Madera Municipal golf course is my baseline for rating all other muni courses. Madera is usually in ok condition, nothing fancy but nothing horrible and has decent greens all at a reasonable rate. ... Continue »

Madera Municipal golf course is my baseline for rating all other muni courses. Madera is usually in ok condition, nothing fancy but nothing horrible and has decent greens all at a reasonable rate. With that, today was no exception. Greens were in nice condition rolling smooth at a medium+ pace. There was light rain for about 30 minutes just prior to teeing off this morning so that kept the greens a little slower than normal. I never realized how tough the greens can be here. Don’t get me wrong they aren’t like Blackhorse, Spanish Bay or Glen Annie, but they have just enough undulations to really test your skills.

The greens easily held well struck approach shots and even chip shots would check up occasionally.

Fairways were decent enough. Mainly winter thin(ish) but overall not bad. The fairways even had a little green color to them throughout. No issues with the tee boxes and even the par 3’s had good coverage. I avoided the bunkers all day but judging by my playing partners reactions, the bunkers were mainly hardpacked dirt with a light dusting of sand on top. The skirt area around the greens were in decent shape and made chipping with confidence easy.

There isn’t much rough so to speak. There’s the first cut which is all of about a ½” taller at best than the fairway. After that and it’s hardpan dirt between the fairways. Layout is a parkland style and completely flat. Our group was all walkers and judging by the carts out on the course, it looks like they are still the same old beat up basic carts they’ve had for years and double riders.
I don’t know if I’ve ever played here prime time on the weekend but the standard rack rate for walking was bearable as was the POP. We were making good time until the turn and then the wait at every shot got longer. Still we finished right at 4 hours on a 9:50 AM tee time during a three day weekend.