Way Ovedue!

Spent the morning with Johnny, Alex, and BSF a couple Wednesday's ago at Rancho Solano. This is my favorite course outside of the East Bay as its pretty easy to get to and offers a good... Continue »

Way Ovedue!

Spent the morning with Johnny, Alex, and BSF a couple Wednesday's ago at Rancho Solano. This is my favorite course outside of the East Bay as its pretty easy to get to and offers a good challenge while also being fun.

It's known to many as the Home of the 3Putt! Huge greens, pretty firm and decent speed...

The course was in great shape overall. Checkin was easy... and the grill was clean.

Just a hop, skip and jump off 80 if your traveling between SF and Sacramento

Played Rancho Solano on 9/12 with the GK crew. This was my first time playing here and What a fun course! Track has elevation changes, water features and great conditions throughout!! Course desig... Continue »

Played Rancho Solano on 9/12 with the GK crew. This was my first time playing here and What a fun course! Track has elevation changes, water features and great conditions throughout!! Course design offers the option of grip it and rip it without too much risk of being heavily punished. Yet it has enough trees and water hazards to keep you honest and make less than driver a viable option at times.

Greens are HUGE and have several big undulations throughout. Three putts are easy to do on these greens. All but a couple of greens were in fantastic shape rolling smooth at a medium-slow pace. Just a couple of greens had some brown spots on the edges but again the greens are so big the brown spots were 40-50 feet away from the pins

Green side bunkers had excellent soft fluffy sand. Tee boxes were flat and lush and the cart gal came around a number of times.

I really enjoyed this course and highly recommend it.

Every year I like to make a drive up to Fairfield, CA from SoCal and play 36 with GK’ers at Rancho Solano and Paradise Valley. Just a couple of very fun tracks that are always in great shape when I pl... Continue »

Every year I like to make a drive up to Fairfield, CA from SoCal and play 36 with GK’ers at Rancho Solano and Paradise Valley. Just a couple of very fun tracks that are always in great shape when I play them. Starting with Rancho Solano.

Joined by GK’ers BSF, Alex326 and BGarcelon we teed it up 7:24am and finished in little over 4 hours with no waiting. Great time! Was a beautiful morning in low 60’s when we teed off which felt wonderful to me having played Sunday in desert in 100+ temps. The golf course was in excellent condition.

Greens, running mostly smooth, medium speed (although being they are huge, with big undulations plus some severely sloped you need to be very careful on those downhillers).

Fairways, lush with good lies all day, that is when I found the fairways, was pretty wild off the tee.

Rough, fescue, mostly lush, cut down in most places to only an inch or two above the fairway height. In some places greenside higher but being I’ve been living in Bermuda or Kikuyu rough this summer, was sure nice to be able to slice through the fescue and make some great pitch shots.

Bunkers, good shape, quality light brown sand with coarse texture. Being the course was a little damp in the morning there were some tough plugged ball shots out there I saw in my group.

Tee boxes, lush, mostly level, not much divot damage.

As for the layout, I love this golf course. HUGE fun greens that I mentioned above. Hilly yet not over the top. Beautiful surroundings. Holes rarely parallel each other and challenge you with great variety. Mostly elevated tees with demanding shots. Water hazards and trees are the golf course’s main defense outside of the difficult big greens. Some challenging long par 3’s as well as short ones. Dogleg left’s and right’s but overall I think the course favors a draw. Hole #11 is my favorite and depending on the tees you play you either need to hit a big drive to get to the edge of the large lake or layup. Either way you’ll have a very fun shot to hit over a big lake to a gorgeous green. Get your camera out.

Beautiful big clubhouse. Excellent service. Treated very well throughout the experience. Saw the cart girl numerous times. Good hot dog at the turn. Alex got the breakfast burrito and it looked very tasty. I might have to try that next time.

Highly Recommended!

I played Rancho Solano with Johnny GK & CIT on 7/20. Part of a 36 hole day up in Fairfield.

We tee'd off promptly at 7:15AM, weather was perfect in the high 60's with just a hint of a breeze.

Ra... Continue »

I played Rancho Solano with Johnny GK & CIT on 7/20. Part of a 36 hole day up in Fairfield.

We tee'd off promptly at 7:15AM, weather was perfect in the high 60's with just a hint of a breeze.

Rancho Solano is tucked into the hills between Fairfield and the Green Valley area. It's about a 5 min drive off Interstate 80 which makes it very accessible to anyone headed to Sacramento or San Francisco from the Valley, and only 20 minutes from the 680/24/4 corridor.

The course was in great shape, from the tees thru the greens. From the blue tees the course runs around 6500yds. You don't need to be long off the tee to score here.

The fairways are very accessible and fair, with some mild to aggressive doglegs.

Once you get to the greens the game changes. The greens are very large with many contours, ridges, and tiers. The pin placement for the day made for some challenging putts. Your short game will make or break you here.

I really enjoy this course and the unique challenge of the green complex's.

That was a fast track last week for me with all the GK Guru rounds and GK Plays to run but finally catching up.

My first round of the trip started at Rancho Solano Golf Course Thursday morning, 7:... Continue »

That was a fast track last week for me with all the GK Guru rounds and GK Plays to run but finally catching up.

My first round of the trip started at Rancho Solano Golf Course Thursday morning, 7:16am, with BGarcelon and Cit. I loved this course for the first time playing it with it's huge challenging greens, elevation changes, doglegs, great variety of holes and fair/demanding tee shots. I loved it again. Course was in great shape. Greens again the highlight, smooth, moderately fast and firm. Fairways and rough lush with just a few brown areas. Bunkers firm but playable. Tee boxes lush in good shape. I snapped a bunch of photos I just posted. Rancho Solano Golf Course is known in the area as 4-putt capital of the world. I believe it if they had the greens running fast. There are lots of shelves on the greens, especially the back halves of them, where big trouble brews. When you see a blue pin, go after it. You’re better off over the green than short on it.

Friendly staff, nice big clubhouse, fast pace of play, the golf course is also known as one of the best values in NorCal. Highly Recommended.

Played Rancho Solano on 5/19. 7:15 Tee time. Course is in the foothills just north of I80 in Fairfield, about 30 minutes (with no traffic) from the East Bay.

The course is public and owned by the c... Continue »

Played Rancho Solano on 5/19. 7:15 Tee time. Course is in the foothills just north of I80 in Fairfield, about 30 minutes (with no traffic) from the East Bay.

The course is public and owned by the city. Was a semi-private club until the dot.com bust. Course is tucked into a gated community with many holes bordering homes.

This course is affectionately know as the "Home of the 4 putt". The greens here were spectacular, very fast, true, and difficult.

The course is not long, or overly technical. It has some risk-reward holes and a few extreme dog legs, mixed with some fun par-3's. The course is very fair, and fun, with the just the right amount of difficulty.

The green complex's are huge, so on in two is easily achievable, but you need to be on the right part of the green if you hope to par.

I really enjoyed my round here and was in and out in 3:45. Was never rushed, or waited long.

For our second GK Review Guru round on 10-19, we played Rancho Solano GC with GK’ers Jerry64, rgm2525 and sixpez. We all enjoyed Paradise Valley GC that morning and made it a double shot of Fairfield ... Continue »

For our second GK Review Guru round on 10-19, we played Rancho Solano GC with GK’ers Jerry64, rgm2525 and sixpez. We all enjoyed Paradise Valley GC that morning and made it a double shot of Fairfield golf. I personally loved the layout at Rancho Solano. The track is molded into the surrounding hills beautifully providing a large variety of elevation changes, scenic views, doglegs in both directions, some water hazards, well position large bunkers, and speaking of large, massive in fact, undulating putting greens. I’ve never played a course with such huge putting surfaces and I absolutely dug it. The course has a local reputation as the “4-Putt Capital of World” and I believe it. Many greens had multiple shelves and if you happen to be on the wrong side of the greens with many of those shelves to deal with, a 4-putt could be in your future. This made the course very unique in my mind which IMO is a big plus.

As for the conditions, very lush and green. Fairways although at times with multiple types of grasses, all lush, providing great lies. The greens, running moderately fast, holding shots and mostly smooth. Rough, which I spent a good deal of time in, very tough to hit from. About 3 to 4 inches thick and in most circumstances your ball will be sitting down. Bunkers in good shape with quality sand. Tee boxes were under maintenance being aerated and sanded but despite the work, played well.

Our pace of play was right at 4 hours and the afternoon shadows sure made the place look pretty. Please see the photos I posted.

The course has nice size clubhouse with a comfortable restaurant bar & grill. I nice enclosed patio and spacious banquet room.

I can’t wait to play this course again. Highly recommended.

Played Rancho Solano on 10/19 as the second round in A GK Guru outing. Course presents some nice elevation changes. Conditions were lush in the fairways but tees were recently punched and sanded yet s... Continue »

Played Rancho Solano on 10/19 as the second round in A GK Guru outing. Course presents some nice elevation changes. Conditions were lush in the fairways but tees were recently punched and sanded yet still provided sound locations to tee the ball up. Rough was 2-3 inches with good coverage and provided some thought in recovery. Bunkers were good with quality sand. Greens here are the highlight of the course. Large does not do them justice, maybe huge, enormous, are better discriptions here. Running medium in speed our group did manage to avoid the dreaded 4 putt. Did notice several greens with unrepaired ball marks. Customer service was good. Definitely a play when in the area.

Played 10-19-16 for the second round of the day with John, Keith, and Jerry in a little under 4 hours in carts. Tee boxes were being punched and sanded but still mostly level and descent to hit from, ... Continue »

Played 10-19-16 for the second round of the day with John, Keith, and Jerry in a little under 4 hours in carts. Tee boxes were being punched and sanded but still mostly level and descent to hit from, even on the par threes. Fairways were in good shape with minimal roll out and nice lies. Rough was between 2 and 4 inches and very thick and lush. Didn't go in any bunkers but playing partners said they were fine. Greens were in good shape, a little slow with an occasional bump, and on the soft side. Very fun course with a good mixture of holes and overall in real nice shape.