Is the Greg Norman Course Too Hard for Average Golfers?

It is the question mid-handicap golfers ask quietly on a visit. Am I going to enjoy a Greg Norman Signature course, or is it going to eat me alive?

Fair question. Nobody wants to buy into a golf community and then dread the home course.

Here is an honest way to answer it for Tennessee National, a private, gated lake and golf community on Watts Bar Lake in Loudon, Tennessee.

How long is the golf course at Tennessee National?

It is 7,393 yards, with 18 holes and a par of 72. At full length that is a long golf course, the kind of yardage set up for very strong players.

The big number on a scorecard is the longest version of the course. It tells you how hard the course can be. It does not tell you how hard it has to be for you.

Is 7,393 yards too long for an average golfer?

From all the way back, yes, for almost everyone. That is not where an average golfer plays.

Most courses are built with more than one set of tees. Each set shortens the holes so a different kind of player can reach the greens. The question to ask is not how long the course is. It is how long the course is from the tees you would use.

This post does not have the tee sets or their yardages for Tennessee National, so it will not guess. The club has the scorecard. Ask for it before your visit.

A simple rule for picking tees: choose by how far you hit your driver, not by pride. If you cannot reach most of the par fours in two good shots, move up a set.

How do you judge difficulty before you play?

Read the scorecard, then look at the ground.

The scorecard gives two numbers for each set of tees.

• Course rating is the score a scratch golfer is expected to shoot from those tees.
• Slope rating shows how much harder those tees play for a bogey golfer than for a scratch golfer. The higher the slope, the more a course punishes an average player.

Then ride or walk a few holes and look for these.

No article can fill in that table for you. Ten minutes on the course can.

What does a Greg Norman design mean for your score?

Less than the name suggests. The label tells you who was behind the design, not what the course will do to your card.

Greg Norman's design firm describes its approach as least disturbance, which means fitting the holes to the land that is already there. That is a philosophy. It is not a difficulty rating.

So do not lean on the name in either direction. A signature course is not automatically brutal, and it is not automatically friendly. What a Greg Norman Signature golf course is explains the label. The holes themselves answer the rest.

Would you want to play it every week?

That is the better question. Difficulty matters on a course you play once. On a home course you play hundreds of times, repeat play matters more.

A good home course has:

• Tees you can move between as your game changes.
• Holes that play differently with the wind and the hole location.
• A safe way to play each hole, so a bad day is still a round of golf.
• Something to chase, so a good day feels earned.

On your visit, play a hole in your head from the tees you would use. Find the safe miss. Ask golfers who play there what the course gives back as you improve. How to evaluate a golf course on a community visit has a full checklist.

What makes a long course easier?

Mostly choices you make before you swing.

1. Move up a set of tees. It is the biggest change you can make.
2. Aim at the middle of the green. Ignore the flag when it sits near trouble.
3. Take the safe line. A steady bogey from the safe route beats a double from the brave one.
4. Play nine. A long course is shorter in halves.
5. Play a scramble with friends when your swing is not there.
6. Play more often. East Tennessee has four seasons and mild winters. More rounds on the same course lower scores more than anything else.

If two people in the house play at different levels, golf as a couple covers formats that keep it fun.

What does it cost to play here?

That is a question for the club. How you get onto the course, and what it costs, comes from the club, so ask for it in writing.

The home is a separate budget. Pricing for homes and homesites is in the info pack. There is no deadline to build after you buy a homesite, so you can keep playing your current course until you are ready to move.

The honest answer

This post cannot hand you a slope rating or a forward tee yardage for Tennessee National. Those come from the club, and they are the numbers that decide the question.

Here is what it can say. A 7,393-yard course is only 7,393 yards if you choose to play it that way. From the right tees, most well-designed long courses are a fair test for a mid-handicap player. Whether this one is, for your game, is something you find out on the ground.

Start with the golf page. Ask the club for the scorecard, and ask ahead whether you can ride or play the course when you visit.

And if golf turns out to be a smaller part of your week than you planned, the lake is still there. Do you have to golf to live at Tennessee National? covers that side.

Facts about Tennessee National come from the community. Lake facts come from TVA. Rules, taxes, loans and insurance change, so confirm anything that affects a purchase with the right office or professional before you buy.