River Club: 5 Things You Need to Know
With sand and water surrounding nearly every green, River Club is a second shot golf course.
Playing through property that used to be home to a thriving rice plantation, River Club is the quintessential South Strand golf course. The layout is superb, conditions are pristine, and the facility oozes charm. Before playing your next round at the Tom Jackson design, here are five things you need to know.
1. Length Matters: The greens at River Club are well guarded, typically by a combination of a sand and water. Most of the trouble is in front of the greens, so when you are pulling an iron for your approach, make sure take enough club to get to the middle of the green.
2. Drive for show, putt for dough, but …: Everyone knows the cliche about the importance of the flat stick, but River Club is a second shot golf course. The fairways are generous, so players can swing away with the driver, and the greens are conducive to making putts, but you have to be the in the right spots. Pay attention to where the pins are make sure your mid to low irons are dialed in.
3. What you see is what you get: River Club is a creative design and is fun to play, but Jackson didn’t trick the course up. The challenges are in front of you and there are no unwanted architectural surprises.
4. The biggest challenge is: Bring your ‘A’ game to the 15th hole. It’s not exceedingly long at 409 yards from the tips (384 from the white tees), but the dogleg right requires players to carry water off the tee and on the approach. Adding to the challenge is a relatively narrow green that runs at an angle. If you make par at 15, you are setup for a strong finish.
5. What you will love!: The 18th hole at River Club is a stunning risk-reward, par 5. Players can attempt to go for the green in two, but it requires them to carry water twice and you have to reach the green on the fly. With the clubhouse (which can include the rest of your group watching you finish) on a hill overlooking the green, it’s a spectacular close to a round.
River Club: 5 Things You Need to Know
With sand and water surrounding nearly every green, River Club is a second shot golf course.
Playing through property that used to be home to a thriving rice plantation, River Club is the quintessential South Strand golf course. The layout is superb, conditions are pristine, and the facility oozes charm. Before playing your next round at the Tom Jackson design, here are five things you need to know.
1. Length Matters: The greens at River Club are well guarded, typically by a combination of a sand and water. Most of the trouble is in front of the greens, so when you are pulling an iron for your approach, make sure take enough club to get to the middle of the green.
2. Drive for show, putt for dough, but …: Everyone knows the cliche about the importance of the flat stick, but River Club is a second shot golf course. The fairways are generous, so players can swing away with the driver, and the greens are conducive to making putts, but you have to be the in the right spots. Pay attention to where the pins are make sure your mid to low irons are dialed in.
3. What you see is what you get: River Club is a creative design and is fun to play, but Jackson didn’t trick the course up. The challenges are in front of you and there are no unwanted architectural surprises.
4. The biggest challenge is: Bring your ‘A’ game to the 15th hole. It’s not exceedingly long at 409 yards from the tips (384 from the white tees), but the dogleg right requires players to carry water off the tee and on the approach. Adding to the challenge is a relatively narrow green that runs at an angle. If you make par at 15, you are setup for a strong finish.
5. What you will love!: The 18th hole at River Club is a stunning risk-reward, par 5. Players can attempt to go for the green in two, but it requires them to carry water twice and you have to reach the green on the fly. With the clubhouse (which can include the rest of your group watching you finish) on a hill overlooking the green, it’s a spectacular close to a round.
The 3 Best Holes at River Club
No. 14 at River Club is ranked among the Grand Strand's top 100 holes.
The beauty of River Club lies in its consistent excellence. Hole after hole the South Strand layout provides players with a different and enjoyable challenge. We assigned head pro Christa Bodensteiner the difficult task of giving us River Club’s three best holes and after careful thought, she delivered.
No. 9, 413-yard, par 4: A long dogleg right, No. 9 doesn’t leave a lot of room for error but it decides a lot of nine-hole matches. Off the tee there is a bunker on the right and out-of-bounds on the left, and the second shot is into a large angled green that is well bunkered.
“My advice would be to make sure you are hitting to the correct side of the green,” Bodensteiner says. “Look where the flag is and make sure you use enough club. With bunker in front it’s okay to be long but not short.”
A par on No. 9 is a good score.
No. 14, 186-yard, par 3: A beautiful island green, No. 14 isn’t particularly long but danger lurks. Best case scenario on a mishit shot is to find one of the three bunkers that guard the green, otherwise you are donating a ball to the cause. That being said the green is fairly large so you players don’t have to be throwing darts to stay dry.
No. 18, 518-yard, par 5: On a course full of memorable holes, the eighteenth would be on nearly everyone’s list of River Club’s best. The dogleg left features a pair of yawning bunkers on each side of the fairway off the tee and a lake that surrounds the green on two sides.
With the clubhouse in the background, No. 18 is a beautiful hole and its reachable in two, but it will take some nerve to execute one of the most daring shots on the Grand Strand.
“You’ve got to be brave to go for it in two,” Bodensteiner says. “You’ve got to cross the water twice. My advice would be to hit one more club than you think you should.”
What are your favorite holes at River Club?
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