When you stand on the 1st tee at Sterling Farms Golf Club, 1 of Stamford’s two 18-hole municipal layouts, you get the feeling you’re about to play a private course.
Behind you, on the other side of the ticket office and cart shack, the additional agile populace compete on six tennis courts whilst, to your proper, golfers try to best their putting strokes on a small practice green outdoors the pro shop.
Further to private clubs Singapore , previous the ninth hole and across the parking lot,is a vastly improved and usually packed green-carpeted driving range, exactly where hackers and low-handicapped golfers alike take benefit of the 25 stalls to warm up.
I had arrived early for my 12:33 p.m. tee off time on a recent Friday so I could get acquainted with my playing partners — Patricia McGrath, a Stamford Golf Authority member, Don Hill and Rose Palladino, three Stamford residents. I hoped they could show me the ropes to the five,922-yard course (from the White tees.)
On the way in from Newfield Avenue, I took note of the two restaurants on the course. The Fairway at Sterling that functions fine dining and the Tenth Tee Grill, where golfers can sit and love a sandwich or hot dog and a cup of coffee ahead of, through or following a round of golf.
As I gazed down the very first fairway, driver in hand, I was disappointed to see that the old battered tree that for years had challenged golfers by overhanging the fairway was gone, a victim of too lots of stray golf balls. In its spot stands a grove of little trees.
The very first hole is a quick, effortless par 4 (uncomplicated, that is, if you don’t major your tee shot the way I did) that calls for a extended iron or wood down a narrow fairway followed by a short-iron down a steep incline to a reasonably flat, unguarded green.
Stepping onto the second tee is a genuine treat. This hole is 1 of the finest — on a course that can boast far more than a few genuinely nice layouts, exactly where the fairways are effectively manicured, the greens are fair and true, and the challenges are substantial for us weekend hackers.
A 499-yard downhill par five demands a excellent drive from an elevated tee with out-of-bounds on the left, trees on the right, and a strategically placed bunker on the left side of a fairway that doglegs left-to-proper. If you happen to be out far enough on your drive, you can attempt to go over a tiny watery channel to reach the green otherwise, you have to have to lay up, use a quick to mid-iron and keep away from the bunkers guarding the greens, front left and middle appropriate.
The third hole is a quick par 4 that needs a straight, but not extended, drive and short iron, avoiding the out-of-bounds on the left and water on the right, if you happen to be brief.
My playing partners informed me that the really extended hitters nevertheless cut the dogleg on the 333-yard fourth hole, but for most of us it’s a medium iron over a drainage ditch and uphill to the green. The fifth hole is a good, 198-yard par three from an elevated tee to a green guarded by water long and to the left.
The par 5 sixth, Sterling Farm’s signature hole, is only 415 yards, but it is up a steep hill that rises drastically more than the last one hundred yards to a green whose surface is not visible from the fairway.
I was specifically glad that I was riding a cart as we worked our way up the sixth, and McGrath informed me that a study by The Northeast Golf Enterprise commissioned by the golf authority offers a total, hole-by-hole enhancement plan that will be made use of as a guide to adjustments in the course as funds turn into readily available. The program suggests dramatic modifications in the sixth hole, from tee to green. (I hope they know what they’re performing!)
The final three holes on the front nine comprise a difficult dogleg right from an elevated tee (seventh) a straightforward, uphill lengthy iron or wood to the eighth hole, and a longish, uphill enjoyable-to-play par 4 ninth that takes you back to the clubhouse (just aim for the American flag.)
Hill and Palladino, accustomed to playing only nine holes, mentioned their goodbyes and right after a swift snack at the grill, McGrath and I mounted the 10th tee to attack the back nine. It starts down a steep hill — dreaded by those amongst us who tend to hook the ball for the reason that the building that houses the grill, on the left, appears to jump out at you.
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