Sunnyvale Golf Course

So we made a reservation on Friday to play on Memorial Day Monday. They were kind enough to mention that weekend rates applied but failed to mention that the restaurant has been closed for over a year. What this translates to is there is nothing, not even bottled water for sale any longer anywhere on the course. I get it if the restaurant had just closed or several months ago, but come on. It would have been nice to know before we got there. It was in the 80’s and not a drop of anything to be had.
The course is in average condition with the exception of the ponds. Yep we are in drought so I understand, but come on. They have been turned into algae ridden, bug infested mud pits.
The course was not crowded at all but we got stuck behind some ridiculously slow golfers turning a 4 hour lap into 5 ½ hour lap. One of the guys in our group finally gave up and went home after 12. Where were the marshall’s? So you know, our group shoots in the 90’s to low 100’s so our expectations are not that of some hot shots.
With the close proximity of higher quality, fully functioning courses with green fees at or below the cost of SVE Muni this is definitely one to pass on.

I really like the course but there are a lot of things missing. I used to come here with my Dad to have breakfast and back in the day watch the Blue Angels. The restaurant is closed and there is no driving range to warm up on. The greens are nice (not great due to the drought). Its not peaceful due to the entire course being surrounded by the freeways. Its loud and hard to concentrate. I like that there are nice open fairways so it leaves room for error without losing your ball. The price is so expensive though. Not sure why? Its not worth it in my opinion.

Played here for the first time and although I came way unimpressed, I was also not disappointed. It’s a nice, short and forgiving course with wide fairways. The course condition wasn’t all that great but in this drought, not many muni tracks are, though the greens were pretty nice. They rolled well, but there were lots of divots that weren’t repaired thanks to people who lack proper golf etiquette.
I’m not going to complain about the slow pace of play like many people have. If you’re playing a muni course on a weekend, there’s a good chance it’s going to be a long round. On a Saturday, it was a 5 hour round. Ever heard the label «weekend hacker»?
The lack of a food/​drink cart can be a problem on hot days and it just happened to have been 85 degrees on the day I played. Even though I brought 3 bottles of Gatorade, I could do used another one. The carts are a tad old as well. The one we got squeaked and squealed all day and the brakes made grinding sounds.
The staff was super friendly in the pro shop. This is a place I’d definitely play again for a change of scenery. It’s a short par 70, but it’s more challenging than a course like Poplar Creek, which is also short.

No cart service, snack shack closed, no restaurant and no food/​snacks what so ever in the shop. Making matters worse, leaving to get food and coming back is not allowed either despite the lack of access to food. Course isn’t too shabby but prices are a bit higher than the course is overall worth.

60+ dollars for a mediocre 18 holes. It seems that their food/​drink services were suspended? And no cart came around on an eighty degree day for refreshments. Go somewhere else, and don’t waste your time.

Played here yesterday for the first time in 20 years (was away from golfing until 2 years ago). I liked the course as a nice change of pace (we place Santa Teresa a lot). There’s enough trees, wind, and water to make it interesting. The course is very flat.
The two things I didn’t like are: no driving range (so we warmed up at Pruneridge on our drive over from Campbell), and no restaurant/​food/​drink right now (for 6+ months so far). Not sure why they couldn’t get a new vendor in place by now!

Nice muni course. No bev cart, no restaurant or anything either. Never understand why they have such high rates though. Can always find a better deal elsewhere for a higher quality of course on golfnow for example. Do like it here though when I do end up playing here.

I live 5 minutes away and this is my go-​to course. For a muni course it’s in great condition seemingly year-​round, and a pretty forgiving course as well for beginners. A good variety of hole layouts, very little elevation change, and only a couple tricky/​difficult holes (8^th hole, i’ll get a bird some day…). Otherwise the course plays pretty wide open and it’s pretty hard to find yourself in an unplayable situation, barring a wildly errant shot. The wind can pick up in the afternoon, but it’s not as windy as Moffett’s course or Shoreline, so if you play a lot on the Peninsula/​South Bay, you’ll be used to it. Weekday super twilight is a steal of a deal, especially during the summer. I’ve gotten in a full 18 holes before for $ 17, pretty hard to beat in this area.

Overpriced, flat. Can’t hit driver on a few short par 4’s

Sunnyvale Muni has become one of my favorite course. As of 2015, the greens are rolling beautifully. Overall course condition is excellent. Unlike other muni courses in the area, none of the holes repeat itself. Very unique layout with water, trees, bunkers, and wind mixed in. But always a chance for a recovery. It is a par 70 with 2x par 5s.
Best tee time is about an hour before twilight starts. It cost a few bucks more, but you can avoid the crowd. Yesterday, I teed off just before 1PM and finished before 5PM.
Poa annua greens are very common in Northern California and tend to get bumpy in the afternoons. I think the greens keeper started to roll the greens in addition to mowing. Bumpiness is not noticeable anymore. I made a 55ft putt yesterday. I am certain luck played a significant part, but it had to roll true.
No more snack shack or restaurant at the muni for now.
Freeways and Moffet Airfield provide white noise.
No real discounts through golfnow or other means
Senior monthly card members (Monday ~ Thursday)
Despite some of the negatives, single digit handicappers should be able appreciate the finer points of this course.

The Good — Overall a decent course for a muni. Forgiving and wide open with some challenging holes with water and sand.
The Bad — It’s not particularly well maintained and the pace of play is over 5 hours. Are you kidding? I have seen a marshall but he’s just not doing anything to increase the pace. Also watch out for goose crap.
The Ugly — No discount booking with $ 50-​$ 60 fees? This course is simply not worth that. There are plenty of courses nearby that are better for cheaper.
Story — Being from Sunnyvale I’ve played this course for years with let downs and overpricing and backed up holes. I decided to give the course another chance and booked a tee time for me and a few buddies. Tee time was accepted and we all planned on it and moved things around to play. ONE DAY BEFORE our game they course CANCELS our tee time on us saying there is now a tournament. No restitution or offers of different times. How do you cancel someone’s tee time? Not good Sunnyvale Muni, we won’t be coming back.

Don’t play this course if your trying to finish in 4 hrs. 3.5 hours for 12 holes. Walked off and the guy at the pro shop blamed me for getting behind some really slow ladies. Then, he wanted to charge me to just start over so I could get my money’s worth. No class towards clientele.

I have lived in Sunnyvale for many years, and have spent many mornings on this course. I love the sport and appreciate having the course so close to home, and it ia also very affordable.

While playing golf there we stopped at the snack shop (aka half-​way house) to buy some drinks. In spite of the price on the menu board posted on the snack shop the girl selling the beverages added on extra dollar to the price. When the discrepancy was mentioned to her she asked us if we still wanted the beverage… at her price not the posted price.
To compound the matter, when we brought this issue to the attention of the person in the Pro Shop and the people in the restaurant neither was concerned and stated there is nothing they could do. The people in the restaurant even indicated she does it all the time.
In addition, the play was very very slow that day. We had anticipated playing 18 holes of golf. Due to the slow play we only had time to play 9 holes of golf. We asked in the pro shop if we could have a rain check for the other nine holes we were told no.
I also reached out to the Parks Department to report these issues and the same as everybody else, they did not respond.
There are lots of other courses to play. I will not return to this one.

Decent course, especially for a muni. It’s maybe slightly worse than Shoreline, but it’s slightly cheaper too. The layout isn’t too simple (there are a number of dogleg holes, forced carries, etc). One notable characteristic is that the course is almost totally FLAT. No joke, there’s probably a 10ft elevation change from high to low point on this course.
I give 4 stars rather than 5, because there are some small patches that could use more maintenance. For example, there is a muddy area between hole 10 and 11 that has been muddy all year (due to sprinkler drainage?), even when it has not rained in 3 months. They should really fix that. Overall though, it’s an enjoyable course.
Now here’s what you’ve been waiting for, my «cheat sheet» for playing the first 9 holes:
Hole 1: Par 4, hard dogleg right. You have a HUGE area to hit your tee shot, just don’t slice it into the water. Obviously you want to stay right, but it’s not terrible to miss left. Even from the left cart path, you’ll only have ~160 yards to the hole.
Hole 2: Par 4. Simple, straight hole. Just avoid the fairway bunker ~170 yards from the green. If you miss very far to the left, your ball will bounce off the net protecting the freeway, and you’ll be fine. So take comfort in that.
Hole 3: Par 5, slight arch left to right. Stay left on this hole. If you slice into the trees to the right, you should probably just punch out. I’ve seen people hit their tee shots into the right trees, then spend 4 – 5 shots hacking it up to get to the green, each shot hitting a tree or branch. Just STAY LEFT and you won’t have this problem. A shot missed left is in far better shape.
Hole 4: Par 3. Simple par 3, not much to say. The bunkers aren’t too menacing. Go for the hole!
Hole 5: Par 4 dogleg right. This is the hole to hit your monster fade. You only need to clear about ~100 yards of trees on the right side, then you are open to the green. So slice and dice.
Hole 6: Par 4 dogleg right. Almost the same as hole 5, but longer. The monster fade that would put you 30 yards from the green on hole 5 will put you in the woods on hole 6, so be careful. A straight tee shot to the right side or middle of the fairway is fine.
Hole 7: Par 3 lake carry. Just clear the lake. If you’re going to miss, don’t miss short (spash) but otherwise you’re fine. Just a few trees on the left, and an easy bunker + hill on the right.
Hole 8: Par 4 river carry. The river runs just before the green. The biggest mistake I see on this hole is not using enough club on off the tee. From the white tees, you have about 250 yards to the river. 280 from the red tees. I see people that have never driven the ball 250 yards in their life decide to use a 3W off the tee to avoid a slash. They just set themselves up for a long second shot that often goes awry. So please, use a driver on this hole, unless you are Tiger Woods. Also you don’t want to miss right, any ball to the right of the cart path is likely GONE. The green is really tricky on this hole too, if you overshoot it you’ll be in the sand. Better the sand than the slash though. I wrote a lot about this hole, because it’s probably the toughest hole on the course, and the hole people misplay the most. If you only remember one thing from my cheat sheet, USE A DRIVER ON HOLE 8.
Hole 9. Long par 4. If you don’t have good distance, the green can be tough to reach in 2. If you’re playing in the late afternoon, the wind is probably blowing in from the bay, and you have basically no chance. Just play it as a par 5. As a par 5, it’s an easy hole. Don’t kill yourself if you can’t make it.

If I could, I’d probably give it 3.5 stars. It’s not a bad course, especially for the high handicapper that needs to gain some confidence. I’ve recently taken to playing one a week, Wednesday or Thursday in the early afternoon. Most players walk, but at $ 35 for 18-​holes and a rider, it’s not bad ($ 25 to walk).
Beware that it can back up, and if it does your usually SOL. I’ve seen a marshall, but I’ve never seen him do anything to speed things up. All I know is that if my foursome is creeping up on your threesome, then you are not playing ‘ready golf’ properly. The day this happened, we passed them on a par 3 and were wide open for the rest of the afternoon.
Despite being mostly flat and fairly open, every hole presents a unique challenge. It’s only a Par 70, so you’ll see the Par 5’s just twice. All the Par 3’s are reasonably handicapped, with one coming in around 150 yds and the others approaching 195 yds from the blue teebox. You’ll find water on a number of holes throughout the course, along with some stiff doglegs. The sand lacks any fluff, and you might as well just be hitting from loose dirt. The fairways could be better maintained, but it’s just a muni so I let that slide a little. There are some rampant dandelions that can wreck havoc searching for a lost ball. The flat, round greens are not too fast, but are a little of the harder side. The benefit to that is that you’ll rarely encounter ball marks, but it’s offset with wonky speeds and landing zones that take some getting used to during play.
Overall, I’d recommend the course, but watch out for a few things others have mentioned. The single rate is non-​existent online (I think you can call though), and the staff is hit-​or-​miss. No drink cart, but you pass the snack shack three times at holes 3, 9, and on the way back through the tunnel to 14. Yes, it’s pricey.
They leave fairway cuts a bit rough, so you’ll lose some roll when the clippings are in the way. As other’s mentioned, no driving range. At least the first hole is fairly open, so you’ll have some room to «warm up» as you play.

The course plays well and the rates are good. I would have rated higher, but their online reservation system does not allow for a single player reservation. Search yields nothing even when the course is wide open.

The woman in charge of the pro shop is a dried up, ugly, old hag and she needs to be fired immediately.
We arrived on a Sunday for our 9:45 tee time only to be informed by the aforementioned dried up ugly old hag that we did not have a tee time.
There was a lot of back and forth at this point. The hag was rudely insisting to my bf that he called the wrong place, that he made a mistake, that there was no way he had made a tee time. She even went as far as to call Sunken Gardens to see if he had a tee time there. My bf had to pull out his phone and show her that he had in fact dialed Sunnyvale Muni. It turns out the employee who booked the tee time made a mistake and booked us on Monday, not Sunday as we had requested.
Mistakes happen. However, I find it unacceptable that:
1. The hag was rude & condescending to us from the moment we said good morning
2. There was never an apology, just a casual yeah whatever, these things happen
3. She made no attempt to correct the situation & when we asked if we would be able to get a tee time, we were told that if we wanted to wait around for hours we might be able to get on, she made a point to emphasis the word might over and over
We decided to call Shoreline rather than wait around for hours.
I won’t be back to Sunnyvale Muni.

Ive played this course more times than I can remember, and it never seems to change. I’ve had good times and bad. the bad usually being either the wind or some Ahole who gets paired up with us. The course itself is pretty nice, although the greens can get a bit bumpy if it’s rained recently.
All in all, you get what you expect for a muni course. If you want a high dollar course with greens to match, try Cinnabar Hills or Darkhorse. Just keep in mind you’ll be paying three times what you’ll pay at a muni.

I’m not a golfer and the last time I played golf was in PE class in 7^th grade. Does that count? Yes of course. Does it really matter? No because that was so long ago that I don’t know what I was doing. However, there is miniature golf (which I’ve played a few years ago but way more recent than 7^th grade) but that is nothing like golf on a golf course like this place.
I was here for my company’s golf tournament, and I figured it was something I could try since I heard a lot from my coworkers as well as a few of my friends talked about playing golf. I arrived outside of the golf store where they had practice areas for putting. I went inside to pay and it was $ 35.50 for me but I’m not sure if that’s the price for the whole golf tournament thing my company set up with them.
Anyways, my coworkers and I played all 18 holes and we got to drive the golf carts around. The one hole I thought was tough (and apparently it’s the hardest one out of all of them) was hole #8. You can see the layout of the hole in the pictures I will upload. I thought it was a good golf course but I don’t play golf to know what’s good or horrible in terms of layout. I think it’s still fun to play on though.
There was a snack shack over near hole #3 and I was hungry so I ordered a regular hot dog ($ 3.75). I didn’t start eating it until a few minutes later and that caused the bun to become a little hard. It was still edible though. In my opinion, it’s priced a little high for what it’s worth. Well, I was hungry so I can’t complain that much.
After we all finished playing the 18 holes, we went to the restaurant?/bar above the golf store to eat. We had like a mini-​banquet of different food for everybody to eat. The burgers were pretty good and the chicken felt like it was missing some sauce (in other words it was a bit dry).
This place is a good place to go if you just want to play golf on a relaxing summer day.