I had the pleasure of playing at Grosse Ile CC near Detroit this week. Prior to beginning play, a warning was given; "Don't be long." I wondered if the green complexes were mowed down off the back, nahhhh...not really. The advice was aimed at NOT being PAST THE pin....
At Grosse Ile CC, on the majority of the holes if you went long and high, the possibility of going past the flag came into play (a big NO NO here), you were in trouble, with number 13 (the one that I forgot to get pics of...) being the most severe. On several holes I think that I made par by being on the front rather than on the green itself. I felt that on some greens you could, in effect, be punished for hitting the green in regulation. These greens were nicely (or not so nicely depending on how you putt) sloped from front to back. There were many areas of severe contouring that could really wreck havoc on your putting, and your scorecard. The greens were also nice and speedy (I personally disdain and loathe slow greens BTW). The greens on the par 5's seemed to be the most benign of the bunch.
I struggled here, but not because of these greens, I never three putted. A few trees caught some of my errant shots and forced me to take my medicine with a healthy dose of double bogeys. I am not sure if more trees really need to be removed at Grosse Ile or not. I would need to play here more in order to make a definitive decision regarding tree removal. At times, the trees actually collect errant shots that may have gone much, much farther off path than originally desired.
Grosse Ile CC is the type of course I could play everyday and not wish i was playing somewhere else. It passed my litmus test, for sure.
