Last Saturday we played a very enjoyable round at Gross National.
This was the third city golf course of our summer tour.
Here's the official description of the course:
Gross National Golf Club opened in 1925. It has gently rolling hills with elevated tees and greens. We rent riding carts, although many golfers enjoy walking the course. There are three sets of tee-markers on each hole to challenge all skill levels. It is a mature course with lots of old trees.
It hosted the 1964 USGA National Publinks Championship. The course’s location makes it readily accessible from Minneapolis or St. Paul with Interstate 35W marking the southern boundary.
A “great layout” is how most customers describe the course; another reason Gross has been considered “The People’s Choice'' for years.
It does have a "great layout" and I can see why it's considered the "People's Choice".
The course was in excellent shape. The greens were soft, smooth and fast. The "soft" and "fast" might seem like a contradiction in terms, but both were true because of the "smooth". Patrick, the guy who rounded out our foursome, said that the greens were rolled every time they were cut.
After our last outing at Ft. Snelling, I especially liked Gross' layout. On most of the 18 holes you could see the flag from the tee, and hit your drive as far as you wanted. In other words, there weren't any "hit the ball 150 yds then make a 90 degree turn to the right for the final 200 yds" holes.
There was not much sand, and there were only a couple of holes where water came into play. The course was plenty challenging by virtue of the mature trees lining the fairways.
My inability to hit a golf ball straight is enough to make most courses challenging.
When I see "challenging" used to describe a course I picture balls landing in water, hitting from sand instead of grass, and spending the day looking for balls instead of enjoying golf.
How was my play? In a word "crappy", I shot a 127. I was partially successful with my new method of sacrificing distance for the sake of accuracy. I've become very adept at sacrificing distance. I did hit about 10 out of 18 fairways, maybe more if you count the ladies tee as part of the fairway.
My short game remained short except for the times when it was long enough to carry the green. But then it usually went back to being short on the return trip.
My putting also let me down. That sounds better than "I putted poorly".
I should mention that my youngest son made an eagle on the par 5 10th by hitting a 5-wood 260 yds off the tee, and then a 6-iron 240 yds to about 3 ft from the cup. Ah, to be young, flexible and coordinated!
Although our weather limits the amount of golf we can play in Minnesota, I think we are a bit spoiled by the golfing value available to us. The cost for 18 holes was $32 - which, for the quality of the course I think is a real bargain.
We're on vacation next week. Next on the city course list is Theodor Wirth.
I'm also trying to learn a new swing, I'll have more to say about that on my next post.
