This week I had to make a pretty impromptu trip to handle some executor shit for my grandma's estate. I decided if I was going to drive 20+ hours over a few days I could at least take a break and golf a little bit. So not being from the area I had to do a tiny bit of research on good local options. Here is what I ended up playing:
The first course was the Longaberger corporate course now known as The Virtues in Nashport Ohio. It is ranked as the #1 public course in Ohio. It was a fairly reasonable $80 tee time at 8:50am on Monday (booked Sunday night). The course was in good to really good condition. Pace of play was decent. The marshalls were pretty overbearing unnecessarily. But overall a real good day. I drove the ball better than I typically do and shot an 89 from the whites. This included 2 birdies on par 5s and played the par 5s in even total which I will take any day. My buddy who rode with me and typically beats me shot a 92 and ended up paying for about half of my round after side bets.
https://www.thevirtuesgolfclub.com/
Tuesday I was on the way back home and decided to just grab a course on the way. We ended up playing at the Brickyard Crossing course which is next to AND inside of Indianapolis Motor Speedway. It was $130 to walk in at 1:00 on Tuesday afternoon. The course was almost empty. The price did include a medium size bucket of range balls. I found out pretty quickly that this course was above and beyond most that I typically play. Just the driving range was immaculate. The course did not disappoint either. 6 holes out, you go inside and play 4 holes on the infield, and then back out for the last 8. The place was pristine. The only bitch I have is we paid, bought polos, filled up our range buckets, warmed up, etc. We get to the turn to the first tee and the marshall stops us. He is giving the standard fill in your divots, yadda yadda and then casually mentions its cart path only today. Why I ask? Its clearly not wet. It was a beautiful day. He explained on some of the holes they were resodding the cart paths so they just make the whole course path only. That would have been nice to know ahead of time. It ended up in the mid 90s and was pretty hot. The fairways and greens are expansive. It was pretty punitive to have to walk 70-100 yards to the opposite side and look for your ball if you sliced it off the tee and the path was up the left for example. Some of the rough was fairly lush and finding your ball was an issue at times. Lots of walking. It was a fairly short course from the whites with a semi reachable par 4 and under 500 yard par 5s.
Otherwise I loved the course. The cart was high tech. When you drove under the speedway it played a pretty cool hype video. Good bluetooth speakers. The halfway house was great after hole 9. There were coolers on most tee boxes with Smart Water bottles complimentary. The marshalls were all nice. The beer cart girls were extra impressive compared to most courses where they are usually pretty. Overall just a great experience. I again shoot an 89 exactly and beat my buddy again who shot 91. I only ended up $8 on the side bets though so not as lucrative as the day before.
https://www.brickyardcrossing.com/
Then it was a long boring 7 hours drive home arriving in the middle of the night after stopping for dinner.
Where else have you guys played on a whim? I pretty regularly drive all over the Midwest. Any pointers or tips?
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Originally Posted by Jayjami
