The Ocean Course is only really hard if you play the wrong set of tees. If player's don't bite off more than they can chew, it generally is a very enjoyable round (pending the wind is blowing less than 20mph -- once that happens, all bets are off). I've played it over 300 times so I know my way around the course. The reason that it's hard is that Pete Dye made it "look" hard. Standing on the tees, players see nothing but trouble and very little fairway so the tend to swing out of their shoes. However, once they reach the fairways, they find they're giantic. It's Pete playing with their heads. Additionally, there are no forced carries into the greens except for No. 17. The greens aren't tricked up. In fact, they're fairly flat. And, they are only elevated if it is expected to be using a short iron to hit into them. Otherwise, they are designed to allow balls to bounce onto them. If players play a "connect-the-dots" type of games, hitting fairways and greens, rather than playing power golf, players can score quite well there...