One of the great ironies of living in a winter paradise like Phoenix is that just when the weather gets wonderful, the prices get outrageous.
That’s a very unwelcome development for someone like me, who tends to be a little bit price-sensitive when it comes to paying for golf. With two young kids at home, shelling out more than $100 for a routine round at a local course hurts my wallet and my conscience.
That’s why the summer in Arizona is truly my time to shine — at least, in a golf sense. Because the deals available for courses that routinely charge a lot of money for rounds in the high season drop to rock-bottom prices. The only caveat? You have to play in 100-degree heat. But remember — it’s a dry heat. Truly, it’s not bad!
This year, my mom and I bought summer passes to Starfire Golf Club in Scottsdale — an original Arnold Palmer design that once included three nines but has since been renovated to feature a 9-hole short course (the Mulligan — a wonderful option for families) and a full-size, 18-hole option, the King.
Here’s the killer detail: For a one-time fee of $149, you can play basically unlimited golf for $20 per round on the King and $11 on the Mulligan from mid-May to mid-September. There are a few restrictions around weekend tee times and a seven-day book-ahead limitation, but let me tell you, that’s the kind of value I covet!
My mom and I both bought passes as soon as the deal began with the goal of playing once per week. With the exception of a few missed weeks for summer trips, we did, logging 12 rounds over the course of the summer and bringing our total spend to approximately $400 — or about $33 per round. We always teed off between 8:30 and 10:00 a.m., and never spent more than four hours playing. Once, when crowds were sparse, we even ripped around for a sub-three-hour loop (what a thrill!).
I learned at Starfire that the best part about bargain golf is that it takes all the pressure off of your performance or expectations for the day. When you’re spending an arm and a leg on a round of golf, it’s easy to get frustrated by bad shots or holes because you want so badly to justify the expense with a day of good play and memories. But when the round is inexpensive, I’ve found that it frees me up mentally to enjoy the day more thoroughly — regardless of any bad swings.
My mom and I don’t warm up before teeing off, and we often skip ahead a hole or two to avoid slow groups. One day, I even brought my son along when he took a day off from camp. It was his first-ever “big course” experience, and he absolutely loved it. He teed off on every hole and putted every green.
So what’s the drawback here? Well, the heat, of course. Some days were worse than others. But as full-time ‘Zonies, it rarely fazed us. If you play in the morning, you can usually get at least an hour or two of semi-moderate temperatures. Camp and school drop-off prevented me from playing in the 6-8 a.m. timeslot, but that’s the best way to beat the heat. And a bit of cloud cover can also make a huge difference.
The only other thing to consider is that summer prices also mean summer conditions. At Starfire, that meant that grassy surfaces became more scarce as time went on, and irrigation occasionally saturated some landing areas.
A course that’s not pristine? That’s never bothered me. I grew up on a rough-and-tumble daily-fee. The opportunity to spend time with my mom, swinging and laughing all summer long — for a reasonable price! — is the real gift.
Needless to say, we already can’t wait for the summer heat to return.
