Golf in St. Louis

[amandaokla]

Hey Guys,
I'm looking to find the best course to go to in the surrounding areas of St. Louis. I got 2 days to play what I can. Any suggestions?

[Raoul Duke]

I would recommend Jefferson Barracks (http://www.dgcoursereview.com/course.php?id=48), it is a great course, fairly easily accessible, and near the Gateway Discs pro shop (although it is often closed midday during weekdays). I have also played Creve Coeur Park, Endicott Park and another course near a church which may not exist any longer (the course, not the church) and Endicott is the next best IMHO. More info here: http://www.rcfdiscgolf.com/

Sioux Passage looks phenomenal too, never got a chance to throw there. If you do, please post a review!

[Khao Pra]

i've played all of them in st louis up to about 2 years ago and agree with Raoul, Sioux Passage and jefferson barracks are the best 2 that st louis has to offer. i used to be married to some woman in st louis so was unlucky enough to have to spend some time in that city a few times a year and while the greater st louis area has an incredible amount of green space and numerous courses, overall they were very ho hum and not worth a trip. hopefully things have changed for the better, they did for me because i am not married to that woman anymore and don't have to go to st louis.

[Three Putt]

St. Louis is a lot better disc golf town than that.

Sioux Passage is a fantastic course. It gets overlooked because it is out of the way and a lot of out-of-towners don't take the time to get there. It is well worth the effort. Jefferson Barracks is also a very good course. Endicott is a notch below these two but still worth the time to play. The hidden treasure is a tough 9 hole in West County-Bluebird Park in Ellisville is a very good course, one of the best 9 hole courses I've played. There is also a top-notch course in Festus, just south of St. Louis. I think the park is called West City Park. Anyway, it is over a year old and still not on the PDGA course directory for some reason. This is keeping the buzz down on this course but it is great. East of St. Louis you have Foundation Park in Centralia, which is the best course in Illinois.

So if you are staying in downtown St. Louis you have six courses I'd rate "4" or higher within an hours drive.

[Olorin]

Here's info on St. Louis from my U.S. Course Guide (at DG Resources):

St. Louis

Ranked by quality: 1.Sioux passage, 2.Endicott, 3.Jefferson Barracks, 4. Creve Couer, 5. Collinsville.

1) Sioux (Passage not only because I just re-designed it, G. Scott Galvin) has lots of Elevation and the par changes about 10 strokes from the A placements to the C's. Its open for the most part but the trees do come into play. Most well kept park in the county. Mach 3's.
2) Endicott is really woodsy. Lots of 50 year old dogwoods and maples(?). Chris Lang and Dave Mac design.New GDS Titan Pro baskets.
3) JB located in the southern part of town was a Union Army Base. The course flows between 100+ year old hardwood trees. About 75 feet of elevation change between the highest and lowest spots on the course. They have the biggest league here in town and the most casual play, and the GDS Pro shop is located next to hole 18's green.
4) Creve Coeur- huge lake here next to the course with a constant wind blowing over it. This dude plays around par 70 in any pin configuration. Really flat and long the sparse trees will cripple upshots. Course management skills are needed here. Good spot for weaker arms to break out rollers. DisCatchers.

St Louis vs. Kansas City courses

Sioux passage will have to get the nod on Cliff drive or Water works. With our 3-4 pins per hole, severe elevation changes, ( both up and down) and now pins tucked in the woods, it might be in the top 10 in the country. If we were to put all pins in the long and play the wild grass as OB, I'd put it up against Winthrop Gold any day.
SP is not a hyzer party any more, pure power could help you score, but putting is key as you will have less and need to hit most of them.

Next up for us is Endicott, unfortunately for KC they do not have a single course that compares.
Endicott in the winter is better than Rosedale and swope anytime, in the summer add 4 or 5 strokes or more when in the long. Endicott is short on paper but with well defined fairways on the left, right and ceiling on most holes, techinical is the word. The greens are tricky and you will find out fast, how the trees in the 1st 1/3rd of the flight come into play more than you think. At a glance it might seem easy to make pars here and they are if your not too aggressive off the tee, but birds are REALLY hard to come by without gunning for them off the tee and never come in bunches, if you start pressing the tough greens will eat you up and add strokes quick. Most holes have a very fair fairway and if you've never been to bogey world ( 11-13) its well worth the trip file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/LHBIV%7E1/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/msohtml1/07/clip_image001.gif Even if you combined all of the best 18 holes at Rosedale top AND down under it would still come up rather short to Endicott.

On to Jefferson Barracks going toe to toe with Swope. Swope gets boring fast and the holes are awfully close to each other in spots, you can see people all over the course while your playing most of the holes. The pin locations at Swope compared to JB are like comparing Rosie O’Donnel to Angelina Jolie(?). JB in full bloom with the elevation and killer pin placements scores a first round knockout over Swope and even rivals waterworks!

So now we have Creve Coeur up against Wyco. The par 70 CC, requires more technical shots than one would think for what appears to be an open course. WRONG!! There are 12 very demanding tee drives and at least 12 very demanding approaches of over 200, Wyco might have 4 or 5. Add any wind and CC is world class!!!

We have Quail Ridge, St Charles and Collinsville. All 3 are great courses on great pieces of land that need only 1 or 2 hole changes, but I don’t know any other KC course to compare them to.

Last on the list for us and the newest is Festus.
Plays to a par 70 with water OB on 9 of the 18 holes. A nice mix of woods and trees up hill and down. Holes 9 and 18 both over a 1000' with the pins 30' from a big lake. the holes in the woods along the 30' wide river are a scenic beauty, cant wait until summer to see this baby in full bloom.

If we have to match up Sioux Passage against Blue valley than Festus would go against Cliff drive.
The 700 foot backward walk, throws from on or too close to the road and improper spacing from pin to tee is enough to put Cliff Drive out of the race going up against almost any course we have. Love the land, but in my opinion needs to be redesigned to at least flow. I believe no attempt was made for a front and back double loop. Its not that cool to wind up 3000 feet from your car on hole 9 if you want a world class course.

We have a course in Centralia, Foundation Park, which is about 1 hour from downtown. It has 2 pins and 2 tees, the longest layout plays to 10,800 par 72 and is most likely the best disc golf course I have ever played and I’ve played 397. The only rival anywhere is Ozark Mountain, only Foundation park in Centralia is a picture perfect park with a creek, woods, elevation and very dense rough for those who play too aggressive. Both Ozark and Centralia will destroy average players. Its one of those courses where 68 or 69 would be the hot round and par could win the event after 4 rounds. Once we have a big event at this course it will have its place on the map and in history.

Sioux Passage


Reviews:
·Blue tees are made for big arms, but a bit hard to find. Front nine was more technical, back nine had some awesome elevation changes and crush after crush after crush (although a tad too wide open for my taste). By the 12th hole my arm was shot, by the 18th I was chewing on Advil. (Dave Devine, 8/01)
·The front nine is great and easy to follow. The back nine is in the back part of the park. Personally, the holes on the back nine were OK, but there was quite a walk between holes and no obvious indication as to where the next tee was in some instances. It is the best of the St. Louis courses. (Anita Jackson)

Courses in St Louis:
Endicott
Jefferson Barracks
Creve Couer
Collinsville
Festus
Centralia
Quail Ridge
St Charles

[Olorin]

One more, in the vicinity of St. Louis...
Ellisville

Bluebird Park

Reviews:
A wicked little gem can be found in Bluebird Park (deceptively titled) in Ellisville, MO (1/2 hr west of St Lou). Only nine holes but still puts most 18 holers to shame. By far better than anything St Louis itself has to offer (including Sioux). Just standing on first tee you know you're in for something special. Hole 4 may be the best hole I've ever seen. Hole 7 is also a beauty. Definitely worth the drive. (by GNet)

[Khao Pra]

bluebird was a good 9 hole park to play, i remember having deer stand around feeding within 50 feet of me but whoever wrote those course reviews is high. calling any of those places world class is an embarassment. sioux is very nice and probably the only one i would return to play, JB is good but i can probably come up with 100 other courses as good or better just in the midwest.

[Three Putt]

It is all a matter of opinion. I would not get into an argument of Sioux Passage vs. Waterworks or Endicott vs Rosedale. They all are very good courses. If you are in St. Louis or Kansas City, any of them are worth your time. Debating them hole by hole and arguing which is best is a waste of time.

The review was obviously written by a St. Louis player as he says "our" courses. In my opinion he is way off base with Creve Couer, which is long, wide open and boring. Quail Ridge is also boring for the advanced player from the concrete tees, and good luck finding the pro tees if you don't know where they are. So, some of the reviews are overly pro on the side of the St. Louis courses. On the other hand Khao Pra is being pretty harsh, maybe due to the fact that he was not fond of St. Louis for reasons other than disc golf. The truth, as it often is, is probably in the middle somewhere.

[Olorin]

Yes, the St Louis vs. KC comparison was written by a St Louis guy who was trying to promote the St. Louis courses, so it was quite biased.

[Khao Pra]

so which st louis course is world class? three putt i completely agree with you that creve couer and quail ridge are boring, endicott is anything less than special, not a very good part of town and only an average city park. you need to be a homing pigeon to find jefferson barracks, you can drive around inside that maze for an hour before you find anything. read up a couple of posts where i said that st louis has the green spaces to compete with charlotte. st louis should be high up on the metro park disc golf scene but really falls short when it comes to quality. most midwestern metro areas (apart from indy) have fewer courses than st louis yet higher quality imo, and none of them have a disc manufacturer in their back yards. it's nothing personal against st louis, i just think all of this world class 5 star talk for st louis is way overblown and if you'd seen any of my other "world class" rants, i've already stated that i don't think there are any truly 5 star worthy disc golf courses yet.

[Three Putt]

I'm not saying any of them are "world class." I'm just giving an opinion that they are better than you have stated. You said "overall they were very ho hum and not worth a trip." I gave an opinion that at least six of the courses in the area are worth the trip. I'm sure we will not be the last people to disagree on this site.

[Khao Pra]

well good, we can agree to disagree about st louis and no harm, no foul. come on over and play my course and we can compare notes and i'm sure we'll find some that we agree on outside of st louis.