COURSE REVIEW

Badlands Golf Club: A desert course that's as tough as its name

By Chris Baldwin,
Senior Writer

You'll have to search a little to find Badlands Golf Club in Las Vegas, and search a lot to recover your golf balls on this enjoyable but punishing Johnny Miller desert course.

LAS VEGAS (April 9, 2007) - Badlands Golf Club isn't easy to find. It's off Alta Drive on a little road. There's no sign saying "Badlands this way."

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Consider it the warmup. For that's nothing compared to how hard it is to locate your golf ball on this Johnny Miller and Chi Chi Rodriguez vision of yucks.

Watch your ball go speeding into the desert. See it soar high into the rocks and stop, never to bounce down again. Unless a jackrabbit comes along and dislodges it hours, days or weeks later.

"More than anything people talk about how hard a course it is," clubhouse attendant Mike Guido said.

You could even say Badlands borders on diabolical with some of its two forced desert carry holes.

Only Badlands also gives a lot back. Literally.

This is a golf ball scavenger's version of heaven. At least those who have cacti and thorn resistant clothes and one of those crazy long ball retrievers that immediately qualifies the user for social security.

You're going to find a ton of golf balls here. You might not always find yours, but you'll end up discovering another one or three. That's the thing about Badlands. It usually giveth more than it taketh away.

"We're three up on golf balls," Pat Shovlin gleefully shouted as our group approached the sixth hole of our first nine. This despite having chunked plenty into Miller's desert of no return.

It's hard to describe Badlands as a "fun" course. This 27-hole track is a test, ready with punishment if your driver or putter are at all wayward. The greens are speedy, and there are no mounds routing your ball back into the fairway.

Yet Badlands can be a blast to play. A blast with bruises, but a blast nonetheless.

"I really like this course," Connecticut visitor Joey Connors said. "It kicks some ass."

Probably yours.

This is a Las Vegas course where you need to hit good shots to be rewarded with anything but a groan. Getting on the green on these par 3s is far from given (our group managed it about a quarter of the time).

Badlands' fairways are very green (especially for a Vegas area full of weird water rules). From the tees it looks like clear sailing as long as you stay out of the desert rock areas.

Looks can be deceiving.

What you don't see is how thick the rough up, how it swallows up balls and makes punch-outs trying. Combined with the ultra-penalizing desert areas, it seems almost unfair.

"This is true target golf," Guido said. "I try and tell people that you just have to hit it straight."

Guido laughs, and I wonder if he's auditioning for the role of a cartoon villain. Just hit it straight? In Vegas, the land of golfing with a hangover on two hours sleep?

Maybe if you play Outlaw, the newest and tamest of Badlands' three nines, demanded by members who got tired of getting slapped around all day, every day. But if you're just visiting you'll want to take on Diablo and Desperado.

Badlands Golf Club gauntlets

Desperado's No. 9 shows Miller and Chi Chi Rodriguez, who consulted on the Badlands design, at their best, and cruelest.

This is a showy hole with a big desert drop clear off the tee, into a gleaming green fairway, and then another desert canyon clear down to a tucked away plateau green. If you don't mess up on your first swing, you have a really good chance to do it on your second or your third.

It's two great shots, three good ones, or disaster. Johnny Miller and Chi Chi are probably never going to be asked to design a playground.

The Diablo nine is equally dastardly. No. 5 is typical, a long par 3 with a fast, shot-repelling green. Someone decided to give it a more Western feel by putting an old-looking wood barrel near the tee.

There's a house right behind the tee box too. A big one. Badlands may have plenty of desert bite, but it's anything but away-from-it-all. You're playing through a subdivision, and pretty well-to-do one by the looks of it.

The Diablo and Desperado nines opened in 1995 and come in at a combined 6,893 yards from the back tees.

In fact, some of the fun here is in gawking at the lavish, spread-out playgrounds on the crests overlooking the course, especially on Diablo.

"Look at that enormous place," Shovlin said, pointing to a mansion Tiger Woods might even consider.

Hey, it's something to do when you're not scavenging for your Pro VI.

Badlands Golf Club: The verdict

Badlands gives you something very different in Las Vegas golf. It's a course you'll remember, one that will leave you and your buddies with stories to retell for years.

You'll be laughing at someone for cranking a shot - or 12 - sideways into the desert.

You'll be bragging about that high tee shot that curved around the rock wall and settled nicely into the fairway.

It's an easy golf course to recommend, if not to play.

Las Vegas restaurant tips

Wolfgang Puck's Postrio in the Venetian mall is one of the more underrated spots on the celebrity-chef-studded Strip. You get super fresh salads and pastas for Vegas reasonable prices (out the door for under $40 per person with a glass of wine).

Las Vegas hotel tip

Wynn Las Vegas is the type of high-end splurge that grows on you.

It takes staying here to appreciate the Wynn. It's no great shakes as a casino, but there are more guests-only perks - from views of the nightly light show to a great pool scene - than at any other Vegas hotel.

Any opinions expressed above are those of the writer and do not necessarily represent the views of the management. The information in this story was accurate at the time of publication. All contact information, directions and prices should be confirmed directly with the golf course or resort before making reservations and/or travel plans.