I'm a big believer in every course having value, and this course has it, but it's for a very specific crowd. Most golfers will not enjoy their trip here. This course can teach you how to make the best of hard-to-progress-down fairways. You'll learn how to throw putters better, and those skills can benefit you at other courses. That said, Ball golf is a game of pars. Disc golf is a game of birdies. On DGCR, this is listed as a par 65. If you play it, you know that's an accurate par because the holes require shot shapes you can't really hit in one stroke. But, I shot 11 down by course par standards and got a 931 rating, so ya know … there's that. Few of these holes feel like par 4's or 5's. I left feeling defeated, not like I shot an 11 down round.

PROS:

-Great course for teaching you how to hit tight, wooded landing zones. You can't bite off too much here.

-Great course to teach you how to scramble in the woods to save par. A lot of your 2nd shots will be from the rough.

-Great course to teach you to take your medicine and make the best shot, not the miracle shot.

-Great course to teach throwing without taking any steps.

-Great course to play with a group of varying skill levels if you want to keep it close. An average player can keep up with an above-average player because the holes don't allow skill or creativity to shine.

-Close parking to hole 1.

-Practice basket.

CONS:

-Horrible tee pads. Probably the worst I've ever played AROUND. They're slick and trusting your backhand is nearly impossible. Forehands off the tee are okay. The pads are so bad you want to play around them, taking your run-up to the side, but on most holes, there's not enough space for that, and the tunnels are so tight you don't have room. I smacked my hand on a tee sign on my follow-through working to avoid the pad.

-You absolutely have to have a map. There's no other way to get around.

-This course is not relaxing. It's mentally draining. One of those rounds where you give up on disc selection and just throw or putt with whatever happens to be in your hand.

-The tunnels are unnecessarily tight. Most of the fairways are around 7 - 9 feet wide, with plenty of trees in the fairway. Most don't provide a true line to the basket on what feels like a par 3.

-Outside of hole 1, you won't get excited stepping up to a tee pad.

-Part of what makes disc golf great is the blend of athleticism and creativity. This course prevents creativity.

-Most of the holes feel the same. Tight tunnel. Too many trees in the way to beat them all. Try to get as far as you can before you hit something.

-The course has a walking path moving through most of it, and you'll hear walkers moving around you throughout your round. They don't bother you, but it has a weird vibe to it.

HOLE BREAKDOWN: (Assume right-handed shots) Also, bring/download a map. Navigation is not possible without one.

Hole 1 is the best hole on the course. Fair wooded tunnel that requires a 200-foot straight shot.

Hole 2 has a similar tunnel to hole 1 for most of the fairway, but then hits a huge group of trees by the basket. Get to those trees and you'll have a 30 - 45 foot putt.

Hole 3 is where the frustration started for me. The fairway tunnel bends slightly right, before cutting back hard to the left. Use a putter to land in the fairway. You need to make it right enough around the bend to have a shot into the green.

Hole 4 is a longer left bending fairway. Around 180 feet straight to a left fade. Once you start fading you need to push 100 feet into the tunnel to reach the basket.

Hole 5 is one of the better holes on the course. This one feels fair. This requires a straight to left fading shot through a tunnel. The disc needs to get moving left around 150 feet into the flight to bend with the fairway. There's a handful of trees to miss about 30 feet from the basket if you want to park this one.

Hole 6 is close to a good hole, but there are just a few too many trees in the way. If you're playing for 3, a straight shot will get you in position to pitch up to the green. To park this one, you'll need to hyzer flip a forehand and get it to fade out a bit at the end. This would be extremely difficult based on the space in the fairway.

Hole 7 is a bad hole, but the concept is good. It's a ridiculously tight tunnel, less than 10 feet wide, but there's no overhang. It's a 333 foot Par 5, which should be a par 3, maybe par 4. The problem with this hole is the tee pad location. It's offset to the left of the start of the tunnel, forcing you to throw high to make it around the corner into the tunnel. So, you need to throw straight, but you can't based on where the tee pad is. The right side of the fairway is dense with a creek running through it. The left side is all tight wood line. The green is a small cove surrounded by trees. If you get off the fairway here, you're pitching out. I threw an Innova Dart off the tee to stay in the fairway.

Hole 8 feels very similar to Hole 7. It's shorter, but you're essentially throwing down the tight tunnel hoping your disc makes it to / stops in the gap to the left where you can find the basket. A skip shot could get you under the basket, but that would be a risky shot with the tight fairway. You can't see the gap to the basket off the tee.

Hole 9 would need a sick RHBH flex shot to get under the basket. The fairway forces you left first, then cuts back right midway through the flight and moves straight toward the end. This is a good hole design, but there are a few too many trees in the way to try the flex shot. Making this a two-shot hole makes more sense.

Hole 10, I honestly don't remember. Sorry, all. A lot of these holes have a very similar feel to them. The photos on DGCR show a shot that moves left to right and likely requires you to push far forward to reach the basket.

Hole 11 has a tree that's fallen down overhanging the fairway. The tee pad is slightly elevated, which makes the overhanging tree trunk even worse. You really can't throw straight and over it, so you need to throw under it. The fairway moves left early, probably 100 - 150 feet into the throw, and then goes straight after the bend. In my opinion, the best way to drive on this hole is to throw a forehand shot from your knee. You're lower to the ground, and a forehand shot releases from your hip rather than your shoulders. If you're right-handed, the odds of driving more than half the fairway are slim with this play, unless you turn it over perfectly. But, it's better than smacking that overhanding tree and basically progressing 30 feet.

Hole 12 is another hole I don't remember. Sorry again, all. Last one of those on this list.

Hole 13 has the tee out in a field with a tree line on your left. You follow that tree line straight ahead into a cove that fades left. You need to throw straight here and fade as you get to the cove/gap. If you throw something overstable and fade into the gap, you won't push forward enough to get to the basket.

Hole 14 is another tight wooded hole. This has a pretty tight gap off the tee. Push forward and start fading just before the trees right in front of you. This has the same feel as most of the course.

Hole 15 is the first of two open field holes. You won't see the basket from the tee, but walk right from the tee pad and you'll be able to see the basket bumped up right next to the tree line. This is a right-hand backhand hyzer shot. The tree line is a good obstacle here. You need to throw wide enough around it, but you don't want to throw too wide or you won't make it back to the pin. This basket is tight to the tree line, so if you fade too far left, you may have a tricky putt.

Hole 16 feels completely different than most of the course, and it's a better version of Hole 15. You throw through a good size gap out into the field, and you're looking to get at least 300 feet of distance. The basket is to your left from the tee, built into a cove in the tree line. The basket is pretty deep in there, probably 50 feet or so. This is the one hole that feels like a par 4. The mistake off the tee is to finish too far left near the tree line. If you finish straight or right from the tee, you should be able to see the gap to the basket and have an upshot to get your birdie.

Hole 17's fairway requires a slow fading shot to the left. The map shows two routes to the basket, but there's no right fading route there now. A great drive could get under the basket here, but again, there are a lot of trees to miss off the tee and not much space to stand next to the tee pad.

Hole 18 feels close to hole 1, but again there are too many trees in the fairway to get to the basket in one shot. The fairway requires you to move the disc slightly left to right midway through the hole, but it's straightforward after that. There's a walking path near the basket that you can take to walk back to the parking lot.

If you are trying to work on your short game and patience, this is the course for you.

If you are trying to work on losing disks in creeks, losing disks in overgrowth, finding tees, finding baskets, hitting trees, contracting west Nile and malaria and perhaps finding Bigfoot...then this course is for you.

I can't imagine anyone liking playing this course for 18 holes. If a couple of these holes were thrown in on some other courses to make it more challenging, I get it. But it's too much and ridiculous to play and enjoy for 18 straight.

- Requires a lot of accuracy and some atypical shots, which has the potential for being valuable practice you may not get on other courses. (Especially see notes below about the amount of thick trouble you can get in here. This course will force a lot of tough saves out of thick woods, which could be good practice for the once or twice you have to do it on other courses).
- Nice open field by the parking lot is a great spot for field work before or after a round. (Rip some bomb drives here, as you won't be able to on the course).
- Practice basket before one is also a nice touch and I wish more courses had this.
- Isolated from other park activities so other park goers aren't likely to get in your way

- Insanely tight. I played at the end of December with no leaves on the trees and most holes were just ridiculously demanding of pinpoint accuracy all the way down the fairway. I couldn't imagine playing in the summer. I believe there were only two holes with fairways wider than about 30 feet.
- Short. I guess with it as tight as it is, it is good that most holes aren't longer. But at the same time, it would be nice to have a few holes where you can open up just a bit.
- Overgrown. I have a feeling a lot of fairways used to be a bit wider. Hole 9 (supposed signature hole) has a huge fallen tree blocking the already tight fairway meaning you are essentially driving into a wall of wood. If you get off the fairway on pretty much any hole you find yourself in some seriously thick brush with very few lines back to the fairway. This the type of course where you can expect to play multiple shots where you are just throwing 8 to 10 foot shots out of the woods so you can have a look on your next shot.
- While some short and tight courses are fun, I found the lines on some holes to be very strange. There were quite a few holes where there just didn't seem to be much of a natural shot or line to the basket. Lots of "spray and pray" shots vs technically executed shots. There are holes where if you make an 8ft gap you might get a birdie. Miss and you are looking at a 5.
- Muddy, muddy, muddy. I played in late Dec and there was mud everywhere. The rubber pads were caked in mud and unusable.
- Tough to navigate. There are orange ribbons hanging in trees along paths to some tees, but even with this, I found myself lost. The course map at the beginning was a bit helpful, but with some numbers having fallen off, it wasn't as useful as it could have been.

I can see this course having potential as it is a lot more wooded than many other courses in the area. However, there would need to be a good amount of tree and brush clearing for me to want to play this again. Overall I found it a very frustrating round, not necessarily because I felt I was playing poorly but just because the course is unrelenting in making you throw awkward and extremely tight shots with no margin for error and a very harsh punishment for a miss.

I played The Central Park yesterday. It's a tight technical course but is fair and has some variety. I liked it so don't be saying that I hate all technical courses. I don't find anything too charming about Summit Park. Hole after hole plays down an overgrown fairway approximately 6-8' wide. Except # 7 which plays down a slightly wider path but compensates for that by having swampy water down the entire right side of the slightly wider non-fairway path.

A couple of holes did have garbage cans. The course started out OK with # 1 & 2 being fairly normal tight, technical holes, but they were fair. Then the jungle started closing around me and the course.

The course is extremely overgrown. I knew from the start when I had to break off a few small branches just to get my tee shot off. Also when the tee sign was hidden in the jungle.

The course basically plays on dirt which would be mud quite often here in less than sunny Illinois.

Some rubber tee pads were coated with mud making them quite slippery.

Navigation was quite dicey at times. Trails lead off in different directions. I completely missed 12-14 and I'm not sorry I missed them.

This swampy area is quite mosquito infested. If I missed a spot with my Backwoods Off, they bite me there.

There were lots of litter scattered about. C'mon guys, pack your empty cans out.

Note to whoever claims to be in charge here. Could you please update the course directions on DGCR to indicate that this courses is next to "Sun Fun Splash Park?" The mini-golf is long gone.

While you're at it, the on-line map could use the same information upgraded there. Thank you for your consideration.

And if anyone missed the reference in my always clever and amusing Review Title, What I meant is I'd just as soon see Rosie in her skivies than endure another round at this course. Like Tommy Lee Jones said in Men in Black, That's not a memory I want to have."