A few days late, but here's my wrap up of DeBell with Johnny and rgm2525 on Tuesday, 11/12. In general, DeBell is the little guy in the bar you end up in a scrap with, thinking it will be an easy conc... Continue »

A few days late, but here's my wrap up of DeBell with Johnny and rgm2525 on Tuesday, 11/12. In general, DeBell is the little guy in the bar you end up in a scrap with, thinking it will be an easy conclusion in your favor until you realize your first swing missed, you've been hit twice, you are now on one knee and the room is spinning. The first few holes in particular are teasingly short, but unforgiving if you get off line. They demand you execute strategically and precisely or you can get behind quickly and early. In the bigger picture, discounting the par threes leaves you 14 holes, on only three of which you can see the green from the tee — very few grip-and-rip opportunities here. As far as actual conditions, in the interests of efficiency I'm going to build off Johnny's report, which you should all read first. His report on the conditions is pretty much spot on. I would subtly differ from him in that I think the greens were just about as quick as one would want (my opinion) relative to the slopes and shapes of the greens there. There are already some greens that are virtually impossible to stop your ball from above the hole. I really enjoyed them on the day, but if improvement means getting quicker, they might end up inappropriately quick for the topography (again, IMHO). I've been at outings with Johnny but had never played with him directly, so I finally got to see his prowess with the putter, with which he is an assassin. He made a bunch and when it didn't go in, it never missed by much, so his threshold for putting challenge would exceed mine. All the rest was as reported. I was in enough bunkers and quickly found they were firm enough to partially deflect my sand wedge. I eventually found my gap wedge had a more appropriate bite. While some bunkers were pretty clean, many had conspicuous pebbles, and one in particular was like a mini-quarry, heavily strewn with pebbles and small stones. That was the exception to the overall very enjoyable conditions. The additional charms of DeBell are the dramatic, aforementioned topography and the views they provide, the relative isolation of the canyon setting and resident wildlife, and the nice upstairs bar and restaurant that has a large outdoor deck with views in three directions — one of the cooler places to hang out post-round. I was fortunate to have excellent company in Johnny and Ron. Watching Ron is always a clinic. He makes it look easy — for him, at least. DeBell is quirky and challenging enough that I wouldn't want a steady diet of it, but it is a good course with unique charms that draw me back periodically. Every once in a while I have to see if I can still take a punch.