Potomac Shores Golf Club (Nicklaus) - Dumfries, VA

[CJ Carder]

I got to play the almost brand new Potomac Shores club in Dumfries, VA (a little south of DC) on a hot, steamy day yesterday and wanted to pass along some thoughts I had since not many new courses are opening up anymore. 

The course was originally started a few years ago but ran into some development issues.  They officially opened for public play about 3 weeks ago (according to the girl in the pro shop) but it's obvious the course has been there for a good while longer.  Everything was grown in nicely and other than the fledgling real estate development, you would think it's been around for years.

Some general thoughts on the course:
- The elevation changes - oh, the insanity.  I've played a good number of courses and haven't seen elevation changes like this since maybe some rounds in northern Michigan.  You're really introduced to the slopes on the par 5 3rd where the entire hole plays straight down a hill.  You are then led back up to the top of the hill / mountain for the par 3 4th which was a good 1.5 clubs downhill.  The tee to fairway drop on the par 4 9th is jaw dropping. 

- The elevation certainliy inspires some wonderful visuals for the course, but the routing is crazy.  No way on earth could anyone ever walk the course unless he/she was part billy goat.  Just the drive from the 3rd green to the 4th tee took approximately 4 minutes.  With that said, on a hot day, the voyage between those two holes was just what the doctor ordered as you felt like you were going through a cool tropical rainforest.  If you decide to play and they tell you the course is cart path only, run away quickly.

- I have some concerns about the playability and the continued maitenance of the course.  From a playability standpoint, the tips were 7000+ and the gold tees (next option) were 6355.  As someone who normally plays courses around 6600-6700, the 6355 was pretty much all you'd want thank to the elevation and some forced carries.  I don't know who the residential target market is around there, but I could see the general population getting very tired and very beat up having to play that course every day.  From a maintenance perspective, the whole course is bent grass and there are some very very large bunkers that I have to imagine aren't exactly cheap to keep up.  Case in point, just the amount of sand in the bunkers was overwhelming.  3 weeks into normal play and you could already see areas where the general player couldn't rake the bunker appropriately.  For those of you who played Mike Strantz's Stonehouse and Royal New Kent where they first opened, that's what these bunkers reminded me of.  And as Stonehouse has proven, it's ridiculously tough to maintain all of that consistently, especially if you happen to go through a deep recession.

- I wonder about the greens too as they had a ton of little humps and bumps in them.  Very rarely did you have a flat put and my partner and I noticed a number of double breakers from <20 feet.  Fortunately, they weren't overly fast (even somewhat slow in some areas).  But for $95, the public is going to want tour level conditioning and I'm not sure those greens can support it.

- My vote for the best hole would be either the par 5 10th or the par 4 11th.  The 10th, gives you a 230 yard carry option over a deep bunker, at which point you have about 230-250 downhill to a wide green.  The catch is that the fairway on the approach is split in half by a small grove of trees and rough, so if you're going for the green, you better have some curve to your shot.  Otherwise, you still get to decide from which angle you'd like to approach the green.  The par 4 11th is short on the card (only about 360), but plays slightly uphill and doglegs right.  A shot that isn't hit far enough winds up being visually blocked from the green, but a longer tee shot opens up to an approach straight down the entrance to the green and eliminates the need to carry a fairly wide bunker.

- As with many Nicklaus courses, you better bring your high fade (for a righty) shot.

- Awesome southern decor clubhouse

- Must say I was rather disappointed that even bordering the Potomac, there were zero views of the river.

Here's the website if you want to take a further look - http://www.potomacshoresgolfclub.com/.  Feel free to ask questions if you want and I'll try to respond.

[Raphael_Larson]

CJ -- I played Potomac Shores in Mid-May (and was told the course had been open a few weeks then) and had a lot of the same take-away thoughts you did.  Overall, I thought the individual holes were consistently good and reasonably interesting, but felt that course in total lacked cohesiveness due to the distance between holes and elevation change.  I left wondering how the course is going to survive in the DC market.  Considering the price, the travel time it took to get there, and the ridiculous distance between holes, I can't see returning anytime soon. 

[Jon Cavalier]

I played Potomac Shores this morning and thought I would add my own take, which mirrors those of CJ and Raphael. I'm not from the area, so the sustainability of the course doesn't much concern me - I'll focus my comments on the playing experience.

Pros:
- can be a fun shotmaking course for a sub-14ish handicapper; like May River in that respect, there are a good number of shots that tip the difficulty meter, and the reward for pulling the shot makes for very satisfying, enjoyable golf; typical Nicklaus in this regard.

- nice visuals; seemed like 80% of the holes were downhill, some extremely downhill.

- nice variety on the par 3s.

- interesting, undulating greens which were, for the most part, in good condition.

- very friendly staff.


Cons:

- as mentioned by CJ, I don't understand why the routing doesn't incorporate even a single view of the river, let alone a hole that brings it in to play; the cart path between 17 and 18 comes within 100 feet of the river, and it would have been easy to site a green there and open up a gorgeous view of the river.

- would be brutal from the 6350 tees for most golfers carrying a 14 handicap or above, and there's no next tee until around 5800 yards, so they'll end up with a huge number of players playing over their heads; again, typical Nicklaus.

- brutal pace of play; see above - I teed off as a twosome at 8am, following a threesome that included a younger player; we walked off the 18th green at 1:05; of course they had played the gold tees (after asking the starter if they should play the tips); the ranger did come around and warned them that they were more than two holes behind - they sped up for 10 minutes before falling right back to pace; it's been a long time since I played a five+ hour round - I cannot tell you how brutal it was to do it as a twosome.

- completely and totally unwalkable, as mentioned above. The only course I've seen that comes close is the ridiculous Tradition at Stonehouse. Potomac is a far better course.

- overpriced; I paid $122.

- the conditions were rather iffy in spots, especially for a $122 ticket; many of the fairways had dead brown areas where the fairways were down to dirt and were bad enough that I would call it ground under repair; didn't have a huge impact on playability except when it was near the green in chipping areas, and it was on several holes.

I have photos of the course and the brown areas if anyone wants to see them.

In the end, while it probably doesn't sound like it, I would not recommend against this course for a decent-or-better golfer in the area looking for a new course to check out. But I won't be going back.

[Lester George]

CJ,

It has been around a long time.  I did the first golf course routing on it about 22 years ago.

Lester

[Carl Nichols]

What does the residential development around there look like?  When I last read about Potomac Shores, it seemed like they were hoping to have a base of members from the surrounding development supplemented by daily fee play. 

[Jon Cavalier]

What does the residential development around there look like?  When I last read about Potomac Shores, it seemed like they were hoping to have a base of members from the surrounding development supplemented by daily fee play. 

The streets are laid for a rather large housing community, but it's far from finished or full. At the far end of the Potomac Shores development, there was some construction going on at what looked to be the premier site on the entire property - gorgeous long views of the river from the bluff. But it was very minor, early construction. On the drive through the development from the entrance, there are some "neighborhoods" built and other streets that dead end where one assumes they've yet to build. It's a huge piece of property that mighty be 25% developed. There are few if any houses visible from the actual course.

Lester George could speak to this far better than I, but the fact that they left that bluff for housing, rather than using it for an amazing spot for the clubhouse, illustrates the priority given to the housing.

[Lester George]

It has been planned and replanned a bunch of times.  If I remember my plan correctly, I had my clubhouse overlooking a marina on the river.  The prominent point you are speaking of was reserved for the community center which was village-like.  There was some plan to create an arrival by boat, train, auto. 

Lester

[Tim Taylor]

I've played it twice now - last September and this past weekend. I like it. Yeah, it's cart ball that I'm not even sure a triathlete should attempt walking, but it is what it is given the topography and the housing development that's going in. Lack of river and creek views is a bit disappointing. Conditions were fine both times I played, pretty firm even though we had a ton of rain a few days prior. No dead, brown or dirt spots anywhere. My partners complained that the greens were slow but they're used to playing at Congressional and RTJ. For a public course with the slopes on some of the greens they were fast enough.


There's something to like about almost every hole and no hole strikes me as boring or stupid, except perhaps the really short par 3 15th which seems like a placeholder between two fun par 5 holes. Maybe the par 4 ninth with it's dramatic down and then back up again but otherwise it's a good collection of holes. There's enough width for the bogey golfer though if you get out of maintained playing corridors you're dead on most holes.


On many holes, the safe play is a tee shot that gets you to ~150 yards from the green. It usually narrows or has bunkers around that distance. Likewise, safely to the middle of the green is smart. Going for tucked pins can be punitive. Ask me how I know


Re: cost - the standard rates are too high but there are readily available specials on their website or email list. We paid $85 for a Saturday morning tee time instead of the "normal" $115.


It's a hike down I-95 from my house, and traffic usually sucks at least on way. Like I said, I like the course but don't see my self playing it more than twice a year given the distance and five hour rounds.


Tim