Last update - 12/7/19
My first time at Larkin (used to be Fox Den CC), finally. The first thing you notice is the laughable "driving" range -- it's about 125 yards long and only allows wedges. So if you need to warm up with irons and woods, you'll have to hit into a single hitting net they have set up next to the putting green. Once you get over that and actually get onto the course though, you'll love it. The greens are bent grass and were in great shape. One of only a handful of decent public courses around Charlotte that hasn't switched over to Bermuda greens. The greens are mostly flat but at least on this day, the greenskeeper made up for that by hiding the pins on the edges of the greens. I'd say about 1/3 to 1/2 of them were within 10 feet of either the front or back edge of the green -- which made short-sided chips and putts from off the green rather treacherous. The tees, fairways, and rough were all in fine shape -- though I saw several bunkers with standing water. The fairways and rough are all Bermuda so of course they were dormant. No issues to report however. I really enjoyed the layout. Great mix of challenges with strategically placed hazards requiring risk/reward decisions, daunting elevation changes and reachable par 5's. I was playing in a 2 man scramble but I could see being able to shoot a good individual score here. Though this course is a long haul for me (almost to Statesville on I-77), I'll be back at least once or twice a season. I'd love to see it in the Spring when it's greened up.
