Gateway National Golf Links

Gateway National is consistently in the top tier of course conditioning in the St. Louis Metro area. It offers great views of the downtown St. Louis skyline. The only bent grass fairway public course in the St. Louis Metro area. However, it is one of the most expensive courses to play on a weekend morning ($83). You can find courses of similar quality at cheaper rates on the Illinois side (Spencer T. Olin and Annbriar).

Their greens are at the top of the class in the area. Roll true and have great speed. Stroking a few putts on the practice green is the foreshadowing of what you will experience in your round.

The course had some flooding issues back in late July but they moved quickly with numerous pumps to get the water off the course quickly. There are only a few areas that show any evidence of the flood waters. The left rough on hole 5, the raised wooden path from 14th green to 15th tee. You must cut in front of the 14th green and over a berm to the 15th tee. Finally, the rough between 17th tee to the green on the par 3.

A couple of tee boxes need some care. The white tee on hole 4 is too small and beat up with all the divots and it is rounded like a pitcher’s mound. The white tee on the par 3, 14th is rough also.

The course has decided to let the grass grow high, beyond the left fairway bunkers on hole 8. I have no problem with this, to prevent players from taking this shortcut and playing the hole as it was intended to be play. However, this is new and many players are unaware of this change. It is really difficult to find balls in this high rough and it only slows down play. I would recommend the starter mention this to players before they tee off.

Course was not in the best shape. Only one restroom on the course and it was disgusting.

Had a good time playing here for the first time. The fairways and greens were in good shape. Some of the areas in the rough, around the greens, and the bunkers need some attention though. Played on a weekday and the pace was great, as our foursome finished in under 4 hours. The course offered a good challenge with it's layout.

Overall a good course but to charge $90 is truly outrageous. There are a few holes that are absolutely beat up and on hole 17 there is absolutely no fairway, it’s a par 3 that consists of a tee box a green and then about 115 yards of nothing but mud and swamp.

Great course and service from the staff. I’ll be back next week.

Overall I thought the course was ok value. Some holes were in hard shape. A few had been flooded then possibly burnt out? I thin the courses in forest park are in better shape for less.

Consider this a warning. Do not pay $100+ to play Gateway National. The course conditions continue to decline. In my honest opinion this is a $40-$50 golf course. It may have bent grass fairways, tees, and greens but many tee boxes are in pitiful shape and the greens need some TLC. I understand the challenges that recent flooding have caused. Many areas are GUR and washed out. It amazed me how poor the rough areas were. Very inconsistent... Hardpan due to lack of watering, no grass, or totally overgrown. I get it... keep your ball in the fairway, but it appears that all efforts go towards the bent grass. Hopefully the grounds crew is able to turn things around. Otherwise, this place will be turned into a parking lot for Nascar fans. I hope that doesn't happen because the course layout is good and the St Louis area needs a higher end course like I recall this course being in previous years.

Overall this is a great course to play. Recent floods have the course in repair and while not bad there are defiantly some areas that are being worked on. Pace of play is hit or miss this time I played, we must have had a group clogging up the course. Took 4.5 hours for our group to finish. Waiting on one or two groups on every tee was agonizing.

The week was filled with unprecedented amount of rain in the St. Louis area. From Monday night to Thursday afternoon – 14 to 18 inches of rain. The grounds crew was working hard to pump the water off the course to make it playable by Sunday. I would guess, most of the course was under water at some time. Considering all the rain, the course conditions were still very good.

Here were the changes that were made on Sunday:

Hole 5, par 4 – changed to a par 3

Hole 8, par 4 – changed to a par 3

Hole 11, par 4 – tees moved up

Hole 12, par 3 – green was only half mowed because half the green was still wet from being flooded.

Hole 13, par 5 – changed to a par 3

Hole 15, par 4 – tees moved up

Hole 18, par 5 – green very damp from being flooded.

Due to these changes and course conditions, Gateway National gave every golfer a $10 off coupon on their next round at Gateway in 2022.

All my playing partners and other people I talked to this week, felt this was not enough. We played with all these alterations at the full rate of $83. How can you charge the same amount of a normal day with all these alterations? A head scratcher. The $10 off for a future round was a nice gesture but most people will lose the coupon or forget about it the next time they play Gateway. They really needed to reduce the green fees on that day by $20. I don’t want to come down too hard on Gateway because they were dealing with record rainfall and doing a fine job just to make the course playable. Kudos to the greens keeping staff there. But, maybe if something like this happens in the future – they should think about reducing the greens fees on the day people play the round.

The greens and fairways were in their usual outstanding shape, in the areas not flooded. However, I cannot give them a 5 star review because the compensation offered by the course was not enough.

I had heard nothing but great things about Gateway from multiple people so i was excited to play there and brought a few friends with me.

The course layout was fun, but challenging at times.

We had some pretty bad flooding leading up to our round, so i completely understand the course being in rough shape. My issue is that we received no communication that multiple par 4's and par 5's had been converted into par 3's and one hole was actually going to be shut down all together and we still paid full price for the round without essentially being able to play a full round.

In addition to that, something that the flooding had nothing to do with, the bathrooms are disgusting and certainly not what i would expect from a course that costs almost $100 to play at. Both on course and in the clubhouse were in terrible shape.

More than likely won't be returning as the facilities are not worth the price in my opinion.

I always look forward to playing rounds at Gateway National. The greens and fairways are ALWAYS some of the best around the STL area.

Course is well maintained and greens are not slow (unlike most STL metro courses of equal quality). Keep those greens rolling true!

First few holes was in a steady drizzle, but cleared up and it was a great round.