Shelby Rd. Baptist Church sits in a rural area about halfway between Muskegon and Ludington, MI. It's easy to get to, only about a 1/2 mile off of the US-31 freeway. There is a large chunk of property behind the church dedicated to an 18-hole DGC.

Generally speaking, the land used for the disc golf course is shaped like a bowl. The center/bottom of the bowl is thinly wooded, but the trees get thicker the higher you venture up the bowl. The course plays clockwise around the bowl, playing up and down it several different times as it progresses. One nice byproduct of a layout like this is that you could easily skip holes if you aren't looking for a full 18.

The course designers used the terrain well to create some nice holes playing both uphill and downhill. The elevation changes are not extreme here, but enough to affect things on many holes. Several baskets are perched on slopes - rollaways are possible! There are a nice mix of left turns, right turns, and straight fairways cut through the woods. This is a par 3 course, but there is enough technical challenge to partially make up for the lack of length.

The baskets are yellow banded DISCatchers - nice choice for the wooded holes. The tee pads are concrete - smallish but adequate. There were also trash cans at most tees, and benches at many tees. Some of the benches looked like they were brand new.

Several of the wooded holes here seemed a little bit too tight. The worst offender for me was #4, which plays 310' straight ahead through a razor-thin gap between tree trunks. I can see this problem being worse in the summer when everything is grown in. The rough in many areas consists of thick groves of shrubs and small spindly tree trunks, which often sit right next to the fairway. I would think that disc loss could be a real concern in the summer, and just the density of small trunks was frustrating at times when I visited in April.

Hole 12's tee pad is in play from hole 11's pad. I would like to see a tall fence installed next to hole 12's pad to address this. There were a couple of other tees that seemed a little bit close to the previous basket, but with the rough grown in it's probably not a big issue.

The tee signs could use some work. Those that were present were just a laminated piece of paper with the hole number, distance, and a rough line. Several were unreadable or missing entirely.

Although the course flows pretty well, a little bit of navigational signage would be nice too (currently none).

No kiosk, practice basket, or porta potty.

While there are plenty of decent holes here, nothing really stood out to me. This course does not have the nice views of Flip City down the road, and the large blue plastic trash cans (many of which were tipped over for my visit) and road noise detracted from the aesthetic a bit.

The photos here are a bit of a mess, because some of them reflect when this was only a 9-hole course. The map currently posted here also reflects that 9-hole era, although the current 18-holer does start at the same place.

Odds are you are checking this course out because it's so close to Flip City. Is this a worthy warmup for Flip? That probably depends on what you are looking for, and also the time of year. This course provides decent technical challenge and is unlikely to be crowded (I only saw one other group on a beautiful - if breezy - Saturday afternoon in April). In the summer, the thick rough will make this a more frustrating play overall but you might still be happy with a few of the more open holes. I enjoyed my round here. If the church were to widen some of the fairways, thin out the rough near fairways, upgrade the tee signs, and add a couple of extras I can see this being a 3.0 or 3.5 level course.

The course has a good amount of diversity in terms of flight paths.
It you like precision shots with little distance, this is a great course.
Fairly easy to find tees and baskets.
The tees and baskets are in good shape.

Extremely hard to find discs outside the fairway.
On either side of the fairway you will run into prickers and hardly be able to see anything.
There aren't any long holes.
This is a great course for extreme precision, but that's about it.

-very easy to navigate and there is a mailbox near the first tee with scorecards that have a map on them.
-nice baskets. the yellow band at the top makes them easy to see.
-very good variety for 9 holes. you throw uphill, downhill left and right.
-elevation changes on pretty much every hole.
-very good "fun factor"

-tee pads are dirt/sand. some of them are very bad. 6, 8 and 9 come to mind. hole 9 is a sweet downhill shot but the angle of the tee pad makes it nearly impossible to get a good run up.
-when I played, the grass reallllllly needed to be mowed.
-it is not challenging. I would guess that the longest holes are around 250'... which brings me to...
-distances are not marked. I would appreciate knowing the distance of the hole, but it isn't a huge con really.
-I didn't notice any trash cans on the course.

-very fun course with a lot of birdie/ace opportunities. I would like to play the whole course with just a putter.

-my favorite hole was 9. it is the longest hole there and very downhill.