Wingate University DGC reviews
4
0
Wing it at Wingate 2+ years
Reviewed:
Played on:May 6, 2017
Played the course:once
Pros:
Uncrowded college campus course that offers a good mix of fairly open holes reminiscent of a city park combined with wooded holes and mixed, in&out of woods holes. So it's a smorgasbord of DG hole types. The distances range from fairly long, legitimate par 4 distances to fairly deuce-able for most DGers. The woods are very nice and natural plus a swamp comes a bit into play to spice things up.
You've got fairly descriptive tee signs and Innova baskets that are holding up.
There's a handful of really fun or clever holes here, like 1 is a nice starter hole, 18 is a really pretty, wooded par 3 finishing hole through some old trees and along a little creek and hole 16 is a gap hitter's dream playing in and out of the woods with a nice green alongside the swamp tucked around the corner.
You've got fairly descriptive tee signs and Innova baskets that are holding up.
There's a handful of really fun or clever holes here, like 1 is a nice starter hole, 18 is a really pretty, wooded par 3 finishing hole through some old trees and along a little creek and hole 16 is a gap hitter's dream playing in and out of the woods with a nice green alongside the swamp tucked around the corner.
Cons:
The rest is not much to toot horns about. Finding holes can be a bear, even with the map (biggest bugaboo for us was finding hole 4, head down the dirt maintenance road that goes around the swamp until you see an obvious gap in the woods on the left). Then you've got some long walks between holes that dampen the fun.
The wooded holes are really disappointing. Hole 4 is enjoyable but hole 5 is a goofy angled short hole that seems like a misuse of elevation. Hole 6 is decent but again, really short. Then hole 7 solidly disappoints by giving you no discernible fairway to begin your wooded Par 4. Poke and pray straight through the trees or upshot something up to that maintenance road and use it for the fairway? Then the green consists of thick, knee-high weeds in the open. Hmm. Seems like using the 5, 6, 7 stretch to make two higher quality holes like hole 4 would've been better than two blah holes and a hole that's a Par 4 to make up for a lack of proper fairway.
Hole 8 is...something. You immediately throw over a bridge, okay, through a tight tunnel of woods, uphill. This is another Par 4 but there really isn't an adequately sized landing zone and if you don't stay dead center on the fairway, you are up the proverbial creek. To mock you, there's a wide open power line right-a-way running parallel to this crazy straw fairway and it's very tempting to try and blast through the thick schule and forego the fairway altogether.
Hole 9 is alright, has a nice green with the basket perched on this little knoll in the field and gives you a nice, open field hole of relief to air it out after you've been bouncing back and forth from poison ivy roughs the previous two holes. I think you're supposed to play a gap along the treeline in a sweeping hyzer fashion but you can easily just throw over that parked trailer and the honeysuckle as the crow flies to the basket. Even then it's still a tough deuce if you don't have a fairly big arm but it's a much less stupid angle and an actual Par 3 that way.. Finding the next hole after this one can be tough, unfortunately you may wish you never find them (take a right after the basket back towards the woods).
Holes 10 through 13 are basically more tight, crazy straws using a gravel maintenance road as a fairway. You're surrounded by thick woods and you'd think you could carve out some cool holes through them so these just seem like super lazy design. Hole 11 isn't too bad though, the FW is at least adequately wide compared to length and is a basic flick hole. But the others feel like throwing down somebody's unkempt driveway, oh joy.
Hole 14 and 15 use a power line right-of-way. Wait, this option was on the table? Then why the Hell does hole 8 exist?! Hole 14 is an open deuce or die hole, kind of fun. Hole 15 is longer but what the hell is the tee sign doing over there off to the right side? Who wants to tee at a 45 degree angle to the fairway? I thought the tee sign locale of hole 2 was a mistake but now there's a trend. This smacks of Schwarz. More unused power line right-of-way that could've been used to make a proper dogleg just sitting here, curiously.
This course has natural tees. This isn't a huge con on the holes that are basically on flat lawns. All of the wooded holes however means ruddy, uneven, root covered ground, possibly muddy, with generally no place to do a run-up. At least none of the stupid tee locations are permanent.
The wooded holes are really disappointing. Hole 4 is enjoyable but hole 5 is a goofy angled short hole that seems like a misuse of elevation. Hole 6 is decent but again, really short. Then hole 7 solidly disappoints by giving you no discernible fairway to begin your wooded Par 4. Poke and pray straight through the trees or upshot something up to that maintenance road and use it for the fairway? Then the green consists of thick, knee-high weeds in the open. Hmm. Seems like using the 5, 6, 7 stretch to make two higher quality holes like hole 4 would've been better than two blah holes and a hole that's a Par 4 to make up for a lack of proper fairway.
Hole 8 is...something. You immediately throw over a bridge, okay, through a tight tunnel of woods, uphill. This is another Par 4 but there really isn't an adequately sized landing zone and if you don't stay dead center on the fairway, you are up the proverbial creek. To mock you, there's a wide open power line right-a-way running parallel to this crazy straw fairway and it's very tempting to try and blast through the thick schule and forego the fairway altogether.
Hole 9 is alright, has a nice green with the basket perched on this little knoll in the field and gives you a nice, open field hole of relief to air it out after you've been bouncing back and forth from poison ivy roughs the previous two holes. I think you're supposed to play a gap along the treeline in a sweeping hyzer fashion but you can easily just throw over that parked trailer and the honeysuckle as the crow flies to the basket. Even then it's still a tough deuce if you don't have a fairly big arm but it's a much less stupid angle and an actual Par 3 that way.. Finding the next hole after this one can be tough, unfortunately you may wish you never find them (take a right after the basket back towards the woods).
Holes 10 through 13 are basically more tight, crazy straws using a gravel maintenance road as a fairway. You're surrounded by thick woods and you'd think you could carve out some cool holes through them so these just seem like super lazy design. Hole 11 isn't too bad though, the FW is at least adequately wide compared to length and is a basic flick hole. But the others feel like throwing down somebody's unkempt driveway, oh joy.
Hole 14 and 15 use a power line right-of-way. Wait, this option was on the table? Then why the Hell does hole 8 exist?! Hole 14 is an open deuce or die hole, kind of fun. Hole 15 is longer but what the hell is the tee sign doing over there off to the right side? Who wants to tee at a 45 degree angle to the fairway? I thought the tee sign locale of hole 2 was a mistake but now there's a trend. This smacks of Schwarz. More unused power line right-of-way that could've been used to make a proper dogleg just sitting here, curiously.
This course has natural tees. This isn't a huge con on the holes that are basically on flat lawns. All of the wooded holes however means ruddy, uneven, root covered ground, possibly muddy, with generally no place to do a run-up. At least none of the stupid tee locations are permanent.
Other Thoughts:
If this is the redesign I'm glad I missed the original. By the by it's not a terrible course at all but it should definitely not be mentioned in the same breath with hardly anything in nearby Charlotte. Widen some fairways here and there, suss out proper tee locations for some, beat Nature back a bit so that the immediate rough gives some recovery options and you'd have a generally fun course. This course needs a dedicated group of locals that know what they're doing to tweak and maintain it before it can be moderately close to a 3-star course or better. Worth a round or need a change of pace if you somehow have played everything nearby to death, sure.
