Oak Ridge Golf Club

Played Sunday and course was overbooked. 2.5 hours to play 9 holes. Requested a rain check for the back nine and was told no. We spent $50 at snack bar as well. Poor business decisions for a course serving a regular Western Mass golfer.

The staff was not existent for our 740 tee time. We then teed off at 750. At 1047 these two guys I only caught one of there names Anthony told us there was a shotgun in 30 minutes and we had to hurry up because we had been there for four hours. The staff hasn’t even been there for four hour and then drove off. We were on hole 14. By rate of play we would have finished in under 4. At 1125 they came up again and told us this was our last hole I tried to explain a couple of things. First of all on hole 3 someone was out there with there dog blocking our hole and stayed for 25 minutes waited for his dog to poop and left it there!!! Secondly NO ONE TOLD US THERE WAS A SHOTGUN!! If we had been told from the start we would of probably picked up the pace a little. Not that there was much room. There was 4 of us playing. Lastly he was very aggressive and assertive when there was no need to be! When I tried to tell Anthony he kept cutting me off saying 4 hours is rate of play we have to leave. And drove to the next hole and waited. So we picked up our bags and just left. I have never been so unprofessionally treated by what’s supposed to be an established golf course. I will make sure everyone that asks never plays here again!!! That told me they wanted our money before the shotgun and that was it! So unreal to be treated like that NEVER GOLF HERE EVER PLEASE!!!

The greens were fast and true. just fun to putt on.

Watch out for the bears that loom around the 16th tee box

Course in good shape. The traps still need work. The leaves were a major problem

Course was in good shape and pace of play was great

If time playing this course and I was lost. Course map is horrible. Had way too many hazard drops because we didn’t know they existed. Lots of blind tee shots as well and went into hazards that were not on the card.

Haven't played Crestview yet so I can't say this is Agawam's best course but this is, in my humble opinion, head and shoulders better than St. Annes and Agawam G.C. Don't get me wrong, I've never had a bad time at St.A or AGC, but there's something about Oak Ridge that is just better, I dunno. I just wanna hit driver, wedge, and putter. Here's a place you can do it. Good greens. Well maintained fairways. Tee boxes I have no complaints.

Would be nice if c.c. reported recent aeration. I understand spring & fall is when golf courses aerate but not reporting is skeptical

Oak Ridge turned into a fun visit for me today, having been paired with two friendly and interesting Golf Now players; our conversation never waned over the eighteen.

Of typical length from the whites and blues, the durable 1974 Fazio layout at Oak Ridge nonetheless plays longer than its total yards, owing primarily to its par of 70, along with five par-3s ranging (today at least) from 176 to 200 yards from the blue tees. Also in the mix are three par-5’s ranging from 500 to 575. And the longest, hole six, forces most golfers to lay up from the tee with something less than a driver. I ended up hitting into the green on my third shot with a six-iron today, but only partly because the course was soggy from the aftereffects of Sunday/Monday’s tropical storm. Architects George and Tom Fazio thought you should be challenged a bit more on these five-pars, so they made the twelfth (for example) an especially narrow, angular brute that plays uphill over its second half. And they sited its green on a tall plateau. Yikes!

The course rating from the deepest tees--the golds, at 6,702 yards--is a rather whopping 72.6 against par of 70; it’s still 70.6 from the blues. That’s just plain difficult. The Fazio’s also threw in, for good measure, several tough and fairly long four-pars featuring doglegs, ponds and streams, deep and strategically-placed bunkering, and plenty of trees that definitely hinder progress toward the greens when fairways are missed, and not necessarily by all that much.

No doubt Oak Ridge is full of strong and well-designed holes. The opening trio of par-fours sets the tone, but there are more good ones at nine, ten, and eighteen. Of the five par-3’s, every hole works, though I particularly like the 11th and 17th for their straightforward challenges. The three-shotters, on the other hand, are decent enough, but I don’t think any stand out, unless you like the kind of torture-test that is the twelfth. Okay, it’s still playable. The sixteenth finishes well with a well-used dogleg to a shallow and well-defended green, but the rest is a bit mundane.

All in all, though, this layout is a winner. The Fazios deliver a playable course with realistic challenges. Nothing is really tricked up (it’s just tough). I’m not a fan of their tendency, though, to block the crooks of doglegs with trees both sizable and huge (such as at seven and eighteen). Clearly this is unfair to shorter hitters who can’t blow it by the corner, and so may be blocked from the green, oftentimes, when their drives veer toward the crook. This is a point about general design that Tom Doak makes in his “The Anatomy of a Golf Course.”

The greens should keep you engaged here, with enough slopes and variability in their design to constantly change things up from hole to hole. Their breaks tend to be subtle, and reading them correctly isn’t easy. On aesthetics, as well, O.R. is a first-rate golf course. It also feels secluded, nicely, from the outside world.

Conditioning:

Overall good. Fairways ranged from fair to very good (some, like five and six were patchy). Tees and roughs were good, while the greens stood out as excellent--some of the best I’ve played this year.

Best Hole: The tenth, par-4, 431 (blues).

Straightaway but long two-shotter that is best played with a draw from the tee, opening up the bunker-flanked green better from the fairway’s left side.

Some Conclusions:

Definitely recommended, especially for its layout. I don’t think you can go wrong with nearly any Fazio course. This track, too, is the most challenging of three I’ve played in Agawam. Nice clubhouse, capable and friendly service. Oak Ridge was recognized as one of thirteen notable courses in Massachusetts (rating “excellent”) in the 1995 edition of “The American Golfer’s Guide,” by Hubert Pedroli & Mary Tiegreen.

This is a great course to play and it is in excellent condition.

Great staff

Great course

A little congested today but still great time