Fyre Lake Golf Club, Illinois, United States

2IA_Hawks 5:00 PM Jul 10, 2017

Nicklaus design.... NOT Nicklaus quality
I was very anxious to try Fyre Lake after being told about it by a relative that played here several years ago, but left after my round highly disappointed in the quality of the facility. Let's start with just getting to the course. There is a very small sign indicating where to turn for the course on Knoxville Rd, which is very hard to see if you are traveling Westbound, so you're best bet is to look for the 7-Eleven and turn South once you see it. Turn onto Township Rd and proceed to the very nice water feature / sign welcoming you to Fyre Lake with a sign pointing to the right for the golf course. My suggestion is to ignore it and continue South onto Lakeview Dr as my GPS told me to do. Township Rd is out of the way and Lakeview Dr provides a better view of several holes on the course and Lakeview Dr will take you directly to the parking lot below the clubhouse. I say parking lot, but don't expect any valet to come get your bags from this bumpy gravel parking area. The clubhouse is a double trailer with a large "Golf Pro Shop" banner hanging on the front entrance. Upon entering we were essentially ignored by the only person working there since we didn't appear to be anybody he recognized from the housing development surrounding the course. There was a group that came in from the patio overlooking the 1st tee to order food in which he proceeded to help them first. That person proceeded to sporadically order food and drink for his foursome which was slowly prepared by the worker and at one point he apologized to us for taking so much time. Unfortunately he wasn't the one that needed to apologize. The worker never gave us a welcoming "hello" or "be right with you", he just ignored us. Once we finally paid, he did not thank us, tell us about the pin placements, or to enjoy our round, we simply left and headed to our cart and went to the 1st tee. Be warned..... if you have never played this course, the scorecard does not have a course map, nor do the carts have any GPS, or map to indicate yardages to bunkers or water. While the course layout is very good, it became quickly evident to me that the course itself is NOT Nicklaus quality. My errant tee shot on #1 rolled into the #2 fairway which had several weeds around where my ball stopped. Thinking nothing of it, I hit my second shot and moved on. The green on #2 is undulating, like a number of the greens on the course, only this one has a large (approximately 3" x 3") scalded patch at the top of one of the mounds. Bare soil with sand or patches of grass and sand. The bunker in front of the par 3 #5 green is basically made of pea gravel and not actually sand.... so you can ruin your club or claim unplayable and place your ball outside of the gravel trap. This is the same as #6 as well with the addition of quite a bit of standing water in the greenside bunker. Onto the par 3 8th. The tee box, like most of the others on the course was unmowed. This particular one was not repaired from all the divots so the teeing ground was essentially a sandbox with no solid footing to be found. Once you got to the green there was another large scalded spot on the undulating green..... so obviously the person running the mower doesn't know what they are doing. The scalded spot is again at the top of an undulation and had not been repaired. We played in early July so there was some typical hot and humid weather, but there was no beverage cart on the course. I also observed more weeds on the back 9 than I expected from any course, let alone one with the Nicklaus name attached to it. However, since this course filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in 2015 and there are new local owners, I shouldn't be surprised at the poor condition of the course and lack of maintenance. If you're traveling to the Quad Cities for some quality golf, give a second thought about Fyre Lake and take your money and game someplace else in much better shape.

1Zokolady 5:00 PM Aug 10, 2021

Horrible expereince
Course was in terrible shape. The rough was weedy and unmowed. The owner was incredibly rude. Stood in the middle of a fairway filing divets so I couldn't hit my next shot. Horrible experience.