Pros:
Teepads, signage, overall design, landscape
Other Thoughts:
Edward Medard offers an excellent Central Florida disc golf experience amidst a large, rural park set not too far from both Tampa and Orlando. Like most other courses in the area, the amenities on the course are nice, with good signs, one set of nice long concrete tee pads on almost every hole, and way finding aids where needed. What really sets this course apart from others in the region, however, is the landscape on the back nine - a run of very interesting holes playing up to, among, and out of a set of short but steep hills with (perhaps seasonal) water challenges in the low spots of these holes. The amenities, interesting landscape, and solid hole-by-hole variety add up to an excellent disc golf outing that is worth a road trip.
Edward Medard has a bit of a split personality. For the first eight holes it presents a typically interesting Florida outing; overall, each features a perfect tee pad, is mostly par 3 but on the longish side, is a good mix of open and more wooded, and has enough bend in the fairways to reward both long arms and touch games. Get off the fairway and the palmetto and salt bush will punish you. So a pretty cool course, on the higher end of those in the region. Then #9 plays across an open field, but the basket is set atop a 15-foot or so steep hill, back behind a sprawling live oak. Suddenly, there's a lot more pressure on the approach shot. Then the next eight holes play among these hills, mostly: Come out of the trees back downhill and back into the open; fully wooded holes, playing among the many live oaks; and shots from one hill, across water, to a basket on another hill. Among these holes are some of the most interesting and challenging basket placements I've seen this side of Chavez Ridge in LA. Take a run at the basket for par, miss by a little, and you could be rolling downhill into the water or the thicket and looking at a double, at best. I'd be interested to know if there is a single more steeply elevated basket in all of Florida than #16 at this course. The course finishes with a flat woods hole for #18, however, bringing you back to Florida reality.
I'm very glad I made the trip to Edward Medard Park and really look forward to returning. This is definitely the sort of course that will play better the better you get to know it. Tampa and Orlando disc golfers now have a great excuse to get out of the sprawl and into the country for a top-notch outing. Overall, I rate this course as Excellent, and well worth the effort of a road trip or going out of your way to play.