Kota Permai Golf and Country Club

Introduction

My goal this Ramadhan was to play in at least one premier golf course that I have not played before. Which leaves KLGCC, Sungai Long, IOI Palm (the new, expensive one) and Kota Permai. After calling, and finding out that promotion values in the first three were still exorbitant and in nowhere near the budget of our normal cheapskate mentality, we grudgingly agreed to fork out RM185 to play Kota Permai on a Ramadhan promotion. The person on the other end of the phone, probably sensing that I was Gilagolf and would crucify the course the first opportunity given, hurriedly added, “Sir, we are hollowtining the green, OK?”

“So why not cheaper?”

“Sir, very cheap already!”

Obviously have not heard of Gilagolf cheapness definition.

But you know, this is probably the last game I’ll be playing this year during Ramadhan, so what the heck, might as well splurge. So away we went!

Travel (4/5)

Travel is honestly a breeze here. If you know how to go Shah Alam and Kota Kemuning, it is as simple as ABC. In fact, just turn into Kota Kemuning turnoff from the Shah Alam highway and at the first roundabout take a right and follow the road all the way. It would take a complete idiot to get lost here.

The great thing about Kota Permai is that it is built literally right next to the commercial areas, meaning after golf, good food is just a doorstep away. Unlike the god forsaken Amverton or the travel crazy Tasik Puteri, Kota Permai accessibility is legendary. It’s like those easy courses like Tropicana or Saujana or KGNS which is built so people can find it easy and will come, unlike crap courses like Bukit Unggul, that forces you to travel so far only to serve you with a piece of turd-ball.

Price (2/5)

I know I am going to sound very unfair here, but I still think Kota Permai is not worth RM185 on a promo price in Ramadhan. I mean, that would mean, I have to literally fork out almost RM300 on a normal day?? For Kota Permai? I mean, what so great here? Is it because it has hosted a few tournaments and boom, that makes it a great course? Don’t get me wrong. I like the course, but it compares itself to Saujana a lot, but the history of Kota Permai is lacking. So what if you have had some PGA pros hack your course? Have you earned the tradition that RSGC, KGNS etc have? OK, you argue, what about KLGCC? Good point. I don’t know because I’ve never played there. But does Kota Permai inspire absolute awe and fascination? Not really. It’s a very, very nice course, but it doesn’t cut to charge RM300++ on green fee. If we had to pay around RM130 or even sub RM150, it might cut it, but at RM185, plus caddy tips, another RM210, it’s borderline difficult to recommend the pricing on a Ramadhan promo.

First thoughts

Teeing off at the first tee, the inviting par 5, you are greeted with a large expanse of fairway. It is a GREAT first hole to tee off with. The condition of the course was sub-par based on its obviously high standards, but my first thought was: Gee, it’s like a Saujana twin. A lot of tee off has elevated status, allowing you to see the course at the tee and giving you a wide view of all the bad stuff that’s going to happen to you. Compared this to the extremely flat Kota Kemuning next door, it is simply not a fair fight. It’s like Manny Pacquiao vs Steven Tyler on the boxing floor. It’s like a pitbull terrier vs a Chihuahua, which is lamed, blind and possibly bleeding on the floor. It’s simply a ridiculous comparison, because Kota Kemuning Golf Course would be like a pile of crap. That is sitting INSIDE another pile of crap, that’s on top of a huge dung hill of crap. You get the idea.

Service (3/5)

The only service we had were the caddies. And the caddies were meh. I could do without. They couldn’t give me any read on the greens, which was annoying, because the greens were like sh*t. They absolutely refused to comment or give me a break, instead giving nonchalant response like, “Break sikit.” Or the world famous, “Aim Straight” at the tee box. I don’t know why caddy schools have to teach the Aim Straight strategy because isn’t that what we are freakingly trying to do all the time? Would you advise a man dying of thirst to drink? Or a dog to bark? Or my stupid crazy neighbor to act like a stupid crazy neighbor? No! Because it’s natural! They offered some reasonable service in terms of ball searching, so it’s not all bad.

Fairways (3/5)

Kota Permai fairways are generally well kept. Broad fairways will greet you mainly, but there are some deceptive bunkers laid in the most diabolically strategic places that eats our balls, especially the fairway ones. The fairways are not as undulating as, say, Rahman, but it gives enough variation to keep things interesting. However, my biggest dislike is that at some fairways, tyre tracks completely spoilt it for me. On a RM130 course, it’s fine. On a premier course? Geez come on. And I haven’t got to the greens.

Greens (2/5)

Again, is this a fair assessment? No. It’s like taking a snapshot of Scarlett Johannsson without her makeup. She still looks hot. Ok, not Scarlett, maybe this one. I believe it’s Khloe Kardashian, who is famous for doing absolutely nothing in her life other than banging basketball players. Oops, I don’t know, I mix all of those Kardashians up actually. So anyway, fine, the greens were hollowtining and we have been warned. But the greens still suck. For RM185. If we take the maintenance away, I do recall it’s an excellent, excellent green, but I guess not today. Nada enjoyment.

Rough ( 3/5)

Ohh. The bunkers. You are going to spend a good while in them. There is the index 2 15th which plays relatively easy, but for one humongous Sarlac bunker smack in the middle, which a 210 – 220 drive would find easily. I was going on one of my hot streaks of pars, narrowly missing a 4 foot birdie putt on the previous hole and looking to take the game away…until the Sarlac got me. From there, it was sort of a downer. My hook came back and that was it. The idea is, though I hate that bunker so much, it was a very nice bunker. The rough itself was challenging, but you could still get out of it, not like the Saujana pit bull grass where it bites and won’t let go your (golf) balls.

Aesthetics (4/5)

Kota Permai is typically similar to Saujana or even Tropicana. It’s not extremely breath taking, but it’s a very nice looking course. Mainly because of its usage of elevation of the tee, smart doglegs and usage of water. I also liked the way they put wooden boards on some of the edge of their bunkers. In fact, my playing partner used one of these boards to rebound his crap shot into the green. There is slight maturity in it, but not so many trees as to actually lose your ball, unless you get an unlucky bounce like I did on my third hole, or you shank your ball so badly. I really like the broad fairways though. These are the ones where you just take out your driver and take a mighty swing at it. One of my favourite holes is hole 10. It has a blind dogleg left,and a two tiered fairway. It drops significantly about halfway through, giving you a great view of the green if you  are at the top tier.

Another nice hole is the 9th, to end the front 9. A mighty swing with your driver to the right helps avoid the Sarlac bunkers, but yet put you in an awkward stance due to it’s undulation. Overall, if you like Saujana, or Trops, Kota Permai will suit your eye very much.

First hole is a beauty. You love it immediately as it opens up a slight dogleg left. Second hole is what I fear the most, water on the left. Thank goodness I avoided that but in turn sent my drive into the trees. I punched my second out and navigated a bogey on a green surrounded with water on right.

My two blown holes has very similar stories. 3rd hole, I drove well, but horribly misaligned and sailed into the trees on left, and wicked bounced through the fence into another house for unplayable. CIS!! My other 7 is the 16th. Nemesis type of hole with water left. As usual I hooked mine into the water promptly.

Other than those, I actually played well but due to some awful decision making, my scores unfortunately didn’t reflect it. Which I guess is why we often want to come back and play golf…the belief that we don’t suck as much as you think.

Fun Factor ( 4/5)

Kota Permai doesn’t play difficult. Or maybe because we were having so much laughter that it loosened my swing considerably. It’s a huge difference who you play with. I play with my brother’s group on Saturday at KGNS: and they are all so freaking serious. It’s like I am attending someone’s wake. Or a funeral of my golf swing. My brother himself is a fun chap, but you just sense the entire joy of playing golf ebbing away into a sludge of despondency. It’s because they are good. They are so darn good, it bores the crap out of me, who in turn, did not play good because there was no chatter, no ribbing someone, no making fun of someone’s shank, no screaming because you miss a two footer for RM2…it’s just…golf and goodness, it’s so hopelessly bland. My normal group however consist of clowns who are often the noisiest flers in the course, constantly surfing of waves of joy, elation and sudden depression in the game. I don’t know, everyone prefers something to his or her own taste, but for me, bet a little, wager a little, but everyone should have fun.

The course itself had its nuances. Like the 5th. After a great drive, I was 130 away. I took out a pitching wedge and completely sailed my shot into the river behind the green. Without course knowledge, there was no way I could have judged correctly. And the caddie were useless in given any sort of help in yardage, frankly.

The par 5 12th had some major fairway problems, which shouldn’t be for a course like this.

I like the par 3 14th. It looks easy, but it’s not, because you have surrounding bunkers and a creek. My partner landed his ball inside the creek and guess what, he played from there! Inside the stream! Obvioulsy I wish he found success but he blasted over the green and then went on to a triple. Mine was a 4 footer for birdie which I retardedly missed.

The ending hole is one of the more enjoyable ones on the course. Again, elevated tee, the fairway is deceptively difficult, with bunkers hugging the left and water on the right. Amazingly I hit the water on my first drive that sliced the whole day…and hit a three wood from the drop to about 80 meters from the green and stuffed it to 4 feet and again missed my stupid par with some ridiculously bad putting!

Conclusion

It’s difficult to say no to Kota Permai. Like Glenmarie, we do think it’s a little overpriced for a middling experience….but it’s Kota Permai. Once the greens start getting better, I have no doubt the experience will increase exponentially. The fairways are already nice, the holes all have different characters, but it’s just the awful expensive pricing. If you have spare change to kill, go ahead. And don’t forget the food around Kota Kemuning. Plenty to eat, even the Bidor Duck Noodle, which is really nice.

The good:

Broad fairways are forgiving to the crooked swing; great location and travel; nice bunkers and well kept; different characters for each hole; it’s not a tough course, so hackers can look to score if you play reasonable.

The bad:

Mainly overpriced; hollowtining greens make it an awful experience; ‘Meh’ caddies and I am not relating to how they look, which is an even lower ‘Meh’; some parts of the fairways were not great, not at this price!

The skinny: 25 of 40 divots (62.5%).

I wish they’d make it an easier decision and just move down their price bracket to around RM150 on promotion. Unfortunately it is the range of Tropicana and Glenmarie and often times play similar to it as well. Is this a good deal? Frankly the hollow tining makes a great deal of difference, so if possible avoid playing under maintenance. Then again, this is when cheapos like us start hacking the course!

Kota Permai Score Card

Kota Permai Information

Address:

No 1, Jalan 31/100A, Kota Kemuning, Section 31

40460 Shah Alam,

Selangor

Contact: +603-51223700

Fax: +603-51223702

Website: http://www.kotapermai.com.my

Amverton Cove Golf and Island Resort

Introduction

After what seemed like an eternity, Gilagolf is back to doing what this blog was set up for ages ago. Reviewing crappy golf courses in Malaysia, sprinkled with some really good ones. But mostly crappy, because the crappy ones are the most fun. Anyways, I’ve always heard about Carey Island Golf Course long way back. It was always described in no uncertain terms, as a 9 hole stinkbomb that makes cow dung taste like Baskin’s Ice Cream. With Oreo topping. So I never really ventured there, unless perhaps if it was the final golf course on earth, and committing suicide was no longer an option.

However, a few months back, I began to hear rumours of another world. Another golf courses, set up like ‘the links in old St Andrews’, with beautiful lakes and oceans, and the wind caressing your hair as you launch a perfect 8-iron into the air, only to see it whipped around like a mongoose going after a cobra due to the high winds. Where you have to aim to the ocean, so that the wind can blow your ball back into the fairway. Where mastery of the Stinger is key, to  keep the ball under the wind. Most of us have mastered that anyway, except our Stinger is a top ball and our ball is just under the wind, it’s also skimming along the ground to only about 20 meters. This place was called Amverton Cove. At first, I thought this was a mistake and this referred to place possibly in England or perhaps a custom golf course created in the Playstation Game Tiger Woods 2013. I mean, aside from the insidious practice of naming it a very western sounding name “Amverton” – in the same way caplang products like Bonia, Giordano, Milano sound Italian — which world does anywhere in Malaysia ever represent a ‘Cove’? A cove is like a coastal inlet (according to Wiki). The last cove I experienced was called Lulworth Cove in the Isle of Purbeck when I was doing the Thomas Hardy experience walk with my wife 2 years back. It looks something like this:

This is a cove. It’s a beautiful cove.

The Carey Island I search in Google got me this:

View of Carey Island

In terms of beauty, it’s like a comparison between this:

And This:

I know. They are not even the same species. But you get my point. Anyways. It’s a free country to name anything you deem fit. Amverton Cove it is. Armed with these precious rumours, a group of intrepid golfers took the chance on a gloomy morning to head out, where no Gilagolfer (from our group) has gone before.

Travel (3/5)

I heard of Carey Island when I was a kid, and even been there before. However, I’ve probably not gone there for close to 25 years or so, so getting there itself is an adventure. If you’ve been to Tasik Puteri before, it’s more or less the same philosophy. Create a golf course deep inside and far away from the highway. However, unlike the god-forsaken location of Tasik Puteri, Amverton has really benefited from the SKVE highway at Saujana Putra, which is a direct highway that goes straight into the heart of the forsaken lands of Banting and Carey. I don’t know exactly know why google maps doesn’t have it, and instead forces you to go through Shah Alam, but the best route is to take the NKVE out of PJ, and exit at Saujana Putra. It’s not that far, especially if you’re like a friend of mine who lives in Putra Heights, which is next door. Once there, go straight past the roundabout and you immediately end up at the SKVE toll and there, you can access it. Once you’re at the SKVE, go till the end at you’ll need to turn out into the smaller roads. From there it’s pretty straightforward. Amverton turnoff is just about 1 km or so away from the old 9 hole stinkbomb golf course.

Over all, it was a welcomed drive. Just be careful with your speeds, as the SKVE has a lot of dips and bumps and not at all flat. Otherwise, I’d say travel was surprisingly easy.

 

 

Price (3/5)

I’d say it’s pretty worth the RM120 I paid to play in Amverton. The crux of the matter here is that you need to have 2 flights in order to pay 120, or you end up forking RM138, I think. This hardly makes sense to me, because all I have to do if I had one flight, was to just go to another flight and say, can I join you guys? As in, can my flight just register with you guys? I mean, if they have one flight also, sure, they will be of course ok. Even if they had 2 flights, Malaysians being such cultured and social animals, they’d also generally say yes, so we had 3 flights, and hence ok for the promotion. It obviously is a gimmick from Amverton to get more flights, like bulk purchase or something. It’s a pretty stupid idea, and only serves to annoy the crap out of your customers, Amverton. Nobody does this. Stop it.

A good thing is that for senior citizens, you are further reduced to RM108. Yaay! 15 more years for me to go to get this privilege!

 

 

First thoughts

I’ll be honest. My first thoughts were: “I’m glad I took the day off.” I mean, it was just a welcomed sight. Some golf courses do that to you and Amverton, after the dreary drive through the rain, looked great. It was so strange, to come upon this golf course after driving through a patch of land that looked horribly desolated and boring.

The sign that it was the right thing to do to neglect all other responsibilities in life and just play golf was when we saw a full rainbow over the golf course, and the sun breaking through the morning rain. It was a promise, that although our golf will no doubt suck as usual, it would be the right choice to come to Amverton Cove. Even though it’s representation of a cove is the same as my golf skills representation of Tiger Woods.

 

Service (2/5)

Don’t get me wrong. The staff was friendly enough. The same way as someone who is about to take your money and your kid’s education fund is friendly about it. I mean, we though of having breakfast at Amverton Cove first before heading out to play. Amverton not only uses English names and English landscape to describe the golf course, it also uses pricing from England to describe its menu.

RM13 for fried rice? RM17 for breakfast?RM5 for a toast??!?  And the toast was basically toasted Gardenia bread with a cheap butter and no knive. I had to spread with my spoon. And it sucked. The kopi-o was also about 5. Our breakfast for 3 ended up to be RM40. And this was with two guys eating the RM5 toast and another guy eating an RM15 nasi lemak. Is this crazy, Amverton? Like your two flight promotion, this crosses the line between mildly annoying to brain-numbingly stupid. I guess they have to travel pretty far to get the bread in and all prices are jacked up like in Genting.

Skip the club food and go straight for golf.

 

 

Fairways ( 3/5)

Amverton has Bermuda grass for fairways. Which is generally good, except that maintenance is not going to be easy. As this is a new course, the conditions were still good, if not mildly runned over because of the rain and because they allowed buggies on the fairway. There were a number of spots where the Bermuda was completely balded out and sand has replaced the grass, but I will take it as a new course trying to mature itself, which would probably take some time. So, let’s give it the benefit of doubt. It’s not easy trying to maintain these fairways in a palm oil estate. Plus, with the rain, drainage was pretty darn good as we didn’t have any casual water anyway (but plenty of water otherwise!).

Greens (3/5)

We enjoyed the greens…but it narrowly misses out because a number of these greens, on 11th or 12th, was being sanded. Again, we take it as a new course, and maintenance is still ongoing, but from what we see, the greens are going to be in very good condition soon. It’s fast, and enough undulation to give us the yips—generally, anything with 1 cm of undulation or break gives us the yips, but you get what I’m saying. I think Amverton got this right.

Rough (4/5)

There was not much rough to contend with. Basically if you’re spraying your tee shots like morning piss like me, miss it on the side of the rough instead of water. I know it sounds like a stupid advice, but say, you know your miss is a hook. Instead of aiming it on the fairway, where a hook will bounce off to the left water, aim it way to the rough, so even if you flush it, you end up in the rough with plenty of recovery options. The grass isn’t thick, and the bunkers are very well maintained, even after a solid splashing from the rain. Actually, the bunkers are great. But of course, not while you’re in it, but if you saw the rainfall, you’d think other courses like that stupid Beruntung course, the bunkers would have become swimming pools.

 

Aesthetics (3/5)

OK. Amverton Cove is nicer than we thought. I liked it, but it depends on your type of course. Calling it a links course shows how little people know about links. It’s NOT links. It’s just a flat course that is immature, hence you have little shade and trees, and not much wind and it’s flat as Kate Moss. In fact, the advantage here is that it gives a feel like RSGC, where you can just see the course and everyone playing on it. It’s like a big playing field, where you can shout “Hi!” to your pal on the 1st tee while playing on the 15th tee. Unlike ‘sandboxed holes’ in courses like Ayer Keroh, where each hole feels like you’re completely isolated from the other hole, there is a relatable sense in Amverton, where flights can interact with each other easily. I think having a tournament here is going to be F-U-N. On the other hand however, because there is literally NO elevation, the aesthetics, after a while becomes somewhat of a downer. Every hole plays almost similar with dogleg here and there, water on the left or right, some hidden lake in the middle of nowhere, and basically no sense of awe that you get like if you played in Johor’s Legends course or Saujana Cobra. Elevation makes the course more beautiful, and in Amverton’s case, this is a minus. Overall, it depends on the type of golfer you are. I personally like the hilly types of terrains you find in Rahman Putra, but it still doesn’t detract the fact that Amverton is a nice looking golf course.

The surrounding environment isn’t so good looking however, but these are all being constructed, so it’s not so fair to make a judgement until the resort gets fully operational. I might be able to trick my wife to come here for a ‘family outing’ with a couple of Gilagolfers and their similarly tricked family….

 

 

Fun Factor ( 3/5)

We really enjoyed Amverton. It’s been a while since we had a lot of fun, but basically, we had two of the noisiest flights on the course. Because it was so flat, our yells and laughter was heard all over, which makes it, I guess, quite unethical but ah well. I didn’t have my best game, but I didn’t think I messed up so bad. We teed off at 10. The par 5s here are delectable. You can reach both in 2 on the back nine. But they punish wayward shots. On hole 10, I had only 180 left after a long drive. I sliced it, and boom, it goes into the river on the right. I didn’t even know there was a river because the course was so darn flat. Double.

The 11th was bad for me because of water on the left. I topped my drive and with another 180 to go, I proceeded to pull my 3 wood into water. Stupid 3 wood now has cost me two holes. Triple. Hole 12, par 3, what can go wrong right? Over-drew my 8 iron and it bounced on the fairway and trickled to the left. I didn’t even realize the water ate into the fairway near the green…and you will get this a lot because you can’t see crap at the tee box due to the flatness—if you can get a caddy, well go for it maybe they can help. So my first three holes, I was +8. After that, I played much better, including the par 5 14th, where even if I OB-ed my 3 wood from the fairway second shot, I still put my next 3 wood shot onto the green from 190 out and two putted for bogey. I like the par 5s.

The signature hole is the par 4 18th, where you can challenge the lake to carry about 220 – 230 to cross. We played safe, but all attempted mulligans to see if we could cross and all failed miserably. From the fairway I don’t know how I messed up so badly to double bogey it but ah well.

The second nine was way better. The only letdown was the index 1 hole, which is a 289meter par 4 6th. The only problem was right water, but landing space on the left was plenty so 3 out of 4 guys from our flight parred that easily. I think they need to change that index 1 a little, it’s too easy.

Every hole has water. But unlike Rahman where you need to cross them, most of these are not fronting the teebox but lay to the left and right, treacherously eating up your wayward shots. There’s even a hole where you have to go onto a wooden walkway to walk across a swamp to the teebox, I think hole 6.

Out of 18 holes, 12 holes have water to the left, and potentially terrible for hookers like me. In fact hole 10 – 18 features 7 of 9 holes with bad news for hookers. Ironically, the only two times I ever sliced my tee shot all day ended up in the lake, when water was on the right. It. Was. Retarded.

 

 

 

Conclusion

We’ll definitely make another trip here. The travel wasn’t half as bad as we thought. And the course itself was worth the trip and the fun we had. It’s one of those courses where you just know that the second time you play here, you’ll play better because you know the courses slightly better. You know where to miss, whether to go for it or not. And of course, who doesn’t want to come back to a course with a rainbow over it?

The good:

Huge potential for Amverton Cove. Of course, if I could, I’d change the name because it ain’t a cove. But let’s give it a break. It’s a good course in Carey Island and recommended to go. The greens are well maintain, the fairways hold up to rain, the rough is also good and if you like water, hey, this is as watery as it gets. Every hole has water!

 

The bad:

The pricing is still a little steep for a course that is not elite. It’s in the middling range like tasik puteri, just above dog crap courses like Kinrara and Holy-Crap-This-Is-Awful-Sh*t courses like Beruntung, but at RM120 on a weekday? It’s high. And why is the food pricing like eating in Ben’s in Bangsar? Also, aesthetics is a hit and miss…the lack of elevation, immature trees, flat features is a minus. It’s like a girl who will be considered pretty but never beautiful.

The skinny: 24 of 40 divots (60%).

Of course, recommended to give it a try. Most of you will probably enjoy this course like we did, and once it starts maturing, it will get better. Give the food here a miss though. Down the road, there is a very good seafood restaurant (halal) called Kang Guan (I think)..it seems to be very popular. Play golf only and don’t stay a minute longer than you need to.

Amverton Cove Score Card

Amverton Cove Information

Address:

PT673, Jalan Pulau Carey, Mukim Jugra,

42960 Pulau Carey,

Selangor Darul Ehsan.

Contact: +6019-3382233/ +6019-3832233

Fax: NA

Email: enquiries@amvertoncove.com

Website: http://www.amvertoncove.com/