(0.930 Rating) A supposably 2 tee niner playing through grass fields, woods and parking lots.
- DANGEROUS DESIGN - I felt inclined to start this review with the cons. The Cons far overshadow any of the good that was achieved here. Much of the layout plays along, and even through, parking lots. Tee (2) is in the middle of a busy church complex entryway road. Hole (4) is 90 percent a parking lot and the tee shot has the potential to hit cars coming up a secondary blind access road. Hole (5) is also 90 percent a parking lot with blind spots as well. (6) throws over parking areas and tees from an access road as well. Just about every hole here has issues. I would put the level of unsafe design into my personal top 15 out of 645 courses thrown as of this review.
- AMENITIES - There are baskets… That's basically it for purchased course related amenities. The tees reuse existing paved areas and are both great and bad at the same time. The great part about the tees is the near unlimited size. The bad part about them is that the indicated locations are roads and parking lots. There is no tee line and they are not numbered. No benches, practice basket or alt placements. Supposably there are alt pads, but I only found 1 of them. Note, I wasn't looking for them. There are also porta-potties on the property.
- SIGNAGE AND NAVIGATION - My phone died midway through the round and this is not a good course to have this happen on. No course map, no tee signs, no numbering anywhere. I struggled to find my way around. I think I played it right to finish the course, but who knows.
- NATURAL BEAUTY - I scored this aspect much lower than what was achievable. I don't get excited about throwing over large expanses of asphalt. It looks drab in addition to the near certainty of scraping up one's discs.
- HOLE VARIETY - The play variety at Valleydale is actually one of the stronger aspects, but the average course will still change it up more than here. There are some ups, downs, longer plays, chip shots and left pocketing shots. It felt like decent parkstyle play and all, but the hole variety is not in the same league when compared to the top courses in Birmingham.
- TIME PLAY - On paper, I was thinking 20 minutes, but it took more like a half hour. The course loops around the edge of a 25-acre church complex. There could be some searching on errant discs and the tees are hard to spot as the painted markings are flush with the ground.


Pros: Counts as a played course
- GAMEPLAY FOR A NINER - If one is able to ignore the built environment and the thought of scraping one's discs off the pavement, there are actually some decent shots here. I thought (5) was a neat upshot with the basket perched on a bluff. Sure there are a ton of safety hazards on the hole, but I got a mini adrenaline rush watching my sky hyzer dive bomb inside the circle. (6) was a cool valley shot too, but I had to tee from an alternate spot as there were too many vehicles in play. (7) thru (9) are all decent park style plays with the basket tucked into a pocket.
- TEE SURFACE AND BASKETS - The tee surfaces are great, which are endlessly long James Conrad approved asphalt pads. The pads are marked using a church logo, but as noted, they are not numbered. The baskets are respectable MachVs.

The Valleydale Church course should have been a whole lot better. The property does not appear to have been fully used and the conflict areas along the west side should have been avoided. A 2.0 level course should have been achievable on this property with similar budget constraints. As is, I'm going with a mid 1.0. The flawed design was the biggest influence on my rating score and I think that would be the case for many others as well. Those that don't care about safety would likely score the course higher than I have. I haven't played too many courses like this one thankfully. Somewhat similar courses I've played include The River Course near Columbia GA minus the water, Bay Oaks in Fort Myers FL minus the flatness and Carson-Newman north of Knoxville TN, which was recently RIPd. No one should go out of their way to play here. I wouldn't even encourage Birmingham players to check it out unless they feel the need to play every local course once.

The Valleydale Church is a nine-hole offering with so many parking lot fairways and interfering obstacles that creating a course here is akin to the unpardonable sin.

The baskets are Mach 5 and seem to catch well.

Holes #6 and #7 are a decent design; the baskets are on a nice grassy area and far from pavement. This is a section of the property that should have been utilized more and included additional holes.

Also, the church features the nicest bathrooms I have experienced in relation to a disc golf course. If you enter the upper lobby near the Hole #1 tee area, you'll see a nice Welcome sign and directions to the restrooms, which were large and in pristine condition.

The design is a disaster. Nearly every hole involves throwing from the parking lot and several of the fairways are nearly completely over pavement. I scuffed two of my drivers in the parking lot during my nine-hole round.

In addition to the prevalent pavement throughout, there are plenty of other issues. The Hole #1 basket is literally on the tree line. The Hole #2 tee area is on the entrance road and significantly slanted, making footing challenging. Holes #2 and #3 appear to be in transition and are full of tree debris, making traversability difficult. Hole #4 is nearly 300 feet over pavement, and with prickly bushes lining the road, there is very little room to land a disc safely. Hole #5 requires throwing over the parking spaces and then up a steep hill lined with bushes with little room behind the basket. Hole #6 prompts driving safely to the left to avoid throwing directly over parked cars. Hole #7 includes passing over a four-foot-high chain-link fence. Hole #8 goes over the parking lot for a couple hundred feet and then has some very rough areas along the tree line on the left. Hole #9 involves throwing along the parking lot boundary into the edge of the woods, which is not cleared out well.

Navigation would be nearly impossible without a map. No tee signs. There are no hole numbers near the tee areas. There are no navigational cues. The only indication of a tee area is a small, white depiction of the church's logo and an arrow painted on the pavement.

The course wouldn't be safe to play if there are many individuals using the church grounds. Even on a weekday morning, there were numerous vehicles parked near the church when I played.

The only thing worse about the design is the course trying to masquerade as an 18-hole layout. It's not. It's nine baskets with alternative locations, which might be necessary to utilize if there's occupied parking around the church due to activities and events.

The course starts near the upper lobby doors – look for the church logo painted on the road as part of the drop-off oval that includes a portico. Holes #2 and #3 are in the woods down the hill and closer to the main road, and then starting from Hole #4, the course winds around the church in a clockwise manner.

The Valleydale Church course needs to burn in hell. No amount of prayer will save this awful, wicked and disc-gouging design.