Speaker 1: Like adding length to create a championship course is just
Speaker 1: so backwards, you know, like to difficulty all does it
Speaker 1: just favors the long hitters more and more.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's the places where it makes sense. To do
Speaker 2: that is to do it, is to do it where
Speaker 2: you know there's a lot already a long, difficult hole
Speaker 2: and it's already a three shot hole for somebody. You know,
Speaker 2: adding forty yards to a three hundred and fifty yard
Speaker 2: hold only makes a medium, you know, part four that
Speaker 2: is impossible for the average guy to get to regularly,
Speaker 2: and still a wedge for the better player. I miss
Speaker 2: a green, for example, I'm already upset when I find
Speaker 2: my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset. And when
Speaker 2: I find my ball in.
Speaker 1: A bright egg Frida Egg, the dreaded Frida Egg, fridagg,
Speaker 1: Frid Egg Egg, Frida Egg, bride egg.
Speaker 2: Lie, I'm about ready to run off the golf course.
Speaker 1: Ladies and gentlemen, Welcome back to another episode of the
Speaker 1: Frida Egg Podcast. Today we're joined by Mike Devrees, one
Speaker 1: of today's forefront architects. He's designed great golf courses such
Speaker 1: as Cape Wickham, Kingsley Club, gray Well wells and also
Speaker 1: some some nice public courses such as Pilgrim's Run, and
Speaker 1: also done some very high profile restorations such as the
Speaker 1: Meadow Club out in San Francisco area. Mike, welcome on.
Speaker 2: Thank you. I appreciate it. Looking forward to being a
Speaker 2: part of the show.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it'll be it'll be fun to talk architecture.
Speaker 1: These conversations always get into deep and dark rabbit holes.
Speaker 2: Well that's good. It's a passion that I've grown up
Speaker 2: with since I was a kid, and I'm just lucky
Speaker 2: I get to do it every day.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So it's usually how I like to start these is.
Speaker 1: I'm always curious about how you got in and to
Speaker 1: architecture and when you knew that you wanted to be
Speaker 1: an architect. So you've had this passion since you were
Speaker 1: a kid.
Speaker 2: Yeah. My grandfather taught me the game when I was
Speaker 2: six or eight years old, and so I was I
Speaker 2: just was immediately attracted to golf. It was something that
Speaker 2: I did with my maternal grandparents and an uncle who
Speaker 2: was a really good player. He was a scratch player,
Speaker 2: and so I would hit balls in the front yard.
Speaker 2: That was the first kind of thing that we did.
Speaker 2: And then I would follow them around and wherever my
Speaker 2: my uncle would finish near the green, I would like
Speaker 2: put my ball down and chip or putt or whatever
Speaker 2: he was doing, and you know, try and do what
Speaker 2: he did. And I would follow them for their lessons
Speaker 2: or anything like that. And then there was a little
Speaker 2: nine hole golf course near me, Frankfurt Golf Club, where
Speaker 2: ultimately they would, you know, someone would drop me off
Speaker 2: and I'd play nine holes with whoever was available. And
Speaker 2: then when I was a little older, my my grandparents
Speaker 2: were members at Crystal Down, so I was fortunate to
Speaker 2: be near that and to experience that from an early age.
Speaker 2: And certainly that's one of the great courses in the world,
Speaker 2: and I was able to you know, learn about golf there.
Speaker 2: And then when Fred Muller came in the pro at
Speaker 2: the Downs, a longtime pro there, he's been there forty
Speaker 2: one years now. I started working for Fred in the
Speaker 2: pro shop when I was fourteen, and then a couple
Speaker 2: of years later I was working in the pro shop
Speaker 2: and on the grounds crew during the week. So every
Speaker 2: day of the summer I was I was on the
Speaker 2: golf course doing something, whether that was working, you know,
Speaker 2: moving bags or getting carts or mowing greens and and
Speaker 2: or going back and you know, playing golf and then
Speaker 2: late afternoon or something. So it was something that was
Speaker 2: really quite passionate. And when I was seventeen, I kind
Speaker 2: of figured out, you know, breaking bunkers. I kind of
Speaker 2: figured out that crystal downs was a lot more special
Speaker 2: than just the regular Joe blow Muni or whatever. Then
Speaker 2: I played back in Grand Rapids where I grew up,
Speaker 2: you know, went to school and stuff, and so I just,
Speaker 2: you know, it was always there. It was always something
Speaker 2: that I really really enjoyed, and it was something that
Speaker 2: was you know, part of my life and my family
Speaker 2: and all of that. And then when I finished undergrad,
Speaker 2: I was a business major and I did something else,
Speaker 2: worked for Herman Sporting Goods and figured out their mission
Speaker 2: in life and mind were kind of going an opposite direct,
Speaker 2: and I was getting married back up in Frankfurt. I
Speaker 2: came back to the golf course, did some projects on
Speaker 2: the golf course for the superintendent and figured out that's
Speaker 2: really what I wanted to do. And Tom Doak at
Speaker 2: that time was building high point in his first solo design.
Speaker 2: And we're in Traverse City and my former boss on
Speaker 2: the grounds crew at the Downs was the project manager.
Speaker 2: So I went over there and I met Tom, and
Speaker 2: when I got back from camping from my honeymoon, I
Speaker 2: went and helped them finish and clean up High Point,
Speaker 2: and then worked with Tom for about two and a
Speaker 2: half years on a couple of different projects down in
Speaker 2: Myrtle Beach, the Heathland's course at the Legends Complex, and
Speaker 2: then I came back up to Michigan in the Black
Speaker 2: Forest golf Course near Gaillard. I ran that project for him,
Speaker 2: and then we didn't have another project to go to
Speaker 2: and that's when I went back to school and I
Speaker 2: got my master's in Landscape architecture from University of Michigan.
Speaker 2: And then I've worked for uh for Tom Bosio's group.
Speaker 2: They needed somebody on a couple of projects as a
Speaker 2: design associate, and so I did that for about fifteen
Speaker 2: months out in in Hudson at Hudson National in New
Speaker 2: York and the Cordier Valley Club in Vale, Colorado. And
Speaker 2: then since then I've came back to Michigan and I've
Speaker 2: been doing my own stuff for the last twenty plus years.
Speaker 1: So yeah, that's UH, that's cool. You got to I've
Speaker 1: heard a lot of stories. I've been meaning to get
Speaker 1: up to Black Forest. And you know, when you look
Speaker 1: back at at the crew that you guys had there,
Speaker 1: it was it was Tom, yourself and and Gil Hands
Speaker 1: and I uh, I mean to talk about three pretty
Speaker 1: impressive guys for a three man crew.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there were a few other helpers too, but but
Speaker 2: it was, it was, it was. It was a great
Speaker 2: a great product. It was super fun. All we you know,
Speaker 2: we were just talking about golf shots all the time,
Speaker 2: and we were all young and we're all not very
Speaker 2: different in age and things, and so uh it was
Speaker 2: a great opportunity just to talk about, you know, what
Speaker 2: we were trying to do and how to how to
Speaker 2: best make it work and and uh sometimes we try
Speaker 2: something and just you know, see how it would work
Speaker 2: and it would evolve into something else. And so you know,
Speaker 2: that was a really awesome experience. And you know, it
Speaker 2: was a you know, their lifelong friends and and guys
Speaker 2: that you you know, they're everybody's doing really good work
Speaker 2: still to this day and try and stuff, and so
Speaker 2: it was it was quite a good experience.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So I've always I'm always curious about when you're on site,
Speaker 1: what you guys are doing on the downtime. I mean,
Speaker 1: is it is it just all golf all the time?
Speaker 2: Uh? Yeah, Well, on site, there's not much downtime. You're
Speaker 2: you know, you're building and when you have good weather.
Speaker 2: You know, it depends where you're at in the country,
Speaker 2: but if you're in the north, you know, you're building
Speaker 2: whatever you can build during that time frame. So there
Speaker 2: isn't a lot of downtime. You're on site, you know,
Speaker 2: all day you're not playing golf, you're but you're talking
Speaker 2: about golf, or you're playing a little dirt golf, just
Speaker 2: hitting shots here and there just to sort of get
Speaker 2: a feel for something maybe. So uh, it's it's you're
Speaker 2: you're constantly, you know, I mean still to this day,
Speaker 2: constantly thinking about what the shots would be when you're
Speaker 2: building in the dirt, or how that's working, or what
Speaker 2: if we shifted this or move this, and you know,
Speaker 2: how do you how do you deal with you know,
Speaker 2: you come up you always run into stuff, whether it's
Speaker 2: a new course or or an old course. You know,
Speaker 2: old courses when you're doing renovation or restoration type work,
Speaker 2: you run into old infrastructure. You know, a lot of
Speaker 2: stuff underground whether that's old irrigation drainage. It could be
Speaker 2: drainage that's not even from the golf course. It could
Speaker 2: be an old stone drain from a farm one hundred
Speaker 2: and fifty years ago or something, and it's probably in water.
Speaker 2: So there's a lot of things that are that are
Speaker 2: really different and you have to you know, I think
Speaker 2: all the above mentioned guys, you know, Tom Gill, myself,
Speaker 2: Ben and Bill, you know, we're we're in the field
Speaker 2: because we believe that's important to be able to make
Speaker 2: those decisions, uh, and and to do that in a
Speaker 2: you know, in a real time manner, and to sort
Speaker 2: of be able to assess it and think about, you know,
Speaker 2: what's the best solution for that, what's the most practical
Speaker 2: way to do that?
Speaker 1: I imagine. I know one of your courses, Gray Walls,
Speaker 1: is way up in the upper Peninsula of Michigan, and
Speaker 1: like you mentioned it, you know, with the northern the
Speaker 1: time constraints. Did you do you feel a little bit
Speaker 1: more pressure when you're designing a course in an area
Speaker 1: that that only has a you know, a finite amount
Speaker 1: of time when you can really moved dirt around, and
Speaker 1: that I'm really curious about that project in general.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, we had a we had a great team
Speaker 2: that was involved there. So we had a superintendent Pitchevrette
Speaker 2: who ran the project for the club. And they haven't
Speaker 2: they haven't. They hadn't existing golf course eighteen holes nine
Speaker 2: holes that had been built in twenty six by William Langford,
Speaker 2: which is really good, and then forty years later they
Speaker 2: added another nine holes in the midst with Gil came
Speaker 2: in and did that, not following Langord's original routing, but
Speaker 2: then somewhat close, you know, in the same area. Some
Speaker 2: of the some of the land had been used for
Speaker 2: some housing and things like that, so he couldn't use
Speaker 2: it all or follow follow Languorg's routing in that golf course.
Speaker 2: They were in Marquette, Michigan. They were doing thirty five
Speaker 2: to four thousand rounds a year on that. Yeah, very
Speaker 2: he plays and and they love their golf and they
Speaker 2: have really long days in the summer and so they
Speaker 2: they play and play and play and play as much
Speaker 2: as they can. So, you know, they they're very active
Speaker 2: people in the you know, all seasons up there, they're
Speaker 2: outdoors and because they have such long daylight, they'll do
Speaker 2: they have they have men's and women's leagues and things
Speaker 2: and within the club, and they'll do two hundred. They'll
Speaker 2: have two hundreds around after five o'clock at night, just
Speaker 2: because you know, people will work the whole day and
Speaker 2: then they'll go out and play their league. Yeah, so
Speaker 2: it's it's busy. We call it the factory short but
Speaker 2: we so the Gray Walls project, we had Peachevrett, he
Speaker 2: was he ran, he was sort of the project manager
Speaker 2: for the club. And then we had a company out
Speaker 2: of Northernes, out of Ashland, Wisconsin, Northern Wisconsin called Northern Clearing,
Speaker 2: and they're really experienced with moving big piles of dirt rock.
Speaker 2: They do a lot of things involved with power lines
Speaker 2: and you know, clearing in the middle of nowhere, and
Speaker 2: so it was excellent to have them as a team.
Speaker 2: They also they built about twenty or thirty golf courses also,
Speaker 2: so they have a whole other division that deals with golf.
Speaker 2: So we had guys that were experienced and knew what
Speaker 2: was going on there. And then we had an irrigation
Speaker 2: guy out of Minnesota, See who was really phenomenal. So
Speaker 2: there were a lot of pieces that had to go together.
Speaker 2: And you're right, it's a short season and you can
Speaker 2: get hit with weather and you want to get grass
Speaker 2: in the ground and planted, and so it was it
Speaker 2: was fairly accelerated that way. We did clearing late fall
Speaker 2: in the early spring, and then really the construction was
Speaker 2: done in one season, which is pretty amazing considering it's
Speaker 2: a very rugged site. But we didn't We worked around
Speaker 2: the rock that was there and we have a lot
Speaker 2: of really good sand on site, so the soils are
Speaker 2: really quite excellent, good, good growing medium. And superintendent that's
Speaker 2: there now, Craig Moore was He took care of the
Speaker 2: the old golf course when we were building, and he
Speaker 2: also had worked at the Kingsley Club under Dan Lucas
Speaker 2: for a number of years, so he's a very very
Speaker 2: good superintendent and he's he's he Pete. When Pete Chevrett left,
Speaker 2: Craig took over the came back up to Marquette and
Speaker 2: has been a superintendent there really almost from day one.
Speaker 2: So really it's a good arrangement and they do an
Speaker 2: excellent job.
Speaker 1: How with whether you're doing a restoration or renovation or
Speaker 1: building a new course, how important is the relationship and
Speaker 1: with the super and and really getting them involved.
Speaker 2: It's critical. It's really critical. If you know, if you're
Speaker 2: constantly button heads with somebody that's going to take care
Speaker 2: of the golf course, then what you're trying to build
Speaker 2: is not gonna it's not going to be carried out
Speaker 2: because you know, they may think, oh, well, you know,
Speaker 2: I want to do it this way, and that might
Speaker 2: not that might not be the vision that's you know,
Speaker 2: you're sort of portraying for the golf course. So you know,
Speaker 2: getting to know that person and you know, working with
Speaker 2: them on a day to day basis and all that's
Speaker 2: really important one so that you can kind of help
Speaker 2: to explain what you're trying to achieve and what you're
Speaker 2: trying to do as well as knowing that then they're
Speaker 2: going to be able to take that direction and they're
Speaker 2: gonna they're going to maintain it the way that you
Speaker 2: would like it to be maintained and if they have
Speaker 2: a question, they'll call you and talk to you about it.
Speaker 2: So it's it's really it's really important. I think it
Speaker 2: leads to a better product and it and then you know,
Speaker 2: it's a team job. Every job is, you know, there's
Speaker 2: a big team. It's not just me. There's a lot
Speaker 2: of people that are involved with the project, and and
Speaker 2: that person's really critical.
Speaker 1: It's I imagine, do you keep in touch with your
Speaker 1: old projects and your you know, the superintendents from the
Speaker 1: old projects with it with some sort of regularity.
Speaker 2: Or yeah, fairly, fairly, fairly often depends on the situation,
Speaker 2: you know, not as much as you'd like. You gotta
Speaker 2: gotta do other you gotta do new stuff. You gotta
Speaker 2: do new work. You gotta keep paying the bills. So yeah,
Speaker 2: but but yeah, it's important to you know, Hey, what's
Speaker 2: what's happening. How's it going. Kingsley Club is twenty minutes
Speaker 2: from my house, so you know, I'm there a lot
Speaker 2: and uh and it's a special place. It was really
Speaker 2: the first completely solo job that I did, so you know,
Speaker 2: it's a wonderful, amazing golf course. The ownership has been fantastic.
Speaker 2: The superintendent, Dan Lucas, has been there from the beginning
Speaker 2: and built a golf course with me. So so we
Speaker 2: see each other regularly. If I'm in town and i'm
Speaker 2: you know, I'm going to play a game or something,
Speaker 2: I'm probably going out there and that, you know, so
Speaker 2: we're always seeing stuff and this and that and trying
Speaker 2: to make sure that that we're staying you know, on
Speaker 2: track with stuff. And then ed Walker, the owner, has
Speaker 2: been fantastic and you know, he has things about want
Speaker 2: to improve or you know, change this or that, little bits,
Speaker 2: you know, do we need to add a bunker here
Speaker 2: or there or something. They've added some cabins over the
Speaker 2: years and things like that. So so he's always, uh,
Speaker 2: you know, very involved and has been from the beginning.
Speaker 2: And that's that's been a great relationship. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So one of our listeners, Tim Ragons, asks about the
Speaker 1: process of laying out Kingsley Club. But I'm just uh,
Speaker 1: and speaking more generally, how do you go about routing
Speaker 1: a golf course once you once you win a project
Speaker 1: and figuring out how the how the holes are going
Speaker 1: to work together and what holes are going to be.
Speaker 2: What I'm well, for me, first of all, you just
Speaker 2: got to become you know, really familiar with the with
Speaker 2: the property and you have to figure out what's going on,
Speaker 2: you know, how do how does the how does it
Speaker 2: feel on the ground. Can't just you know, I can
Speaker 2: read couple maps and squiggly lines really well, but every
Speaker 2: total map I've ever seen also has you know, errors,
Speaker 2: of it. So so, and there's stuff that's that's on
Speaker 2: total maps that gives you the general broad thing, but
Speaker 2: there's always little bits and pieces that you have to
Speaker 2: be there and in the field to see. So when
Speaker 2: you're going around and you know, you know that there's
Speaker 2: a knoll over here or this valley or something like that,
Speaker 2: and if you're going around and depending on the property,
Speaker 2: how open it is or how treated it is, et cetera,
Speaker 2: maybe you're making notes of the transition from maybe this
Speaker 2: environment to the next environment or wow, there's a really
Speaker 2: good drove of you know, oak trees or maple trees
Speaker 2: or pine trees, or maybe there's one there's one big
Speaker 2: tree there and stuff like that. So you're trying to
Speaker 2: become really intimate with the property and the land, and
Speaker 2: you're trying to find golf holes that naturally fit into
Speaker 2: the land. At least I'm trying to do that. And so,
Speaker 2: you know, with regards to you know, specifically Kingsley and
Speaker 2: talking about that the question there. So it was the
Speaker 2: property had been clear cut about fifteen years before we
Speaker 2: were outsite, and so there was a lot of regrowth
Speaker 2: of just a thicket of choke cherry and fire cherry
Speaker 2: and aspen trees, and it was I mean, you couldn't
Speaker 2: even walk through lots of it. It was just impenetrable
Speaker 2: great grouse cover and you know, bird hunting cover. But
Speaker 2: and then there were a few areas where there were
Speaker 2: like brambles and you know, more of you know, like
Speaker 2: wild raspberries or blackberries and stuff like that, and you know,
Speaker 2: a few trees left over here and there, so you
Speaker 2: could see some of the stuff, but a lot of
Speaker 2: the ground you couldn't. So you kind of had there
Speaker 2: were some trails going through and you had to kind
Speaker 2: of get used to that and get get a feel
Speaker 2: for that. And it's it's severe property in areas, and
Speaker 2: so it was hard to figure some of stuff out.
Speaker 2: One of the holes that I saw isn't actually a
Speaker 2: hole on the golf course, but it was a really
Speaker 2: really cool short par five that play for people that
Speaker 2: know the golf course. The third hole, the middle of
Speaker 2: the third hole on the left side of the fairway.
Speaker 2: If you played a hole from there back across number
Speaker 2: four and the ridge and number two to where the
Speaker 2: back te on number six is, that's it's about a
Speaker 2: five hundred yard hole and it's it's a really cool
Speaker 2: you know, there's all these ups and downs and you know,
Speaker 2: little ridges and spots and bowls and things like that,
Speaker 2: and would have made it really interesting challenging for you know,
Speaker 2: for a better player to hit it too. But you know,
Speaker 2: you could plot out three shots and you know, really
Speaker 2: try and place your ball and get the position and
Speaker 2: things like that. The only problem with that is it's
Speaker 2: a great at hole. It just didn't work with anything
Speaker 2: else and it chopped up a lot of things. So instead,
Speaker 2: you know, what happened is we had this what I
Speaker 2: call the South forty, which is that area down there's
Speaker 2: about forty acres where you have the ridge on number
Speaker 2: two down to you know where seventy six green and
Speaker 2: four t and three green are. It's all this big
Speaker 2: area surround this deep sinkhole in the middle of two,
Speaker 2: four and six. And so instead of one great hole
Speaker 2: this par five that we found right away, we have
Speaker 2: a really really cool little ridge top par three, we
Speaker 2: have a you know, two par fours, one a little
Speaker 2: bit longer than the other that tumble and bumble kind
Speaker 2: of on ground that leaves and gives and leaves you
Speaker 2: with a shot. But sometimes you're gonna have a blind
Speaker 2: shot into the green if you go into one of
Speaker 2: the balls, and sometimes you're gonna see on the top
Speaker 2: of the ridge. And then five is a paralleling. It's
Speaker 2: kind of off to the side of this south forty
Speaker 2: but plays an entirely different opposing par three to number
Speaker 2: two into a big punch bowl green. And then you
Speaker 2: have six across and around the deep sinkhole. And then
Speaker 2: seven leaves that in a in a dramatic fashion with
Speaker 2: the downhill drive and stuff into an area that is
Speaker 2: enclosed instead of being totally wide open and seeing all
Speaker 2: these other holes. So we gave up this one really
Speaker 2: cool par five, so we got five to six, you know,
Speaker 2: really good holes out of it because of how we
Speaker 2: could utilize that land. So that was one of the
Speaker 2: things that you know, that particular question the guy's asking
Speaker 2: about laying out Kingsley was trying to figure out how
Speaker 2: those those puzzle pieces fit together. And that of course
Speaker 2: any sort of project that you're.
Speaker 1: Doing, so it's you probably walk, so you walk the
Speaker 1: land and you obviously you see you see it all
Speaker 1: the time, Like I'm driving down the road and I
Speaker 1: look and I'm being like, I see. That would be
Speaker 1: a really great golf hole. Can I imagine that happens
Speaker 1: with you more so than me. But you walk this
Speaker 1: land and you identify some of the golf holes you
Speaker 1: like the most. But you can't be married to him
Speaker 1: because when when you try and put the hole to
Speaker 1: puzzle together, you know some of those are going to
Speaker 1: You're going to lose some of those holes almost all
Speaker 1: the time.
Speaker 2: Right, Absolutely, you've got to find. To me, it's not
Speaker 2: about one great hole. It's about the sequence of holes
Speaker 2: and how holes transition from one to the other. And
Speaker 2: so one of the things that okay, so kind of
Speaker 2: figured out the south forty, which is in the corner
Speaker 2: of four hundred acres, But how do we get to that,
Speaker 2: or how do we use that as a beginning or ending,
Speaker 2: or how does that transition with other stuff? Well, the
Speaker 2: hard part at Kingsley was east of that, east of
Speaker 2: the east of the front nine is a big wetland
Speaker 2: down there that isn't easy to work around, doesn't necessarily
Speaker 2: make for a great call, is environmentally sensitive, So transitioning
Speaker 2: that way was difficult. Can't go south off the property,
Speaker 2: can't go west off the property, so you got to
Speaker 2: go north. And then how do you how do you
Speaker 2: do that? How do you transition that? And so seven,
Speaker 2: you know, ultimately ended up being a simple part of
Speaker 2: that problem because we didn't want to climb seven back
Speaker 2: up to the tee that that wouldn't make for a
Speaker 2: very good hole. So leaving the property there was was
Speaker 2: an easy way to think about it. Eight kind of
Speaker 2: fell into place because of just really cool ground and
Speaker 2: a great green site at the base. You know that
Speaker 2: little raised platform that the green is there. There was
Speaker 2: a shelf there on that hill and so there was
Speaker 2: shaping involved, but you know that a lot of that
Speaker 2: was kind of in place, and the and the big
Speaker 2: bunker in the middle of the fairway, there was a
Speaker 2: mound there, and the ridge was there where the what
Speaker 2: we call the three amigos and the on the drive
Speaker 2: they were there. So all those kind of tied together,
Speaker 2: and nine kind of set up so with the par
Speaker 2: three and having two different angles and stuff, those those
Speaker 2: areas were just there. All we did is flatten off
Speaker 2: the tops of those ridges and and little bomps and
Speaker 2: stuff and made a tea. So that was that was
Speaker 2: a you know, kind of simple. The hard thing was
Speaker 2: what how do we how do we get out there, Yeah,
Speaker 2: you were, how do you lead? And so ultimately that
Speaker 2: ended up being do we do that in like two
Speaker 2: holes or do we do it in one? And ultimately
Speaker 2: it ended up being the first hole, which was a
Speaker 2: big hole, and and we created the big shelf and
Speaker 2: the bunkers in the middle, and and you know, works
Speaker 2: out really well. It's it's intimidating for a lot of
Speaker 2: for a lot of people are their first thing and
Speaker 2: they see, wow, that's my drive. But but I think
Speaker 2: it plays. It actually plays really well, and it doesn't
Speaker 2: play as difficult if you if you don't get too
Speaker 2: aggressive with it, if you're just like an average player.
Speaker 2: You know, if you just hit a regular drive and
Speaker 2: hit it up there, you have a decent chance. And
Speaker 2: the and the green is is in a you know,
Speaker 2: a nice little shelter bowl there, and you can play
Speaker 2: shots off of the right side, and so there's opportunity there,
Speaker 2: you know, to start out well, but you can screw
Speaker 2: it up well too. I did that the other day.
Speaker 4: That's that's the that's the beauty of golf is you know,
Speaker 4: I think you put yourself out there and you give
Speaker 4: people the opportunity to screw up.
Speaker 5: Because I we do that.
Speaker 2: We do that pretty easily. We're golfers.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's something I always it bugs me when I
Speaker 1: see trees in front of hazard, like trees in front
Speaker 1: of bunkers. Is on like a short par five is
Speaker 1: let give people the opportunity to hit themselves in, get
Speaker 1: themselves into that forty yard away bunker and have that shot,
Speaker 1: because you know, being in there in two and making
Speaker 1: a six is like the most frustrating thing if you
Speaker 1: if you're if you have trees, people are probably just
Speaker 1: gonna lay up and hit their wedge up there, and
Speaker 1: it kind of removes the interest, right right. So I
Speaker 1: think something that from your website that I found interesting
Speaker 1: was it kind of how you your philosophy on on
Speaker 1: adding difficulty for the you know, the really good player
Speaker 1: and especially combating technology and with the modern game and
Speaker 1: how how it's growing, Like, what are your philosophies in
Speaker 1: terms of marrying playability with ch unique challenge and interest
Speaker 1: for the you know, scratch player.
Speaker 2: Well, first of all, I think you have to give
Speaker 2: them options. If you give a really good golfer only
Speaker 2: one option, they they commit on that and and they
Speaker 2: make that shot because they're good, they're really good. So
Speaker 2: if you give them three options, all of a sudden,
Speaker 2: there's a little bit of doubt if I can get
Speaker 2: ten or fifteen percent, a doubt in the good golfer's mind,
Speaker 2: they may don't maybe they don't fully commit to that shot,
Speaker 2: and then they have a tendency to make an error,
Speaker 2: you know, and then that sort of compounds itself. The
Speaker 2: technology is out of control, so we won't get into that,
Speaker 2: but you know, it's hard to it's it's hard to
Speaker 2: design for that. But I think if you give people options,
Speaker 2: and you give them variety and diversity, then for the
Speaker 2: better player, that's more decisions and more complexity, and that
Speaker 2: gives them a little bit of doubt, and that I
Speaker 2: think makes it more fun ultimately or more challenging. And
Speaker 2: for a guy that you know, all he ever does
Speaker 2: is just bomb a driver and grab a wedge and
Speaker 2: hit it, which is kind of what the PGA Tours
Speaker 2: become just because of how technology is. You know, that's
Speaker 2: not really exciting golf, particularly for the average golfers. And
Speaker 2: so if you can build in variety and interest and
Speaker 2: diversity and options, then the average guy who can't depend
Speaker 2: on hitting it one hundred and eighty or two hundred
Speaker 2: and twenty or how many yards you know, they're capable
Speaker 2: of hitting it. They you know, they get themselves into
Speaker 2: positions and then they have to assess. And if you
Speaker 2: have a narrow fair way with lots of long rough,
Speaker 2: you know, they have one option and they just whack
Speaker 2: it out. But they have they spray the ball, but
Speaker 2: they get themselves in a bad angle and there's a
Speaker 2: bunker kind of in their way and they're not really sure.
Speaker 2: Then the average player that thinks about it but can
Speaker 2: execute a shot to get into a position that maybe
Speaker 2: gives him a better opportunity, and he and he does that,
Speaker 2: then they get a little charge. They get energized about
Speaker 2: it and it's like, wow, I did that. That was cool.
Speaker 2: So that's achievement in itself, but it also makes it
Speaker 2: more interesting and more exciting for every level of player
Speaker 2: to be able to do something.
Speaker 1: I think it's almost like you give the average player
Speaker 1: they could be as long as there aren't like trees
Speaker 1: in their way or they're in really really long rough.
Speaker 1: It's they feel like they have this They have this
Speaker 1: illusion of hey, I can hit this shot. If they
Speaker 1: have a clear shot to the green, you know, there
Speaker 1: might be a bunker in the way, they might have
Speaker 1: the worst angle to a green that runs away, but
Speaker 1: they feel like they have a chance versus you know,
Speaker 1: a ball rolling into the water, rolling into the trees.
Speaker 2: Sure, I mean a lot of that, you know, growing
Speaker 2: up and playing with my grandfather, and towards the end
Speaker 2: of his life, he wasn't hitting the driver. He hit
Speaker 2: his three wood. I don't know why I ever put
Speaker 2: it back in the bag, because you know, he hits
Speaker 2: three at least twice on every hole. And then you
Speaker 2: know he you know, in a long and a long hold,
Speaker 2: he hit three of those and some sort of chip
Speaker 2: and run up there in a putt for five more
Speaker 2: the time. And I, of course would hit it a
Speaker 2: lot further than he, but i'd be in the weeds
Speaker 2: or something, you know, when I was a kid, and
Speaker 2: and I'm out there scrambling and trying to get back
Speaker 2: and criss crossing all over the place, and you know,
Speaker 2: I'd make bogue. I'd make double bogey, and he'd make bogey,
Speaker 2: and you know, let me move on to the next hole.
Speaker 2: Both guys are crafty, exactly.
Speaker 1: It's how much as an architect, how interesting, how much
Speaker 1: goes into watching. You know, when you play golf, say
Speaker 1: with like a wide range of players, how much do
Speaker 1: you watch the way different players play golf courses and
Speaker 1: think about that when you're designing.
Speaker 2: Of course, I think about it a lot. And you know,
Speaker 2: I enjoy playing with a wide variety of players too.
Speaker 2: I mean it's it's you know, I've gotten I've gotten
Speaker 2: better over time, probably just because I manage my game
Speaker 2: better or whatever, and don't get into trouble as much
Speaker 2: and don't hit it as far as I too. But
Speaker 2: it's to me, it's interesting to do that. And I'm
Speaker 2: always interested in in any any other golfers, you know,
Speaker 2: opinion of what I've built or what they just played,
Speaker 2: and why and and because every golfer has an opinion,
Speaker 2: we all know that. And you know, they may not
Speaker 2: be looking at what I'm looking at, and so I
Speaker 2: can learn from that. I guess I look at that way. So,
Speaker 2: for instance, fifteen years ago or so, Pilgrim's Run had
Speaker 2: been open for you know a couple of years, and
Speaker 2: my aunt and uncle and cousin who had all played golf,
Speaker 2: you know, more than they were playing at that time.
Speaker 2: And this is my uncle that used to be a
Speaker 2: scratch player, and my aunt had was a decent player
Speaker 2: at the time, and I used to play golf with
Speaker 2: her when I was little too, but she hadn't really
Speaker 2: played much in you know, a while, and my cousin
Speaker 2: had played something not much recently. Went out to Pilgrim's
Speaker 2: Run and you know, we had a really good time
Speaker 2: and my uncle, you know, his game started, you know,
Speaker 2: coming alive and and he really enjoyed, you know, a
Speaker 2: couple he's like, oh, I got to try that shot again.
Speaker 2: You know, that was really cool. So that was exciting.
Speaker 2: But at the end, I asked my aunt, I said,
Speaker 2: you know, what did you like? And she said, oh,
Speaker 2: you don't want to know what. I know what I think,
Speaker 2: And I said, yeah, I do, because everybody's looking at
Speaker 2: something different. She said, well, I just like being out
Speaker 2: there and seeing turkey and deer. It wasn't anything about
Speaker 2: the golf. She just liked the experience of being out
Speaker 2: in nature and you know, having a good time with family.
Speaker 2: So so that's that's entirely valid. Uh that made you know,
Speaker 2: that may not help me as far as you know
Speaker 2: how to build a golf hole, but that's important too.
Speaker 2: You know, A perspective a puller. Yeah, that polar golf
Speaker 2: experience is important to a lot of a lot of players.
Speaker 1: It's uh, yeah, it's it's perspective because you get wrapped
Speaker 1: up like I'm a huge golfer and I deep and uh,
Speaker 1: pretty much every aspect of the game except for equipment,
Speaker 1: and but I you know, it's always so important to
Speaker 1: keep the perspective of what the casual golfers out there
Speaker 1: to do, and especially you know, the one that might
Speaker 1: only play two three rounds a year, you know, around
Speaker 1: a year.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 5: Yeah, so you've done a.
Speaker 1: Pretty extensive a restoration work and you've also you also
Speaker 1: obviously grew up at Crystal Downs. I'd love to talk
Speaker 1: a little bit about Golden Age architecture and the influences
Speaker 1: you've had and kind of who you've who you've taken
Speaker 1: away a lot of you know, inspiration from I imagine
Speaker 1: Mackenzie is a huge influence. But curious if if there
Speaker 1: are any any others.
Speaker 2: Well, Mackenzie and Maxwell, you know, certainly first off, because
Speaker 2: you know, growing up at Crystal Bounds and we're in
Speaker 2: there and spending thousands of days on the golf course there,
Speaker 2: their impact is really you know it's been most influential,
Speaker 2: but all of those, you know, whether it's Tilling, Hasts,
Speaker 2: Ross Rayner, McDonald stuff, George Thomas, you know, Harry Cole,
Speaker 2: thom Simpson, all of those guys did stuff and did
Speaker 2: stuff at a high level, and you can learn from
Speaker 2: any of those. So when you're working on a on
Speaker 2: a project and you're you're sort of part of archeologists
Speaker 2: and and trying to figure it out and fix you know,
Speaker 2: maybe some structural problems or something that was changed because
Speaker 2: of something out of the club's control or the original
Speaker 2: designers control. A lot of times that leads to you know,
Speaker 2: a better understanding of that project or or that designer.
Speaker 2: So to me, that's always really fun and exciting, and
Speaker 2: it's more more interesting to see what they did with
Speaker 2: would say limited. I mean, they moved a lot of
Speaker 2: dirt in some cases. You know McDonald was really good
Speaker 2: at that. You know, if he wanted something, he would
Speaker 2: move the end of the world to do that. Whether
Speaker 2: that was leto you know, they they moved a lot
Speaker 2: of dirt at the National too, so that sort of
Speaker 2: stuff wasn't unheard of, but it was unusual at that time.
Speaker 2: I guess you know, guys were trying to find ways
Speaker 2: of building and working within the landscape. And I think
Speaker 2: that's some of the stuff that whether you want to
Speaker 2: call it minimalism or whatever, you know, that's that's what's
Speaker 2: driving a lot of the work that I do. And
Speaker 2: I think that's what's driving a lot of the stuff
Speaker 2: that uh that Tom Doak and Bill Hans and Bill
Speaker 2: Cornback Crensch are doing. So, you know, working with that
Speaker 2: land and finding out how to do that and finding
Speaker 2: the way that a property as interests and uniqueness and
Speaker 2: all that that stuff ends up being something that that
Speaker 2: can be really really good golf and you meet golf.
Speaker 2: It's not necessarily having to manufacture something all the time.
Speaker 2: Just try and get the best out of what that
Speaker 2: piece of ground offers you.
Speaker 1: And I think given the economic state and what happened
Speaker 1: in the in the eighties, nineties and early two thousands,
Speaker 1: it makes the most sense economically, certainly it does.
Speaker 2: Economics is always a factor, So you know, trying to
Speaker 2: do that and being efficient with things, and you know
Speaker 2: that works. That works at any any time in history. Really,
Speaker 2: you know, even if even things are flush, you know,
Speaker 2: why do why do more than you have to to
Speaker 2: create something. So maybe maybe to you know, have a
Speaker 2: bigger story or something, but I don't think that's necessary
Speaker 2: to create good golf.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So for for say a beginner architecture fan, you know,
Speaker 1: somebody who's just getting into it, and they go play
Speaker 1: a Golden Age course or or one of your courses
Speaker 1: or a Tom Doak design or Corn Crunshaw, what are
Speaker 1: what is something that they can look for around the
Speaker 1: golf course, like, you know, something to start to take
Speaker 1: in when they play new golf courses or even playing
Speaker 1: their own golf course.
Speaker 2: Well, I think for me, one of the things that
Speaker 2: one of the things that's a big difference for me is,
Speaker 2: you know, is how is the rhythm and flow of
Speaker 2: the golf course? So how do you transition? And we
Speaker 2: talked a little bit about that, you know, and trying
Speaker 2: to figure out a routing it Kingsley and stuff earlier,
Speaker 2: but any golf course that's for me that's really really important.
Speaker 2: And part of that is because I think that that
Speaker 2: transition if you get off the green and you and
Speaker 2: you just roll right into the next tee in a
Speaker 2: in a short and simple sort of fashion, and then
Speaker 2: all of a sudden, the next hole is presented to
Speaker 2: you in a good in a good way. Uh, then
Speaker 2: you know that each hole leads to each other in
Speaker 2: that transition. Even if you don't have ocean side or
Speaker 2: you know, some spectacular feature on the property, you've got
Speaker 2: a solid, really good golf course that ties together. There's
Speaker 2: a lot of there's a lot of Donald Ross golf
Speaker 2: courses that you know, we're built in cities or you know,
Speaker 2: on sort of underscript land that work well in that
Speaker 2: fashion and that flow together well. And so I think
Speaker 2: if you think about that, think about, Wow, you know
Speaker 2: I got off that. You know, it wasn't a very
Speaker 2: big transition to the next tee and the next The
Speaker 2: next te presented the next hole to me in a
Speaker 2: really good way. I kind of I knew what I
Speaker 2: wanted to do. It gave me, It gave me options,
Speaker 2: It gave me a good idea of where I should
Speaker 2: play and how that constantly works throughout the round. You
Speaker 2: can kind of think of it as you know, the
Speaker 2: old guys, everybody was walking, they didn't have golf carts,
Speaker 2: and so maybe part of that, you know why there's
Speaker 2: better flow and rhythm to those golf courses had to
Speaker 2: do with you know, they they weren't thinking about Okay,
Speaker 2: I'm you know, I got golf carts, I got a
Speaker 2: cart path, I have this, and you know, and that's
Speaker 2: sort of an element of today's golf. But can you
Speaker 2: make the golf course walkable too, because that's really the
Speaker 2: way the game started. And you know, if you're there
Speaker 2: are people that are hardcore walkers, and I walk, you know,
Speaker 2: most of the time when I play. But that is
Speaker 2: a you know, that's sort of a pace of the game.
Speaker 2: Pace of the game is kind of a human scaled,
Speaker 2: human paced game. So and if you're you know, on
Speaker 2: you know, this nice little stroll and you have to
Speaker 2: be playing golf and it just sort of comes in.
Speaker 2: But if you've got a bunch of long transitions because
Speaker 2: you're going through a housing development or something, not that
Speaker 2: those don't have their place. They do, but how can
Speaker 2: you how can you minimize those types of things and
Speaker 2: make it flow better and make it make it, you know,
Speaker 2: something that someone could walk. So like Gray Walls up
Speaker 2: in Marquette, it's a pretty severe sight and everything. And
Speaker 2: the first t is three quarters of a mile from
Speaker 2: the clubhouse because the clubhouse is part of the the
Speaker 2: original golf course complex, so they shuttle if you're going
Speaker 2: to walk, which the golf course is walkable, but they
Speaker 2: they drive you out in the you know, the limo
Speaker 2: cart and pick you up after eighteen. But the golf
Speaker 2: course actually does work fairly well for most of the part.
Speaker 2: There are some tougher transitions because of elevation, but the
Speaker 2: golf courses is really a pleasant walk and and gets
Speaker 2: down and flows together, which is.
Speaker 1: Cool as a as a place I've been dying to
Speaker 1: get to. This summer was just a lot. Next summer,
Speaker 1: I think I'm gonna have to get up there. How
Speaker 1: do you go about something I pay attention to A lot?
Speaker 1: Is the variety within the course, whether it be you know,
Speaker 1: the par three is having different you know, different lengths,
Speaker 1: different shots, different looks. But then also like within the course,
Speaker 1: you know, how am I am I being asked to
Speaker 1: hit you know, draws on multiple holes in a row
Speaker 1: or is there a good blend of fade.
Speaker 5: Holes and draw holes?
Speaker 1: How you know?
Speaker 3: Within that?
Speaker 1: How much do you guys think about that when you're designing.
Speaker 2: I think, well, I think you think about it quite
Speaker 2: a bit, but I don't think you try and force
Speaker 2: it either. Yeah, you know the best thing is that
Speaker 2: you know, this whole fit in here, Yeah it does,
Speaker 2: and what next sol dude fits there? So you have
Speaker 2: three holes in a row where you have to hit
Speaker 2: you know, the Nicholas power fade. Okay, great, that may
Speaker 2: be the way that it works, but for me, the
Speaker 2: sequencing is and how they transition is maybe more important.
Speaker 2: But at length, you do want to have variety within
Speaker 2: whether you're just thinking about the part threes, the short fors,
Speaker 2: the medium fours, long furs, the part five. So you
Speaker 2: want variety within those each of those sub sections, but
Speaker 2: you also want to have them feel like, you know,
Speaker 2: they work together on the golf course. And I think
Speaker 2: that's one of the things when we talk about rhythm
Speaker 2: and flow. Excuse me, I think you I think you
Speaker 2: have to look at sections of the golf course might
Speaker 2: be more difficult just because of the train that they're
Speaker 2: on or what what it lends itself to. And you
Speaker 2: may have some other parts of the golf course that
Speaker 2: maybe are you know, appear to be easier, but you
Speaker 2: might not necessarily score well there either too. So that's
Speaker 2: part of the you know, kind of that rhythm of
Speaker 2: the golf course. And in that round and you can
Speaker 2: use that to your advantage. So you can have you know,
Speaker 2: really really tough sections of holes right together, and that
Speaker 2: could that could be three s fours and fives together,
Speaker 2: or it could be you know, two long fours or whatever.
Speaker 2: Those types of things can help, you know, give identity
Speaker 2: or or something to a golf course. So think about
Speaker 2: Augusta National an amen corner. So you know the eleven,
Speaker 2: you know, is a demanding, h you know, long four
Speaker 2: with water next to the green, and then you've got
Speaker 2: you know, this short little pitch shot that just seems
Speaker 2: to kill everybody's round. And then you've got this really wonderful, short, short,
Speaker 2: short five that provides all different kinds of options things
Speaker 2: to you. So a lot of variety in their definition.
Speaker 2: And you know, i'd say twelve and thirteen or two
Speaker 2: of the great holes in the world. You know that helps, uh, yeah,
Speaker 2: but you can you can think about that in other
Speaker 2: ways also, So you know Kingsley, I mean, we have
Speaker 2: a big tie that opens up and you know a tricky, little,
Speaker 2: you know, demanding second hole, and then you've got a
Speaker 2: couple of par fours that have this sort of tumble bumble.
Speaker 2: So it's not necessarily an easy start, but if you
Speaker 2: you know, if you do, you know, make a couple
Speaker 2: of pars, you know, right off the bat, and then
Speaker 2: you know, you get you know, three pars in a
Speaker 2: bow or something in the first four holes. You know
Speaker 2: you've had a really good start, and you know, so
Speaker 2: things can things can turn up, and you know, sometimes
Speaker 2: you don't start well. You know, you might get a
Speaker 2: double bowe in the bowe in the first two hole.
Speaker 2: I've done that before, and I you know, I've at
Speaker 2: thirty seven or thirty eight on the front. So you know,
Speaker 2: then at the rest of the nine, I you know,
Speaker 2: I did pretty well. So you have opportunities to gain
Speaker 2: or lose within that and so I think I'm thinking
Speaker 2: about that a lot. But I'm also trying to provide
Speaker 2: not necessarily. I guess my philosophy is you like to
Speaker 2: give someone It might not be an overt you know,
Speaker 2: draw or fade shot into something, but a certain pin
Speaker 2: location or from this side of the fairway or that's
Speaker 2: out of the fairway might that might be a better shot.
Speaker 2: But that might depend on the player too. Some player
Speaker 2: might might not like that and might want to try something.
Speaker 2: You know, if someone is constantly a pader of the ball.
Speaker 2: You know, they may want to be in a certain
Speaker 2: position to try something else. Yeah, then you might. Then
Speaker 2: some other player might, so you got to give them
Speaker 2: an opportunity to do that.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I think that's one of the most important
Speaker 1: things too, is you know, I think there can be
Speaker 1: a preferred shot shape, but I don't like when design
Speaker 1: dictates that you have to hit this shot because then
Speaker 1: you know, the majority of golfers just you can you
Speaker 1: might not be able to hit that shot in your sol.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So I want to get into some listener questions.
Speaker 1: We got a ton of them, and I think your
Speaker 1: most acclaimed course and we haven't even touched on it
Speaker 1: is uh is Cape Wickham down in Australia on King's
Speaker 1: Island or Tasmania, and uh I wanted to. We had
Speaker 1: Simon asked about the project kind of what are you
Speaker 1: most proud of of that design? But then also what
Speaker 1: did you learn from it and if you would change anything,
Speaker 1: what would you change?
Speaker 2: Well, it's it's a challenge because king Island is remote,
Speaker 2: but it's really quite accessible. It's only a forty minute
Speaker 2: flight from Melbourne, so so as far away as it is,
Speaker 2: you can really get there, and it's it's close to
Speaker 2: a lot of people, not necessarily for Americans, but for Australians. Uh,
Speaker 2: it's a it's a very windy site in the middle
Speaker 2: of the back straight, so it's and it's exposed right
Speaker 2: on the ocean and really, you know, we had to
Speaker 2: create a lot of it just to accommodate that. And
Speaker 2: you know, knowing that it's it's still quite playable. I
Speaker 2: played it in close to a gale force win and
Speaker 2: you know, really only lost one ball, and that's because
Speaker 2: it rolled off of the eighteenth green and I didn't
Speaker 2: want to go down the bank and try and find it.
Speaker 2: I think, you know, it was you were able to
Speaker 2: if you if you didn't try and aggressively attack things,
Speaker 2: you had an opportunity to play a shot, you know,
Speaker 2: and keep it low and along the ground and stuff
Speaker 2: like that. So that was I think that's turned out really,
Speaker 2: really well, and I'm really excited about that. The artist
Speaker 2: challenge there, I think is that it's so dramatic. It's
Speaker 2: the property. It's the most diverse property I've ever seen.
Speaker 2: It's the most amazing sight I've ever seen for a
Speaker 2: golf course. Because you're right on the ocean, and you
Speaker 2: have clip top holes. You have holes that are in
Speaker 2: dunes with just really unbelievable movement to them. You have
Speaker 2: holes that are right down on the ocean level, the
Speaker 2: eleventh holes basically in the ocean. You've got holes that
Speaker 2: go inland. You've got you've got a you know, a
Speaker 2: headline that you start out on and you finish on
Speaker 2: this sandy cove beach the beaches and play, you know,
Speaker 2: on this on this idyllic sort of lagoon. So you know,
Speaker 2: think of the Blue Lagoon and you know in the
Speaker 2: movies and things like that. I mean, it's just an
Speaker 2: unbelievable spot. And then the kicker is you've got one
Speaker 2: of the tallest lighthouses in the world, Kate Pick and Whitehouse,
Speaker 2: which was built in eighteen sixty one, is in It's
Speaker 2: one hundred and fifty seven feet tall. So it's super
Speaker 2: dramatic and that could be really overwhelming. And the golf
Speaker 2: had to be really really good too, you know, not
Speaker 2: just have is the first thing people do is they
Speaker 2: get there and they and they go, oh, you know,
Speaker 2: insert exploitive. So it's incredible. You know, that reaction is
Speaker 2: good as the pictures are of it. You go there,
Speaker 2: it's even that much more dramatic. And so with that
Speaker 2: over with that sort of spectacle overwhelm the design. But
Speaker 2: people are they're talking about the golf holes and this
Speaker 2: shot and that shot or whatever, and so you know,
Speaker 2: that's really exciting.
Speaker 1: I imagine with the holes being so exposed, you have
Speaker 1: to be really careful on greens, especially with you know,
Speaker 1: the way people like to get modern green speeds up.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and we I mean we were very cognizant of that.
Speaker 2: So the greens for the most part are not you know,
Speaker 2: super undulating. I mean, there's there's contour on them, but
Speaker 2: it's also they're all rescue, so they're not going to
Speaker 2: run as fast on a daily basis as a bent
Speaker 2: grass green is going to or the greens that are
Speaker 2: in in the Melbourne area, whether that's Royal or Metropolitan
Speaker 2: or Victoria, any of those courses. So so it's a
Speaker 2: little bit different there. But the greens roll through, they're firm,
Speaker 2: and the benefit of that also is that with this,
Speaker 2: you know, with all fascue everywhere, the ground game and
Speaker 2: true links golf really comes to life because when the
Speaker 2: wind's up, you got to keep that ball down and
Speaker 2: you've got to have an opportunity to play a little
Speaker 2: bump and run shots to get them in there. And
Speaker 2: then if you know, if your ball rolls off, it's
Speaker 2: not it's not an overly bunker golf course. We don't
Speaker 2: We didn't really need that from a I didn't really
Speaker 2: need that from a from a strategy or a you know,
Speaker 2: just a visual aspect. There's enough visual going on there,
Speaker 2: so you know, the bunkers are really set up for
Speaker 2: challenging golfers to hitch hit certain shots or to skirt them,
Speaker 2: you know, to get a better advantage. But there's a
Speaker 2: lot of short grass around greens, so if you miss it,
Speaker 2: if you miss a target, you have opportunities to you know,
Speaker 2: bump and run the on the ground and the bescue
Speaker 2: really really works well for that. So and I think
Speaker 2: that was that's one of the things that's really neat
Speaker 2: about the golf course.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I got to get to Australia. I might spend
Speaker 1: like a month there. There's just so much down there,
Speaker 1: and especially with the you know, all the new development
Speaker 1: that's happening down there, and obviously looking at photos of
Speaker 1: Cape Wickham, it makes you feel like you need to
Speaker 1: go sooner than later.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, right, isn't that where you're going on your honeymoon?
Speaker 1: I wish I'm going to Saint Lucia, which I didn't
Speaker 1: think was had any golf but then I found that
Speaker 1: there is a golf course, so I might have to
Speaker 1: have to check it out, get some rental CBS. I'm
Speaker 1: sure it's uh, it's got some some shrunk greens and
Speaker 1: some overgrown fairways is what I'll get. Well, I guess
Speaker 1: will happen, but there it might be a pretty good
Speaker 1: golf course.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you never know, Yeah, yeah, I know. It's you know,
Speaker 2: King Island is is amazing. You know, it's a part
Speaker 2: of the State of Tasmania, which is a state of
Speaker 2: Australian that they call it the Island State, and you know,
Speaker 2: King Island is just a smaller aspect of that and
Speaker 2: halfway between Victoria and the main island of Tasmania. So
Speaker 2: King Island is is a just an amazing place. You know,
Speaker 2: it's sort of a throwback in time. The people, they
Speaker 2: are phenomenal. The dairy industry and you know, the beef
Speaker 2: and dairy industry is a big factor, the seafood and
Speaker 2: it's just a really fun, comfortable place to you know,
Speaker 2: place to be. People are fantastic and relaxed and and
Speaker 2: you know, we loved it. It was a great family
Speaker 2: experience because I had the opportunity to bring my family
Speaker 2: over there. Uh, and they were they were there for
Speaker 2: My daughter was there for a couple of months, but
Speaker 2: my wife and son were there for six months during
Speaker 2: the project and stuff too, So it was it was
Speaker 2: really neat.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's it sounds awesome.
Speaker 1: It's gonna be cool to get to bring your family
Speaker 1: to place like that. We got a question from double
Speaker 1: J here, and I think it was it's a good one,
Speaker 1: given your your background with with Crystal Downs and familiarity
Speaker 1: with Perry Maxwell. If Perry Maxwell was based in Chicago
Speaker 1: or New York, would he be considered a top five architect?
Speaker 1: He says rarely mentioned, but his courses flow are terrific.
Speaker 2: Uh, it's a good question. I think the problem with
Speaker 2: you know, Perry's the time period that he worked, you know,
Speaker 2: was primarily the Depression where there wasn't much stuff going on.
Speaker 2: So I think Perry's you know, lack of say, public
Speaker 2: adoration really has to do with the time period that
Speaker 2: he worked in versus the work that he did, because
Speaker 2: his work is phenomenal. Prairie Dunes is unbelievable, and all
Speaker 2: the courses that he touched on too, that he did
Speaker 2: little bits and pieces too. He did a lot of
Speaker 2: the original little tucks and you know, Nips to Augusta
Speaker 2: National and so a lot of his stuff is still
Speaker 2: out there. People just don't recognize it certainly. You know,
Speaker 2: being based in Oklahoma wasn't to his advantage. Yeah, but
Speaker 2: I think it's you know, it's his recognition from in
Speaker 2: a public aspect. I think he has more to do
Speaker 2: with his time period than it does with his location,
Speaker 2: because he did get around. You know, you think about
Speaker 2: Harry Cole. You know here in the States, Harry Cole
Speaker 2: doesn't really get a lot of exposure. But you know,
Speaker 2: he was in London and he's influenced a lot of
Speaker 2: guys in the business and did a lot of amazing work,
Speaker 2: but he's not really recognized here in the US. You know,
Speaker 2: Alistairs recognized, you know, because we talked about it at
Speaker 2: Augusta every year, and Cyprus Point obviously in Royal Melbourne,
Speaker 2: so you know, very high profile golf courses that old
Speaker 2: excuse excuse, me high profile golf courses that whole tournaments
Speaker 2: or have held tournaments that Cypress Point was involved with,
Speaker 2: you know, when being Crosby had the so and and
Speaker 2: it's you know, it's still just you know, it's it's
Speaker 2: a legendary place. So I think he may, he may,
Speaker 2: but I think it's more of the time period.
Speaker 5: That's that's a good point.
Speaker 1: The Great Depression, really, I feel like was a it
Speaker 1: was a was one of the worst things that happened
Speaker 1: to golf course architecture because the whole development, the philosophy
Speaker 1: almost took a hard shift because there is such a
Speaker 1: dead period and design and and new philosophies came out
Speaker 1: of you know, when people people almost just started fresh
Speaker 1: and it was like a whole new thing. When when
Speaker 1: golf courses started to be built again.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, art it's definitely difficult, but there was some
Speaker 2: great stuff that was done during that time too. So
Speaker 2: you know, for instance, Prairie Dunes, you know that that
Speaker 2: first nine holes there, Wilsonian Links course in in North's
Speaker 2: amazing place. Under totally underrated, I think, oh so under ye,
Speaker 2: the bet Page courses, you know, so there was there
Speaker 2: was still some good stuff done well.
Speaker 1: He touched on Langford earlier. He's got to be one
Speaker 1: of the more underappreciated architects of all time.
Speaker 2: Incredible work. Uh, he certainly doesn't doesn't get his stuff
Speaker 2: just isn't, as you know, well known. And a lot
Speaker 2: of the things he did because he was basically in
Speaker 2: the Midwest here. He did a lot of courses, for instance,
Speaker 2: like the old course up at Marquette Doll Club where
Speaker 2: he designed eighteen holes, but they only built nine, yeah,
Speaker 2: because that's all board at the time it was a
Speaker 2: smaller town or something. And then you know, the other
Speaker 2: nine holes got built by somebody else later down the road,
Speaker 2: and you know those are it's really evident, what are
Speaker 2: the better golf holes? When you play those play those courses,
Speaker 2: it's language there. They're not just you know, a step
Speaker 2: above their leaps above the other holes on the golf course.
Speaker 2: And so that is incredible.
Speaker 1: It's like Culver is a nine hole course in Indiana,
Speaker 1: but it was the original plan was for twenty seven there,
Speaker 1: and you think about what he would you know, nine
Speaker 1: hole courses just they're tough because they don't get as
Speaker 1: much a claim. But I mean building a great nine
Speaker 1: holes that you wonder what it would have been if
Speaker 1: it was all twenty seven.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, absolutely, So we.
Speaker 1: Do we do a thing you said, very underrated. We
Speaker 1: one of our sticks here is over it. We have questions, overrated, underrated,
Speaker 1: and we'll we'll kind of splice splice those in because
Speaker 1: we got some some regular questions and some overrated underrated,
Speaker 1: and with overrated underrated just say, hey, is this overrated
Speaker 1: or underrated? But the template idea of template holes and
Speaker 1: this is from Marquette Golf Club, Uh, overrated, underrated.
Speaker 2: Overrated For the most part.
Speaker 5: I think, Hm, it's uh.
Speaker 1: I'm a template hole guy, but I like to see
Speaker 1: fresh twists on him now in modern architecture.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, and that does make it, That does make it
Speaker 2: better that way.
Speaker 1: You need to get that.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And then here's the here's one from.
Speaker 5: Con Or Doherty.
Speaker 1: Which iconic golf hol would you like to see changes
Speaker 1: made to anywhere?
Speaker 2: Well, that's their iconic golf holds for a reason, right, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: So so why would we why would we want to
Speaker 2: change them? I guess the way to the way to
Speaker 2: think about that would be that we should probably change
Speaker 2: one that had been changed for some other reason and
Speaker 2: change it back to what it was originally.
Speaker 1: That's that's kind of what I was thinking along those lines.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: His second half of the question is is almost a
Speaker 1: direct uh. He almost leads you right into that. And
Speaker 1: and with the with the us An this week in mind,
Speaker 1: he says overrated, underrated, the tenth hole at.
Speaker 2: Riviera underrated, underrated man one of the greatest. It's one
Speaker 2: of the greatest holes in the world.
Speaker 1: It's it's unbelievable that it's way underrated. But I mean
Speaker 1: it fits exactly what you're talking about with all the
Speaker 1: options and how it makes uh makes the great player think.
Speaker 1: But for for the everyday player, it's it's uh, you know,
Speaker 1: it's a short part.
Speaker 2: For it's achievable and that's that's that's why it is
Speaker 2: so great, and it's so phenomenal and and and pros.
Speaker 2: It should be an easy hole for him, and they
Speaker 2: somehow manage to screw it up all the time. Yeah,
Speaker 2: which is awesome.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's I I played there, uh last summer, and
Speaker 1: you know, I obviously watched the telecast so many times
Speaker 1: and and everybody's like, you just can't hit it in
Speaker 1: that right bunker.
Speaker 5: You can't.
Speaker 1: You have to aim left you have to aim left.
Speaker 1: And sure enough, I get on the tee, I pull
Speaker 1: out driver and I'm like, I should just aim at
Speaker 1: the left side of the green, not left the green,
Speaker 1: and I hit I hit my driver a little right
Speaker 1: and I end up in the bunker and and I
Speaker 1: hit the best bunker shot of my life, Like the
Speaker 1: best bunker shot of my life. And I yell up,
Speaker 1: like where did that end up? They're like, oh, over
Speaker 1: the green.
Speaker 5: It's just like.
Speaker 1: That's yeah, it's a And then I, you know, I
Speaker 1: had to make a really good up and down just
Speaker 1: to make four. It's just it puts so much stress
Speaker 1: on you and as a as a as a scratch player,
Speaker 1: but it's so it's it's so just right there for
Speaker 1: the for like, if my dad, who's like a sixteen
Speaker 1: handicap played it, I don't think he'd think twice about it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Yeah, that's it's just a it's an unbelievable golf hole,
Speaker 2: and it's it's you know, that's it's probably the best
Speaker 2: you know, short part for in the world. I mean,
Speaker 2: just with regards to that. You know, there was a
Speaker 2: question there about the best drivable part, so that's probably it.
Speaker 2: But you know, and in general, I think like having
Speaker 2: a quote drivable power four might be it depends on
Speaker 2: which way you're looking at it. But you know, those
Speaker 2: could those could be kind of underrated in a lot
Speaker 2: of in a lot of regards because people think, oh,
Speaker 2: it's just too easy. But if it's if it's really
Speaker 2: well done, you know it's it's it's one of the
Speaker 2: more fun holes on the on the golf course. And
Speaker 2: that's really the separation of the great short furs, of
Speaker 2: the separation of the great great golf holes and the
Speaker 2: great golf course excuse me in the world.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's the short part four is obviously had like
Speaker 1: just a huge resurgence. I think one of the things
Speaker 1: that the short part four and the reachable par five
Speaker 1: is done is they've diminished the skill of building a
Speaker 1: great long part five or long part four. What are
Speaker 1: kind of your philosophies around doing those. I think those
Speaker 1: are kind of now the hardest hole is to build
Speaker 1: and have people say, wow, that was a great hull.
Speaker 2: Well for the high level player, you can't build a
Speaker 2: long part five. I mean there's six hundred and fifty
Speaker 2: yard part fives in the US Opening and guys hit
Speaker 2: the six Linds into them. So what so what's what's
Speaker 2: a long part? Five eight hundred and fifty five yards.
Speaker 2: I don't know is true that, you know, that just
Speaker 2: seems crazy to me, So I think it it has
Speaker 2: more to do with, you know, how something fits into
Speaker 2: the land and making guys make shots. And I don't
Speaker 2: know that for you know, for that that high level player,
Speaker 2: the pros. I don't know that there's any five that
Speaker 2: we have in the world that that is a true
Speaker 2: three shot hole anymore. Twenty years ago that was true.
Speaker 2: There were some holds like that, but that just doesn't
Speaker 2: happen anymore. I think with the technology, it's yeah.
Speaker 1: They get to like a wet like now really like
Speaker 1: a good three shot hole isn't a good three shot
Speaker 1: hole because like they hit driver, they lay up to
Speaker 1: a wedge and it's just a wedge jam.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's it's unfortunate for the for
Speaker 2: the for the average guy though, for the regular club player,
Speaker 2: and even you know, even the good club player. You know,
Speaker 2: three shot holes are are demanding, and you know the
Speaker 2: really good ones demand three good shots. So you know,
Speaker 2: you have to hit a decent drive to get into
Speaker 2: position to you know, have a good second shot, whether
Speaker 2: you can get get home into or you know, your
Speaker 2: third shots got to be you know, something reasonable so
Speaker 2: you can get it close. And you can do that
Speaker 2: with with tough green design, you know, and make things
Speaker 2: more difficult that way, but you've got to have options
Speaker 2: for that also. So I think that's that's fun. The
Speaker 2: fourteenth that at Kingsley is a is a par five,
Speaker 2: and you know, it's it can play short depending on
Speaker 2: where you hit your drive because there's kind of a
Speaker 2: power slot. If you hit it over the bunkers, your
Speaker 2: ball can carry and it can run quite a way.
Speaker 2: And so you know, even an average hitter on occasion
Speaker 2: has times where he can get to get home into
Speaker 2: or get really close to the green, you know, which
Speaker 2: is which is kind of cool. But it's a demanding
Speaker 2: green and you know, it's a demanding shot to get
Speaker 2: in there. And the third shot is fun even if
Speaker 2: you're laying up and playing off to the side. So
Speaker 2: that type of stuff is you know, I think it's
Speaker 2: fun and successful being able to do that.
Speaker 4: That's it's that's I guess, yeah, it's it is.
Speaker 5: It's tough.
Speaker 1: I think that's a it's just I think long part
Speaker 1: fours and long par fives are now underrated in.
Speaker 5: My mind, but.
Speaker 1: Because of like the resurgence of the short part four
Speaker 1: and short part five, I think, you know, demanding holes
Speaker 1: that there they have like a little bit less interest,
Speaker 1: but they're they're so good. One they're really good. Like
Speaker 1: you know, you look at the road hole. So how
Speaker 1: to So mikeh Iration has a couple questions. The first
Speaker 1: one is very very open ended. What makes a good
Speaker 1: golf hole in your mind?
Speaker 2: Well, it's something that responds to what that particular piece
Speaker 2: of ground has so and it and it involves having
Speaker 2: something that's sort of unique with within that the scope
Speaker 2: of that whatever that environment is there, and it makes
Speaker 2: a golfer think about I want to try this or
Speaker 2: that or should I you know, blow it over that
Speaker 2: bunker or he It forces a golfer to make decisions.
Speaker 2: Sometimes that decision might be rudimentary, but rudimentary decision might
Speaker 2: lead to a more difficult decision, you know, further down
Speaker 2: the golf hole. So I think, you know, making the
Speaker 2: golfer think about what he wants or wants to try
Speaker 2: to do, I think is really good and important and
Speaker 2: and you've got to have a good green complex because
Speaker 2: you know, if you have you know, an awesome hole
Speaker 2: all the way up to the green, then you have
Speaker 2: this dead flat green with you know, nothing really going
Speaker 2: on around it. That's not real fun for a lot
Speaker 2: of people because that that might be the only thing
Speaker 2: that some that some golf have. They don't have length,
Speaker 2: They can't overpower a golf hole, but they can hit
Speaker 2: a precise, little wedge shot or something like we were
Speaker 2: talking about, you know, my grandfather and the other old
Speaker 2: guys you know, a while back. You know, they they
Speaker 2: they drinking along, drinking along, drinking along, get it up
Speaker 2: there close and make a pot and make a five,
Speaker 2: and you know occasionally they get one better than not,
Speaker 2: you know, and make make it four out of it
Speaker 2: or something on it. You know, like what would be
Speaker 2: like you're saying a long part four. You know, they
Speaker 2: would have to treat this a three shot hole. So
Speaker 2: you know, if they make that that last good shot
Speaker 2: and they make it four, that's like making a birdie
Speaker 2: and you know at third face because they're already giving
Speaker 2: up a shot with the distance, or if you miss,
Speaker 2: you know, around a green. A good green complex gives
Speaker 2: you options, whether that's you know, short grass to bump
Speaker 2: and run it, flop it, chip it, put it whatever,
Speaker 2: or does it give you a counter bank, uh, or
Speaker 2: you know some sort of shelfer ridge to play off of,
Speaker 2: you know, to get the ball close to the hole.
Speaker 2: So that's interesting and I think those things make a
Speaker 2: good golf hole, but they also a good A good
Speaker 2: golf hole or a great golf holes made better when
Speaker 2: it transitions from previous fall in the next hole and
Speaker 2: all that. You know, in isolation, it loses, it loses
Speaker 2: some of its impact. I think it might make it
Speaker 2: appear better than it is. But you know, if you
Speaker 2: have a great golf hole within a really good routing,
Speaker 2: that's really what you're trying to do.
Speaker 5: That's a that's a great answer.
Speaker 1: It's I love the you know, force somebody to make
Speaker 1: a decision that could have different kind of repercussions later
Speaker 1: in the hole.
Speaker 5: That's so good. So uh.
Speaker 1: Micah also has a question about the Metal Club and
Speaker 1: he wants to know how how does Metal Club compare
Speaker 1: to other Mackenzie designs and where does it rank within
Speaker 1: Northern California's great golf courses. You might have a little
Speaker 1: bit of biased answer.
Speaker 2: Yeah, maybe, yeah, metow is a special place, the first
Speaker 2: course that Mackenzie did in North America really in the
Speaker 2: Western hemisphere, so you know, it does hold a special
Speaker 2: spot in history with regards to that, and it is
Speaker 2: a phenomenal spot in the world. It's surrounded by the
Speaker 2: Marine Municipal Water District, which is protected land and will
Speaker 2: never be developed, so you can't see a domicile from
Speaker 2: the property and that's never going to change. So it's
Speaker 2: you know, it's a half an hour from the Golden
Speaker 2: Gate Bridge and there's I don't know five million people
Speaker 2: in the metro area there, but you can't see a house.
Speaker 2: That's pretty cool it is. It's a great walk, it's
Speaker 2: a wonderful golf course to play every day where you
Speaker 2: know the average guy can get around and can you know,
Speaker 2: have good days and bad days, and really good players
Speaker 2: can score well, but they're also going to have their
Speaker 2: their troublesome days too. The green complexes are really phenomenal
Speaker 2: and it's as pure a restoration as as anything out
Speaker 2: there because of the soil structure and how it was
Speaker 2: done in the original construction. When we when we peeled sideback,
Speaker 2: we could see exactly where the green the greens mix
Speaker 2: was because it had been screened better and there was
Speaker 2: finer and didn't have these little small stones at the
Speaker 2: regular soil had, so we were able to be really
Speaker 2: really accurate with with all that is an everyday golf course,
Speaker 2: I think it's you know, it's right up there with everything.
Speaker 2: It's you know, is it as good as Cyper's Point
Speaker 2: Pebble Beach, San Francisco Golf Club. No, but you know
Speaker 2: I would, I would easily put it in the top ten,
Speaker 2: if not, you know, a little bit higher. Yeah, that
Speaker 2: props the tempo. You know, you might say it's a
Speaker 2: little bit Scheffer has some more dramatic holes to it,
Speaker 2: things like that, but it's got to be really close
Speaker 2: right behind that Cow Club's you know, very good. But
Speaker 2: uh and every day. You know, I'm probably biased. I'd
Speaker 2: rather play the Metal Club every day than than col
Speaker 2: Clubs or Possitive for that matter.
Speaker 1: That's I mean, that's a big thing of it. I
Speaker 1: always think the best way to rate courses isn't like,
Speaker 1: you know, if you could go play one place one
Speaker 1: day one day, but it's how you how you split
Speaker 1: up ten rounds against two courses, because you know it
Speaker 1: it'd be it's you know, there are a lot of
Speaker 1: great golf courses that you want to play and you
Speaker 1: play once and it's like, Okay, I played it, but
Speaker 1: like the course that makes you want to just keep
Speaker 1: coming back and playing over and over again, or in
Speaker 1: my mind, the really great ones.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, and then you've got you know, you've got Olympic.
Speaker 2: You got the Lake in the Ocean course there too,
Speaker 2: and you know there's some incredible history there. Also.
Speaker 1: They got some interesting new bunkers.
Speaker 2: That's really demanding. Every day.
Speaker 1: I saw some really, I saw some pictures of the
Speaker 1: bunkers and they just they look like it looks like
Speaker 1: it got just more and more demanding, where you've got
Speaker 1: bunkers that are twice the height of people and they're
Speaker 1: so steep.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I haven't seen them in person yet, so yeah,
Speaker 2: I'll just I'll have to reserve judgment until I do that.
Speaker 1: I've only seen the photos of people in them, and
Speaker 1: it's uh. And then I had a member that reached
Speaker 1: out to me about it, and it doesn't does. He
Speaker 1: didn't sound very happy about it, but.
Speaker 2: Yeah, good fun in the bunker, right.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's a it's a whatever.
Speaker 1: It's hard golf so Buck Walter, and this is a
Speaker 1: great question, Northern Michigan golf underrated or very underrated because
Speaker 1: it and uh, just to tack onto that, what's uh,
Speaker 1: you know, what's kind of one hidden gem up in
Speaker 1: northern Michigan that everybody should try and see.
Speaker 5: That's a public.
Speaker 2: Course, well Belvidere is not completely public. Its semi private,
Speaker 2: but you can get on there and and it's a
Speaker 2: wonderful William Watson designed from the mid twenties and it's
Speaker 2: just super super fun to play, and some great golf
Speaker 2: holes there, old time kind of golf, really good green contours.
Speaker 2: Bruce Heppner's done some green reclamation there recently, and you know,
Speaker 2: so it's it's going to get even better when they
Speaker 2: do when they do that kind of stuff. So to me,
Speaker 2: that's just a it's a really special place. It's always
Speaker 2: fun to play. They have a hickory tournament there every June,
Speaker 2: which is very well attended, one of the one of
Speaker 2: the more popular hickory events in the country and well
Speaker 2: deserving of that.
Speaker 5: Mm hmm.
Speaker 1: That's that's the same course that Tom Doak said was
Speaker 1: one of the hidden gems of America. So people got
Speaker 1: to get out there.
Speaker 2: That's right. Got to get there.
Speaker 1: I think I got it. I mean, I'm doing a
Speaker 1: Northern Michigan trip this fall. I'm going to go up there.
Speaker 1: I was supposed to supposed to go this this week,
Speaker 1: but I just I'm too busy.
Speaker 5: Uh.
Speaker 1: This is a great question from Alistair Philip. What's the
Speaker 1: most fulfilling part of being an architect? Uh?
Speaker 2: Here and somebody say that they they had you know,
Speaker 2: really they had fun playing your playing your golf course,
Speaker 2: or I tried this shot, tried that shot. That's like
Speaker 2: the highest compliment anybody can give me. For me, it's
Speaker 2: you know, I mean just from the personal aspect, it's
Speaker 2: the creation process and trying to put the pieces of
Speaker 2: the bubble together and then you know, create something that
Speaker 2: people want to come and play and experience and and
Speaker 2: that's that's really fun. And then you know, and the
Speaker 2: post the post part of it is you know, going
Speaker 2: back and playing stuff that you built, whether that was
Speaker 2: last week or you know, last year or fifteen years ago.
Speaker 2: That's kind of fun to do that.
Speaker 4: M h.
Speaker 5: I bet I it's something.
Speaker 1: I played a new course the other day and I
Speaker 1: I was a little disappointed in it.
Speaker 5: And yeah, I felt.
Speaker 1: The full brunt of what you guys probably feel is
Speaker 1: that the finality of design, like once it's done, is done.
Speaker 5: For a while.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's got to be the tough part.
Speaker 2: I don't have, you know, really regrets on stuff that
Speaker 2: I did, because things happened for you know, things happen
Speaker 2: and materialize for a reason during projects. So you know,
Speaker 2: if someone's real critical of a project, they probably don't
Speaker 2: understand you know, this factor or that factor or whatever
Speaker 2: was involved in that project. And that's you have to
Speaker 2: be there to do that. So make those decisions in
Speaker 2: those and with the information that you have. And there's
Speaker 2: there's not really a lot of stuff that I'm you know,
Speaker 2: would I would want to you know, just run right
Speaker 2: back and change that. Just that just doesn't It doesn't
Speaker 2: happen because I spend a lot of time on sites
Speaker 2: try and try and do that. Yeah, that's that fact.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's that.
Speaker 1: There's always with everything, there's always underlying things that happen.
Speaker 1: You know, almost every situation. Nobody knows the full scope
Speaker 1: of it. All Right, you've been more than generous with
Speaker 1: your time. Here, let's set we got three quick overrated
Speaker 1: underrated You ready, yep?
Speaker 5: All right, trees.
Speaker 1: Overrated, Crown Greens underrated, I love Crown Greens, and buy holes.
Speaker 2: Overrated overrated.
Speaker 1: I think I would have agreed with all three of
Speaker 1: those then No, No, I liked them though they're all
Speaker 1: they were all from listeners, So I appreciate you coming on.
Speaker 1: Mike's got a lot of public access courses. If if
Speaker 1: somebody was going to just you know, strive to play
Speaker 1: one of your golf courses, which is the one you'd
Speaker 1: want them to see.
Speaker 2: Okap Wickham of course, but that's a that's a pretty journey.
Speaker 2: So the easiest way, you know, particularly for public access
Speaker 2: golf courses, Grand Rapids, the Mines golf courses really right downtown,
Speaker 2: you know, inexpensive and a great play. It's hard, it's
Speaker 2: a difficult, difficult course. Pilgrim's Run is a half an
Speaker 2: hour north of Grand Rapids and uh it is beautiful
Speaker 2: and really well done. They take care of you. They
Speaker 2: have excellent service there. All the courses do, but they
Speaker 2: especially like you know, roll off the red car people.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 2: And Diamond Springs which is about a half an hour
Speaker 2: southwest of Grand Rapids is a is a wonderful golf
Speaker 2: course too. That's that's very inexpensive and a very interesting
Speaker 2: play from the standpoint that it's it's one cut of
Speaker 2: grass and then just green height and then and then
Speaker 2: outer stem. So yeah, it's a it's very minimal maintenance,
Speaker 2: but it's it's extraordinarily playable and fun and has a
Speaker 2: has a gorge that goes through it that's really really cool.
Speaker 1: And you know what those are all on the way
Speaker 1: up to northern Michigan.
Speaker 2: It's uh, it's it's a very yeah, a very easy thing.
Speaker 2: You could fly into Grand Rapids and stay downtown, go
Speaker 2: to the group pubs, you know, play golf, play golf
Speaker 2: during the day.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and they're yeah, all affordable too, which is a
Speaker 1: great thing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's very affordable.
Speaker 1: So Mike will have to have you on it again.
Speaker 1: And thanks so much for for the time, and we
Speaker 1: look forward to seeing what's next.
Speaker 2: Thanks thanks for having me on. I really appreciate it
Speaker 2: and look forward to another time.
Speaker 3: Yeah, thank you. Eight