The course was renamed "The Virtues Club" in 2016 as part of the sell-off from the Chapter 11 (or is it 7?) Longaberger basket company. Their basket-shaped corporate office is still for sale, btw, if you want to buy it.
My daughter played a Hurricane Junior Tour event there. Her tees were a combo of the white and the gold, and it measured just a shade under 5800 yards. I'd previously played the course in 2007, when I knew substantially less about golf course architecture than I do now.
(She'd shoot 81, 75 to tie for first, losing in a playoff on the first hole.) Like virtually every junior tournament, she walked (with a push-cart), and it was nearly 90° both days and the Friday we drove in a cart to play a practice round. They shuttled the kids only from 9 green to the 10th tee.
She, and every other kid, survived.I played it again the day before her event, so she could see the course. The day I'd reviewed the course in 2007, it was quite windy: 8 played into the wind, as did 13 (diagonally, but into). That must have meant a northwesterly wind, I believe. Pretty common in this area.
I played one set of tee markers up from the back, at about 6700 yards, mostly because I didn't feel like driving backward if necessary while my kid was playing 100 yards ahead of me or whatever. I wanted to be able to hit my shot and help her figure out the course by walking quickly to her tee box.
My thoughts, in order of the holes…
1. I hit a 3W and was close enough to the tree that driver definitely would have been a bad play. I don't understand the comments about how the tree is unreachable - from the back off the back tee box it was 283 to the tree.
2. A fun hole with a nice "NASCAR" banked side board for the tee shot. The green here is narrow, and being left ain't so great. A solid but relatively unspectacular hole IF you can figure out your aiming point off the tee (oh how lasers have made golf simpler, particularly on new courses).
3. See above note about lasers. I hit driver and had only a partial sand wedge. Not great, not terrible.
4. Oy. I remembered hitting driver before, and my daughter said it was 280 to some guys in their carts. Well, either I turned into Brooks Koepka momentarily or she did something wrong, as the play here was probably a hybrid off the tee. I flew it over the cart path and through the fairway long. But if you find the fairway, you're faced with a long iron shot to a very shallow green with water short and what looks like death long, so… you lay up with a sand wedge, so you can hit another short pitch after that? Kinda dumb. I liked this hole in 2007 when I wasn't as long a driver, but don't like it much at all today.
5. A solid but unspectacular par three, with no real good place to miss it.
6. A fun short hole. I drove it well here and had 65 yards from the top left part of the fairway. The green has some great contours.
7. A solid par five, where the right side gives you the better angle, and the layup can be complicated by some land movement/side slopes. I don't get the people bagging on this hole - I thought it was solid, good.
8. Controversy! I drove it through the left fairway into the rough just short of the water and had a partial SW to the green. Hit that to two feet. My daughter played up the right side and had a wedge from about 100 yards downhill, from a slight downslope. I have never really seen a ball stay up on the steeper parts of this hole's fairway. Maybe if they haven't mowed for awhile. Play it right and it'll roll for awhile, and to the left, too, where it's a bit flatter.
9. The best par three, by a mile, at the course.
10. A solid par five… except that virtually everyone will (and should) probably lay up. I tried to bust one up the right side but caught an iron leaf on the last tree and had 220 to a narrow target. I laid up with a 7I.
A foot to the left and I'd have had a 6I, though, and likely gone for the green.
11. A good hole in that you're not sure how much to bite off. I might like it more if they mowed DOWN the reeds and tall stuff in the marshy area so you could see the "cape-like" nature of the tee shot. As it is it was nearly blind. I hit a 3W at the slope and had a 75-yard shot in. The green is partially hidden by the hill on the left. A well routed short hole, IMO.
12. Blah.
13. A long hole when it's windy. Today it wasn't too bad, so driver, 7I was fine from about 445. The big hole short of the green to the right was intimidating and the width of the fairway is hidden by the right fairway bunker (that's easily carried).
14. Almost aced it, and right is very, very bad. But still, blah.
15. I think I hit a hybrid here years ago. Today I hit a 9I over the back of the green and hit a great pitch to save par. A solid but unremarkable hole.
16. One of the better holes on the course, with a cape-like tee shot and a two-tiered green - I purposefully shaded left off the tee and into the green, blasting from the bunker to a birdie putt. I liked this hole - it's short enough to tempt while having enough danger areas to keep your interest, as well as an interesting green.
17. A solid hole, playing out to the left with another two-tiered green, which can be used to feed the ball to the right half of the green.
18. Also solid, though the walk afterward will get remarks. It's not nearly as bad as many other walks I've had up hills in the Pittsburgh area, so I didn't think it was that bad. The false front is a bit odd, though, seeing as how it's the only hole on the course with such a feature, and from the fairway it's not obvious that it's a false front.
IMO, The Virtues Golf Club has a good, but not great by any stretch, course.