Played an early morning round at Fairway Hills…took a chance on walking on, and lucked out.  It was only chilly this morning and not the “holy crap why did I wear shorts” cold I’ve managed so far this year.  Played with a threesome that were nice enough but unforunately, the concept of “ready golf” hasn’t yet hit them. One of the big problems of being a SGIC is when you get stuck with the folks that, while nice enough, give you the stink eye as you head off with them.

Fairway Hills (and it’s tougher sister course Hobbits Glen) went to bermuda grass for the tees and fairways several years ago; while it means they do great in our inevitable hot summers, bermuda is brown when it’s dormant (and it stays dormant until it warms up). You can play off it fine, but it’s brown. A week of nice weather this week means it’s slowly starting to go green but for now, it still has that redolent look of being brown.

I tried to explain this to the guys I was playing with but they were seemingly content believing the course was shoddy (it’s not).  Greens were in decent shape; I’d put this down to everyone in the region still recovering from their post-winter aeration/punching.

Fairway Hills is a very odd course; there are some short holes where you can make pars and birdies and a few holes that you could blow up (#5 and #16 for starters).  Overall, a nice day out (it was warming up nicely as I putted out on 18 while the threesome I played were arguing over something from 17).

Fairway Hills will never be my favourite course…it’s not walkable (too far between holes) and there are some holes that are backups waiting to happen (#5 being a prime example- a forced carry over a native wetlands followed by a layup to a tiny landing area and a third to an elevated green with trouble all around it).  But, they work with the First Tee and have a good set of forward tees for golfers new to the game.

Note to my fellow golfers: if you have a single assigned to your group, there’s a better than good chance that we’re not a homicidal murderer or some form of similar lowlife.  Just throwing that out there.