Pros:
1) Kiosk for information at the first tee. Garbage and benches at the first tee also a plus. There are also bathrooms available at the parking lot/1st tee area.
2) There is a practice basket with plenty of room for up to 50-75' putts. This is a nice feature especially for this course where you will likely have a bunch of longer putts to try and save par.
3) Signs have all information including Hole #, par, distance and a diagram indicateing a general flight path. The signs are also sponsored by local sponsors which is nice.
4) I may have beaten some of the park workers to work, but because it wasn't light out when I got there I had to wait to tee off. In the 30 minutes I waited I saw multiple trucks, and a golf cart with two guys driving around picking up trash and generally checking the condition of the disc golf course. Always a nice feature to have a parks department that cares for the course too.
5) Nice large concrete tee pads. This is essential on this course because of the rollng terrain and need for secure footing when trying to hit those small tunnels and land your disc in appropriate places.
6) The turf is in great condition on the openholes of this course. It was wet when I played but it was obviously they maintain the turf well. The turfed areas show the gently rolling hillsides that exemplify Kentucky.
7) The wooded holes generally have a good cover of leaves to keep the exposed soil from being slick and muddy. Many of the other trouble spots have mulch in places, specifically some green and tee areas.
8) Easy to follow routing despite minimal signage. A few places are slightly confusin and could use some directional signs, but all around not a bad layout and not to challenging to follow.
9) Nice DGA baskets, although I would rather see discatchers on this course because of being in the woods. It would help locate the basket from time to time.
10) Garbage and benches on many of the holes and they are very well done. They have not simply been slapped together, someone took their time to do them right.
11) Incredibly picturesque. I want to come back in season when the Blue grass is lush and Dark Green, the trees are fully leafed out and the stream is flowing like it was following the recent rains. I could spend all day playing disc golf and I am sure my wife could spend the whole day snapping cool natural setting pictures. I only wish I had brought my camera along for this course, even though it was winter there were still some cool pics, both disc golf related and simly nature related.
12) Some real risk/reward baskets. That is what makes this course a duece or die course. I feel like the front 9 is much easier to get dueces and threes while some of the wooded back 9 are certainly easier to 3 and 4 than any hole on the front.
13) There is an incredible variety on this course. They have wonderful elevation changes, they have a massive creek, they have some tightly wooded shots of all shapes, they have some rolling kentucky bluegrass fairways with baskets tucked ever so tightly into the edge of the woods. There are even a couple wide open holes that give you a chance to really rip it. I like Hole 24 despite being fairly wide open because it gives you a chance to really tear into a drive and really try to get a 3.
14) There are dual tees on holes 16, 19, 21 offering some different shorter looks at some of the harder holes on the course. I played the longer tees just because but I can see the shorter tee allowing for a much easier run at a 2 or possibly a simple 3.
15) This course has a very nice variety in hole length. A lot of the holes play much longer than the listed distance because of the inherent challenge in the woods. There are a few downhillers that play shorter too. Overall this course has enough length to challenge someone who has less than a 250' drive. That is what makes this a good duece or die type course. The pros better birdie a bunch of these holes to hold their own, and for a newer player 3's will still be accessible on most holes with a good approach and a putt.
16) This is some seriously solid DG on this course. The variety, the terrain, the maintenance, all create a wonderful experience.
17) Very fair course that has been very well played in. It does not require a lot of luck to do well it requires a lot of skill. This is the mark of a truly good course and I have played some good ones especially on this roadtrip.
18) There is some serious variety in shot shaping on this course. You have shots that have to be turned both ways and you also still have to consider how to land your disc flat to avoid those extreme rollaways!
Cons:
1) #1 tee area looks like a mess right now because the mulch has eroded or broken down. I am sure based upon the pictures that this is something they handle in spring, but I think the 1st tee should have a little more frequency since everyone stands around the tee creating compacted soils and breaking down the mulch quicker.
2) A few of the baskets seem to be low either from installation of the sleeve or erosion of the surrounding soils actually raising the soil level arond the baskets.
3) There are a few wet spots on this course and some simple steppers could be put in place to make this a better course. More permanent structures could also be made, but may not be necessary unless after a major rain.
4) Walk path comes into play as you play down the fairway on a few of the back 9 wooded holes.
5) The road is in play on the right of #3, but you will likely only have to deal with park workers in that corner of the park.
6) A sign to send you across the parking lot to Hole #5 would be helpful because you cannot see the tee sign from 4 basket because of the piles that the parks department has piled in the parking lot. There are a couple other spots where a sign might make the flow easier for a first timer.
7) Walk past tee #24 and cross the road to find holes #22 and 23. This is another spot a simple directional sign could be helpful.
Other Thoughts:
If this is a 4.5 course then I cannot wait to see Idlewild. I cannot give this a 5 because it is lacking a little bit of maintenance and also some amenities that take a course to the cream of the crop. I had an awesome time and obviously on purely disc golf level this is one of the best of the best, but I rate courses on everything and not just the DG experience. I ended my epic roadtrip from Milwaukee down to Florida and back through North Carolina with some incredible courses. You can only imagine how epic this trip was when you realize that this was my 4th favorite course from this road trip. That amazes me because this is a really solid course. I am so fortunate to have been able to play so many great courses and to end the trip on this course is incredible. I am looking forward to coming back to the Cincinatti area to play this course again and Idlewild.