West City Parks disc golf course, also known as Larry G. Crites Memorial, is a long 22-hole course that combines long open shots with narrower fairways through varying degrees of woods. This course will really test your driving distance to make par on many holes, and is not set up to be a fun time for new players.

Location of West City Park is a few minutes from I-55, making it an easy stop while on the road. The course is located on the drive that's all the way on the north end of the park; some reviews made it sound like this little parking lot and drive weren't accessible to cars in the past, but it seems to be now. There are plenty of gas stations and food options as well in case you need to stock up before what will be a decently long round at West City. Course baggers will enjoy the proximity to Jokerst Memorial Park, which is a great stop if you want a round of golf that's shorter, or, you know, more fun than West City. For a day of disc golf, Hillsboro and Grace Way are 9-holes nearby, as well as St. Louis as a whole. Going south, courses are present but more spread out south of Woodsy Bogler.

Park Amenities are plentiful across this expansive park. There are multiple playgrounds and bathrooms, including a port-o-john by the start of the course. There are also plenty of pavilions and ball fields, including a nice baseball/softball complex across the street. My friend and I noticed some mountain bikers along the tail end of the course by hole 23, but other than that, there doesn't seem to be too much overlap between disc golf and other park uses with few exceptions.

Course Equipment is a mixed bag on this course. The baskets are Gateway Titans, and while some were tilted, they're overall in good shape still. THere are concrete tees for the most part, and were nice to throw off of. There's varying signage on the course; some nicer laminated signs for the "big guns layout" include a detailed picture of the hole layout, distances, and pars, while other older signs had pars, distances, and a basic to non-existent layout of the hole. Some holes also just got a hole number. At least one basket had a directional sign on the bottom of the basket to the next tee, something that could be useful elsewhere on the course as well.

Course Design at West City has some variety to it, though the vast long fairways will be what you remember after your round. With three par 5s and several other par 4s, this course will give your arm a workout.

Shot-Shaping isn't something explicitly required on most of the fairways, but will come in handy at times. The wooded holes such as 14, 16, and 17 will require particular angles to get down the fairway, and hole 12 is an uphill shot that will reward you if you can manage a right ending shot at that high angle. Hole 3 is a RHBH hyzer that is well guarded. Hole 21 is the opposite with a right turning shot. Some other holes like 7 and 15 don't necessarily require a particular shape but rather simple accuracy to miss trees around the fairway. Most holes, however, are pretty open and will simply reward distance.

Distances are, well, distant as a whole on this course. 9 holes top 400 feet, with your par 5s coming in at 859, 718, and 679 feet respectively, the later two involving a hill on the green. The wooded holes are mostly shorter, with 12 being the shortest at a mere 97 feet (plus elevation), but as a whole, the 9,009 feet this course is listed at feels like an understatement.

Elevation is not robust in this park, but the hill between the upper and lower portions of the park and disc golf course really makes a difference for the six holes that play along or across it. Holes 3, 4, and 20 play down, especially 4 and 20 (ayy), making for some of the more fun tee shots you'll find here. The other three holes finish uphill, adding some pepper to your approaches. Hole 2 slightly plays downhill to start, and Some of the wooded holes have some slight elevation. Other than that, it's a flat course, with that singular hill across the middle of the park pulling its weight.

Difficulty Level at West City is decently high, making it a not-so-great option for newer players. The long fairways throughout the course combined with the tight wooded shots mean that anyone who can't both throw long drives and accurate wooded shots is going to have a hard time on some or all of this course. Jokerst is much more forgiving and a great place to learn the fundamentals before graduating to this course.

Course Highlights for me would be holes 1 and 4. Hole 1 was a fun start to the round, being nice and open, with some challenge coming in throwing around the pond. Hole 4 was definitely my favorite tee shot, with the downhill drive off the tee down a narrow gap in the trees into a more open field.

Course Equipment at West City needs some TLC badly. The older tee signs really don't have a lot of information, with some only having a hole number. The newer signs for the "big guns layout' are nice but didn't seem to be consistently present. More permanent signs that aren't taped to the older ones would be great, along with more directional signs. Some of the basket sleeves are also in need of some attention; hole 4 was the worst culprit with what had to be an almost 45 degree slant.

Navigation will be a big challenge without Udisc, and while Udisc is useful, newer players might not know about it. I like when a course can easily be navigated by a brand new player who just picked up some Innova DX plastic from Dicks Sporting Good or Walmart, and this course does not have that. Multiple transitions have numerous white signs in view, and some of the wooded transitions are far from obvious as well.

Missing Equipment on holes 18 and 19 really make for the worst of my previous two points. Hole 18 is missing a basket, and hole 19 is missing a tee sign. With 18 being along the creek, this is a really bad spot for anyone to decide to throw blind. Hole 19 is also a tight wooded shot in the opposite direction up a hill, but with no tee or sign, you'd never know about it without Udisc. This is apparently one of four newer holes added to the original 18 hole layout, and it seems like they decided to not finish building it.

Proximity To Other Park Amenities is not a big problem at West City, but the pavilion along hole 1 and the path behind hole 2 are two areas where you might want to keep an eye out for other park goers.

Flooding is an apparent issue for the lower section of the course based on older reviews, and the fact that Udisc has a layout specifically addressing the flooding. The lower section of the course is surrounded by a creek, and the west half of this area seems to get the worst of this flooding when it happens, with sogginess hanging around long after storms. Watch the weather leading up to your round here.

The 4 New Holes, being 6, 7, 8, and 19, don't add anything new to the course other than one somewhat challenging tee shot off 7, relatively to extremely open shots on 6 and 8, and an incomplete wooded hole for 19. Not much value is being added by these 4 holes on an already long and monotonous OG 18.

Fun: this course doesn't have much of it unless you like throwing a large number of bomber shots during your round. This course on average is long open shot after long open shot until you get to the wooded holes, most of which either don't have a clear fairway, have an unreasonably shaped or tight fairway for non-advanced players, or just don't have equipment present. Then more bomber shots to end your round. Some courses make for a fun round despite outside negative factors. This course seems to have the opposite problem.

This course should be good when looking at it on paper, and has enough dedicated land with just enough variety of tree coverage and elevation to make for a fun 18. Somewhere across the large portion of land this course uses is the makings of a fun 18 hole course, I just know it. Instead, we have ourselves numerous long and wide open fairways, wooded shots that are much more likely to be frustrating for the average play than fun, and poor or missing course equipment throughout the course. The more I write about this course, the more I want to rate it even lower.

I think the course is disappointing mainly because it could be great. There's more than enough land to make some fun holes of disc golf, and the fact that they could (apparently almost) afford 4 extra holes of equipment tells me there is, or at least was, a budget somewhere that could have been used to add signage to help with some truly horrendous flow issues with the navigation. Your flooding bypass layout on Udisc still includes some of the lower area. If that part doesn't flood, why not just leave the other part unused? You have plenty of trees in the lower portion and woods in the east portion of the park, so why not try to use those more and clear some fairways better? Is there a budget with the local club or parks department for better signage? So many questions, to which I don't expect nor really care enough to get an answer for as someone who lives 45 minutes away but also lives closer to many better courses.

The 3.43 average rating left some hope for a fun round, but this course was the most disappointing disc golf experience I have had since owning an Innova Groove. I think the most telling thing about this course is that among the various amenities listed on the parks and rec page for this course, disc golf is nowhere to be found. The park

Until this course gets investment, I don't want to think about it anymore. Come here if you want the review votes or course bagging checkmark. Otherwise if you need 18 holes to play, play Jokerst twice.

FANTASTIC challenge. This course has every shot you can think of. Long, short, up, down, flat, left, right, into and out of (even through) trees, over water, it's all here. Save for the RHBH hyzer bias, it's all there in good balance too.

Pin placement is superb.

The lake in the middle, the creek around the back side, the cliffs, the trees - a good looking course in the dead of winter, but its got to be gorgeous when everything is green.

BIG park, so golfer traffic shouldn't be a problem.

POPULAR park, so pedestrian traffic WILL be a problem, especially on hole 1, which basically plays directly into and against the flow of foot/vehicle traffic.

DESPERATELY needs signs to point you towards parking near the first tee, (because the park IS so big and there's 2 or 3 lots between the entrance road and where you need to be) and you'd better hope that particular pavillion isn't being used or you're parking at least 1/8 mile away.

"Pads" are dirt marked off by painted iron ingots (fair enough, no money for concrete), but there's no markings whatsoever for holes 1 and 9, just tee signs.

Most tee signs were missing the bolt to mark A or B pin placement.

No signs to send you in the direction of the next tee (remember, BIG park).

Only one set of benches/porta-john for the entire course. For a layout that can reach 9740 feet, that's unacceptable.

....And you'd better hope you can hold it if someone is using THAT pavillion too.

I think I counted 4 trash cans for the entire course. The park management is practically begging you to litter.

The sign marking the road (National Guard Drive) to turn in at is set 50 feet off the road and behind a tree; completely hidden and useless, especially if you're coming from the east. Go in the other entrance and you'll be driving the wrong way down a 1-way street.

The sewage drain/culvert coming from the creek and going into 4's fairway stinks like holy hell, and it's probably a biohazard.

The park is also apparently a regional depository for goose shit. It's EVERYWHERE. Disinfectant (Lysol?) and hand cleaner of some kind is VERY highly recommended.

Quite possibly the best course design i've ever seen, paired with absolutely abysmal facilities and integration into the park.

Simple and cheap upgrades (of the signage alone) will earn this course another disc...

UPDATE 2/8: according to St. Louis Club website comments, concrete pads have been installed.