Pros:
Reed Canal Park is a short, fun course. Just like the Speedway down the road, you can throw caution to the wind and have one fast-paced, aggressive round. Let the birdies fly.
- Simple, straight ahead course is a fantastic city park. Course uses the trees as an excellent obstacle without feeling tricked out. Besides the trees, the only other obstacles you'll see on the course will be some of the crosswinds and park-goers.
- The front nine has more trees creating a more varied layout. The back nine is sparser, with baskets strategically placed near trees to create the challenges.
- There are dual pin locations on many holes. Based on the tee signs, many give the holes different looks - i.e. dogleg left vs right. I only noticed a couple that seemed to be unimaginative putting the basket 30 - 40 feet further back types.
- This is a mid-range and approach-shot type of course. I only used anything longer than midrange on several holes. Only three holes are longer than 300 feet - 1, 10, & 11. Those three are very open so no challenge.
- #2 & 3 are two of the more challenging and enjoyable layouts. Both have heavily tree-lined fairways while offering enough gaps to carve your shots back to the basket. I had birdie putts on both and didn't think I threw an exceptional shot on both.
- Course begs for ace-runs. Eight holes, including four of the final five are less than 200 feet. You play a couple rounds here and you should have at least one shot that has...a...chance...to....go....in....
- Along those lines, great course for beginners and kids. With no true long holes, most holes in the 150 - 250-foot range, and virtually no chance of losing a disc, you can bring a newbie, one-disc owned player here.
- Best thing about the course is the park its located in. Lots to do here for the family: playground, walking trails, large pond, picnic tables. Let them do there thing while you play a round.
Cons:
I enjoyed this for being a short, beginner-friendly course. Along those lines, this course essentially nails its target. In the big picture, several observations.
- My biggest issue was the inconstancy of the basket locations - Pin A vs Pin B. The metal-colored baskets blend into the shaded areas, or are hidden by trees, so it's not always easy to spot them from the tee. When I couldn't see them, I'd base the location off the distance listed on the DGCR app. My success rate was about 50% for picking the correct location. On one blind tee shot (somewhere around hole #6 - 8) I threw to the blind dogleg left, parking my disc within 4 feet of the sleeve. Unfortunately, it was in the OTHER location, so I had a 50 foot, bending putt. Instead of a tap-in birdie, I had a disappointing birdie.
- Course plays over and close to the walking trails a lot. Had to wait on walkers multiple times. Also had to wait on a kid on a bike riding in the fairway while his dad stood 20 feet from me pretending not to see me. FYI, watching me about to tee off before your kid rides 100 feet in front of me, making eye contact with me for a couple seconds, then looking away doesn't mean you didn't see me no matter how much you tried.
- A few more next tee arrows would be nice. Yes, there are arrows on the tee signs. However, for those of us who didn't pay attention to that when we teed off, when we hole out and now see multiple tee pads and holes, it's kind of a crap-shoot of which hole to play next. I only walked to the wrong tee one time. After that, it was a simple process of elimination.
Other Thoughts:
Reed Canal is fun for what it is. In the DG universe, it's very non-descript. If you're wanting to stretch your legs in the middle of a 10-hour car ride, this was the perfect 40-minute break for me.
- Courses like this serve a purpose. Regular players want & need more challenging courses. To continue growing the sport and getting support from local governments, you need to appeal to new players as well.
- Being from Charlotte, this course is right up there with our area's 3 pitch-n-putt courses. If it means I'm in Daytona, I'll pick this one every time over those.
- The crosswinds playing off the ocean add an extra challenge. On #11, the tee pad is protected by trees. The fairway then opens up, at which time the winds lovingly picked up my disc and blew it a good 75 feet off line. By the time I got to #18, breeze was strong enough that I was aiming a good 60 feet right of the basket, throwing a big sweeping shot back to this 152-foot hole. Nailed my 15-foot birdie putt so consider it a success.
- #15 has a raised basket, begging you to make a run. It's only 141 feet so it feels playing the safe up-and-down layup is the easy way out.
- Overall, this is slightly below average as a course. The biggest factors are that the course doesn't force players to use many different discs. Play the entire course with a midrange disc - Roc or Buzz - and you'll be fine. You also don't get penalized for being overly aggressive as you should be able to recover with a bad tee shot on most holes with easy up and downs.
- This is about as average of a layout as you'll find. Fun factor, scenery, 10 minute drive to the ocean, and overall park quality rate higher. As for the disc golf, consider this a good practice course or ego booster.