Cottonwood Hills - Buhler Kansas

[bhj83]

Yep I actually played there last year and absolutely loved it. I would rank it higher than most KC non-private courses.

[Turbosnake]

[quote name='tnord' timestamp='1422037295' post='10804457']
don't forget to hit up Sand Creek just down the road in Newton.
[/quote]

if any of you guys are in town to play Sand Creek hit me up..... i am fortunate enough to live on the course

[tnord]

i played cottonwood yesterday for the first time, and I don't really care for it. there must be 8-10 holes with some sort of hazard that is very much in play that you can't see from the tee. total BS. giant mounds of long native grass right in the middle of the fairway, sunken bunkers behind elevated bunkers in the middle of the fairway, doglegs and elevation changes positioned so that you can't see them.

some of the holes are good, but more of them are bad.

i can't even remember how many times the four of us would hit tee shots and we'd all say "i think we're all safe, but who knows." then we'd go up to where our balls were and 3 of the 4 of us would be lost or in some sort of hazard.

i thought faldo was better than this.

[burniemac]

tnord I was the same way first time I played it. The more I played it the more I like it. What they have done since November when I played is amazing. The owner was talking about making some changes on a few holes.

[tnord]

give me half a day on a bulldozer and i could make that course 10x better.

i'll play it again because it's just down the street from me, and i might have a different perspective playing in a non-scramble format. but seriously....from a purely design standpoint, when you have a completely blank slate to start with, why the hell would you put in so much trouble that you can't see?

[burniemac]

I think it is a better course in non scramble format. I also have a yardage book which helped. It reminds me of the dunes you will learn where you can miss. The one thing I would like to see at Cottonwood is not as many blind tee shots. I think it is great from the back tees.

[tnord]

cottonwood is nothing like the dunes imo.

the dunes is hard but fair. you can always SEE what your options are. cottonwood you're hitting into an abyss and just guessing how to play the hole. i think we hit into the group ahead of us yesterday 3 times because you can't see a damn thing.

if you want to be aggressive at the dunes on holes like 6 or 14, cut the corner....have at it. but you can SEE the bunker you have to carry. you can SEE the fairway you're trying to hit into, and you can SEE the safe spot to play.

some holes at cottonwood are a total joke. the par 5 that throttles down to about 10yds wide, then you have a 200yd blind shot or a 110yd layup. give me a break. it might be around #16 or so the tree you can shoot in the distance at the end of what you THINK is the fairway is at about 320...great....that's your line. i hit it right down the middle of the fairway i could see, over the top of one mound of gunch, on what i thought was a conservative line. i get up there and there's a 50yd wide mound of crap right in the middle of the fairway with about 20yds on either side of it to play to.

i could go on and on.

a couple of the holes i liked....the one where you could at least see the green to the left over the big trees was good. there was a driveable par 4 with a long fairway left, or some crap you needed about a 260 carry and 300yd to the front. that was a good hole because you had to make a choice and commit to it, not take a guess and have a whack.

golf is like pizza, even the "bad" stuff is great, but there's just a lot of monkey business at CW i did not care for. it's not like it's because the course beat us up either, we shot -14 from the whites in a scramble, so we did just fine.

[burniemac]

Yes the dunes is hard and fair. I have played a couple of times with the wind blowing and greens fast that is was not fun. I think at cottonwood I have played it enough and with the yardage book I had a idea of where to hit it. I like the blind shots on some holes but I also don't mind courses like that. IMO the biggest thing with cottonwood is knowledge of playing it to get the feel. I hated it first time I played it.

[tnord]

but should you HAVE to play the course via yardage book?

my laser is wore out after yesterday and i still couldn't figure it out.

i don't mind difficult courses at all, or courses that have so much trouble you barely use driver. but I need to be able to see what i'm doing. i just spent a week in phoenix with a group of 30-3 index players and had a great time even at easier courses that tip out at 6200 yds and have a rating of 68. i hit one driver all day but that's because i knowingly chose to lay up to a yardage rather than trying to get it as close to the green as possible.

at CW without spending a few nights studying a yardage book you can't manage your round, or plan out how to play a hole at all because you can't see a damn thing.

player 1; what do we do here?
player 2; i don't know - travis shoot that tree in the distance, it looks like the line we want.
me; that tree is 250, the tree to the left is 320.
player 4; is there fairway on the line of the 320 tree? is there a bunker?
me; i have no earthly idea. i guess we'll all just hit driver because unless i hit a 7i to lay up off the tee, i can't see where we're going.

[burniemac]

Maybe the first time you play it. My skycaddie gets a workout there and at the dunes. At the dunes i have to use my skycaddie to remember where i can't cut corners anymore.

[ugsomlcfsesr]

[quote name='tnord' timestamp='1433252215' post='11673656']
cottonwood is nothing like the dunes imo.

the dunes is hard but fair. you can always SEE what your options are. cottonwood you're hitting into an abyss and just guessing how to play the hole. i think we hit into the group ahead of us yesterday 3 times because you can't see a damn thing.

if you want to be aggressive at the dunes on holes like 6 or 14, cut the corner....have at it. but you can SEE the bunker you have to carry. you can SEE the fairway you're trying to hit into, and you can SEE the safe spot to play.

some holes at cottonwood are a total joke. the par 5 that throttles down to about 10yds wide, then you have a 200yd blind shot or a 110yd layup. give me a break. it might be around #16 or so the tree you can shoot in the distance at the end of what you THINK is the fairway is at about 320...great....that's your line. i hit it right down the middle of the fairway i could see, over the top of one mound of gunch, on what i thought was a conservative line. i get up there and there's a 50yd wide mound of crap right in the middle of the fairway with about 20yds on either side of it to play to.

i could go on and on.

a couple of the holes i liked....the one where you could at least see the green to the left over the big trees was good. there was a driveable par 4 with a long fairway left, or some crap you needed about a 260 carry and 300yd to the front. that was a good hole because you had to make a choice and commit to it, not take a guess and have a whack.

golf is like pizza, even the "bad" stuff is great, but there's just a lot of monkey business at CW i did not care for. it's not like it's because the course beat us up either, we shot -14 from the whites in a scramble, so we did just fine.
[/quote]

I have to agree with this. Played it in college a few years back. Practice round and two tourney rounds. I could have gone back the next week and still would have had no clue where to hit it on some holes.

I think Faldo was trying to build a "real" golf course. ("Real" in my mind means tough for scratch players, and probably not the best course for 15 handicaps. Think Fazio, Dye, Maxwell etc) And I'm ok with a course making 15 handicaps shoot 100, and challenging scratch players. If I had to sum up Cottonwood in one word it would be goofy. If I had to use two words I would probably put an expletive in front of goofy.

[tnord]

that's a great point. it's pretty tough to even "learn" the course because you can't SEE it. it's not like you hit a tee shot, get up to your ball, then realize "man....i should have hit X club to Y spot next time." then on your next round you can try it out.

at CW you hit a shot, get up to your ball, and think WTF? then you come back to the course a month later and remember that you hated the hole, but you STILL don't really know what to do.

i had fun yesterday, and i'll have fun the next time i play it....i can enjoy golf anywhere. i'm sorry, but at least 1/3 of the course is poorly executed.

[tnord]

local rumor has cottonwood closed for good...again.

[bhj83]

Did it really? Facebook page would say otherwise (https://www.facebook.com/Cottonwood-Hills-1462831573968720/?fref=ts).

[tnord]

its back open...those rumors were just that.

[bhj83]

Ok, is it worth the play? Planning to head down to the Wichita area next month and it was on my short list. Would rather play PD but not sure I can get on there. Would be fine with playing Sand Creek again if I had to.

[tnord]

eh....maybe. not sure what they're charging these days. when i played it last year there are a handful of holes that i think are a complete joke. they're not just blind shots, they're blind shots with hazards waiting on the other side. one of the par 5s you end up hitting something stupid like 3w gap wedge gap wedge because you have no idea where you're going.

 

another one is blind and then the fairway spits around a couple of 20' tall t**** covered in gunch in the middle of what you thought was the fairway...and they're right in the landing area.

[dock4]

I played Cottonwood a year ago and I agree with TnLord. The course is gorgeous and is probably worth playing for that alone once. Of the 18 holes you have blind shots on probably 12-15 holes. It is weird to stand on a tee box and literally have no clue where you should aim. You will end up holding up a yardage book on the and pointing to where to aim based on that book. Then you hit the ball and you hope you guessed right. This also makes the rounds take a long time because you are never quite sure where to hit and find your ball. Then you realize your tee ball that you thought was down the middle is in fact in some gunch.

 

I am in no hurry to play it again but it really is a shame because it is a beautiful course but it needs tweaking to create natural landing areas etc.