Southern Hills Golf Course — Attraction in Hot Springs

First, the good... This is a beautiful course and is well-maintained. We have a group of college friends in our 50's who have been getting together to golf once a year for the last 15 or so years. (Lots of fun and no seriousness.) Our group has good golfers and not-so-good golfers in our group, so we play best ball to move faster and to be courteous to other golfers. We will let anyone play through. We have been to several courses all over the Black Hills and have always had a great time. We have been to the Southern Hills Golf Course twice with two bad experiences. The first time, we believed the course was open until dark, about 8:30ish. We were on the 7th hole at a little after 7:00 when the lady from the clubhouse came out on a cart yelling at us that we had to get off the course because they were closed, and she wanted to go home. We had just driven our balls off the tee, and she wouldn't let us go get our balls. Well, after a few years, we decided to try again. We called and explained our group. Eight women, pretty slow, but we do best ball so that helps. They said that we were welcome. The lady in the clubhouse was great and again confirmed that we were ok to be there. We had two groups of four, and on one hole we were somewhat together (easy to do with best ball because you just need one in the second group to get a great shot), and so we all hit to the green. The first group putted and then the second group putted. The course marshal was following us, and told us we couldn't all be on the green together. We explained that all eight were not putting at the same time, and that we were golfing separate but we would not let that happen again. We were actually trying to speed things up. He seemed OK with that, but then proceeded to follow us literally parking beside us the entire rest of the time we were there. He also was talking to the foursome behind us, and at about the third or fourth hole, they came up to us and were very rude about how slow we were. We told them that they can golf through if they want, and so they did. It turns out that they were not faster than us because we then waited at every tee behind them. That was ok with us... it gave us a chance to take pics and visit with the other group of four. There was only one other golfer who golfed through. He was a single golfer who was playing very fast. Our time to finish nine holes, including waiting for the group in front of us was about 2 hrs and 45 minutes. That was slow enough to warrant having a course marshal escort us the entire day. I think the message here is that this course is for serious, good golfers only. Other courses we have golfed over the last 15 years, and some of them multiple times, that have treated us well and made us feel welcome include Belle Fourche, Lead Country Club, Tomahawk Country Club, Hart Ranch, and Ellsworth AFB. This course is very convenient to our friend who travels the furthest because she has family in Hot Springs, so we really had hoped for a better...

This is the best, well-cared for public course dollar/fun per yard. The front nine takes you through a challenging yet forgiving need for fades and draws. It advances every skill level with options to cut for a 150yd iron shot or to play it safe with the hybrid fairway. The elevation changes provides players with high five opportunities going around and over hills. The back nine feels like the course designer went off leash. The opportunities to be alone out in the wild teeing off into unforgiving yet playful landscape is of a dream. Taking risks on shots are rewarded though trouble if not strategic. Don’t skimp on reading the greens - a lot to roll with here.

To add to the course, Sony + Jill (sp), among other team members such as Jay cutting the greens, are some of the friendliest staff. Club members such as Wally, Ron, Steve, Tom, + others are some genuine folk who care about this track. This is a well run, well taken care of golf course for the city of Hot Springs. 10/10, highly recommend. Can’t wait to run it back next year.

Tip: If you can, play from the blues; some of the best tee...

First time playing this course and first time playing “up North” this year. It’s always difficult switching from “thicker” Arizona greens to northern greens and this course was a somewhat expected shock! The staff was very welcoming and took the time to explain the course layout since it was our first visit. Some of the hole to hole transitions are confusing indeed! We found really nice, fast, contoured greens that got the best of us. Overall a really well maintained course, but it does have multiple personalities! The predictable traditional layout of the front nine lulled us into comfort and the out of this world back nine made us realize what a challenging course can be like! No way both nines were designed by the same person! All in all, a great day out. Well done Southern...