. 14 is a 475' downhill shot starting open, flattening out and ending with a 75' tunnel to the basket. Going for a deuce could easily end up in a 4 (or 5) and even laying up could end in a 4 if you do not place your drive where you can access the tunnel. Hole 17 is a 548' flat hole with a split fairway off the tee. Finesse your drive around the stand of trees causing the split, but still get far enough down where you can get up and down for a 3. Good stuff!)

4) Natural beauty (Appalachian beauty preferred) and seclusion. == A+
(This course is amazingly beautiful and secluded! The grassy fairways in the woods blew my mind.)

5) Bonus points for multi-throw holes with defined landing zones, good risk/reward and multiple options to play them. == C+
(Like I stated earlier 17 is a GREAT par 4. 570' hole 8 is OK as the uphill nature of it adds effective length, but length is the only thing this hole has going for it. I really wish this course had more par 4's and 5's - there seems to be room for that.)

It's all about feeding the addiction, so I ranked this course subjectively based on my own "personal addiction factor". The grades above tell how well the course will draw me back to itself again and again and again. Since I have played a decent number of courses (149 18-hole, 91 9-hole as of late 2009), my hope is that players/explorers who have similar addiction tastes will find my ratings list helpful as they choose courses to play and explore.

I fully expect others with different tastes/philosophies to disagree with me....that's the fun of things here. See my profile for my rating philosophy.

good mix of long open and shorter technical shots. trees will punish errant shots!

I've been told there is alot of poison Ivy but I did not see any.

Wish I had time to play all four courses! Great concrete tees.

First visited this course not long after it was installed. I have loved it from day one and the trip with Texconsonite was my third time here. We all respected silver/gold as the toughest; then our opinions varied....I find this the second best course on this wonderful site...White is good; but short; Blue, a little too open (update note, that blue has had both length and toughness added); Red a perfect combination of blue and white. I believe it requires quite an assortment of shots to score well on Red. This is the course here that they have spent a number of years refining; and to me; it shows.
(Another update: A few new, long tees at red. Including, a gorgeous long tee on #18, which adds length to what was already a 435 ft. hole. Also, elevation; and a great tee area, surrounded by huge pines, which play a part in your disc exit to pin.
As of 11-19-09, blue and red courses considered to be in the placements intended for Worlds. Club has done this to allow players to play courses as they will be used in 2010.

When Red had expanded past it's original 18 hole format; a few nice hill/lake in play holes were added. These have become part of the blue course, and thus, are still in play. These are the only two things that would make red better. Instead, they make blue better. So, this isn't really a con; just a reply to red missing those two ingredients.

This is the course that set the bar for the remaining venues on this site; and imho; after playing red; you'll understand why the local crew has advanced to the point of hosting a worlds event.

As the other three all will eventually, Red has all concrete tees with pretty good tee signs, and colorfully marked baskets.

As Red is the oldest course, it is the most polished of the four. The teepads, pin locations and signs are all set and accurate. The fairways are manicured and maintained here, as opposed to gold or white, where there is still much brush-clearing to be done.

Red is probably the most balanced of the four. It offers a nice mix of relatively open and more tightly wooded holes, though woods are in play on every hole to some extent.

This course likes to squeeze you, and give you stretches of trouble. For example, you give have to shoot through an open field, but the pin will be tucked back into a wooded area. Or you may have a sharp hyzer or narrow tunnel shot off the tee, but after that chokepoint it gets easier. Thus, this course will throw challenges at you, but more like a few hurdles on every hole than a maintained tightrope walk like some courses force.

This is nice, as it lets you break down the challenges a piece at a time, especially on the longer holes, where you will probably only throw through one kink in the fairway at a time.

Many baskets are blind off the tee, but odds are you probably saw the basket through the woods while walking down a previous fairway, and thus have some idea of where you're aiming, plus the good signage helps.

Also, because this course is so compact, it has great flow, so you don't spend much time walking. We played this course after Silver, and Red felt like such a relaxing break after 3 hours of abuse. Red is fun without feeling ridiculously hard, though it is still quite technical and challenging.

This course has tons of trees, and several of the holes will have you scratching your head off the tee, including some tough right curving shots.

This course boasts some nice elevation (up or down) on a few holes, and has a tricky thread-the-needle shot over a small creek as well, on top of trees everywhere.

This course also offers a nice mix of long and short. Holes range from several under 300 to a couple over 500ft in length. Deuce opportunities are balanced out by tough 3's, and any hole on this course has the potential to trip you up if you're not careful, as the hole scoring spreads within our group showed.

Several holes were of this mold: Thread a maze of scattered trees on the wide fairway to the pin with bushy shule behind and on either side of it. Each one poses a different puzzle of which gap you want to shape your drive through.

This is a nice, broken-in wooded course with many very interesting holes. Also, it has easily the best drainage of the four courses here, so on a wet day, this is your best bet.

Red is relatively flat course, other than the large open hillside that a few holes play on. This limits the course more than anything else, because as far as wooded holes go, it delivers the goods.

This course is amazingly compact, which is impressive considering its length and variety, but also has its downsides. It seems like several holes are almost too close together. As you can often see another fairway through a narrow band of trees, its very feasible that an errant shot could end up shooting through the trees onto another hole, which could potentially be dangerous.

Also, the open hillside that you start in and return through towards the end has several problems. Firstly, you can see several baskets off the tee, so it can be a little confusing to know which one you are shooting at sometimes.

Also, hole 2 curves along the treeline and curves right into the trees past tee 3. Though there are a few trees there, an errant drive right on 2 could hit someone teeing off on 3, which is a big problem. Both holes are great, but perhaps a sign or something downhill from tee 3 doubling as a shield from fairway 2 wouldn't be a bad idea here, for safety.

Navigation gets confusing in one spot. From basket 12, go to your right through the woods to get to tee 13. Its obvious once you find it, just not easy to see through the woods, and because 13 has no sign.

The holes here will challenge you, and this course is a blast to play, perfect for a nice relaxing round, if you want more distance than the white course offers. However, I believe that the designers at Lemon Lake really learned alot with each subsequent course they put in, steadily improving their designs.

Right now, this course is the only one with all concrete tees and a real "finished" feel to it. But, as the other 3 catch up in preparation for Nationals, they will all increasingly outshine this course, IMO.

According to a sign on this course, Matt "Homie" Lovasko, a dearly departed local DG legend, once aced holes 2 & 3 of this course in the same round. That is an amazing homie story. When you are here, ask the locals about him, he lives on through their continual dedication as well as their "homie" shirts and discs. Ask a dozen of them and you will hear as many different stories about homie, all of them good.

Its just something that really stuck with me when we played here, what a wonderful group the locals are, and how they honor their dead friend is very indicative of that. On top of the four wonderful courses here, the locals are what makes Lemon Lake such a special place, truly deserving of hosting Worlds. I would not hesitate to go back here for several days, to play each course several times and hopefully do them justice.

One of the best reasons for this course is the possibility to play three rounds of 18 with different challanges on all three rounds. Alot of finesse is needed on the Red Course. Most tosses will involve trees in front, on the side, and pretty much all around you. Fun and challenging with long drives needed on 8 and 17 but most of the time you'll find yourself threading the needle instead of throwing a hammer.

TREES, yes this is also a pro but chop enough wood on this course and it gets annoying.

More opportunity to lose your discs on Red then on Blue but usually not a huge problem. Great course to practice up on the finesse shots.

good mixed of holes, some open, some well wooded, well signed, maintained outstandingly by DGC, picnic areas and gazebos for an all day trip

poison ivy, $4 parking for in state, $7 out of state (but worth it), went on a Wednesday in the morning and no one was at gate.

great 3 18 course location near the greater Chicagoland area. most of the holes there is little to no risk of throwing at others which is very rare. worth the trip.