Please explain your choice in the poll. I may make a trip to one or the other, so I'm trying to decide which one to choose.

At this point, it has to be St. Louis with three courses having good PDGA Course Evaluations to only one for KC. That's your only relatively objective source for the moment.

www.pdga.com/course/eval/index.php (http://www.pdga.com/course/eval/index.php)

Oh yeah... the Evaluations would be a good place to start.

I look forward to the day when all of the courses in each city have been evaluated so that I can make a full comparison. Until then this data just shows that there are more active PDGA Evaluators in St. Louis than in KC. This is a good start, though.

I wonder if Waterworks and Rosedale are on anyone's agenda to evaluate?

I look forward to the day when all of the courses in each city have been evaluated so that I can make a full comparison. Until then this data just shows that there are more active PDGA Evaluators in St. Louis than in KC.




I agree 100%. With so few evaluations, and in its current state of progress (and with its leadership) the Course Evaluation Program is simply not ready for dissemination, and to be tied to the PDGA Course Directory.

As a St Louis resident I invite you to come here. We've freshly updated our existing courses and added a bunch of new ones. Come to the Open this May if you can, you'll play 4 great courses and use every disc in your bag.

As a St Louis resident I invite you to come here. We've freshly updated our existing courses and added a bunch of new ones. Come to the Open this May if you can, you'll play 4 great courses and use every disc in your bag.



What are the 3-5 best courses in St. Louis? Please rank them if you can. Thanks.

Souix passage, Endicott, Jefferson Barracks, Creve Couer, and Collinsville.

My favorite is JB but Souix Passage and Creve were redesigned after I left there this summer.

I really didn't care for swope or Rosedale in KC but Waterworks was nice. I havent played the new one but I heard it is sweet.

1)Sioux (not only because I just re-designed it) Passage has lots of Elevation and the par changes about 10 strokes from the A placements to the C's. Its open for the most part but the trees do come into play. Most well kept park in the county. Mach 3's.
2)Endicott is really woodsy. Lots of 50 year old dogwoods and maples(?). Chris Lang and Dave Mac design.New GDS Titan Pro baskets. Heavy Police presence here fyi.
3)JB located in the southern part of town was a Union Army Base. The course flows between 100+ year old hardwood trees. About 75 feet of elevation change between the highest and lowest spots on the course. They have the biggest league here in town and the most casual play, and the GDS Proshop is located next to hole 18's green.
4)Creve Coeur- huge lake here next to the course with a constant wind blowing over it. This dude plays around par 70 in any pin configuration. Really flat and long the sparse trees will cripple upshots. Course management skills are needed here. Good spot for weaker arms to break out rollers. DisCatchers.
Over the last few years our club re-organized and started re-vamping the courses. We have a dedicated crew at each course now and a Club Member base around 180 as of April 1. A lot of us were travelling and wanted to make St Louis a must see town in comparison to the ones we have visited.
Also, I really like KC. Those guys set the bar a long time ago in my opinion and anything we do is catch-up, but after next Saturday Sioux will have permanent tees and we will start on another project. Like most places it always seems like the same guys working everywhere, but our same guys total around 45 or so. Gotta go set-up some holes for a Tourney, hope this helps your decision.

What happened to my post?

I thought I made a long post in great detail, but cant find it anywhere.
1st off I would like to say that only Des Moines is in the running against St Louis for the city with the best courses.
Sure I'm biased, but the facts are still the facts.

I guess I'll give the head to head comparison again for the courses in KC that I have played. To KC's credit I have not played blue valley and from what I hear it could be their best. This could even the game some but if we count Festus( once we get concrtee tees) or centralia ( with or without the tees) fuuugetabout it!



Here we go:
Sioux passage will have to get the nod on Cliff drive or Water works.
With our 3-4 pins per hole, severe elevation changes, ( both up and down) and now pins tucked in the woods, it might be in the top 10 in the country. If we were to put all pins in the long and play the wild grass as OB,
I'd put it up against winthrope gold anyday.
SP is not a hyzer party any more, pure power could help you score, but putting is key as you will have less and need to hit most of them.

Next up for us is Endicott, unfortunatekly for KC they do not have a single course that compares.
Endicott in the winter is better than rosedale and swope anytime, in the summer add 4 or 5 strokes or more when in the long. Endicott is short on paper but with well defined fairways on the left, right and ceiling on most holes, techinical is the word. The greens are tricky and you will find out fast, how the trees in the 1st 1/3rd of the flight come into play more than you think.
At a glance it might seem easy to make pars here and they are if your not too aggressive off the tee, but birds are REALLY hard to come by without gunning for them off the tee and never come in bunches, if you start pressing the tough greens will eat you up and add strokes quick.
Most holes have a very fair fairway and if you've never been to bogoy world ( 11-13) its well worth the trip :D
Even if you combined all of the best 18 holes at rosedale top AND down under it would still come up rather short to Endicott.

On to Jefferson Barracks going toe to toe with Swope.
Swope gets boring fast and the holes are awfullly close to each other in spots, you can see people all over the course while your playing most of the holes.
Even Yellow rope cant help this match up :eek:
The pin locations at swope compared to JB are like comparing rosie odonnel to angelina Jolie(?).
Jb in full bloom with the elevation and Killer pin placements scores a first round knockout over swope and even rivals waterworks!

So now we have Creve Coeur up against Wyco.
The par 70 CC, requires more technical shots than one would think for what appears to be an open course. WRONG!!
There are 12 very demanding tee drives and at least 12 very damanding approaches of over 200, wyco might have 4 or 5.
Add the fact the hotties walk, run, bike and rollerblade by all day makes it worth the trip on a nice day.
Ask the columbia boys about CC and see what they think.
add any wind and CC is world class!!!

We have Quail Ridge, St Charles and Collinsville.
All 3 are great courses on great pieces of land that need only 1 or 2 hole changes, but I dont know any other KC course to compare them to.

Last on the list for us and the newest is Festus.
Plays to a par 70 with water OB on 9 of the 18 holes.
A nice mix of woods and trees up hill and down. Holes 9 and 18 both over a 1000' with the pins 30' from a big lake.
the holes in the woods along the 30' wide river are a scenic beauty, cant wait until summmer to see this baby in full bloom.

If we have to match up Sioux passage against Blue valley than Festus would go agianst Cliff drive.
The 700 foot backward walk, throws from on or too close to the road and improper spacing from pin to tee is enough to put cliff drive out of the race going up against almost any course we have.
Love the land, but in my opinion needs to be redesigned to at least flow. I believe no attempt was made for a front and back double loop. Its not that cool to wind up 3000 feet from your car on hole 9 if you want a world class course.

We have a course in Centralia which is about 1 hour from downtown,'It has 2 pins and 2 tees, the longest layout plays to 10,800 par 72 and is most likely the best disc golf course I have ever played and Ive played 397.
The only rival anywhere is Ozark Mountain, only Foundation park in Centralia is a picture perfect park with a creek, woods, elevation and very dense rough for those who play too aggressive. Both Ozark and Centralia will destroy average players.
Its one of those courses where 68 or 69 would be the hot round and par could win the event after 4 rounds.
Once we have a big event at this course it will have its place on the map and in history.

I think a Major is in order :D:D:D

I appreciate the details you've given us on the courses in your part of the country. Nothing wrong with being proud of what you've helped in making.

I'm really curious about these par 70 courses you mention. Chuck Kennedy has Scatch Scoring Averages on thousands of PDGA rounds but I think Winthrop has the highest SSA. It's only a temp course and the SSA was only like 68. Do you have any idea what 1000 rated golf would be on these courses? There is a spreadsheet you can calculate this with, without having to host a PDGA event.

I've alway heard of Vichy and Ozark Mountain when talk has come to "THE MOST DIFFICULT COURSE IN THE WORLD". My guess is that Vichy had the nod there, but that the course is no more. It sounds like you have several other courses that come close in difficulty when maxed out. I would be very interested to see a table of St. Louis courses with SSA's of 65 plus as these courses are virtually unrecorded.

KC's courses might not pale in comparison as much as you let on, though. I do want to visit St. Louis some day to see for myself. In KC's defense, Waterworks park is the most visually pleasing park I've ever seen. Wyco has many tricky approach shots when the wind is at it's usually pace. We just played a tourney there with the course set up like 8500 feet. Rosedale all long has some tricky greens to approach to. Down under might not be completely fair, but it's as fun as any course. Swope gold has some really fun, long holes. Cliff Drive has tons of variety and the flow isn't bad at all. Blue Valley will be the longest course in the world. Several other courses are in the works...

Perhaps the best course design in the KC area is at a private course called Ted's Dread. Unfortunately, the land is being sold and the course is being pulled.

The good news is that the last Red Bud Open will be at Ted's THIS COMING WEEKEND. Party starts on Friday, tournament is Saturday (all short pins and tees around pro par 60 first round with all long pro par 70 course second round), glow dubs Sat. night and hangout and recover from Sat. night on Sunday. More doubles on Sunday.

Come see this home-made masterpiece of a course. Check out the thread under "tournaments" for details on directions and such.

This course has been out of the spotlight because KC player have it so good without leaving town. Come see what everyone has been missing! You won't get another chance.

Here are the courses on file with SSAs over 70:

<table border="1"><tr><td> Mission Trails (Ball golf course)</td><td>74.5
</td></tr><tr><td>Roland Park SAFARI LAYOUT R1 (2005 LAFS Safari Championships)</td><td>72.6
</td></tr><tr><td>Winthrop Univ. Rec. Area Regular Hole 12 R3 (2003 USDGC)</td><td>71.6
</td></tr><tr><td>El Rio Golf Course Long tees R2 (2004 Tumbleweed Open)</td><td>71.3
</td></tr><tr><td>Ozark Mountain (2001 Ozark Open)</td><td>71.3
</td></tr><tr><td> </tr></td></table>

Chuck,
If Justin Bunnel is a 1020 player and he set the course record at 65 whats the SSA?

This was from the long tees short pins.

It's only one data point. If he shot a score that's average for him then the SSA will be about 68. If it was a hot round then the SSA could easily be over 70.

Dave,

Thanks for the detailed information. That's just what I was hoping for (even if you're not completely objective ) But if you've played 397 courses and designed a bunch then you know courses.

Here are the courses on file with SSAs over 70:

<table border="1"><tr><td> Mission Trails (Ball golf course)</td><td>74.5
</td></tr><tr><td>Roland Park SAFARI LAYOUT R1 (2005 LAFS Safari Championships)</td><td>72.6
</td></tr><tr><td>Winthrop Univ. Rec. Area Regular Hole 12 R3 (2003 USDGC)</td><td>71.6
</td></tr><tr><td>El Rio Golf Course Long tees R2 (2004 Tumbleweed Open)</td><td>71.3
</td></tr><tr><td>Ozark Mountain (2001 Ozark Open)</td><td>71.3
</td></tr><tr><td> </tr></td></table>



Didn't Mission Trails get pulled? Also Chuck, you may want to make sure that data is on a 18-hole basis. That Roland Park safari layout may have been for 21 holes.

Those numbers were taken from my "adjusted to 18 holes" column but it's possible they didn't report it as 21.

I'll ask Bill Geibel.

The Ozark Mt. Tournament included the course in Vichy, MO. Did it not? That couse got pulled, I believe. Before I could play it!!!!

Does the El Rio course exist in the same long set-up that was used for the tournament.

It looks possible that not a single one of these SSA 70+ courses are actually existing in their tournament layout.

The most difficult permanent course in the world with basket targets and marked tees is.....

The most difficult permanent course in the world with basket targets and marked tees is.....



Check the thread Highest SSAs Recorded (http://www.pdga.com/msgboard/showflat.php?Cat=&Board=Courses&Number=216301&fpart=1&PHPSESSID=). I just posted a list that I have (for up to Dec 04).

The most difficult permanent course in the world with basket targets and marked tees is.....



I think Renny Gold which was just played in Rounds 2 & 3 of the Frizzak Open last weekend. That is until we get upcoming event data on some of the new or upgraded courses around St. Louis we're hearing about.

I was originally leaning heavily toward going to KC, mainly because I had only heard of Waterworks. After Dave's detailed comparison I'm now leaning considerably toward St. Louis. Do any of you KC guys have anything you'd like to contribute?

I can't compare the two because i only played a couple St.Louis courses like 7 years ago, i don't even know which ones they were, but i wasnt too impressed. this was long ago though-so no merrit in that. St.louis is four hours closer drive for you though. And from what i am reading prior to this post, the courses sound sweet.

I am from the KC area and learned to play in KC and love all the coures there. Waterworks, Swope, Rosedale are the ones that i have played the most. Wyco i only played twice and that was at the KCWO last year. Waterworks is in my top five courses. Kansas city is a fun place. IF you decide to go there, let me know and I will tell you places you gotta check out.

Best Advice: can you do both? kc and st.louis. it is only a short 4 hour drive. and you can see lots of sweet courses.

The most difficult permanent course in the world with basket targets and marked tees is.....



I think Renny Gold which was just played in Rounds 2 & 3 of the Frizzak Open last weekend. That is until we get upcoming event data on some of the new or upgraded courses around St. Louis we're hearing about.




I take it Renny has permanant tees and pins for the gold configuration?

Yes. You can play Original or Gold daily.

Chuck,
I need to get a pdga event at Centralia soon.
I have a non sanctioned I could use at the end of the month.

Yes. You can play Original or Gold daily.



So as far as PDGA stats go, Rennaisance Park in NC is the most difficult course that you can play in regular everyday use? What is the length, SSA, and formula difficulty (foliage and OB) factor? Wasn't it 69.x? Do the pins stay in the "gold" setting? Is this park a favorite for many players? Perhaps there are too many great courses in North Carolina for this to be true.

Shoen,
Ozark is stilll there lurking under the hay fields.
It hasnt been pulled but also hasnt been maintained.
I did pull Akitas run and sold most of the baskets, It is much easier to clean up and would rank right up there with ozark in difficulty to par, but the par is only 55 with the course record of 51. Ozark is 70 with a course record of 62.
It was kind of strange to see the soring average of mid 70's and the SSA at 66 or something :confused:

Both will be used again, I may have to grease my grandfathers palm or send him to palm beach for a few weeks :D
LONG LIVE OZARK MOUNTAIN!!!

Here's the Renny scoop. You can play either course all of the time. Baskets are in both positions. Suggest using a map though since some fairways cross and holes are one number on one course and another on the other.
www.charlottedgc.com/renaissance.htm (http://www.charlottedgc.com/renaissance.htm)

Thanks Chuck,

Hey Dave... Where are Ozark Mountain and Akita's Run. Was Akita's Run in Vichy, or was that a seperate course althogether. I was told that Vichy was the most difficult course anywhere before it was pulled. Your saying Ozark Mt. is more difficult. I'm sure I have something mixed up here.

Both Ozark Mountian and Akitas run were on my grandfathers farm. He has 300 acres and 1 mile of river frontage on the gasconade river.
I could put 5 more courses on the property with no problem, we havent even went near the river or on top of the 2 biggest hills with the 2 biggest fileds.
Send me an email to [email protected] and Ill send you the goggle earth image link.

You should install google earth and rotate the picture to see the elevation changes!

frisbeepeacegirl,

Thanks for the info on KC. I've heard lots of good things about Waterworks. I'll keep it in mind.

BTW, congrats for your 2nd place finish at the Memorial! I just finished reading the DGW article. What a thrilling final few holes. Amazing that it came down to the last shot!

Went to teds dred, Had a good time, the food was awesome, The people were great, the land was prime for disc golf, but not really up to my design or facility standards.

If I were inviting players to the course from out of town who had to pay money to play, I would have at least taken 2 flags on each hole and made some sort of flat safe tee box.
Gravel tees with ruts, big hunks of wood at the front and 12" drop offs in front of the tees made my mind lock up :confused: after 4 or 5 holes
If my game would have been in tune and I playing better, I would have said the 1st round set up was OK, but the pin placements on the 2nd round were from something out of the twilight zone. (and I REALLY like tucked pins)


I have had so little practice lately that I couldnt focus on the 6' gaps while worrying so much about the footing on the tees. after 9 or 10 holes into the 1st round I didnt even bother trying to figure out exactly where the pins were.

Nikko had four 6's and a seven, lost 3 discs during the rounds and still came in 4th and cashed for $55.
He asked me if I would have been upset if he quit 5 holes into the 2nd round and I said no I didnt mind as he has been playig so pure lately I didnt want to ruin his confidence. He stuck it out and hopefully it helped his mental game to overcome such obstacles ( literally)

Anyway,
I still had a good time, promoted some of our new prototypes, sold a few discs and passed out flyers for the St Louis Open A-Tier on may 20-21st ( forget about whichita come and play our 4 courses.
I expect at least a car load or 2 from KC for this super tour event.

I visited St. Louis recently and got to play three courses: Endicott, Creve Cour, and Jefferson Barracks. I was very impressed with each course.

Endicott is a classic-style course. Set among mature trees, it doesn't play extremely long, but it is a good design that requires a variety of shots, and elevation changes come into play to some extent.

After playing Endicott, I went to Creve Cour. This course absolutely wore me down. It is LONG. It's totally flat. For it's length there is the right amount of trees. I think that it is fair, requires a lot of shots, and requires course management. It really made a believer out of me in the trend towards longer course design.

I played Jefferson Barracks the next morning. It was a great experince, even though I lost a disk on 11. Set among tall, mature trees, it was another great design, long but fair, good use of elevation.

I was very impressed with the courses that I played in St. Louis. I've not played any courses in KC, so I can't really compare the two, but I can say that you won't be disappointed with a trip to St. Louis.

1)Sioux Passage ...the par changes about 10 strokes from the A placements to the C's.



What is Par?

I'm planning a small Christian conference for about 25 people in one of these cities. The dates are Oct 20-22. I'd like to have it at a Christian campground or retreat center or a school or even a church. The facilities and the cost will be the deciding factor of which city I go to. If you have any leads with a place that would work please email me, Lowe Bibby, at Lyrhnc(at)gmail.com [replace the (at) with @.]

Thanks,
Lowe

Can someone rank the KC courses? I leave tomorrow for a trip there. I'll be in KC from Wed 10/18- Fri 10/20 and hope to squeeze in 4 rounds. Which 4 should I choose?

Waterworks is on the agenda for Wed. Then where?
Swope, Blue Valley, Rosedale, WyCo? I want to make sure I hit the best 3 left. What would you suggest?

Sorry for the short notice. I just discovered thtat I don't have as much info as I thought I did.

I've played these courses.
I rank them like this.

1. Waterworks
2. Swope
3. Rosedale up top
4. Olathe (pioneer park?)
5. Rosedale down under

Water Works
Cliff Drive (no concrete teepads yet)
WyCo (league Friday night @ 4:30)
Swope and Rosedale up-top = tied
Olathe (Prarie Center) under-rated...again!?!
Blue Valley (l-o-n-g, and worth a look if you have the time and a guide)
Rosey Down-Under

Lowe - PM me if you have any questions.

Water Works
Cliff Drive (no concrete teepads yet)
WyCo (league Friday night @ 4:30)
Swope and Rosedale up-top = tied
Olathe (Prarie Center) under-rated...again!?!
Blue Valley (l-o-n-g, and worth a look if you have the time and a guide)
Rosey Down-Under




I had the opportunity to play 5 courses. Here's my initial ranking before I do my full evaluations:

Waterworks. An awesome course. Definitely the best of those I played. Probably in the top 20 of the 170+ that I've played.
WyCo
Swope
Rosedale
Prairie Center in Olathe.

Before long I'll have more complete reviews at my google group, DG Course Reviews, [email protected]

KC has the better NFL team. :cool::o:D