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Bittersweet Golf Club
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About
Bittersweet Golf Club in Gurnee, Ill. is ideally situated for a scenic round of golf. The diverse landscape flows seamlessly from lush wetlands to native prairies covered with colorful wildflowers. The layout also winds across a 100-year-old sage meadow and through forests of mature hardwoods, which serve as a home to an abundance of wildlife. Beyond the beautiful scenery, the terrain presents many challenges. The undulating fairways demand accuracy as you hit from multi-tiered tee boxes. Water also comes into play on almost every hole and there's an array of strategically placed bunkers you'll have to avoid. The eighth is the toughest hole on the front nine, a par-4 dogleg right with a lightning fast green. Bittersweet Golf Club's back nine is known for its scenery, which is best displayed on the signature par-5 11th hole, which offers not only a challenge but also a spectacular view from the tee.
| Tee | Par | Length | Rating | Slope |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Black | 72 | 6751 yards | 73.3 | 135 |
| Blue | 72 | 6345 yards | 71.4 | 131 |
| White | 72 | 5559 yards | 67.8 | 122 |
| White (W) | 72 | 5559 yards | 72.8 | 128 |
| Red (W) | 72 | 4952 yards | 70.0 | 121 |
| Hole | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | Out | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | In | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gold M: 73.3/137 W: 79.5/143 | 338 | 565 | 196 | 344 | 371 | 148 | 346 | 422 | 516 | 3246 | 369 | 546 | 403 | 200 | 506 | 420 | 421 | 203 | 437 | 3505 | 6751 |
| Green M: 71.4/133 W: 77.3/138 | 319 | 531 | 169 | 334 | 361 | 126 | 326 | 404 | 485 | 3055 | 340 | 530 | 363 | 183 | 496 | 376 | 409 | 190 | 403 | 3290 | 6345 |
| Green/White M: 69.7/126 W: 75.1/133 | 319 | 531 | 127 | 334 | 234 | 126 | 326 | 328 | 485 | 2810 | 340 | 507 | 363 | 145 | 496 | 376 | 360 | 133 | 403 | 3123 | 5933 |
| White M: 68.0/120 W: 73.0/129 | 298 | 490 | 127 | 323 | 234 | 106 | 309 | 328 | 410 | 2625 | 329 | 507 | 319 | 145 | 445 | 341 | 360 | 133 | 355 | 2934 | 5559 |
| Orange M: 65.2/113 W: 69.8/122 | 283 | 469 | 93 | 279 | 234 | 76 | 288 | 323 | 402 | 2447 | 241 | 424 | 289 | 115 | 371 | 290 | 327 | 126 | 322 | 2505 | 4952 |
| Handicap | 17 | 1 | 9 | 11 | 7 | 13 | 15 | 3 | 5 | 12 | 2 | 18 | 16 | 10 | 6 | 8 | 14 | 4 | |||
| Par | 4 | 5 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 5 | 36 | 4 | 5 | 4 | 3 | 5 | 4 | 4 | 3 | 4 | 36 | 72 |
| Handicap (W) | 9 | 1 | 17 | 7 | 13 | 15 | 11 | 3 | 5 | 14 | 2 | 12 | 18 | 8 | 10 | 6 | 16 | 4 |
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Golf Advisor: Top Courses in Illinois (2016 #12)
Reviews
Reviewer Photos
Friday’s round
Course is great. Nice setup of holes. Very busy. The pace was on the slow side. The group behind us was always hitting the ball right at our heals and there was nowhere for us to go. Even with that we enjoyed the round.
Grass needs work
It appears that wet conditions have caused normal
Maintenance to be cut back. Tees have heavy divots, making it difficult to select an even tee location. Fairways grass was distressed and greens, while rolling quick, were mottled with invasive grasses.
This is a tough course under good conditions.
A suggestion: establish combo tees between white, blue and black to provide more teeing options. I have to take a 5 stroke difference between white and blue tees. This is too much.
Nice course
Usually pace of play was very slow from too many people and no marshal, today was average pacing , well maintained, I will play later
Course maintenance needs work
I stopped playing Bittersweet a couple years ago because the course has seen better days. I thought I would give it another try because I heard they were under different management. Unfortunately, I did not see a difference in the condition this time around. The tee boxes are uneven and chewed up. Maybe I should expect that from a public course but these were pretty bad. The fairways were ok and that probably because the course plays super tight and not many people can hit the narrow fairways. The greens were extremely patchy and bouncy. I’m pretty sure they haven rolled their greens for a couple days before I got there. The one thing that really bothered me more than anything is that the grass clippings were just left there so if you hit your ball in the rough and clearly see where it ended up you can still lose under a bunch of grass clippings left on the course. This course could be really awesome with just a little more care but that was not the case when I played it. Just a final note on something I found interesting. I’m pretty sure the range balls that I was hitting were from when they opened the golf course 30+ years ago (see photo).
Golfer
Always a challenge but have to say the course was in excellent shape and so were the greens . Didn’t appear to have had a full year of play on it allready!
Great course.
Great course. Only issue is that it was recently aerated and no one mentioned it.
Course is a very nice layout. Had 4 women not very good in front of us and very slow. They played only 9 so we moved on back 9. Will play again!
Bittersweet
FYI for those thinking of booking, as of 09/15/2021 the back greens are being aerated and I would assume the front greens are next because it doesn’t look like they’ve been done yet.
Destination Kohler - Champions' Trail Golf Package
Destination Kohler - To Dye Four Golf Package
