St. Denis Golf Club (Chardon, OH)

Here’s a course that has slipped under my radar for a long time. It’s located in Chardon and gets very little attention from those who live outside that community. That’s unfortunate because this place has a lot to offer. 
(The 200/170 yard par three eleventh is a lovely hole that requires a well struck iron shot.) 

Harry Burkhardt designed St Denis in 1967. He was the Cleveland Metroparks first superintendent and was responsible for the design of Mastick Woods (1965) in the Rocky River Reservation. While Mastick is geared specifically for beginners and youngsters, St Denis revels in its challenges for the more accomplished player. Besides length, the player must be able to work the ball off the tee, hit shots from sidehill lies, and be able to read greens with significant break. The low handicap will have his work cut out for him but the high stroke player will be fine too since the lack of sand will allow him to find his ball and keep moving. 

(This little beauty of a hole is only 150/140 yards. The elevated green is nicely perched above the tee box and is a charming to play.)

Without question the highlight of the course are the par threes. They are visually appealing and capture the eye with grace. They all demand strong solid shots, with par being a fine score. 

(The seventeenth is a 200/185 yard par three over a valley. It’s the type of hole one expects near the end of the round where par can gain a stroke against your opponent.) 

There is plenty of variety in the two shotters but the two that really standout are 5 and 15. The fifth is a downhill reverse cambered par four that puts pressure on the drive and then forces a sidehill shot to an uphill green. Not a single trap protects it yet bogey and double bogey is a common score. The other hole, fifteen, plays atop the natural roundness of the terrain.  It seems so simple yet anything left or right will take skill to salvage a par. 

(The 395/380 yard par four fifteenth shows the nuance of a green that slides away on the sides yet is accessible from the front.) 

(The 410/400 yard tenth hole plays slightly downhill with water short left of the green. In this picture, the pond spilled over into the fairway after getting 4” of rain the night before.) 

St Denis ebbs and flows with good chances for birdies and enough tough pars to sustain a round. Burkhardt did a really nice job, especially on the back where the valley is used several times to create interest on drives and approaches. All this is done with only a few holes having bunkers. In my opinion, Burkhardt took notice of all the success Big Met was experiencing which resulted in his design at Mastick Woods, and figured if he could provide a good challenge in a beautiful setting then St Denis would become just as popular. And I believe this course achieves that objective. 

(The 505/490 yard par five opening hole starts the round off briskly. The front third of the green has a severe slope so play a few yards longer.) 

I’ve been making a list of courses that would be a good fit for the Cuyahoga Golf Association, and St Denis is one I’d place near the top. It would be a good substitute for Chardon Lakes which became too difficult for our members, so we understandably dropped it from the schedule. I give St Denis a 5 (good)(worth driving an hour to play).