Played on Oct 9. I had heard that Los Serranos was a terrific course and had intended to play it for a long time. I kept hearing how top amateur events were usually held there, etc. Unfortunately, whe... Continue »

Played on Oct 9. I had heard that Los Serranos was a terrific course and had intended to play it for a long time. I kept hearing how top amateur events were usually held there, etc. Unfortunately, when I first played it last year in 2016, the course was in awful shape. There were many bare spots and the bunkers were just dirt. I assumed that the drought just took its toll on the course like it did on so many other courses. However, after seeing how courses that were previously in awful shape were somewhat better after the past winter, I had high hopes for Los Serranos this time. Alas, I saw little to no improvement. I kept seeing the same old bare spots on the fairways, rough and even just a few yards from the greens. The bunkers remain just hard dirt, so hard that I saw shots roll right through and out of them. The range looked ugly and the balls were mostly old and dirty. On the plus side, the greens weren't too bad and the folks in the pro shop were friendly and gave us a good deal on range balls when a golf tournament delayed our tee time by over half an hour. We were a bit surprised by a cranky old course marshall who threatened us with a slow play warning a few holes in even though the next group behind us was on the tee on a par 5 and we were on the green. Something about 13 minutes a hole. We weren't upset by it since we expected to finish the round quickly with no one left on the course after the shotgun tournament and with all three of us being fairly decent golfers (scores ranging from 74 to 83). We just found the gentleman rather bizarre and oblivious to reality. Perhaps he wasn't doing his job during the tournament that caused our half hour delay in our starting time and was reprimanded. Whatever. We were able to finish the course in four hours just as the sun set so everything worked out just fine. I'm sure the course was once in great shape judging from the omnipresent 2012 Course of the Year signs, but this course appears to be resting on its laurels. It's too bad because it is a nice course with lots of interesting holes. Was the $36 or so I paid to play worth it? Probably, but definitely not worth any more than that given the conditions. However, if the conditions were terrific, I'd be happy to pay more than double that. I hope they will turn it around. At least start by designating bare spots as ground under repair and having grass at least five yards around the green and green side bunkers. It would certainly be nice if the bunkers had some sand instead of just hard dirt.