Chambers Bay

5 1/2 hour round!! Greens were in terrible condition. Way over priced for conditions. Great things were staff & Views. That’s it!!

Top line: a famed course that has amazing views but some seriously fun golf holes.

I watche nearly every second of the US Open when it was at Chambers, so playing this course has been high on my list for some time. The layout of the course was spectacular. A great mix of shots, some tight holes some that are wide open. He one constant is that you want to be accurate off the tee because there are massive waste bunkers on the course. It is a little pricey (we splurged for caddies which was totally worth it) but if you have a chance the course was worth it.

Bottom line: play this course, it does not disappoint

Is it possible for a course to go from overhyped to underrated? It is in the case of Chambers Bay, whose debut on a grand stage at the 2015 U.S. Open was marred by complaints (justified, for the most part) about the condition of its fescue greens.

Things are improving on that front, though the course still has a ways to go before the conditions match up with the phenomenal design of the course and scenery. Simply put, if you like fun golf courses, you'll love Chambers Bay, especially for its remarkable green complexes which gather and shed shots in roughly equal measure. They're worthy of study, and of multiple plays. The course is a tough but rewarding walk, thanks to tremendous views (especially at sunset) of its namesake body of water.

(Pictured: the terrific drop-shot par-3 15th)

I love CB... always have and always will. It does, however, pain me how little they do to maintain and update the course. It has such great views and an awesome layout, but it loses points when the greens look like a quilt and they don't bother maintaining the conditions in a way the price demands.

Can't say enough great things about Chambers. I have played here three times in the last year and each time has been memorable in it's own way.

Sometimes you associate championship courses with stuffy old dudes who like to nit-pick and sometimes harass players who do not fit the typical "traditional golfer" - Chambers is far from this. The staff is great and there to make your experience as easy as possible. They have spotters in places where you may typically loose a ball and golf cart rides in between spread out holes- all to help your round move quickly.

I have never played with a caddie. I'm 28 and walk the course with my bag on my back and read the course notes found on the website (this will help your score). However, Chambers is a beast to walk and a caddie could make the experience more enjoyable for those who are not 28 :)

I played here the first time with a guy who shot a 140 (no joke) and he walked off loving every second. We were never pressed by a marshal. The staff understand the difficulty of the course and the marshal actually noticed that the group behind us was on our tail and he politely asked them to take their time. Besides the fantastic golf- Chambers offers a first class experience to all types of golfers.

There is something magical about standing in the same fairway as Jordan Speith or hitting out of the same bunker as Tiger (I have hit into "Chambers Basement" on hole 18 two out of the three times I have played here. If you follow my path, which I do not advise, put the ball in the back of your stance, close your eyes, and swing).

Chambers is made for the creative golfer. You score well by using the natural slopes provided by the earth. There are vertical challenges all over this course.

Knowing where to hit your ball off the tee and where to hit your approach shot is a must. Like I mentioned, I read the hole-by-hole notes on the website- they are extremely helpful and worth the 30 seconds it takes to pull them up on your phone.

If you have never played Chambers, you can not go wrong with a twilight/ afternoon round. Out of the three times I have played, teeing off at 3:30 in august and walking up 18 with the sun setting over the sound, was a "goose bumps" type of experience.

I have ran into country club guys who love walking on flat surfaces and playing predictable courses and who bash Chambers when they have never even played it. I would encourage anyone who loves golf to play Chambers. Not just for the golf, but to dive into the creative mind of Robert Trent Jones III. I still find it amazing that he was able to look at that piece of land and imagine a golf course like Chambers. It is indeed amazing.

If you have any questions, comment and I am happy to share more about my experiences.

-AD

Beautiful weather. Wonderful layout from tee to green. Green complexes at best are challenging to unfair. All that a few are missing is the windmill and clown's mouth.

Chambers is replacing turf on the greens. Unfortunately they are not redoing the entire green, just spots about the size of an area rug.

I'll come back if in the area. Would not make a special trip to play this course.

This experience actually exceeded my expectations. Forecast called for 70% chance of t-storms but dodged it all day. Only sprinkled on us for half a hole, but was windy throughout the round. Course was in good shape. Fescue fairways were tight and I had to adjust my ball position slightly to strike it solidly. Greens were a little bumpy, but it didn't detract from my experience. I kind of chalk that up to part of the course's challenge. They were a bit on the slow side. Two holes - Nos. 10 and 13 - were on temps. Chambers is in the process of converting greens to pure Poa in response to the criticism during the U.S. Open, so there are patches throughout. I took a caddie and it was well-worth the investment, as he helped me with lines of entry into greens, numbers to carry and reading greens, especially long putts. This no doubt saved me strokes and allowed me to play very well. The course is expansive and landing areas were larger than appeared on TV. Hard to get in trouble. Didn't lose a ball the entire day. The staff here is super customer-service oriented. They genuinely want to make sure you are enjoying yourself. I am 42 and do not exercise, other than golf. I found the walk to be quite enjoyable and manageable. Was not as tiring or difficult as I expected. Must do: the snack shack has a wall display of ball markers from around the country and world. There is a sign that offers you a Chambers Bay ball marker in exchange for one of your local ball markers. Take advantage of this. It is a nice touch that I've never seen anywhere else. Bottom line: hard to get in trouble off the tee. Key to scoring is landing the ball on appropriate number and using the slopes to feed the ball toward the hole. I think lag-putting is the most important element to scoring well here as there are some dramatic slopes on the putting surfaces that are hard to discern.

The host course for the 2015 US open is very challenging, fun, fair and sooo beautiful. Its links style so bounces don't always go your way. the greens still need some help but you can still make putts. The last 4 holes are classic!! the hardest part of chambers is the wind and the green areas. you need imagination, creativity and a good touch with putter and chips/pitches. for golf channel to not include this course as one of the best links course in America is not right. go play it! you wont regret and when the open comes back, the greens will be better

Wow. That's about all I can say with regards to this course. Is it quirky? Sure, a little....but just the right amount. As it pertains to the bucket list courses I've played, I'd have this slightly behind Kiawah Ocean and slightly ahead of Bethpage Black. Yeah the greens were a tad bit bumpy, but they actually rolled true.

The best part of this course is the layout and the variety of ways to play each shot. You could take a flag on or go twenty yards left/right/long of the pin and get the same results. While this course was tough enough to handle an Open, it still provides the high handicapper the option of running shots in low. I can't decide if this is a first or second shot golf course but it's probably both. Jones did a great job on the layout and provides a ton of visual intimidation similar to Pete Dye. Either take a caddy or go out way early with the locals who can give you some tips and lines to take. It's a tough walk, bring some snacks and Gatorade.

Some say this course is tough but I actually beat my handicap on it. If I wasn't playing with locals my score would have probably been eight shots higher but the locals offered fabulous tips on how to navigate each hole.

Facilities are great. Staff is great. Fellow players are great. You also can't beat the views out here.

Biggest piece of guidance: pay attention to the short side of the geeen and avoid it at all costs.

This is one tough course. The greens have tremendous slope on them. While they are not "beautiful", they roll relatively true. If you pick the ball, this will play tough with you as everything is a very tight lie. The humps and bumps will seldom give you a level lie. It is a tough walk with tremendous elevation changes. My Fitbit indicated 45 flights of steps. Expect to get some good bounces and some really bad ones. The pot bunker on 18 (100 yards out from green) is jail (it is about 15 feet deep).

This course has breathtaking views from several locations and is worthy of bringing your camera. Course is challenging, particularly when the wind kicks up off the Bay. As a non resident, the green fees of $275 are not justified because the greens are very very poor. Fungus and mold are present on nearly every green, the fungus has been killed. However, this creates an uneven putting surface that is bumpy and difficult to hole a put over 4 feet. The USGA burned the greens out for the US Open and they have not recovered. Candidly, the greens condition has been a problem for years, with 3-4 greens having had to be redone completely, and those greens do play well. Fairways and bunkers are in very good shape. Should the greens be re-done to Bentgrass as planned, that would be helpful. However, until golfers offer an honest opinion of the current playing conditions, it is my feeling that they are not motivated to correct this blatant weakness in what is otherwise a very challenging golf outing.

Fantastic course conditions and a great staff. They made me and my wife feel like we were on the PGA with the forecaddies and overall welcoming attitude that everyone had.
I've read lots of reviews about the pace of play and while it took 5 hrs for our round it did not feel like it. I thought the staff did a great job assisting us for our pace of play and never felt rushed. Also, the walking and abundance of hills make it quite the walk.
Practice facility was great with well maintained hitting area off the grass with well measured flags to get dialed in. Putting greens for the practice area were great. Make sure you get there early enough to practice putting at the least.
Course conditions were phenomenal from tee box to greens. Fairways were great to hit off of and rolled out like a true links course. It has a ridiculous amount of sand that made it challenging but fun.
If it's your first time playing and you can afford it get a caddie as course management and where to hit the ball is paramount to a good score. That being said the course overall is very challenging but never frustrating. Even more fun was the pin placements were from round 1 of 2015 Open. Awesome to attack the holes that the pros played.
In the end it was a great experience and if you get the twilight it's a great price with great views, great course layout that will challenge but not make you hate life.
Best experience ever in golf to date!

I've had a chance to play this course around six times & have enjoyed every round. Robert Trent Jones II put together a terrific "links like" course which has garnered both accolades & controversy since opening. Chambers Bay can be difficult for the golfers used to playing their golf in the air. The key to playing well here is creativity as this track lends itself to providing innumerable options for those golfers who possess more than one or two shots in their bag. If you play off the correct tee box, pick good lines off the tees, avoid the blown out bunkers, find the the tightly mown fairways as opposed to the tall fescue grasses and bring a hot putter to navigate the heavily contoured putting surfaces, chances are fairly good you will have a decent round. Playing to your handicap or close to it on a course that can beat the living daylights out of you can be unbelievably satisfying. The course may not appeal to every golfer but if you're looking for a challenge, you've come to the right place.

I like the layout of Chambers, beauty unmatched and fun but difficult holes. Don't expect to get a decent score here, the course will be brutal on your handicap. I do not recommend this course, having played there some 8 times. First, the pace is excruciatingly slow. It took over five hours yesterday, on a Thursday before summer. That is very bad. Second, the greens are still in poor shape. Some are sandy and slow, others blazing fast. Many have weeds that look like small broccoli, endemic to the area, and unavoidable. Don't play here if yo are not in good physical conditioning. You will walk up and down for almost six and a half miles.

Chambers is back in great shape and is an extremely hard but wicked fun golf course. I get so tired of people whining about this course. I can promise that the people that complain about uneven speeds on the greens have only played the course once and made the huge mistake of not getting a caddie. (hint - if the putt is headed back into the hillside its slow - even if it seems downhill. its just the way the course plays) I am a 6 handicap and have played it 10+ times and I always rely on a 4-caddie at least. I am still learning the many subtle nuances of this course. I missed a green last round and was 15ft away and below the hole. I aimed 30 degrees away from the hole, hit it 90 feet across the green, wrapped it around a mound, and let the slope of the green take my ball to 12 feet. It was a circus shot that was way higher probability than chipping strait at it and only a caddie that had seen hundreds of shots fail taking the direct route would recommend it!
The putting on Broccoli comments are flat wrong. Its fescue grass. They will never be gorgeous greens that look good on TV but they play fast, true, and kick my butt every time.
And bring Advil - its walking only and with all the hills - its a loooong walk.

I played Chambers Bay a month after the US Open. The fairways and greens were just beginning to recover from the USGA coming in and shutting the water off. But with that being said, the shape of the course was still great! They were working on two greens that had not recovered well from the open but other than that the course was great! Caddies were very friendly and helpful with local knowledge of the course and had great stories from the open. I would recommend this to anyone that is traveling to the Seattle/Tacoma area.

I was lucky enough to be part of the team that took a trip to Chambers Bay ahead of the US Open, and I have to say it blew me away - once the morning fog cleared! Coming from the UK, links is where my true golfing heart lies. I love the scenery and the way the golf course looks visually - encouraging you to get creative and work with the ground. As designer Robert Trent Jones Jr said, he likes the "ground game". This is a course that demands creativity and knowledge. Rarely will you aim for a pin. The greens at this course are the most challenging of all, not only are you dealing with rare fescue grass but run-off areas can be extreme and placement is crucial. All in all though, the beauty captured me - the Puget Sound and lone fir tree are mesmerizing. But be prepared for a workout, this course is a 7.5 mile walk, with a lot of elevation! Enjoy.

This was a special day no matter the enjoyment of the course because I was able to share this walk with my colleagues and friends, Cara Robinson,Daman Hack, and Charlie Rymer.Our goal was to learn every inch of Chambers Bay in preparation for Us Open week on Morning Drive. Consider that it took us 6 1/2 hours to complete our round because we were filming and taking a lot of notes between shots. We were given a three hour buffer from the next tee time so we did not have to rush and that helped with gaining knowledge but it did have an affect on concentration. This experience is special for several reasons. First, there is nothing really like it in the United States and the views are breathtaking. Bandon Dunes is the best retail golf experience Ive ever had because of the variety,quality of golf,and unmatched service. Chambers Bay stands alone with no other course options so you must really commit to this trip. Chambers is very generous off the tee with extremely wide fairways but its visually intimidating because the areas you see clearly off the fairways are so penal and domineering. Listen intently to a local caddy and trust where they tell you to hit your shots based on your skill level. The fescue greens really distinguish this course from other "links" style offerings in the United States. They are firm, difficult to get your ball to spin and depending on the time of year you play they may be spotty. The ground is very firm and the walk is 7 1/2 miles up and down this converted gravel pit and you also play along the perimeter of the bluff on the par 5 8th hole. The challenges are blind second shots to several holes with extremely contoured greens with huge banking on many of them and extreme false fronts that penalize even the slightly missed target yardage. The best holes in my opinion are the ones that run through the valley and I prefer the inward 9 to the outward 9 for that reason. I would recommend playing the right teeing ground on the 9th hole if possible because I think its a much better hole from that angle. The greens as a whole have enormous contour that are not consistent in how they slope. Very few greens are pitched from back to front and I dont think there is enough area between the massive bunkers that front many of the greens to consider it a truly great links because you still have to play the ball in the air long enough to carry the bunkers and then rely on the slope of the greens to give yourself a reasonable putt. I think the overall design would have been better with less bunkering fronting the greens and allowing more use of the areas in front of the green to run shots onto the putting surfaces. The closing stretch is all you want in beauty and drama and hopefully you time your playing of the 15th, 16th and 17th to see a train roll by against the Puget Sound. Chambers Bay is a great story of a county committing to building something their towns people can be proud of and they should be. The golf experience is tough, rugged but unique. The staff is world class with every person insuring you have the best time possible. They really embrace and value that you have made the trek to their lone golf experience at Chambers Bay.

For the golfer who lives for the spectacular walk and the stunning visual, Chambers Bay offers both in abundance. Even beyond the wildness of the golf course – heaving green complexes, orange and auburn-colored heather, yawning bunkers framed by unkempt rough, remarkable elevation change – this is a golf course blessed with location.

Chambers Bay in University Place, Washington – a suburb of Tacoma - sits hard by Puget Sound, separated from the water only by a narrow sandy beach and a ribbon of railroad that is visited several times an hour by freight trains, an echo of sorts of England’s Royal Lytham and St. Annes, whose opening holes run adjacent to the St. Annes railway.

It is one of many aspects Chambers Bay shares with golf in the United Kingdom. The golf course – the site of an old sand and gravel pit – has firm, tight terrain that can make shot-making a guessing game. Well-struck shots occasionally find collection areas, rough and cavernous bunkers (sometimes in a row) and the seemingly poor shot can sometimes, luckily, find safe passage.

Trusting your caddie is essential at Chambers Bay.

My best shot of the day came on the difficult par-4 16th hole when my terrific looper, Jason, insisted I aim my approach along the rough line some 40 yards left of the flagstick. I hit my 9 iron along said line, lost sight of the ball as it disappeared below a mound, and was shocked to walk up to the green and find it 15 feet from the cup. (That I three-putted wasn’t Jason’s fault).
Some may find the course quirky, but if you like links golf and the spirit of the ground game, you will be invigorated by this 7.5 mile trek (wear comfortable shoes and socks for it is a hard walk).

In this era of Instagram, you will be moved often to snap a picture of the many stirring views, including the glorious fir tree that guards 15 green and 16 tee (it is the lone tree on the course), not to mention the occasional sight of dolphins breaching in the distance.

The golf course is Hillside (England) meets Streamsong Blue (Florida) with a dash of Dornoch (Scotland) and Bandon Dunes (Oregon).

Play from the correct tees, load up on some extra pearls, and embrace this beautiful brute.