V.A. is a nice big course. It has plenty of room to stretch out the long throws. There are a few precision placements that are needed. The rough is managed well and it's pretty hard to loose a disc in this stuff. Most shots are apparent and course layout is smooth. The course lends itself to a Pro format well with the long positions and has plenty of advantages for higher skill level players with different shot types. If you've got a roller, thumber, tomahawk, flick, and distance, you'll crush it.

It has a bunch of people in the way. The park itself is just busy with non-golfers. The hole layout can be kinda boring as far as intermediate play goes. The average player will throw a lot of the same shots over and over again and probably shoot around par with maybe a few birdie opportunities. I feel that by moving some of the distances either way would make for more varied scores. There were just a lot of 3.5 holes that made for a bunch of pars.

I'll be playing this course plenty more times. It is a good course. It should make me have a bigger arm and strive for some of the longer par 3's. It's probably wise to play during the week when less people are at the park.

-Good golf. Challenging holes with good length and a decent mix of wooded and non-wooded holes.
-Completing the course requires a variety of shots. Not just throwing hyzers all day.
-The roughs are generally not too bad. While they can be tough to get into, they are relatively easy to navigate underneath the "canopy".

-Navigating the course is terrible. While I'm sure it is easy for locals, if you're playing for the first time it can be pretty frustrating.
-This course needs to be better maintained. The grass was definitely too long when I played.
-Garbage cans were literally overflowing.
-I absolutely hate having two baskets in the ground at the same time at the same hole. If you want to play the longs, you may accidentally play to the shorts thinking that is the position.

There is a gem in this course. A little elbow grease and some better coordination and commitment from the parks department this can be a fantastic course. I did not see any next tee markers. Going from 5 to 6 is completely illogical and needs to be marked. Getting from 3 to 4 isn't immediately obvious either. Next tee markers combined with some signage can fix this. I'd also prefer to see a second set of 'short' tees at all the holes instead of multiple baskets for a few of them.

This course easily has a 4 or 4.5 rating in it, just needs a bit of work.

Concrete pads. Plenty of space for long drives. With exception of the first water hazard discs are easily found.

There are very few technical holes, most others are long fairways with a few trees here and there. I have never seen this course without the trash cans overflowing onto the ground. No signs showing the way to the next hole, bring a map!

The first hole has a bunch of fallen trees in the way. This course is for the player who wants to work on brute force drives and not finesse.

500' holes are a norm on this course so it'll give you a chance to work on your arm. It blends open space, hills and trees into a great combination of challenging holes. This course provides the rare opportunity to throw over the tops of trees while standing on the peak of huge hills...this is a shot you'll want to toss a few discs on for novelty sake.

It's a long course so wear your walking shoes. I would play this course again.

The pros could also be viewed as cons. There is more focus on the length of your drive and less on the precision of the placement.

The holes aren't marked very well either. I tagged along with a local which was the only reason I was able to find half the holes.

It's hot in the summer so bring water.

Clean. Safe. Looooong. Hole 1 as a signature for any course. Concrete pads. Great course for folks with cannonesque arms!

There were no discernible 'next tee' directional signs; so it was difficult finding where to go next. It would appear this is a former ball golf course; so there is a ton of walking between some of the holes.

Of the four courses in the Knoxville area my son and I played over a w/e trip this was the highest rated. Having said that, Admiral Farragut was more fun; however Victor Ashe is a much nicer overall park and 18 holes to boot. If you are a beginner this course is good in that you'll probably not have any problem losing a disc. Still, if you don't possess long throw skill you will take a lot of extra strokes as the course is very long.

The course is easily accessible with it being close to the Interstate. Great concrete tee pads (very large). Every tee had a sign which showed distance for multiple pin settings. Set in a very nice park. There were restroom facilities in the park, but they were not convenient to the course in my opinion. A decent blend of open and wooded and elevation changes. There were a lot of long throws required on this course. I think the longest hole I played was over a 1000 ft. If you like to add in exercise by walking, this is the course for you! Most of the course is away from walking paths and the main part of the park, so you don't have to worry too much about nailing pedestrians with a disc. There was a practice basket near hole 1.

As always, I hate to complain about a course, because I'm always thankful to have one, no matter what, since that's better than none! Having said that, there is a LOT of walking on this course. Not necessarily a bad thing, but it does get old and requires more time than usual to play 18. Not knowing where the basket is placed (due to multiple placement options on the tee signs) on blind shots could get frustrating. The layout and flow just didn't feel natural to me, but I guess they did what they had to, to get the kind of shots the designers wanted in the course.

I imagine this would not be a fun course in the dead of summer from 11AM -4PM. The sun/heat on the wide open fields mixed with tons of walking could be brutal. Luckily when I played there was a quick rainstorm and then cloudcover that kept things much cooler. When I played the fields had just been mowed, so I don't know if this happens regularly or if the grass gets knee/waist high before it is mowed again. If it gets that high, I can't imagine trying to find discs on all the blind shots. It would be nice if some locals could become course guides on the dgcoursereview website to help visitors navigate the course and current pin placements. I thankfully knew a local, so I was very fortunate to have a guide to show me all the tees and tell me where the pins were placed for the many blind throws. This is my main complaint, that without help, I could probably navigate with the map on this website, but more times than not you can't see the basket, and there is no indication on the sign/map which placement it is currently at (obviously you can walk up the fairway and find out, but the walking is already insane on this course). There seemed to be a lot of activity on the course, so chances are a visitor could find someone to tag along with. Hole 1 was pretty cool with having to throw a good distance over a pond. I'm not a great golfer, and can only throw 350-400 feet max (with little accuracy at that distance), and I found very few birdie opportunities for my skill level. All in all, I had a great time playing this course and recommend it, and hope to play it again sometime when I'm traveling through Knoxville.

- Good, not great, Innova baskets on every hole. They seemed to catch true and were all in good shape.

- Uncracked, long concrete pads on every single hole. Good launch areas all told. Very little mud around the pad on most holes, minus one or two here and there.

- Good signage at the tee pad itself to let you know how far out each basket was, and which direction. There was some down side to these signs, but I will get there later.

- OK variety in shots. Lots and lots of very long holes. Some shorter holes, but most of them were bomber holes. there was, 13 I think, a creative hole cut into the woods coming from the wide open.

- Tons of elevation change. Though it could have been used better, there are lots and lots of elevation change shots on this course. Loads of blind shots going down hill. Some more shots going uphill, but not as many as there could be.

- Awesome #1 and #18. 1 starts over a lake and 18 ends in the woods for a VERY hard techie type shot.

- Very nice park with lots of amenities. Though not many of those are near the disc golf course.

- Practice basket! Although I didn't see it until the round was over.

- Nice locals who helped me navigate this monster! Thanks guys!

- I'll start out with the most glaringly obvious con - The layout of this course is just plain TERRIBLE. Going from 2 to 3 makes almost no sense. 3 to 4 is just ridiculous. I would have never found 6 had some locals not stopped me and pointed me in the right direction. The walk between 14 and 15 might seriously be the longest walk I've ever made on a disc golf course, ever. Had it not been for the guys stopping me on 5 and making sure that I knew where I was going, there is absolutely no way that I would have found the hole. Maybe if I was leaving the course in anger I would have found it. This issue could be fixed by some signs here and there that say "Hole #6 this way" or something. But as it stands, I wouldn't go out on this course by yourself. And if I had to play it again, I wouldn't look forward to it. There is just so much distance between a lot of the holes that it almost makes the round not fun.

- while the signs at the tee pads are good, I wouldn't call them great. a few of the holes simply weren't where the signs said they were, at any of the positions. and since many of the holes were blind shots, this was super frustrating. I'm looking at you hole 15.

- many of the holes felt "uninspired", if that makes sense. many of the holes were just long holes in the middle of an open field type area. cool elevation change, but that was the only interesting part at all. and even the changes weren't used all that well.

This is an Ok course. I honestly wouldn't hustle out to play it again, but I wouldn't not play it again either. The layout is just so frustrating that it really killed the round for me.

I recorded a lot of this round in HD as I went, so please check that out here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DPo2MGkQoA

And let me know if the video helps the review. This is my third video review, and I feel like it helps give a better idea of the course. Etc.
Thanks!

What's not to like - playing golf, watching pretty girls walk dogs through the park, people fishing in the lake where you just threw two of your discs? This course has all the great elements- nice tees and signs, rolling hills of grass, challenging pin placements, elevation changes on most holes and did I mention the lake? Plenty of trees and thick shrubs make this a real challenge, causing you to THINK & SHAPE your shots. Most of the course is rolling grass & trees with only a few wide open holes and one in tight woods. Multiple pin placements will keep you thinking. Even when the course was beating me up, I kept thinking "wow I sure like this place!"

The brush can be thick and nasty with thorns awaiting you. The lake on #1 is not too forgiving when the pin is in long position (about 300' to clear the pond). Even if you lay up on the peninsula, you still have a difficult approach to likely get a bogey 4. The long pin on the right should be removed- though it makes a great pin position, the shore below it is a popular place for anglers and too dangerous! A few of the open holes lack trees or other good obstacles (#3-5). Hole 3 in the long position is a bit dull once you pass the first set of trees, and then it's literally wide open the next 700 feet- yawn. Many holes are really lacking "next tee" signs particularly holes 6,13,15 - these walks are also quite lengthy! Trash was a minor problem. Standing water between holes 5 & 15 after a big rainstorm. Finally, the long walks between 5 & 6 and again between 14 & 15 are just rotten if you are new and don't have a map - get a map!

No two holes were alike and you could tell the designers were really making the most of the land there! I feel an improvement of flow (or a few badly needed signs) and some improvement to the wide open holes would help immensely.

The length---8000-9000'---and the fact that much of the course is pretty open with rolling elevation, means those with big arms get a few chances to really air them out.

It's a beautiful place to play, with views from the high hills, and no development surrounding it.

Through some parts of the course it struck me as a 4.5 rating, but then.....

.....there are a number of holes which, while not bad, aren't particularly inspired, with mundane angles or trees to dodge.

Not a lot of shade, and a lot of effort involved, on an August day such as, for instance, my visit.

Hole 1 is great or terrible, depending on your viewpoint. Tee of high above water, throwing a RHBH hyzer to a basket on a slope on the other side, not terribly far away. A tough hole to judge and throw on your first visit; tougher still as your first hole; and I image quite tough for lefties or RH forehanders.

Thinking back on this course, and looking at my ratings of other courses, I was too hard on this one giving it a 2.0. I have updated my score.


Hole 1 is beautiful. It's a decent course. Not really that long, and when it is long, it's in the wide open. Nice park.

Not too much, it was a decent course as I said.

Beautiful park. Out of the 95+ courses that I have played, I would put it somewhere in the lower 1/3. Actually all of the courses that I played in this area were not all that great. I enjoyed Morningside the most, but at the same time, it was in a real ghetto area. But there were some real cool holes there. But Victor Ashe is the nicer park of the two. Group of locals showed me around. Enjoyed it.