For all of the great golfing localities in Wisconsin, one metro area you probably don’t hear much about is Janesville.

Places like Milwaukee, Sheboygan, Stevens Point and Rome tend to dominate the headlines with their impressive lineups of nationally-recognized courses, but several other destinations in the state offer rock-solid golf and otherwise would command more local attention, were it not for Wisconsin having 11 of the nation’s Top 100 publicly-accessible courses on its resume.

Janesville is one of these under-the-radar metro areas, featuring a trio of excellent layouts in Glen Erin, Janesville Country Club and the subject of this post, Janesville Riverside. With surprisingly rich topography shaped by the gaping Rock River, the Janesville area is endowed with great land for compelling golf design.

Not only is the golf terrific in Janesville, it offers supremely good value. Between Glen Erin and Riverside, you can enjoy a 36-hole day on two excellent, well-conditioned, varied designs for just over $100 total. In the age of rising greens fees, you’ll be hard-pressed to find such a great deal anywhere else.

Janesville Riverside occupies a particularly interesting site in town, placed against a bend in the river with excellent topography along its eastern and northern flanks, setting the stage for dramatic golf holes along the precipice. The rest of the property gently rolls amidst mature foliage, presenting tight corridors that you’ll have to contend with after crooked tee shots.

It had been over two decades since I last played Riverside, but I came in with fond memories from my high school days.

I loved the course back then, and especially so after achieving a significant milestone in my golfing career – my first-ever sub-80 round. Anyone who toils enough at this game knows that breaking 80 is tough, and the achievement gave my golf game a feeling of legitimacy. The fact that I was able to do it in a high school golf meet made it even sweeter – there were no breakfast balls, mullies, gimmies, fluffed lies or generous drops. It was a real 79.

In many ways, Riverside at the time reminded me of my home course, Nakoma Golf Club, and that feeling of familiarity made me relax and bring my A-game. Much like Nakoma, this track offers pure parkland golf, with well-kept fairways and greens flanked by narrow tree-lined corridors. Playing to a modest 6,500 yards from the back tees, this is a haven for the shotmaker possessing uncanny consistency off the tee and the ability to play creative shots over, around and under foliage.

Janesville Riverside is annual host to one of the state’s most prestigious championships – the WPLA Ray Fischer Amateur Championship. With the Midwest’s most elite amateurs converging on the site every June for the past several decades, it’s a testament to the property’s enduring appeal and suitability for competitive play.

While this is certainly not an easy layout, the winning scores at the Ray Fischer tend to be very low – Jacob Beckman’s winning score of -22 this year, for example, was just good enough to make a three-way playoff where he would claim the title with two birdies in three holes. This is a short layout with manageable green complexes, setting the stage for a birdie-fest by the region’s best rising golfers.

At the same time, some of my best play as an upper-single digit handicap has yielded scores around 80, which goes to show that for the vast majority of golfers this course has plenty of challenge. Elite amateurs tend to make the game look easy, but the blunt truth is that this is an extremely tough game, even at courses of moderate difficulty.

Established in 1924 as a six-hole layout, Riverside expanded to nine holes in 1926 as golf’s popularity took Janesville by storm. Robert “The Brute” Harris, also known for his work at the original Grand Geneva course (hence the nickname), oversaw an expansion to 18 holes and renovation of the original routing in 1946.

The majority of the property is rather flat, and Harris installed a terrific routing with a mix of doglegs, straighter holes and varied yardages to make this an interesting and fun golf experience. While some of his signature, oft-criticized design tendencies like large, circular greens and cost-minimizing bunker architecture are present here, he toned back these features in a thoughtful way to fit the landscape and add versatility to the layout.

Riverside stands out from a standard parkland layout in its stretch of #9 through 15, largely running adjacent to the Rock River. The topography gets rather wild in this juncture of the round, boasting dramatic elevation changes and multiple encounters with ravines. Through eight holes, you’ll think this is simply a nicer parkland property, but the ensuing stretch seals the deal to make it one of my favorite munis in the state.

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In my visit to Riverside in late May, it was immediately clear that the city takes great pride in its municipal golf operation. KemperSports, one of the industry’s top golf management firms with iconic properties like Streamsong on its resume, oversees the facility along with nine-holer Blackhawk Golf Course on the other side of town.

With a superb management team running the course, the city has also invested significantly in the Riverside property to keep the golf course up to a high standard. Currently, greenside bunkers are being renovated using the Better Billy Bunker method, an industry best practice for optimal playing conditions from the sand. Combined with smooth, fast greens and great fairway and tee conditions, this stands to be one of the best-conditioned munis in the state after the work is complete.

You might notice the bunker construction work in some of the photos, but I’m sure this will be a worthwhile investment that will keep the golf experience vibrant and in tune with the times. I’m certainly looking forward to seeing the new bunkers in my next visit, as Better Billy Bunker contruction tends to yield tremendous results.

Course Overview

Janesville Riverside Golf Course

Janesville, WI

Architect: Robert Harris (1924)

Yardage/Course/Slope Ratings: Black – 6508/71.3/126; Blue – 6206/70.0/122; White – 5868/68.2/118

Hole-by-Hole Rundown

The first five holes play along the southwest border of the property, with a railroad dividing the area between #1-3 and 4-5.

Opening with two short, narrow par fours, this is a gentle-ish handshake to start the round, but also introduces golfers to the challenge they’ll face throughout the round. While the corridors are tight, they are not unreasonable with the fairways stretching 30 to 40 yards wide. However, the trees at Riverside are mature and tower over the fairways, presenting a sense of claustrophobia especially for less accurate drivers.

The short par three 3rd is the standout hole in the opening stretch, playing to a plateau green fronted by a massive bunker. With steep back-left to front-right sloping of the green, you’ll want to avoid long-left even though it looks like a safe bailout area from the tee.

The fourth and fifth cut alongside the railroad with stout length and bunkering that encourages conservative playing lines. Out-of-bounds lurks right in the form of a residential street (especially on the 5th), but there is enough room to keep the ball in play even after a moderate slice.

Riverside has always set up well to my eye, and a big reason for that is a prevalence of dogleg rights. Playing a low cut as my stock shape, I’m usually able to take advantage of left-to-right oriented holes.

Six and seven are both of this variety, first with the par five sixth starkly cutting to the right just 240 yards from the tee. Long hitters may be tempted to cut the dogleg, but a grove of mature trees stands in the way and a clipped branch could doom this strategy. At just 474 yards from the tips, though, elite players may be able to hit iron or fairway wood and still gain position to attack the green in two.

Meanwhile, at the shorter par four 7th, conservative play to the corner of the dogleg is well-advised, as the fairway narrows considerably over the trees to the right with a bunker placed through the landing zone. Unless 60-yard sand shots or low punches through the trees are your cups of tea, leave driver in the bag here.

The par three 8th features a large punchbowl green with a shoulder of rough surrounding the surface. Wildly errant misses outside of the punchbowl will face tough recoveries (as I found out after a pull-hook), but otherwise the receptive design sets up for a nice scoring opportunity.

A wild ride of thrilling elevation changes, intimidating tee shots and great views of the Rock River valley starts at the long par four 9th and doesn’t let up until the closing stretch.

From a teeing location set amongst a dense grove of trees, the drive on 9 appears quite narrow and you’ll want to shape a high fade to set up a clean look at the green. While my tee shot leaked ever so slightly to the right, I was able to punch a long iron through the woods onto a receptive back-to-front sloping green.

My favorite hole on the course, the 10th is a short par five playing across valleys and ridges up to a forested plateau. Starting with hard right-to-left orientation on the downhill tee shot, driver can easily run through the fairway for many players. However, at just 491 yards from the tips, the green is reachable in two with less than driver off the tee for big hitters.

The second shot crests a towering slope placed around 100 yards from the green, a “great hazard” of sorts, with a flat fairway beyond that provides a reasonable runway to the putting surface. From the middle of the fairway, I was able to run a squarely-struck hybrid over the ridge and onto the green, setting up a rare eagle putt. From a more suboptimal position, though, playing to the top tier is a more formidable task, bringing the surrounding trees very much into play.

The 10th triggered memories of Old Hickory, with an old-school design taking on the topography headfirst rather than skirting around its edges.

All three in my group carded birdies here, a noteworthy feat, yet there is certainly potential to card a big number to open the back nine.

The mid-length 11th features an extreme right-to-left sloping fairway that will give fits to those who like to play a draw. I’ve heard criticisms of the severity of the contours here, as solid tee shots are prone to running into the left rough. To me, though, this is another example where Riverside demands a wide variety of shots, and in this case a fade is optimal.

Perhaps the most controversial hazard in golf is a tree fronting a green, and while this is normally a very bad design idea, the 12th at Riverside is a rare example of one done right.

Playing just over 100 yards from the back tees, good players will simply be able to loft a wedge over the tree, but I can see how this shot would frustrate higher handicappers with lower ball flight. The tree covers the front-left entrance point to the green, reducing the number of pinnable locations.

This is an exciting tee shot, though, first crossing a ravine before contending with the specimen oak. To middle or front pins, you’ll need to decide how aggressively to approach the shot as slight mishits could easily catch a branch.

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The 13th and 14th bend around the northwest corner of the property, with intimidating, semi-blind tee shots over ravines.

The shorter 13th encourages an iron off the tee to a narrow fairway, followed by an approach to a tiny, well-protected green.

The par five 14th is a near-90 degree dogleg that many players will have to cut off to the left to avoid running through the fairway. You’ll need ample height to pull this off, as the drive ascends a hill with mature trees guarding the corner. If you can pull off the tee shot, though, a straightforward shot awaits and the green is plenty reachable in two.

The 15th is a slightly downhill par three playing to a well-guarded green. With a short iron in hand, it may be tempting to take aim directly at the pin, but I made that mistake to a back-left location, erring slightly long and ending in a tough position with little green to work with. Lesson learned – play to the middle of the surface.

The long par four 16th plays back into the middle of the property, with a large grove of towering pines stalking the left side. A fairway trap is meticulously placed at the corner of this slight left-to-right dogleg, pinching the landing zone off the tee. Two pure shots are needed to get home in regulation, making this one of the toughest holes on site.

Riverside concludes with two par fours in the heart of the property, starting with the short dogleg right 17th. With the corner well-guarded by timber, iron-wedge is probably a wise strategy for longer hitters.

This spot also produced some of my favorite images of the morning, with the sun rising in line with the green through a layer of clouds, yielding vibrant colors.

The closing hole is taxing and long, playing straightaway through a tight chute of trees. I can imagine it being a tense finisher at the Ray Fischer as par is an excellent score. I vividly remember needing bogey to card my maiden sub-80 round in high school, nervously escaping with 5 to pull it off.

Closing Thoughts

Janesville Riverside was everything I remembered from my high school visits, and it’s only gotten better over the years thanks to unwavering support from the city and exemplary management under the watch of KemperSports. With affordable greens fees, great course conditions and a challenging yet scorable layout, Riverside is a shining example of what municipal golf can be when a community meaningfully invests in its recreational assets. I sure wish every municipality treated its golf operation with the same TLC as Janesville does.

Indeed, Riverside is one of my favorite munis in Wisconsin, eclipsed only by Washington County and matched by merely a few others in the state.

Boasting this terrific municipal option in addition to other compelling public and private options in the metro area, Janesville is a noteworthy golf destination despite its modest population and is a worthwhile day trip for golf enthusiasts across the region.

City of Janesville Golf Website