Smoke Rise Country Club

Very challenging course. If you are looking to sharpen your short game, this is a great course to sharpen you. Lots of woods, hills and bunkers to protect the green. A couple of holes you can use the driver on, but for the most part you can leave it back in your bag.

It is challenging with blind doglegs on several holes. It is not interesting because most of time it is playing up and down through the layout. Unfortunately, the current course conditions need alot of work; the tee-boxes and fairways were aerated. The only consolation were the greens - though hard, were running true.

The course was not in good shape. The fairways were recently airlifted and all of the tee boxes were only sand. They must be replacing all of the tee boxes. The greens were in good shape but were very slow. Tee shots tended to rollout into trouble. I remember this course being a good track, but not on this trip.

I really enjoyed playing this course. It is among one of the most challenging courses I have played. Very hilly, with challenging holes. Greens and bunkers were in great shape, Tee boxes were ok. Definitely, a course that I'd like to come back and play again.

They were doing work to improve the course. Aerating the tee boxes, etc. but the course was still in a little worse condition than expected. Bald patches in the fairways, bunkers that hadn’t been raked in a long time, no line between fairways and rough. The fairways just sort of morph into patchy grass and dirt where the rough should be. That said, very inexpensive and very quick pace of play.

Course was in good condition. Tee boxes being redone but greens were great. Fairways still thin but to be expected given a cool, wet spring. Overall great fun and an excellent hot deal.

T-Boxes were all under repair. Aeration under way. Not a good time to play. This should have been noted. The “hot deal” was not so hot

Awful front nine design, to the point of being down right laughable. I didn't use my driver until the back nine. Grassless tee boxes...weeds all over the fairways. Don't even get me started on the greens. There is not a flat level put to be found. Won't be back.

Very challenging course. Love the dogleg layout. You had to make good shot choices to get there in regulation. We played with "Wolfman". Rick the Wolfman is one of the guys that works at the course. He gave us some great tips on the layout and approaches. Great time. We will be back.

Played in charity tournament today and course was in good shape. Fairways were pretty fast, got a lot a distance. Greens wasn't as fast as the last time i played there but that was two years ago. I've need to play here more because this is truly a nice course.

First, let me preface this by saying that I really enjoy playing Smoke Rise as it is one of the more interesting, not to mention very challenging, "short" layouts that a good to superior player can play to test the state of their game. Unfortunately, the normally smooth and well-conditioned greens appeared to be in a state of flux or stress, as they appeared yellowed, splotchy, and even thin in some spots when I played there this past weekend.

Normally they are some of the best putting surfaces around, but several of the greens (especially the first few holes) looked like they had been "scalped" or mowed too short on the ridges and humps. And then on top of that, they don't seem to have responded to the aeration from late March as the surfaces seemed uncharacteristically bumpy and uneven, while still being quite speedy (not a good combo). Perhaps the excessive rain of late March and April, followed by very dry and cool weather has hindered their growth as I believe they are a Bermuda grass hybrid (mini-verde if I'm not mistaken).

I hate complaining about this as I'm sure the membership and Superintendent staff are acutely aware of the issues, and are probably addressing them as swiftly and skillfully as they can. However, the main calling card of this difficult, target-golf layout is the wonderful greens, which are normally smooth and fast, but fair, the condition of which typically helps a player feel more and more confident as the round wears on after dialing in the speed. In other words, you get duly rewarded for hitting solid putts and rarely do you miss a well-struck 3-8 footer as a result of inconsistencies in the greens.

Again, I'm not unwise to the challenges that the Club has endured, and I realize that there may be strain on the maintenance budget as the Club is surely undergoing some fiscal stress as a result of the smaller than desired membership roster. But when you couple the green issues with both the difficulty of the layout and somewhat neglected turf conditions (especially the tee boxes), it is disheartening to think that the rates are actually creeping up a bit. I would, and do, gleefully pay $50-60 on a weekend afternoon IF and when this course is in superlative condition, but it has a ways to go this spring and summer.

Lastly, for fear of sounding like a spoiled weekend warrior who had his favorite course sold to ClubCorp, kudos to the management for replacing the cart fleet as the wear and tear of the old cars was quite evident, and any under-performing car can be a wee bit dangerous on some of the steeper sloped cart paths (I'll refrain from commenting critically on that topic but I will say thanks to the maintenance staff for patching up some of the more worrisome spots) and mountain-like terrain. Oh, to that end, it might be a good idea to put in some sort of curb / barrier on the left side of the windy path between holes 2 and 3, or at least a cone or sign warning a driver to not drift too far left on the curve. ;-)

Again, let me reiterate how much I enjoy this golf course, and while I feel very lucky to get to play the semi-private facility, I feel like it is teetering on the edge of slipping considerably. That is especially sad when you consider all of the hard work that's been done in the past year or so to improve the course cosmetically (trimming back and clearing trees, cutting out weeds and other tall vegetation along the edges of fairways and improving sight lines off of various tees...still could use some pruning on the left side of 4 tee!) and with respect to play-ability. The staff is always friendly and courteous and I sort of feel like a de facto member with how they've always treated us. Thusly, I am a concerned fan of the course who wants to see the Club succeed and maintain it's place as one of the top semi-private facilities in metro Atlanta, one that prices their golf to the public very fairly and reasonably.

I still recommend that people check out Smoke Rise and give it a second chance if it kicked your butt the first time (or few times!) as it is the type of course you learn as you play it a few times. Once you start figuring out where not to miss, you can really enjoy the multitude of fun, and challenging approaches into what I think are the best greens in Georgia for the money!!

Good luck with the greens and fingers crossed for better grass-growing weather!!

Jason

Great course if your young, it wore me out uneven,lots of hills.

A buddy and I played an 18 hole round at 5:00PM and we really enjoyed it. Just about had the course to ourselves and had no issues with pace of play. The course itself is in good shape.. the only "knock" I have as far as conditions go would be the greens being a tad slow, but overall pretty nice!

The layout of the course is pretty interesting.. we played from the tips and hit driver maybe 3-5 times. This is with there being 5 par fives on the course. A lot of the holes are pretty severe doglegs one way or the other which makes for some holes being a little interesting in terms of club selection.

Overall we really enjoyed our time and will be back to play again!

Played this course after a couple days of storms so it was still windy and most bunkers had some water pooled in the bottom but the rest of the course was great, especially the greens for this time of year.

Challenging layout. Nice mix of short and long holes. Large greens in very good shape. Will challenge your putting. A little fast and dry this early in the spring. Will be great when grass starts growing good.

Hilly, a lot of undulations, all in all, a challenging time.

But, beats working!!

Very friendly staff. Located in a nice little neighborhood. Very hilly course, a number of sharp dog legs. Long hitters will not hit driver much. We only played the back 9. Course was extremely dry except for the greens, which were in fair condition.

The greens were the best I’ve played on this year....excellent greens. The tee boxes were poor. Although it was winter Golf...many tee boxes will be lucky to ever have grass on them this year. The food was good but it took forever to get it. At the turn there was no one to help use it drinks....poor for such a supposedly upscale course. I would go back but only for the greens.