It's time to check out the back nine at River Downs, go here to see the front.
The first thing you'll notice when you step onto the tenth tee is that there doesn't appear to actually be a tenth hole. Just a small gap in a line of trees leading down at least a hundred feet into the river valley far below. That tiny sliver of fairway 200-plus yards out is in fact your target on this 380-yard par 4. Now of course there's more fairway than it looks from the tee, but not that much more. And with how inaccurate this course can be with provided distances, I honestly have no idea what club you would hit to find this fairway. Probably a long iron, but even that's a guess.
Assuming you've gotten lucky and not hit your drive into the trees left or gone through the fairway onto the railroad, you should have a slightly uphill wedge second to a semiblind green with a single bunker front right. But there's no sugarcoating this one; the tenth is just not a good hole. Maybe I could let the drive go if there was space beyond the fairway to not lose your golf ball or if the hole didn't bend nearly 90 degrees left, but there's just so little space available with the angle the fairway is tilted at. And with the hole being so far downhill, successfully judging the distance you need to hit your drive, particularly if it's your first time at the course, is just not possible without a bit of luck.
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| The tenth hole. Sort of, anyway. |
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| Approaching the tenth green. |
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| The tenth green. |
The eleventh hole is a par 3 playing 170 yards over the Patapsco River to a semiblind green perched on top of a small bluff. The green is bunkerless and pretty straightforward, if a bit small, so if you do make it up on top, you have a chance at making birdie. It's not as egregiously terrible as the last two holes, but the most interesting thing about the eleventh has very little to do with the actual hole.
As you're traveling from the tenth green to this tee, you pass by what is pretty clearly an old tee box, and the eleventh tee itself is located on a big, wide-open field that's both flat and devoid of trees. This field bears a striking resemblance to an old fairway, and my brother and I theorized that the eleventh hole of today is not the original hole. A quick trip to Google Earth confirmed this hypothesis; the hole was originally a par 4 with the tee 200 yards further back, and was changed sometime between 2002 and 2005. This obviously begs the question of why the hole was altered. My guess? With the fairway being flat and located right along the river, I bet they had issues with flooding. The fairway probably didn't drain right and got to be in such bad shape that the management decided to build a tee forward and have everyone play from there, limiting the damage done by divots to one spot and circumventing the flooding issues.
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| The eleventh hole. |
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| The eleventh green. |
The twelfth hole is 570 yards, and much like the ninth, you really do feel every bit of that length, as the first two-thirds of the hole plays steadily uphill through a rather snug playing corridor tilted sharply from right to left. Seriously, this drive is narrow, and with the fairway playing bone dry, any sort of draw or hook runs the risk of diving into the left trees, even if it lands in play. You have slightly more space if you lay back, but when the hole is this long, you really don't want to use less than driver. Thankfully, the hole does open up once you pass the 200-yard marker, though of course that also means all you need to do on the second is advance the ball. A solid second will leave a little wedge into the green, which has two bunkers right. This is definitely not a good hole, but at the very least it's not as aggressively stupid as the first and ninth.
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| The twelfth hole. |
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| Approaching the twelfth green. |
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| The twelfth green. |
The thirteenth hole is a short 340-yard par 4 with a fairway that slopes pretty severely from left to right, against the curve of the fairway. An aggressive drive that carries the fairway bunker in the corner of the dogleg will bound down very close to the green, but the fairway narrows between trees left and O.B. right, so any driver not precisely struck will likely disappear. The safe play is a long iron off the tee, leaving a pretty straightforward wedge for the second shot to a green fronted by two small bunkers.
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The thirteenth hole.
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| The thirteenth green. |
The fourteenth hole is 195 yards and plays significantly downhill to a shallow green surrounded by five bunkers. If it sounds like a rather tall order to hit a green with so little green to work with – and where using the ground game is impossible – that's because it kind of is. Perhaps I'm letting my personal experience with the hole get in the way (I hit what I thought was an excellent tee shot, only for the ball to land in the one spot on the entire course that wasn't bone dry, resulting in my shot not bouncing onto the green and a frustrating bogey), but I just don't think this is a very good hole.
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| The fourteenth hole. |
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| The fourteenth green. |
The fifteenth hole is the longest par 4 at River Downs at 430 yards, so naturally, water just had to be involved. The fairway narrows at roughly the halfway point of the hole, pinched in by a pond left and the river just out of sight to the right. There is a decent amount of space short of the pond, but then you're leaving yourself 200 yards for the second shot. The water extends the whole way down to the left side of the green, but there is space right to bail out, which is a pleasant small mercy for the hole to offer.
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| The fifteenth hole. |
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| Approaching the fifteenth green. |
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| The fifteenth green. |
The sixteenth hole is a fairly short par 4 at 355 yards, and you'll never guess what the strategy is on the tee shot.
That's right, it's another forced lay-up with a long iron or fairway wood! While the fairway is wide, it turns nearly 90 degrees right about 225-250 yards out, and with dense trees effectively blocking any attempts to cut the dogleg, you really have no choice but to play conservatively. That will leave a simple wedge into a medium-sized green with absolutely no trouble even remotely close by. This really is a nothing sort of hole beyond the difficulty your own ability (or lack thereof) brings to it.
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| The sixteenth hole. |
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| Approaching the sixteenth green. |
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| The sixteenth green. |
If I had a dollar for every time River Downs forces you to use less than driver on a par 5, I'd have three dollars. That's right, everyone's favorite terrible design strategy appears once again on the seventeenth, a short par 5 just under 500 yards. At the very least, if you aim down the left side, flirting with the trees, you can hit 3 wood. That does potentially bring the green into reach with the second shot, especially since you'll have a better angle. The green (and hole) is bunkerless, but there's a steep falloff into brush and forest short right that will catch out any weakly struck approaches.
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| The seventeenth hole. |
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| Approaching the seventeenth green. |
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| The seventeenth green. |
In a decision that I'm 100% sure was intentional and totally not "oh dear, we've run out of space for our last hole," the eighteenth hole is a 210-yard par 3. Not something you see very often. Of course, don't think that means it's an easy hole. The green juts out on a small promontory, with a brush-filled ravine lurking short and right. There is some space to bail out left, but not a lot, and it's hardly an easier carry. You only have to carry the tee shot 150 instead of 180. I suppose the hole is certainly dramatic, but after so many forced carries, I was hardly excited to finish off the round like this.
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| The eighteenth hole. |
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| The eighteenth green. |
So, how do I wrap up my thoughts about River Downs succinctly?
Yeah, it's pretty bad.
But it is unenjoyably bad, or is it more in the "so bad it's good" category? That is a trickier question. There's definitely some weird stuff going on, and my brother and I did get at least a little amusement out of how bad some of the holes were. That ninth hole in particular is one to remember. But there were also a lot of holes where you just get literally nothing to work with. Holes that are just dull and boring, with no imagination, no personality, no strategy, just hit ball, find it, and hit it again.
I will say this, I would rather play River Downs than Maryland National again. That's an incredibly low bar to clear, admittedly, but it does just barely hobble over. There is some entertainment to be gleaned here, even if it's only to point and laugh at the absolutely abysmal playing conditions (seriously, it was so bad). And while $54 for 18 is still highway robbery for what you get, that's still comfortably less than what Maryland National charges.
Would I like to play here again? Absolutely not. Would I pick this over some other courses like Maryland National or the Links at Challedon (which features a similar disjointed routing to River Downs as well as terrible condition, but lacks this course's meager charm). If you put a gun to my head, yes. And if that isn't a rousing way to conclude the review, I don't know what is.
