GOOSE CREEK PROVIDES A QUALITY BARGAIN.

Byline: Dave Shelburne Staff Writer

MIRA LOMA - Out here in dairyland sits one of the best golf bargains and best road-trip courses imaginable.

Goose Creek, open less than a year and situated near the interchange of the 60 and 15 freeways, rewards its clientele with reasonable playing rates and outstanding course conditions.

The par-70, 6,520-yard layout, which hosted a State Amateur qualifier earlier this month, was designed by Brian Curley and is defined by the kind of distinctive bunkering that seems to distinguish Schmidt/Curley course architecture.

But while Goose Creek's huge and thought-provoking bunkers are apt to grab a visitor's initial attention, chances are golfers will come away as impressed by the conditions of the fairways and especially the greens at this young course.

``We've got an awesome course superintendent in Rudy Cardenas,'' said head pro Ross Fisher, who is another part of the Goose Creek plan to staff the facility with personnel from top courses.

Cardenas was formerly superintendent at the La Quinta Citrus course, which hosts the Senior PGA Tour's Lexus Challenge each December. Fisher worked previously at Hawaii's Mauna Kea Resort, annually voted one of the world's top golf vacation spots.

``It's kind of the focus here, getting quality people with a high-end background,'' Fisher said.

Another focus is reasonable rates. Green fees are $32 Monday through Thursday, jumping to $42 on Fridays and $52 on weekends and holidays. Cart fees are $8 every day.

It's a bargain at a course good enough to host this year's Southern California PGA chapter championship and customer-friendly enough to have fluctuating tee times to avoid backups on the course.

``We're going after quality golf but not at a high price,'' Fisher said.

As for those 40 intimidating bunkers, several of which sit in the middle of fairways and stretch more than 50 yards in length, they will definitely generate careful club and target selection. Fisher suggests those sloping, brilliantly white sand traps are more of a mental hazard than a physical one.

``They're called flash-face bunkers, and they're kind of the signature of the designer,'' Fisher said. ``They look more intimidating than they actually are.''

The long front-end slopes of the bunkers are topped with barely a halnch of sand, resulting in shots not burying in awkward lies but rolling back to flatter terrain.

For the visual challenge the huge fairway bunkers can provide from the tee, Fisher says approach shots play a bigger role in shooting good scores at Goose Creek, where the course record is 65.

``It's more of a second-shot course,'' he said of the mostly flat layout that features few large trees but plenty of water, large, tiered greens and, in the afternoon, challenging wind.

The best test might be the 479-yard, par-4 12th, a dogleg left challenge toughened by winds and a slope that guides balls toward out of bounds flanking the entire right side.

But problems are similar on the 466-yard, par-4 18th, where tee shots must deal with head wind that can push first and second shots toward a right-side lake.

That hole will send more than a few Goose Creek visitors home frustrated, just as the quality of the course seems guaranteed to bring them back.

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Photo: Large fairway bunkers look intimidating off the tee at Goose Creek, but they are really more of a mental obstacle, according to the head pro.

John McCoy/Staff Photographer