Springwood Players' Course reviews
27
3
Player's Play 2+ years drive by
Reviewed:
Played on:Sep 5, 2013
Played the course:once
Pros:
Layout - Overall the course is what I call park style where the course flows a mainly public park setting with few trees and more open fairways.
The best thing about this course is a mixture of distances multiple par holes. You have everything from some shorter par 3's to some monster 1000'+ holes.
It's a predominant placement type course where the emphasis is on where you land not so much gaps you have to hit.
A solid amount of OB helps reinforce the placement shot challenge. There's quite a bit of it and you deal with it beginning to end.
The part of the course I most enjoyed was the 6-11 stretch. Some fun shots where some factors I'll mention in cons are less of a concern. It not only plays the best but is the most beautiful part of the course with some interesting features in play like willow trees.
There's a tad bit of elevation changes in the course with some shots off small hills and a few holes that play along slopes.
Course flows well and it's obvious where to go next most of the time. No long walks to the next pad.
Equipment - Brand new Discatchers and concrete pads that were generally sized appropriately for each hole.
Atmosphere - Really nice new looking park with some great facilities. Wasn't anybody else there really when I was there but with multiple baseball/multipurpose fields on the complex I'm sure that won't be the standard.
The best thing about this course is a mixture of distances multiple par holes. You have everything from some shorter par 3's to some monster 1000'+ holes.
It's a predominant placement type course where the emphasis is on where you land not so much gaps you have to hit.
A solid amount of OB helps reinforce the placement shot challenge. There's quite a bit of it and you deal with it beginning to end.
The part of the course I most enjoyed was the 6-11 stretch. Some fun shots where some factors I'll mention in cons are less of a concern. It not only plays the best but is the most beautiful part of the course with some interesting features in play like willow trees.
There's a tad bit of elevation changes in the course with some shots off small hills and a few holes that play along slopes.
Course flows well and it's obvious where to go next most of the time. No long walks to the next pad.
Equipment - Brand new Discatchers and concrete pads that were generally sized appropriately for each hole.
Atmosphere - Really nice new looking park with some great facilities. Wasn't anybody else there really when I was there but with multiple baseball/multipurpose fields on the complex I'm sure that won't be the standard.
Cons:
Layout - It's a predominant open and flattish course with only two real wooded holes. If you like technical gap hitting disc golf this isn't it. For me there isn't enough balance.
Now to the nitty gritty; in my honest opinion this course was an overreach by the designers. They wanted to make this a championship caliber course with multi-shot holes and an emphasis on placement while throwing at distance and in a way they suceeded. However, the course seems forced on to parts of the park disc golf just shouldn't be which causes not only non-interesting holes but safety issues.
For starters some holes play way to close to the road and parking lots while others play way to close to the fields in the complex. Not to mention you wrap around the fields going counter clockwise so RHBH & LHFH players have a high risk of fading towards the fields and roads. I don't think I'd be comfortable even playing the course if there were kids on the fields.
Secondly the spaces these holes near the fields and roads are crammed in to just seems inefficient and overly punitive considering the OB. I get this course was designed for top level players in mind but we all know the majority of the players will be recreational and unable to control their discs at a level necessary for this to be safe, especially since the shots call for long bombs.
They did put up some Mandos around the baseball field to try and force the issue but to me this is just a sign that the hole shouldn't be there.
I think the course could have been designed as a 9 holer and put in the area where 4-10 and 18-2 currently exists. You could of still had some multi shot holes within this without adding in the more dangerous shots on the course.
There's also a block of woods to the right of 18 that may have been used to give more balance however I don't know if this was usable so I'll excuse that.
To me instead of putting in the 1200' #8 this area should have been broken up in to multiple holes so you could keep more risky shots out as well.
In the end you have some good holes but some really bad and dangerous holes forced in to get from A to B.
Another issue I have is that even some of the better holes equate to throwing a big hyzer or anny over and over. That's most of the front 9 then the back 9 is throw super straight and don't fade left or right and go OB.
The first wooded hole (#2) on the course gives you a tight tunnel shot but it's possible to throw a big hyzer over the trees and championship level players can definitely simplify this hole extremely.
The second wooded hole (#15) has you throwing out of the woods but the fairway isn't discernible at present. I would of moved the pad farther up so you still have a gap you're throwing out of on this par 4 but not a pinball lane. If that was done you could of moved the basket for #14 in to the woods a bit and had a more interesting shot instead of another wide open boring shot.
There's other things that weren't great about this course like the overgrowth and briar coming way to close to a few fairways and greens and I honestly believe this stuff will be taken care of so I'm not going to put a lot of emphasis on it.
Judging from the overall design of the course I would consider a redesign that puts safety and balance at the forefront where as now it just seems like they ignored everything but trying to create challenge through hefty OB.
Equipment - No tee signs as of yet although this could be soon remedied. They used tape to put up the M's for Mando and it's already coming off although that may have been temporary and might end up getting something more permanent.
Where they poured the pads they left overflow concrete in the front and back of the pads which is not only an eyesore but a safety issue although again this is maybe something they end up taking care of they had just poured these pads.
Atmosphere - As I said I played this course when the park was mostly empty though I can see if some baseball games were going on you'd have a ton of people throughout the park and getting in your way. That would make what to me was a not fun round even less enjoyable.
Now to the nitty gritty; in my honest opinion this course was an overreach by the designers. They wanted to make this a championship caliber course with multi-shot holes and an emphasis on placement while throwing at distance and in a way they suceeded. However, the course seems forced on to parts of the park disc golf just shouldn't be which causes not only non-interesting holes but safety issues.
For starters some holes play way to close to the road and parking lots while others play way to close to the fields in the complex. Not to mention you wrap around the fields going counter clockwise so RHBH & LHFH players have a high risk of fading towards the fields and roads. I don't think I'd be comfortable even playing the course if there were kids on the fields.
Secondly the spaces these holes near the fields and roads are crammed in to just seems inefficient and overly punitive considering the OB. I get this course was designed for top level players in mind but we all know the majority of the players will be recreational and unable to control their discs at a level necessary for this to be safe, especially since the shots call for long bombs.
They did put up some Mandos around the baseball field to try and force the issue but to me this is just a sign that the hole shouldn't be there.
I think the course could have been designed as a 9 holer and put in the area where 4-10 and 18-2 currently exists. You could of still had some multi shot holes within this without adding in the more dangerous shots on the course.
There's also a block of woods to the right of 18 that may have been used to give more balance however I don't know if this was usable so I'll excuse that.
To me instead of putting in the 1200' #8 this area should have been broken up in to multiple holes so you could keep more risky shots out as well.
In the end you have some good holes but some really bad and dangerous holes forced in to get from A to B.
Another issue I have is that even some of the better holes equate to throwing a big hyzer or anny over and over. That's most of the front 9 then the back 9 is throw super straight and don't fade left or right and go OB.
The first wooded hole (#2) on the course gives you a tight tunnel shot but it's possible to throw a big hyzer over the trees and championship level players can definitely simplify this hole extremely.
The second wooded hole (#15) has you throwing out of the woods but the fairway isn't discernible at present. I would of moved the pad farther up so you still have a gap you're throwing out of on this par 4 but not a pinball lane. If that was done you could of moved the basket for #14 in to the woods a bit and had a more interesting shot instead of another wide open boring shot.
There's other things that weren't great about this course like the overgrowth and briar coming way to close to a few fairways and greens and I honestly believe this stuff will be taken care of so I'm not going to put a lot of emphasis on it.
Judging from the overall design of the course I would consider a redesign that puts safety and balance at the forefront where as now it just seems like they ignored everything but trying to create challenge through hefty OB.
Equipment - No tee signs as of yet although this could be soon remedied. They used tape to put up the M's for Mando and it's already coming off although that may have been temporary and might end up getting something more permanent.
Where they poured the pads they left overflow concrete in the front and back of the pads which is not only an eyesore but a safety issue although again this is maybe something they end up taking care of they had just poured these pads.
Atmosphere - As I said I played this course when the park was mostly empty though I can see if some baseball games were going on you'd have a ton of people throughout the park and getting in your way. That would make what to me was a not fun round even less enjoyable.
Other Thoughts:
I think it's great these guys had a vision to try and make something grand for the area but to me this was just a poor choice of venue. I sincerely hope what I perceived as huge safety risks turn out to not be so.
Overall I enjoyed a part of the course but the rest to me was not only boring but frustrating considering the issues that popped out to me. I don't recommend playing this course.
I also hope the people who put the work in to make this course happen don't take this as a personal judgement against them and the work they've done but instead as constructive feedback.
As another helpful guide and something I normally don't do I'll post the holes I think need to be reconsidered.
2 - move tee closer to the wood and prevent an over the top shot
3 - perhaps break it up in to smaller holes that lessen the chance of safety issues or remove this part of the course altogether
4 - the short pad to me is not a big safety issue however the long pad seems dangerous
8 - break this hole up in to smaller holes and perhaps use the woods on the left more after clearing out the overgrowth
12 & 13 - both seemed forced just to get you to the other side of the park. due to this i'd think about scrapping 12 - 17 altogether and not using any of that area of the park.
Overall I enjoyed a part of the course but the rest to me was not only boring but frustrating considering the issues that popped out to me. I don't recommend playing this course.
I also hope the people who put the work in to make this course happen don't take this as a personal judgement against them and the work they've done but instead as constructive feedback.
As another helpful guide and something I normally don't do I'll post the holes I think need to be reconsidered.
2 - move tee closer to the wood and prevent an over the top shot
3 - perhaps break it up in to smaller holes that lessen the chance of safety issues or remove this part of the course altogether
4 - the short pad to me is not a big safety issue however the long pad seems dangerous
8 - break this hole up in to smaller holes and perhaps use the woods on the left more after clearing out the overgrowth
12 & 13 - both seemed forced just to get you to the other side of the park. due to this i'd think about scrapping 12 - 17 altogether and not using any of that area of the park.
