WEBVTT - Renovating a Course with Jason Meersman 0:00:00.040 --> 0:00:02.520 I miss a green, for example, I'm already upset. 0:00:02.640 --> 0:00:04.920 When I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset. 0:00:05.000 --> 0:00:07.200 And when I find my ball in a fried egg. 0:00:07.200 --> 0:00:11.440 Friday Egg, the dreaded Frida Egg Friday Fridagg Fridagg bride 0:00:11.440 --> 0:00:13.360 Egg Lie, I'm about ready to run off of the 0:00:13.440 --> 0:00:14.080 hump course. 0:00:37.800 --> 0:00:41.680 Welcome back to another edition of the Friday Golf Podcast, 0:00:41.960 --> 0:00:47.800 and welcome back to another Superintendent series presented by Toro UH. 0:00:48.000 --> 0:00:51.680 Today I am joined by a repeat guest, Jason Meersman. 0:00:52.640 --> 0:00:57.760 He is the superintendent at the Patterson Club in Connecticut, 0:00:58.320 --> 0:01:04.240 which is undergoing an extensive Jaeger Kovich led renovation to 0:01:04.319 --> 0:01:07.560 its golf course. They are in the kind of wrap 0:01:07.680 --> 0:01:10.360 up phase. I figured it'd be fun to talk to 0:01:10.480 --> 0:01:15.320 Jason while everything's still fresh in his mind, and also 0:01:15.520 --> 0:01:18.840 while the Bears are making an unexpected run in the 0:01:19.040 --> 0:01:23.280 in the NFL. Jason and I are fellow Bears fans, 0:01:23.319 --> 0:01:25.759 so we talked about this before our big win over 0:01:25.800 --> 0:01:31.280 the Packers this weekend less and enthusiasm, but big thanks 0:01:31.280 --> 0:01:33.760 to Jason. Big thanks to Toro for all the support. 0:01:34.720 --> 0:01:39.640 Before we get into the podcasts, I want to call 0:01:39.680 --> 0:01:45.240 out Toro Toro's Workmen utility vehicles are engineered to work 0:01:45.280 --> 0:01:47.880 as hard as you do, whether you're hauling to brief 0:01:48.040 --> 0:01:50.880 after a storm or bringing equipment and materials out to 0:01:50.920 --> 0:01:56.240 your crew. 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You are in the middle of 0:02:41.280 --> 0:02:45.960 a full scale renovation of the Patterson Club, where the 0:02:46.000 --> 0:02:50.519 course that you are a the fine superintendent of, and 0:02:50.840 --> 0:02:54.840 I got to ask, what's been more fun doing the project? 0:02:55.000 --> 0:02:55.160 You know? 0:02:55.200 --> 0:02:58.560 I imagine of a lifetime in the sense of like you 0:02:58.560 --> 0:03:01.760 you work. You don't know how many of these projects 0:03:01.760 --> 0:03:05.160 you'll have as a superintendent where you get to you know, 0:03:05.280 --> 0:03:09.760 really reshape the next fifty years of the club that 0:03:09.800 --> 0:03:13.239 you work at, or the Bears being the surprise of 0:03:13.320 --> 0:03:15.800 the NFL. Know what's been more fun this year? 0:03:18.440 --> 0:03:21.799 That's a tough one, right, Like, uh no, I it's 0:03:21.840 --> 0:03:24.320 actually an easy one. I mean, I love my Bearsna, 0:03:24.320 --> 0:03:27.880 I'm gonna tilt it down. I love my beerris. I'm 0:03:27.919 --> 0:03:30.760 surprised I don't have my mustache on, you know, if 0:03:30.800 --> 0:03:36.960 I could only grow one the Uh yeah, this project 0:03:36.960 --> 0:03:39.160 has been the funnest thing I've ever done. I mean, like, 0:03:39.240 --> 0:03:41.480 you know, we have those great moments in your life 0:03:41.480 --> 0:03:44.080 where you're like, oh, it's seeing my kids being born, 0:03:44.280 --> 0:03:46.400 or you know, maybe the first time I met my 0:03:46.480 --> 0:03:52.600 wife that was a good night. This has been like that, 0:03:52.840 --> 0:03:56.640 day after day after day after day, so much fun. 0:03:57.560 --> 0:04:01.360 You know, It's been a long time coming, seeing it 0:04:01.440 --> 0:04:05.120 for fourteen years, you know, seeing this piece of property 0:04:05.120 --> 0:04:12.400 and the potential and slowly nagging and annoying grounds chairs 0:04:12.440 --> 0:04:17.160 and presidents and being as obnoxious as I could possibly 0:04:17.160 --> 0:04:20.840 be to keep them on, you know, focused and online 0:04:21.120 --> 0:04:25.279 when it comes to how this needs to play out. 0:04:25.560 --> 0:04:29.440 And fortunately been blessed with great people around me, and 0:04:29.720 --> 0:04:33.240 I've learned so much from everybody, and we got this 0:04:33.320 --> 0:04:36.760 thing pulled off, right, And I say pulled off, I 0:04:36.760 --> 0:04:42.040 mean getting the approval is that's pulled off. Then when 0:04:42.080 --> 0:04:45.599 you get going to the construction, that's a whole other animal. 0:04:45.920 --> 0:04:49.760 And my gosh, is it fun. I mean, I think 0:04:49.800 --> 0:04:54.520 jeger Kovich told me early on, it's got to be 0:04:54.560 --> 0:04:57.159 a good time. You know, he goes, the work will show. 0:04:57.240 --> 0:04:59.120 If it's a good time, the work will show. And 0:04:59.160 --> 0:05:00.880 if that's the case, oh my gosh, this is gonna 0:05:00.880 --> 0:05:02.400 be some of the best work anybody's ever seen. 0:05:03.440 --> 0:05:08.000 The I I love that premise, right, if you're gonna 0:05:08.040 --> 0:05:12.240 have fun, if you have fun, the work is going 0:05:12.320 --> 0:05:14.680 to show that you were having fun while you're doing it. 0:05:14.880 --> 0:05:20.120 You know, Golf architecture, golf construction is a creative process. 0:05:20.240 --> 0:05:23.680 I always, you know, talk with our team here, like 0:05:23.839 --> 0:05:27.080 our best content, it really shows that we had fun 0:05:27.240 --> 0:05:29.760 making it. The stuff that we had fun making it, 0:05:29.760 --> 0:05:32.880 it shows in the final product, Like there's there's an 0:05:32.880 --> 0:05:36.359 inherent joy that people can see, whether whether it's obvious 0:05:36.400 --> 0:05:39.480 to them or not, there's a a joy that shows 0:05:39.560 --> 0:05:42.960 up in the in the project in terms of in 0:05:43.040 --> 0:05:45.359 terms of the you know, you're doing a lot of stuff. 0:05:45.520 --> 0:05:49.599 You know, you know, you're it's a it's a big project. 0:05:49.920 --> 0:05:52.320 What's been something that you you've had a lot of 0:05:52.360 --> 0:05:55.200 fun doing that you didn't necessarily know you were gonna 0:05:55.240 --> 0:05:58.440 have a lot of fun doing during this project. 0:05:59.120 --> 0:06:05.040 Well, so I had this delusional understanding, this delusional there 0:06:05.120 --> 0:06:09.240 are no rocks on property. Right. We're in New England, Connecticut. 0:06:09.600 --> 0:06:13.800 There's rock walls everywhere, and I've joked with everybody the 0:06:13.920 --> 0:06:16.279 entire time, there's no rocks in this area. Let's just 0:06:16.279 --> 0:06:19.880 get digging, you know. And uh, you know when you 0:06:19.920 --> 0:06:25.400 read about CB McDonald or Seth Reynard and their dragon's teeth, Well, 0:06:25.440 --> 0:06:29.640 so you realize how those things come about because there 0:06:29.640 --> 0:06:31.960 are endless rocks in the ground here in Connecticut, and 0:06:32.000 --> 0:06:33.680 what the heck do you do with all of them? Right? 0:06:33.760 --> 0:06:36.600 So I would say one of my favorite parts was 0:06:38.720 --> 0:06:40.680 all right, Dad, no clue was coming. It was like 0:06:40.880 --> 0:06:43.000 you you're you're sitting there trying to organize these giant 0:06:43.000 --> 0:06:46.960 bowlders that are like the size of a car, and uh, 0:06:47.800 --> 0:06:52.640 you know, maybe a small car. But but anyway, long story, 0:06:52.640 --> 0:06:54.880 short hair, we just started stacking them and I started 0:06:54.880 --> 0:06:58.039 calling these things Polish pyramids. Because I have some polish 0:06:58.040 --> 0:07:00.720 in my blood and my my rock work does not 0:07:00.760 --> 0:07:03.800 look like Italian mason work. So I started calling them 0:07:03.800 --> 0:07:06.680 Polish pyramids. And we got some polist pyramids out there, 0:07:06.720 --> 0:07:08.679 and it's just a way to like clean up an area. 0:07:08.720 --> 0:07:10.800 It's out of play. What the heck am I looking 0:07:10.840 --> 0:07:13.520 at over there? Should be kind of fun, but we're 0:07:13.560 --> 0:07:15.680 gonna have a handful of those out here, kind of 0:07:15.720 --> 0:07:16.400 by accident. 0:07:17.880 --> 0:07:21.320 Is that one of the mounds that you named, Jeffrey. 0:07:21.560 --> 0:07:27.200 Yeah, Jeffrey's Oh Jeffrey. Jeffrey showed his face yesterday. And 0:07:27.240 --> 0:07:29.320 what I mean by that is the snow started melting 0:07:29.400 --> 0:07:32.360 and Jeffrey was the first thing to see the sun 0:07:32.880 --> 0:07:39.800 in the fourth fair Way. Yeah, no, Jeffrey. Jeff helped 0:07:39.880 --> 0:07:42.480 us out in our Devil's Hollow. He was here for 0:07:42.560 --> 0:07:44.640 a couple of weeks and I did a lot of 0:07:44.640 --> 0:07:49.120 work on the driving range and and and four fair 0:07:49.120 --> 0:07:54.480 away sixty. He did the the the Devil's Hollow, which 0:07:54.520 --> 0:07:56.840 is kind of the lower I called our amen corner 0:07:57.040 --> 0:08:01.040 of our property, really neat little section of operating great golf. 0:08:02.400 --> 0:08:04.280 But the last thing he was pushing out was the 0:08:04.320 --> 0:08:07.360 fourth Green and did a great job and then when 0:08:07.360 --> 0:08:11.400 he left, Jaeger formed a little mound named him Jeffrey. 0:08:11.720 --> 0:08:14.440 So Jeffries, we got Jefferys all over though. I mean 0:08:14.480 --> 0:08:16.040 there's a lot of Jeffries out there. 0:08:17.640 --> 0:08:22.440 From from what I gather about. You know, your guys' property. 0:08:22.880 --> 0:08:27.040 You're in Fairfield, Connecticut. There's obviously the country Club of 0:08:27.080 --> 0:08:32.080 Fairfield is a famous course that's also there. And you know, 0:08:32.120 --> 0:08:34.720 the country Club of Fairfield, for anybody that's seen pictures, 0:08:34.840 --> 0:08:39.760 is like almost like a seaside links course. Yeah, and 0:08:40.640 --> 0:08:46.840 you guys are in a completely different setting. You're it's 0:08:46.920 --> 0:08:50.520 like up in like a rocky mount almost mountainous area 0:08:50.600 --> 0:08:55.080 for the area, correct, yes, correct, Yeah, explain just like 0:08:55.640 --> 0:09:00.240 the nuance of like how different those these two properties are. 0:09:01.559 --> 0:09:05.520 Yeah. So we sit on like a knuckle, I call 0:09:05.520 --> 0:09:08.240 it a knuckle, just above the Merritt Parkway. So anybody 0:09:08.280 --> 0:09:10.360 that drives through this area, you're either on ninety five 0:09:10.440 --> 0:09:12.920 or on fifteen, and you're you're trying to go as 0:09:12.960 --> 0:09:15.160 fast as you possibly can before you get stuck in 0:09:15.400 --> 0:09:20.920 bumper to bumper parking lot. Basically, we sit just north 0:09:21.160 --> 0:09:24.280 of the Merritt Parkway on like I said, a knuckle. 0:09:24.360 --> 0:09:27.760 So we kind of. If there was fewer trees, you'd 0:09:27.760 --> 0:09:30.880 see the sound very easily. And I've been told back 0:09:30.920 --> 0:09:32.760 on our thirteenth hole, which is our highest part of 0:09:32.760 --> 0:09:34.560 the property, you used be able to see the sound. 0:09:35.280 --> 0:09:38.920 But there are a lot of large, large trees on property. 0:09:41.520 --> 0:09:44.320 There was the superintendent before me did a great job 0:09:44.400 --> 0:09:46.840 peeling out a lot of trees, and then we've continued 0:09:46.880 --> 0:09:50.120 that for a long time. But at the same time, 0:09:50.120 --> 0:09:53.200 it feels like a parkland type golf course. We're very 0:09:53.280 --> 0:09:57.000 much in. We call Greenfield Hill, which is a part 0:09:57.040 --> 0:10:00.000 of Fairfield that sits up on this hill and over 0:10:00.120 --> 0:10:04.679 looks you know, overlooks Fairfield. When storms are coming at us, 0:10:05.240 --> 0:10:07.960 they typically hit New York, break up a little bit, 0:10:08.640 --> 0:10:11.760 go over the sound, Long Island and north of us, 0:10:11.800 --> 0:10:14.080 so we dodge a lot of weather quite a bit 0:10:14.080 --> 0:10:17.839 if it's coming from the west. But it's a unique 0:10:17.880 --> 0:10:21.440 piece of property. It is like an old horse farm. 0:10:21.559 --> 0:10:26.080 Mister Banks, the I believe he's don't quote me on anything, 0:10:26.120 --> 0:10:28.400 cause I got a lot of unique stories I tell 0:10:28.440 --> 0:10:30.320 about this stuff that I don't know how many are accurate. 0:10:30.760 --> 0:10:37.439 But he's a former like Rockefeller family extension and own 0:10:37.440 --> 0:10:41.040 the horse farm next to us. We bought this property. 0:10:41.120 --> 0:10:42.600 Used to be a horse farm. You find the horse 0:10:42.600 --> 0:10:48.800 shoes from time to time, but it's it's a family 0:10:48.800 --> 0:10:51.240 golf course and it's in your neighborhood, you know what 0:10:51.240 --> 0:10:53.720 I mean. And and like we have the pool, we 0:10:53.760 --> 0:10:56.440 have the rackets. We have an amazing clubhouse that's going 0:10:56.520 --> 0:10:59.520 under that's under renovation right now as well. We're adding 0:10:59.559 --> 0:11:04.680 some soft seeding outside and an outdoor bar and redoing 0:11:04.679 --> 0:11:09.520 the redoing the inside bar and the dining room. So 0:11:10.600 --> 0:11:12.720 kind of a neat section of the project over there 0:11:12.760 --> 0:11:18.840 is getting done as well. So yeah, but beautiful piece 0:11:18.880 --> 0:11:21.600 of property. And Robert Trent Jones Senior did a great 0:11:21.679 --> 0:11:24.520 job laying it out back in the day nineteen forty six. 0:11:24.600 --> 0:11:29.400 He did the northwest or north south layout, great scope, 0:11:31.400 --> 0:11:33.160 a lot of room from green to tea and tea 0:11:33.200 --> 0:11:37.360 to you know, golf hole to golf hole. But yeah, 0:11:37.520 --> 0:11:39.920 very interesting, kind of beautiful piece of property out here. 0:11:41.880 --> 0:11:45.400 How did you guys kind of go about approaching this? 0:11:45.600 --> 0:11:50.719 I think that it's become very I would say in 0:11:50.920 --> 0:11:55.679 vogue if you have a name brand architect from the 0:11:55.720 --> 0:11:58.800 Golden Age, where it's just like, okay, we are going 0:11:58.880 --> 0:12:02.880 to restrict or this because we have Donald Ross design. 0:12:03.800 --> 0:12:09.440 Robert Trent Jones is you know, uh, maybe has fallen 0:12:09.480 --> 0:12:12.840 a little bit out of favor in recent in recent years, 0:12:13.240 --> 0:12:17.719 but he's one of the more revered architects of his generation. 0:12:19.280 --> 0:12:22.640 And you guys were kind of in the early string 0:12:22.720 --> 0:12:25.720 of his designs, which for the most part, you know, 0:12:25.760 --> 0:12:27.600 if you kind of look at his body of work, 0:12:27.720 --> 0:12:31.920 the best work, you know, and this is all my opinion, 0:12:32.480 --> 0:12:36.280 the best work was the earlier work. How did you 0:12:36.280 --> 0:12:40.200 guys got you and Jaeger and the club go about 0:12:40.240 --> 0:12:47.160 approaching the renovation understanding? Hey, you know, Robert Trent Jones 0:12:47.440 --> 0:12:51.320 is a big name in golf architecture, a big part 0:12:51.360 --> 0:12:56.080 of our history. But we we can possibly improve some 0:12:56.320 --> 0:12:57.480 areas of this design. 0:12:59.559 --> 0:13:07.640 Yeah, yeah, great question. So yeah, nineteen forty six, like 0:13:07.720 --> 0:13:11.439 we mentioned before, eleventh Golf Course. Nineteen forty six, he 0:13:11.480 --> 0:13:14.679 started to working with Augusta National. Right came buzz with 0:13:14.679 --> 0:13:19.600 mister Bob Jones and and you know most you know, 0:13:19.920 --> 0:13:22.960 maybe the best golfer of all time to Bob Johns 0:13:23.520 --> 0:13:26.120 to Bob Jones is yeah. So so they were doing 0:13:26.160 --> 0:13:29.000 obviously they were doing work at Augusta National. We were 0:13:29.000 --> 0:13:32.840 a g established club. There's some great history, you know, 0:13:33.440 --> 0:13:36.560 the to the Patterson Club, let alone the Banks family, 0:13:37.720 --> 0:13:41.520 the Rockefellers that owned it beforehand, and then the ge 0:13:41.559 --> 0:13:45.400 president CEO. Most you know, there's always a standing membership 0:13:45.400 --> 0:13:49.160 open at Augusta National from what I understand, but I 0:13:49.160 --> 0:13:50.960 always choked with people that they were probably on the 0:13:50.960 --> 0:13:53.640 search committee when they hired Robert Trent Jones Senior and said, hey, 0:13:54.120 --> 0:13:56.240 come on up to Fairfield and whip us up a 0:13:56.240 --> 0:14:00.040 golf course. Right. You know, our club was Establis it 0:14:00.080 --> 0:14:01.839 was in nineteen twenty nine, but is a social club. 0:14:01.960 --> 0:14:03.640 So in nineteen forty six when they decided to build 0:14:03.640 --> 0:14:07.320 this golf course, they got the hot young you know architect, 0:14:07.440 --> 0:14:11.599 the the yeger Kovich of their time. Maybe uh so 0:14:11.760 --> 0:14:15.800 might argue it's Brian Schneider or whoever. Anyway, there's so 0:14:15.800 --> 0:14:19.200 many great ones to choose from. However, you know, they 0:14:19.240 --> 0:14:21.280 grab this young man, Sid, come build us a golf course. 0:14:21.440 --> 0:14:23.720 And you know we were as he started working at 0:14:23.720 --> 0:14:26.760 Augusta National. The next year he did Peach Tree. We're 0:14:26.840 --> 0:14:28.760 right in the middle of that and when you see 0:14:28.760 --> 0:14:30.640 the layout, you'll go, oh, yeah, I can see what 0:14:30.680 --> 0:14:33.400 he was seeing. You know, we have we have some 0:14:33.520 --> 0:14:36.360 angles on par threes that remind you of sixteen at Augusta. 0:14:36.560 --> 0:14:40.640 You know. You have you have the uphill that disappeared 0:14:40.640 --> 0:14:43.880 over time. You have the downhill par three, a lot 0:14:43.920 --> 0:14:46.680 of variety. You can tell he picked out the par 0:14:46.800 --> 0:14:48.680 threes early on and then and then kind of built 0:14:48.680 --> 0:14:50.880 the rest of the golf course through it. We have 0:14:50.960 --> 0:14:54.240 like a three shot par five, you know, part five 0:14:54.280 --> 0:15:01.480 that you almost cannot cannot reach in two. So when 0:15:01.520 --> 0:15:03.440 we first started doing this, you know, when I first 0:15:03.520 --> 0:15:06.120 got here. First of all, you know, this golf course 0:15:06.480 --> 0:15:08.960 was built. I think they spent one hundred thousand dollars 0:15:09.000 --> 0:15:13.680 building it, and the driving range sat where the eighteenth 0:15:13.760 --> 0:15:16.920 hole was supposed to be so long story short. Nineteen 0:15:17.000 --> 0:15:22.000 forty six, they ran out of treework money to remove 0:15:22.040 --> 0:15:24.000 these trees and finish the eighteenth hole. They had already 0:15:24.000 --> 0:15:27.080 built the green, so they instead of playing through the 0:15:27.160 --> 0:15:29.400 driving range a little dog leg right with a stream 0:15:29.480 --> 0:15:31.520 running through it, they decided to put the t's on 0:15:31.520 --> 0:15:32.880 the top of the hill and play it down the hill. 0:15:33.600 --> 0:15:36.000 And I'm sure they said we'll do this next year, 0:15:36.240 --> 0:15:40.720 never got to it. So we've been playing that goof 0:15:40.840 --> 0:15:42.800 It was a goofy golf hole. It was not supposed 0:15:42.840 --> 0:15:45.200 to be there. Nobody realized why we didn't like it. 0:15:45.240 --> 0:15:48.680 But during you know, during our original like when I 0:15:48.680 --> 0:15:52.680 first got here, we had this this very beautiful clubhouse 0:15:52.800 --> 0:15:54.960 was just built. I knew for we weren't spending money 0:15:54.960 --> 0:15:58.000 for a long time. We just did a small, a 0:15:58.120 --> 0:16:03.400 smaller golf course renovation at that time, unfortunately making our 0:16:03.400 --> 0:16:05.760 t boxes smaller. It was great work, a lot of 0:16:05.760 --> 0:16:07.800 great work was done, but we made tea boxes smaller, 0:16:08.000 --> 0:16:09.800 and we had the kind of the Beth Page Rhys 0:16:09.920 --> 0:16:14.680 Jones bunkers, very exhausting push mowing bunker banks and tying 0:16:14.760 --> 0:16:18.400 up maintenance dollars. So we saw a lot of room 0:16:18.440 --> 0:16:22.840 for improvement on those things. But we started planning. We 0:16:22.840 --> 0:16:25.000 did a plan with the Fasio Group and that kind 0:16:25.000 --> 0:16:27.040 of gave us, that kind of gave me the freedom 0:16:27.080 --> 0:16:30.520 to start working on a plan that was approved by 0:16:30.560 --> 0:16:32.800 the membership. You know, we had a cross section of 0:16:32.840 --> 0:16:36.680 members on this Golf Long Range Planning Committee, so every 0:16:36.680 --> 0:16:39.240 one of our members was represented. We'd walk the golf 0:16:39.240 --> 0:16:42.040 course with Tom mars Off and speak to every single 0:16:42.120 --> 0:16:45.920 golf shot that every single person would play and seeing 0:16:45.920 --> 0:16:48.640 the golf course through everybody's eyes is a unique experience, 0:16:50.520 --> 0:16:55.080 you know, it's you learn so much during those of 0:16:55.120 --> 0:16:57.600 what you think you know just is not so. And 0:16:58.320 --> 0:17:00.560 during that time we created a master plan, goals, key 0:17:00.640 --> 0:17:04.000 initiatives that we still have today. One of them was 0:17:04.400 --> 0:17:08.520 create more golf practice. We needed a short game practice area. 0:17:08.840 --> 0:17:11.199 We only had eight stalls on a range tea. You know, 0:17:11.240 --> 0:17:13.439 we're northeast, we're locked. We're locked with land. We got 0:17:13.480 --> 0:17:15.320 the Myott Parkway right next to us, and we got 0:17:16.000 --> 0:17:18.280 we got members who don't plan on moving, ey our 0:17:18.320 --> 0:17:21.800 neighbors who don't plan on moving anytime soon. It's a 0:17:21.840 --> 0:17:25.000 hard one to expand upon. So how can we take 0:17:25.040 --> 0:17:29.560 what we have, improve it and get all these things 0:17:29.560 --> 0:17:32.080 that we need done? So, you know, and our key 0:17:32.080 --> 0:17:34.120 initiatives I wrote a couple of notes here. Our key 0:17:34.119 --> 0:17:37.760 initiatives are pretty simple. It was like, keep up with 0:17:38.440 --> 0:17:42.080 replacing infrastructure right. You have to keep up with irrigation system, 0:17:42.359 --> 0:17:49.200 your bunkers, make sure the sands right, anything, cart paths, maintenance, facility, drainage, 0:17:49.200 --> 0:17:52.000 all these things that fail, golf course components that fail. 0:17:52.119 --> 0:17:55.080 Keep up with that. That was always number one. Number 0:17:55.080 --> 0:17:58.320 two was to improve practice both short game and long term. 0:17:58.320 --> 0:18:01.600 And you know you're overall driving range, so create more 0:18:01.600 --> 0:18:07.159 golf practice for this very hungry golf golf addicted membership 0:18:07.200 --> 0:18:10.520 that we have and we're in their backyard, so let's 0:18:10.520 --> 0:18:14.600 improve the practice, make the course enjoyable, more enjoyable for 0:18:14.680 --> 0:18:18.000 higher handicappers while making it more strategic for lower handicappers. 0:18:18.280 --> 0:18:20.800 And then the other one was kind of improve the greens. 0:18:22.920 --> 0:18:25.560 Create more whole locations so we're not at risk of 0:18:25.600 --> 0:18:27.760 losing turf because we have to use the same whole 0:18:27.800 --> 0:18:30.760 locations every day. You know, green that has three to 0:18:30.800 --> 0:18:34.280 five hole locations, it's very challenging to to keep grass 0:18:34.280 --> 0:18:37.159 alive in those areas. So those were kind of some 0:18:37.240 --> 0:18:42.600 of our goals. So how do we do, you know, 0:18:42.600 --> 0:18:46.959 how do we do a golf project that takes all 0:18:47.000 --> 0:18:50.920 in that into you know, we focus on all that. 0:18:51.000 --> 0:18:53.160 You know, those are kind of our pillars, but every 0:18:53.160 --> 0:18:56.080 time we looked at something, does it match that? So 0:18:56.240 --> 0:18:58.560 jaeger Kovich was asked, all right, we want a better 0:18:58.560 --> 0:19:00.800 shortcame practici er, we want driving RNG. We feel like 0:19:00.840 --> 0:19:02.959 this part of our property would be good for it. 0:19:03.200 --> 0:19:06.199 You tell us what you see and he came up 0:19:06.240 --> 0:19:08.399 here of a stroke a genius. There's a redance style 0:19:08.400 --> 0:19:10.760 of par three sitting on a hillside that we've been 0:19:10.800 --> 0:19:13.359 playing up and down for so long, and let's just 0:19:13.400 --> 0:19:18.439 play it from a different angle. So he saw that 0:19:18.960 --> 0:19:22.600 with that we could take our old seventeen that was eighteen. 0:19:22.960 --> 0:19:25.159 We could take our old seventeen and make it a 0:19:25.200 --> 0:19:28.200 par five. So we used to finish on a par four, 0:19:28.240 --> 0:19:32.200 par four, par four, part four finish four in a row, 0:19:32.560 --> 0:19:34.080 and it was kind of a hay maker at the 0:19:34.119 --> 0:19:38.000 end of the round. It was exhausting. We saw this 0:19:38.119 --> 0:19:40.959 opportunity to go part four, par four, par five, par 0:19:41.119 --> 0:19:45.000 three finish and create this great short game practice area, 0:19:45.480 --> 0:19:48.040 make two better golf holes than what we had, and 0:19:50.359 --> 0:19:53.399 kind of solve the appetite. With that, we got to 0:19:53.720 --> 0:19:56.000 change the routing of the golf course front nine, back 0:19:56.119 --> 0:19:59.720 nine switch, which in my opinion is even better for 0:19:59.760 --> 0:20:03.639 the overall product, because you know, you're now you're finishing 0:20:03.760 --> 0:20:06.960 on your most exciting part of your golf course, you know, 0:20:07.000 --> 0:20:08.840 and if you let's go back to August and now 0:20:08.840 --> 0:20:12.560 everybody laughed my comparison to gusta national and and and 0:20:13.000 --> 0:20:14.760 rightfully sod the gust. 0:20:15.040 --> 0:20:19.480 It could be the gust, you know. Yeah, that's what 0:20:19.840 --> 0:20:21.080 maybe that's what your goal is. 0:20:21.880 --> 0:20:26.080 Yeah. Yeah, well we're just linked in time and uh. 0:20:26.119 --> 0:20:28.400 And by the way, the first round of golf ever 0:20:28.440 --> 0:20:31.920 played at the Patterson Club was Bob Jones, Jean Sarazen 0:20:32.040 --> 0:20:35.480 and then two gentlemen from ge Okay, so, uh, I 0:20:35.520 --> 0:20:38.960 believe they tied. Mister Bob Jones bogied the last hole 0:20:39.480 --> 0:20:42.199 and uh, the one that was supposed to play through 0:20:42.200 --> 0:20:44.439 the driving range and play down the hill. So he boged. 0:20:44.440 --> 0:20:48.840 It wasn't his fault. Uh, he boged it. They tied. 0:20:49.240 --> 0:20:51.240 Epic battle and I come. I came to find out 0:20:51.240 --> 0:20:53.480 recently that I found it. It was like maybe his second 0:20:53.680 --> 0:20:57.760 to last round of golf he had ever played. What really, Yeah, yeah, 0:20:57.760 --> 0:20:59.120 because it was towards the end of his life. 0:20:59.200 --> 0:21:03.040 Yeah yeah, you makes sense with the time time frame. 0:21:03.600 --> 0:21:05.760 Yeah, it was the same time he was working on 0:21:06.080 --> 0:21:09.280 Peachtree with mister Robert Trent Jones Senior. Right. 0:21:09.400 --> 0:21:12.680 So uh, anyway, I mean if you think about when 0:21:12.720 --> 0:21:18.040 it was built, like peach Tree is extraordinary. Oh yeah, 0:21:19.280 --> 0:21:22.840 it's funny. I you know, I played there, you know, 0:21:23.040 --> 0:21:27.879 and I turned I turned to my host, who's you know, 0:21:28.119 --> 0:21:33.400 very versed in golf history golf architecture, and I turned 0:21:33.440 --> 0:21:36.520 to him on like the second green, I'm like, why 0:21:36.560 --> 0:21:39.840 didn't Robert all of Robert Trent Jones courses have greens 0:21:39.920 --> 0:21:40.240 like this? 0:21:41.000 --> 0:21:41.600 Yeah? 0:21:41.640 --> 0:21:44.800 And his response was, well, he only built one course 0:21:44.840 --> 0:21:48.879 with Bob Bob Jones. Yeah, you know, right, but Peachtree. 0:21:48.960 --> 0:21:50.880 You go there and it's like this is these are 0:21:50.880 --> 0:21:54.280 some of the best greens in the world. Yes, yeah, 0:21:54.320 --> 0:21:56.480 and he's building Patterson Club at the same time. It's 0:21:56.600 --> 0:21:59.760 it's kind of a pretty fascinating it's funny. P J 0:22:01.040 --> 0:22:05.040 producer PJ Played played golf recently on a trip back 0:22:05.080 --> 0:22:07.480 to college where he was giving a He was giving 0:22:07.560 --> 0:22:11.800 a speech on journalism, you know, the hard hitting journalism 0:22:12.160 --> 0:22:17.400 of golf media for students. He played one of his 0:22:17.440 --> 0:22:20.840 early designs also in New York. I think it's like 0:22:20.960 --> 0:22:25.800 green Finger State Park or something along the lines of that, 0:22:26.520 --> 0:22:28.359 and he took a picture of a green and I 0:22:28.400 --> 0:22:31.600 was like, oh my god, like, that's an amazing green. 0:22:32.400 --> 0:22:37.680 And I think, like, what's what's fascinating about the RTJ 0:22:38.320 --> 0:22:43.240 history is kind of how like his career was so long. 0:22:43.480 --> 0:22:49.119 He he spanned so many generations of golf and just 0:22:49.200 --> 0:22:53.520 how the style like changed with the trends of society 0:22:53.560 --> 0:22:58.639 almost you know, his early career was working for these 0:22:58.880 --> 0:23:01.560 you know, the very the peak of the Golden Age, 0:23:01.600 --> 0:23:04.840 the end of the Golden Age. He survives the you know, 0:23:04.880 --> 0:23:07.879 he lives with the Great Depression, and then his early 0:23:07.960 --> 0:23:13.720 career starts and you see the flare of the Golden Age. 0:23:13.800 --> 0:23:18.400 But then it became almost sanitized with society into the fifties, 0:23:18.840 --> 0:23:21.680 you know six you know, like and you just see that, 0:23:21.840 --> 0:23:25.200 and then it's like the you know what society became of, 0:23:25.240 --> 0:23:28.199 Like how can we just like pump out you know, 0:23:28.280 --> 0:23:32.320 the same products. You know, there's this I think about 0:23:32.359 --> 0:23:33.080 this all the time. 0:23:35.600 --> 0:23:38.160 Yeah, yeah, there's this. 0:23:38.280 --> 0:23:42.439 Uh there's this burger place in Chicago called Chival and 0:23:42.480 --> 0:23:47.199 they have a small they have this other side, you 0:23:47.240 --> 0:23:50.919 know chain. A Chival is just a standalone restaurant. But 0:23:50.960 --> 0:23:54.800 they created these at first in the city, these little 0:23:55.520 --> 0:24:01.800 like neighborhood burger places called small Cheval and you go 0:24:01.880 --> 0:24:04.760 in and you get the Auschivals known. You know, it 0:24:04.800 --> 0:24:07.520 got voted as the best burger in America by somebody. 0:24:08.000 --> 0:24:10.480 So then they have these small chivals where you can 0:24:10.520 --> 0:24:14.960 go get the burger, but they are just burger stands, right, 0:24:15.720 --> 0:24:20.119 and there's just this great like I got it. The 0:24:20.160 --> 0:24:22.160 first thing I got when I got back to Chicago 0:24:22.280 --> 0:24:25.639 for a winter break was a small cheval burger if 0:24:25.680 --> 0:24:28.040 you go and you get like a burger and fries. 0:24:28.320 --> 0:24:31.120 And nowadays it's like, you know, it's like thirteen dollars 0:24:31.359 --> 0:24:35.159 for burger and fries or may fifteen dollars. But yeah, 0:24:35.400 --> 0:24:38.600 you know, it's gone up considerably. But the idea of 0:24:38.680 --> 0:24:42.560 a neighborhood burger stand where it was like your local 0:24:42.640 --> 0:24:46.439 burger stand, if you think about McDonald's, that is the 0:24:46.480 --> 0:24:50.040 place that McDonald's made extinct. During the same era of 0:24:50.040 --> 0:24:53.879 golf design, like the trends of society went around, like 0:24:54.240 --> 0:24:57.200 how do you just like create like the same product 0:24:57.320 --> 0:25:00.920 at a like large scale. And that might be part 0:25:00.960 --> 0:25:03.720 of why Robert Trent Jones And you know, there's a 0:25:03.760 --> 0:25:05.680 lot of reasons, and you could get into a lot 0:25:05.720 --> 0:25:08.000 of reasons why, but like part of why Robert Trent 0:25:08.080 --> 0:25:14.760 Jones golf courses became so almost monotonous in comparison to 0:25:14.840 --> 0:25:18.360 his early designs, as part of it was society norms 0:25:18.800 --> 0:25:22.600 pushing you know, almost against art in this period. 0:25:23.000 --> 0:25:28.000 Yeah, right, yeah, creating the cookie cutter stamp. Just need 0:25:28.000 --> 0:25:31.959 the signature, good sir, we're gonna use it. You know. 0:25:32.240 --> 0:25:34.439 I always imagined he had like a notebook of like 0:25:34.480 --> 0:25:36.520 thirty two greens and he was like, I'm going to 0:25:36.600 --> 0:25:40.560 give you a five twelve six for you know, and 0:25:40.640 --> 0:25:44.639 then But I mean, but if you look at the 0:25:44.680 --> 0:25:46.480 template holes, right, it's the same thing. 0:25:46.720 --> 0:25:46.919 You know. 0:25:47.040 --> 0:25:51.520 I always jokeing Seth Rayner. You know, I think somebody 0:25:51.600 --> 0:25:54.520 said one time Seth Rader is the most overrated architect 0:25:54.520 --> 0:25:56.639 of all time because he was just tracing what his 0:25:56.880 --> 0:25:58.960 good buddy did. And it's like, well, that's not accurate. 0:25:59.040 --> 0:26:01.600 He's also the greatest, possibly great civil engineer of all 0:26:01.680 --> 0:26:07.159 time as well. But you know, yeah, it's kind of 0:26:07.200 --> 0:26:10.920 the same thing in a way, right, Like he had 0:26:10.960 --> 0:26:14.000 these and again when I went to Peachtree, I was 0:26:14.000 --> 0:26:16.320 forced to play Peachtree. I mean, what a what a 0:26:16.480 --> 0:26:21.400 unique gem. Oh my goodness, But there's holes out there 0:26:21.400 --> 0:26:23.840 where I'm like, oh, there's our fourteen. You know, there's 0:26:23.880 --> 0:26:27.440 our old six, there's thirteen. And it would be a 0:26:27.440 --> 0:26:29.520 little bit bigger or a little bit smaller or a 0:26:29.560 --> 0:26:32.240 little bit different or but it was kind of a 0:26:32.560 --> 0:26:34.840 you know, a lot of there's a lot of similarities 0:26:34.880 --> 0:26:38.800 when it came to that. And I think when Jaeger 0:26:38.920 --> 0:26:41.640 came out here and suddenly we were like, we got 0:26:41.680 --> 0:26:44.679 all of the greens approved to redo. And after the 0:26:44.720 --> 0:26:46.680 first three he did, everybody's like, oh my gosh, we 0:26:46.760 --> 0:26:49.000 got to do them all and thank god we had 0:26:49.000 --> 0:26:51.040 a little extra. You know, I didn't make this project 0:26:51.080 --> 0:26:54.280 about grass types. I wanted to reuse all the grass 0:26:54.280 --> 0:26:57.280 that we had during the project, all the fairway greens, 0:26:57.560 --> 0:27:00.720 Tea's approaches, we just reused it. It was a little 0:27:00.760 --> 0:27:04.760 spotty or something. But so during that but I had 0:27:04.800 --> 0:27:09.160 budgeted the entire project with SOD, so that money alone 0:27:09.320 --> 0:27:12.080 covered us to do the added eight greens that we 0:27:12.119 --> 0:27:16.520 needed to do budget wise, And so suddenly we were 0:27:16.560 --> 0:27:18.879 off to the races. And then you're you know, Jaeger 0:27:18.880 --> 0:27:20.840 would pull up to a golf hole like our eleventh, right, 0:27:20.880 --> 0:27:23.120 this is early. This is probably the fifth when he did, 0:27:23.640 --> 0:27:27.280 and it was our eleventh new number two and it's 0:27:27.320 --> 0:27:29.800 a par five and the screens kind of banks in 0:27:29.840 --> 0:27:33.359 their sideways and it's very you know, he could have 0:27:33.359 --> 0:27:35.399 done whatever he wanted in that stage. But the reality 0:27:35.440 --> 0:27:38.120 is he paid. You know, he sits there and looks 0:27:38.119 --> 0:27:39.520 at it. He's like, this is what should be there 0:27:40.160 --> 0:27:43.119 to gentle walk up to the green. It has a 0:27:43.119 --> 0:27:45.240 little fall off on the back left, it has a 0:27:45.240 --> 0:27:48.359 little right kicker. So he he made it just better. 0:27:48.600 --> 0:27:51.800 He maximized its potential. But it's a very similar golfle 0:27:51.880 --> 0:27:54.080 like it hadn't changed much. We just got the fairway 0:27:54.080 --> 0:27:57.879 bunkers right. You know, he painted a mask, you know, 0:27:57.960 --> 0:28:00.920 everywhere he went. It's like a it's like a price 0:28:01.000 --> 0:28:03.960 is painting. You know, these guys are so talented, it's unbelievable. 0:28:04.160 --> 0:28:05.920 I always tell people it's like he's he's out here 0:28:05.920 --> 0:28:08.520 building prices paintings that my members are going to get 0:28:08.560 --> 0:28:11.320 the exercise on. Like how cool is that? You know, 0:28:11.520 --> 0:28:14.119 Like what are we doing out here? Like it's just 0:28:14.160 --> 0:28:16.480 so good. And when you're looking at it and you're 0:28:16.520 --> 0:28:19.239 seeing the lines move, and you know, and and and 0:28:19.320 --> 0:28:22.679 his right hand man, Nick Mills, who comes from Australia, 0:28:22.920 --> 0:28:25.720 and you know, I can't wait to play Nick Mills 0:28:25.760 --> 0:28:27.679 golf course. I mean he's young in his career, but 0:28:27.800 --> 0:28:31.520 good god is he Yeah, the influence from the Australian golf, 0:28:31.560 --> 0:28:36.119 which I need to go see someday. You know, it 0:28:36.160 --> 0:28:38.040 would have been a much more Australian feel out there 0:28:38.040 --> 0:28:40.440 if Nick had to say. But like, but you know, 0:28:40.480 --> 0:28:42.920 the two of them together, they really did a great 0:28:43.000 --> 0:28:46.280 job with the lines and carrying you through the property 0:28:46.320 --> 0:28:49.480 and just drawing interest to everything you're looking at while 0:28:50.760 --> 0:28:55.840 not changing certain things that much. Like eleven, twelve, thirteen 0:28:56.680 --> 0:29:01.200 are new, two, three, four, five, seven. A lot of 0:29:01.200 --> 0:29:03.920 those didn't change much, you know, like they got better, 0:29:04.200 --> 0:29:07.480 a lot better. But you know, there wasn't it wasn't 0:29:07.600 --> 0:29:10.440 like we needed to reinvent the wheel on those holes. 0:29:10.840 --> 0:29:14.240 Some some we did, you know, the the re routing. 0:29:14.600 --> 0:29:17.680 The two new holes are new eight to nine, old 0:29:17.760 --> 0:29:21.840 seventeen eighteen. Those two are brand new golf holes. I 0:29:21.840 --> 0:29:24.600 would say, so is our new number one number old 0:29:24.680 --> 0:29:26.760 number ten. It's in the same place. But the green 0:29:26.800 --> 0:29:30.400 got pushed back twenty yards, brand new green. Much different 0:29:30.440 --> 0:29:35.880 feel when you walk out into the property. But so like, 0:29:36.080 --> 0:29:39.760 you know, I don't know, you just kind of then 0:29:39.800 --> 0:29:41.160 he got to that back now and he made quite 0:29:41.160 --> 0:29:43.320 a few changes, but at the same time, like just 0:29:43.520 --> 0:29:45.200 improving what we already had there. 0:29:54.080 --> 0:29:56.120 All right, let's take a quick break to talk to 0:29:56.160 --> 0:30:01.240 our friends from Best Day Brewing. Best Day is our 0:30:01.920 --> 0:30:07.080 craft non alcoholic beer of choice. Best Day Brewing wants 0:30:07.200 --> 0:30:10.600 you to have the best day. Yet we are brewed 0:30:10.920 --> 0:30:15.600 for the doers. They're not about sobriety. Everyone has their 0:30:15.640 --> 0:30:18.680 personal choices when they want and where they want to 0:30:18.680 --> 0:30:22.240 consume alcohol and non alcoholic. So it's all about the 0:30:22.360 --> 0:30:25.720 right occasion. 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I really like the electro line too, So 0:31:38.320 --> 0:31:40.680 go to Best Day Brewing dot com thanks to them. 0:31:40.760 --> 0:31:53.320 And let's get back to Jason. How how important is 0:31:53.600 --> 0:31:58.360 the sequencing of where you start and end your project, 0:31:58.600 --> 0:32:04.680 like picking the places to start construction now that you 0:32:04.720 --> 0:32:05.560 look back on it. 0:32:07.600 --> 0:32:12.680 Yeah, so this is a good question. This is a 0:32:12.680 --> 0:32:15.600 strategic question. And to answer this properly for anyone, you 0:32:15.600 --> 0:32:18.840 would need to know every detail of their project. For instance, 0:32:18.880 --> 0:32:23.040 we're doing work with the Clubhouse, so the overlap between 0:32:23.120 --> 0:32:30.000 us where fine art meets legos is challenging. Sorry all 0:32:30.040 --> 0:32:32.800 you engineers and builders out there, But where fine art 0:32:32.840 --> 0:32:36.920 meets legos, you're like, uh, okay, this is hard. Jager 0:32:36.960 --> 0:32:40.120 can't give you an engineered rendering of what it's going 0:32:40.160 --> 0:32:43.640 to look like until he's done with that gigantic bulldozer 0:32:43.680 --> 0:32:47.840 of a paintbrush, you know what I mean. So we 0:32:48.000 --> 0:32:51.440 ended up having to get to the clubhouse area in 0:32:51.480 --> 0:32:54.240 August to prep the area and give them what we 0:32:54.360 --> 0:32:59.960 thought was best for them to now build a new 0:33:00.160 --> 0:33:02.080 a new turn building. We have a new turn building, 0:33:02.480 --> 0:33:07.360 we have a future outdoor teaching like a golf practice center, 0:33:08.400 --> 0:33:11.239 and then expanded patios and things of that nature. So 0:33:11.320 --> 0:33:13.640 like where we butt uped, all that was very strategic. 0:33:13.680 --> 0:33:15.520 We had to get that right and then get out 0:33:15.520 --> 0:33:17.760 of dodge and then come back and clean it up 0:33:17.760 --> 0:33:20.320 when they're done. So that was kind of forcing us 0:33:20.360 --> 0:33:23.240 to where we started and where we're going to end. 0:33:26.520 --> 0:33:29.720 But yeah, for us, we did. We did a soft 0:33:29.720 --> 0:33:33.320 close right, so we were July seventh, you know, second 0:33:33.360 --> 0:33:36.120 week of June. Since then, it has been like gas 0:33:36.640 --> 0:33:42.520 pedal to the floor, drinking out of the fire hose, right, 0:33:42.920 --> 0:33:45.440 pulling an Oakmont there, I'm stealing Oakmont's drinking out of 0:33:45.440 --> 0:33:48.280 the fire hose. I mean, it has been game busters, 0:33:48.320 --> 0:33:51.320 just going like crazy. You know. We had to have 0:33:51.400 --> 0:33:56.600 our invitational back to back invitational club championships, you know, 0:33:56.680 --> 0:33:59.040 cram it all in there before we lost three holes. 0:33:59.440 --> 0:34:01.600 We took three holes at first. We made them right 0:34:01.640 --> 0:34:05.040 around the maintenance facility. Was great because we were really inconvened, 0:34:05.080 --> 0:34:08.160 you know, it was very minimize inconvenience to our golfers. 0:34:09.360 --> 0:34:11.319 We kind of got to stay in this little footprint 0:34:11.520 --> 0:34:13.799 and bang out three of our golf holes right around 0:34:13.800 --> 0:34:16.719 the maintenance facility. That took about two weeks before we 0:34:16.719 --> 0:34:20.840 needed to start deconstructing. And you know, the deconstruction process 0:34:20.960 --> 0:34:23.880 is always a week or two, sometimes three four ahead 0:34:23.920 --> 0:34:29.600 of the construction. The sequencing of these projects is mind blowing. 0:34:29.600 --> 0:34:33.600 You're like you you go in there and in a day, 0:34:34.160 --> 0:34:38.959 rich Lebar's army, all right, lgr Lebar Golfer Innovation's army 0:34:39.040 --> 0:34:41.040 comes out and they rip apart a golf hole. And 0:34:41.080 --> 0:34:43.040 what I mean by that is they take the sod 0:34:43.120 --> 0:34:45.319 off the green, put it on tarps. Oh, I got 0:34:45.320 --> 0:34:47.759 to keep this alive for two weeks on tarps two 0:34:47.760 --> 0:34:51.719 weeks max. Don't ever go longer than that. Then they 0:34:51.719 --> 0:34:53.440 take the sod and they flip it to something that's 0:34:53.480 --> 0:34:55.600 already the side from the faraway and the t's and 0:34:55.640 --> 0:34:57.880 put that somewhere where it's already ready to go. So 0:34:57.880 --> 0:34:59.920 you have to have somewhere that's ready to lay the 0:35:01.560 --> 0:35:02.800 and then you just kind of rip out all the 0:35:02.880 --> 0:35:05.200 rough grass, take all the top soil, put that into 0:35:05.200 --> 0:35:08.000 a pile. Store that somewhere. Take the old bunker sand, 0:35:08.000 --> 0:35:10.480 get ready to reuse that for drainage, so put that 0:35:10.600 --> 0:35:16.520 somewhere else. It's it's very precise chaos. And then they're like, 0:35:16.520 --> 0:35:18.759 all right, Jaeger, here you go. And then he goes 0:35:18.760 --> 0:35:21.000 and bulldozes it, and you're licking your chops. You're like, 0:35:21.040 --> 0:35:23.120 oh my gosh, this has turned out better than I 0:35:23.160 --> 0:35:28.120 thought it could be. And then it's two weeks of complete. 0:35:28.520 --> 0:35:30.160 You know, you scan it. That was our big thing. 0:35:30.200 --> 0:35:32.200 Scan it, all right, scan it, you know, Jagger would 0:35:32.239 --> 0:35:34.080 be a quarter of the way done with something. You'll 0:35:34.120 --> 0:35:38.080 scan it and anyways, then we scan it. That way 0:35:38.120 --> 0:35:39.680 we could put it back together with the light ar 0:35:40.120 --> 0:35:45.120 and and then it's two to three weeks of construction. 0:35:45.360 --> 0:35:47.279 Like you have to rebuild the thing three times before 0:35:47.280 --> 0:35:50.839 it's done. It's maddening. It's maddening. You're like looking at 0:35:50.880 --> 0:35:53.239 it and your eye could vision just put sod on it. 0:35:53.800 --> 0:35:56.239 Oh wait, we need drainage, we need bunker liners, we 0:35:56.280 --> 0:35:57.959 need you know, we need to core out the green 0:35:58.080 --> 0:35:59.600 we need to and then we got to put it 0:35:59.600 --> 0:36:01.680 back together. They're just like the paper rush at it 0:36:01.840 --> 0:36:03.640 so oh mad name. 0:36:05.760 --> 0:36:10.719 Tell me about it? Reusing the grass and the decision 0:36:11.040 --> 0:36:13.440 to do that. I feel like it's a big trend 0:36:14.120 --> 0:36:18.160 with these with with golf renovation projects that you know, 0:36:18.200 --> 0:36:20.920 we're going to do this project and I need the 0:36:21.040 --> 0:36:24.400 latest and greatest mono stand And what I mean by 0:36:24.480 --> 0:36:30.600 monostand is like single type of grass is kind of all. 0:36:30.920 --> 0:36:35.879 It seems like the trend versus taking your grass that's 0:36:35.920 --> 0:36:39.920 been played on for you know now home close to 0:36:40.000 --> 0:36:43.960 eighty years and and and saying this is this is 0:36:44.000 --> 0:36:46.239 our grass and we're going to reuse it. What's what 0:36:46.320 --> 0:36:49.840 are the benefits and drawbacks to making a decision to 0:36:50.040 --> 0:36:51.680 reuse your grass? Grass? 0:36:53.719 --> 0:36:55.759 So in a perfect world, I would love to have 0:36:56.800 --> 0:37:01.120 Oakmont or wing football of greens where I on this planet. 0:37:01.800 --> 0:37:05.040 That would be perfect. Maybe actually make it all fairways 0:37:05.360 --> 0:37:07.920 approaches and teas as well, not as well, right, let's 0:37:07.920 --> 0:37:11.279 just go make it all that. And then that black 0:37:11.280 --> 0:37:14.960 beauty rough too much turf type tall because it grabs 0:37:15.000 --> 0:37:17.759 the club face a little bit, but just enough. Some 0:37:17.800 --> 0:37:20.680 people are using the fine fescues in the rough now, 0:37:22.280 --> 0:37:24.680 but it would be nice to have. It's a nice 0:37:24.680 --> 0:37:28.560 to have Patterson Club. We had a lot of necessary things. 0:37:28.560 --> 0:37:30.960 We had a new irrigation system we needed, We needed 0:37:30.960 --> 0:37:33.040 to redo all the drainage. We needed to pore out 0:37:33.040 --> 0:37:36.239 the greens and get those things right. There was a 0:37:36.280 --> 0:37:39.279 lot of needs, and I didn't feel like Monostan was 0:37:39.320 --> 0:37:43.359 one of them. And also, you know, I always joke 0:37:43.400 --> 0:37:45.160 with people, I've never found a golf course. It didn't like, 0:37:45.680 --> 0:37:47.719 you know, I've never once played a golf course. I 0:37:47.760 --> 0:37:51.000 was like, up, that was a miserable day. You know, 0:37:51.080 --> 0:37:54.239 this just doesn't happen unless you're got there miserable right, 0:37:55.000 --> 0:37:59.680 and then had a terrible burger. But anyway, never had 0:37:59.719 --> 0:38:03.440 a bad d and a golf course. So one of 0:38:03.480 --> 0:38:06.200 my I'm gonna tell a quick story here, one of 0:38:06.200 --> 0:38:08.160 my members take me to Ireland. A member guests in 0:38:08.200 --> 0:38:10.560 Ireland every year and dune bag and it was so 0:38:10.640 --> 0:38:16.839 much fun and man, good living. Well. One year we 0:38:17.160 --> 0:38:19.239 went over to another golf course. He had just joined 0:38:19.239 --> 0:38:21.920 Hogshead and we took the airplane over there, and and 0:38:22.200 --> 0:38:25.080 about a couple of months beforehand, he goes, you know, Jay, 0:38:25.120 --> 0:38:27.720 he goes, what's with all these weeds in our native area? 0:38:28.200 --> 0:38:30.600 You know what's going on here? Like God, looks terrible. 0:38:31.000 --> 0:38:33.080 You know, when you're in the United States, it wants 0:38:33.160 --> 0:38:37.600 to be perfect, fine fescue and an inland parkland golf 0:38:37.600 --> 0:38:41.400 course which makes zero sense, right, can't have any weeds. 0:38:41.440 --> 0:38:43.319 It has to be just that. Then it has to 0:38:43.360 --> 0:38:46.319 be just the rough, then just the fairways. Anyways, we 0:38:46.320 --> 0:38:47.960 go out to this other golf course in Ireland and 0:38:49.560 --> 0:38:51.759 I grabbed the bag from my cadde so I got 0:38:51.760 --> 0:38:53.440 to get out of here. I can't be here anymore. 0:38:53.920 --> 0:38:56.080 And he looks at me all confused. I go, they 0:38:56.120 --> 0:38:58.960 got weeds in their native areas. I'm out of here. 0:39:00.239 --> 0:39:01.319 I'm going back to the bar. 0:39:01.680 --> 0:39:03.200 I can't hear you jammed them? 0:39:03.520 --> 0:39:06.520 I damned it, Yeah I did. Anyway, So after a 0:39:06.560 --> 0:39:08.960 couple of chuckles, you know, the reality is, you know, 0:39:09.000 --> 0:39:10.720 I've been fortunate to play a lot of great places 0:39:10.760 --> 0:39:13.640 all over the world, and Royal Dorni's not out there 0:39:13.680 --> 0:39:16.960 worrying about monotypes, you know, North Barracks, you know whatever, 0:39:17.120 --> 0:39:20.600 It's a mixed salad and it's amazing. It's show stopping, 0:39:21.200 --> 0:39:23.560 you know, it's the best thing you could have, you know, Royal. 0:39:23.800 --> 0:39:26.920 What about Barrora, If you ever played Barrora, You're like, 0:39:26.920 --> 0:39:28.560 that's where I want to wake up if I die. 0:39:28.840 --> 0:39:30.439 When I die, if I get a chance to play 0:39:30.440 --> 0:39:33.279 golf every day in the afterlife, it might be Borro 0:39:33.440 --> 0:39:36.360 If I had to pick one. I got sheep walking around. 0:39:36.400 --> 0:39:41.400 I have electric fences around the greens, and nothing's perfect, 0:39:41.600 --> 0:39:45.440 but everything's perfect, you know. So I don't know. 0:39:45.600 --> 0:39:50.759 That's so I'm a big anti monostand I guess it 0:39:50.800 --> 0:39:58.560 would be my stand, especially for an old golf course. Yeah. 0:39:58.640 --> 0:40:03.480 I think Bruce Happener once called it on this podcast 0:40:03.520 --> 0:40:06.520 the grass and when the way they they blend together 0:40:06.800 --> 0:40:09.760 and become what it is over one hundred years. That's 0:40:09.840 --> 0:40:15.000 like the Patina exactly golf course. And one of I 0:40:15.040 --> 0:40:19.280 think the more disturbing trends in golf is like we 0:40:19.280 --> 0:40:23.640 we do these twenty five million dollar projects and they 0:40:23.680 --> 0:40:26.480 come out and it's had one hundred year old golf course, 0:40:26.600 --> 0:40:28.200 and you come out and you look at it and 0:40:28.239 --> 0:40:32.000 it looks brand new because it's all brand new, singular 0:40:32.040 --> 0:40:35.719 type of grass, and it's like you've actually lost You've 0:40:35.760 --> 0:40:40.239 lost the nature and the essence of the interconnectivity of 0:40:40.320 --> 0:40:44.839 what Bobby Jones and Jean Sarasen played on when and 0:40:45.040 --> 0:40:47.640 the first year, you know, like you can at least say, 0:40:48.239 --> 0:40:52.600 you can say it's the same grass and a lot 0:40:52.640 --> 0:40:56.400 of clubs. What happened is that they have they've just 0:40:56.480 --> 0:41:00.640 swapped out grass and it's it's not an expensive line item, 0:41:00.680 --> 0:41:04.840 like you said, because you chose to keep the grass, 0:41:05.120 --> 0:41:07.719 is that had no issue there were it wasn't an 0:41:07.800 --> 0:41:10.880 issue because you chose to do that. You got to 0:41:10.920 --> 0:41:13.960 do eight new greens instead, which is going to make 0:41:14.080 --> 0:41:18.600 such a more bigger impact than a grass that over 0:41:18.680 --> 0:41:20.359 time is just going to become the same. 0:41:22.640 --> 0:41:25.920 Yeah. Yeah, you know, going into this project, we were 0:41:25.960 --> 0:41:28.799 going to add you know, we were going to add 0:41:31.680 --> 0:41:35.319 putting green square footage right about a half acre. So 0:41:37.040 --> 0:41:41.880 a good friend and someone that I trust, one of 0:41:41.920 --> 0:41:44.280 the guys I steal ideas from steal you know again, 0:41:44.480 --> 0:41:46.839 I'm as smart as my buddies, right, Like, that's it, 0:41:48.160 --> 0:41:50.480 Steve rabbitue wing Foot I called him up. But I'm like, 0:41:52.000 --> 0:41:54.640 I'm building some nurseries. I know you're great at it. 0:41:54.719 --> 0:41:56.680 Let me how'd you do it? Blah blah blah blah blah. 0:41:56.680 --> 0:41:59.440 Long story short, I dropped off a container and he 0:41:59.480 --> 0:42:01.759 filled up container full of his cores when he was 0:42:01.760 --> 0:42:04.640 doing erification. And you know I bought got him a 0:42:04.719 --> 0:42:08.560 Colony pizza truck for his efforts. You know, the whole 0:42:08.560 --> 0:42:10.480 staff was out there. I think Lebar's staff was there 0:42:10.560 --> 0:42:11.840 during that time of year as well. We had a 0:42:11.840 --> 0:42:15.080 big pizza party for him allowing us to use his course. 0:42:15.440 --> 0:42:19.160 We built three quarters of an acre of bn sorry 0:42:19.400 --> 0:42:23.840 wing Foot Poa greens nurseries before this project, knowing we 0:42:23.880 --> 0:42:28.800 needed to do expansions priceless right like right, we have 0:42:28.880 --> 0:42:31.920 this old beautiful grass and he's not that far away, 0:42:32.000 --> 0:42:34.680 so it's I would always hope it would become that 0:42:34.800 --> 0:42:38.960 over time. So you know that's when you come out 0:42:38.960 --> 0:42:42.440 here the first year, two years, you're gonna notice that 0:42:43.120 --> 0:42:46.120 the grass doesn't match up exactly the whatever. You know, 0:42:46.400 --> 0:42:48.439 there's a little more poe on this screen than bent 0:42:49.600 --> 0:42:51.960 whooped dee do You got to get it in the hole, right, like, 0:42:52.880 --> 0:42:53.759 just get it in the hole. 0:42:55.520 --> 0:42:59.960 So is the is the obviously Oakmont wing Foot legendary 0:43:00.120 --> 0:43:04.160 POA greens and the manner in which they kind of 0:43:04.239 --> 0:43:07.600 like do there what you talked about the sod farm, 0:43:07.680 --> 0:43:10.920 the aerification. They take the head of the plugs and 0:43:10.960 --> 0:43:15.080 then they grow their grass from the aerification plugs so 0:43:15.120 --> 0:43:18.560 that they always match. So is your hope then that 0:43:18.800 --> 0:43:23.000 over time that wing foot poa that you put in 0:43:23.520 --> 0:43:26.839 as part of your expansions will override the bent and 0:43:26.880 --> 0:43:31.400 you will effectively have the you know, yes, wingfoot poa 0:43:31.560 --> 0:43:33.560 greens at the Patterson Club. 0:43:34.080 --> 0:43:37.239 Yeah, that's that's kind of the idea. We'll take our 0:43:37.280 --> 0:43:40.719 favorite grass types when we redo our nurseries, and we 0:43:40.760 --> 0:43:43.200 will verify those greens and we'll go build some nurseries 0:43:43.239 --> 0:43:45.960 with it. Might even try to get another truckload from Rabbie. 0:43:47.320 --> 0:43:50.080 But yeah, basically, you just put down the greens mix 0:43:50.160 --> 0:43:53.839 you build kind of a I didn't build an entire green. 0:43:53.920 --> 0:43:56.280 I kind of went three to four inches of mix, 0:43:56.920 --> 0:44:00.480 minimal drainage, laid it down, rolled the snot out of it, 0:44:00.960 --> 0:44:04.760 keep rolling it, then start mowing it, top treuss it, whatever, 0:44:04.920 --> 0:44:07.480 and just get that stuff right. And then all of 0:44:07.480 --> 0:44:10.040 a sudden, Yeah, over time, if I get a if 0:44:10.080 --> 0:44:12.239 I'm out plugging out bad spots on greens when it 0:44:12.239 --> 0:44:18.120 comes to ballmarks or whatever, somebody spills of cocktail. You know, 0:44:18.160 --> 0:44:21.440 wing foot poets going in and then over time, Yeah, 0:44:21.600 --> 0:44:23.880 I mean, I don't promote seed heads, so I'm not 0:44:23.880 --> 0:44:27.080 gonna be able to like overset it that way. But yeah, 0:44:27.200 --> 0:44:29.479 over time the poe will just slowly creep in there. 0:44:29.880 --> 0:44:33.880 And and I think somebody told me one time in college. 0:44:33.920 --> 0:44:35.680 They were like, this is back before all the growth 0:44:35.680 --> 0:44:39.879 regulators when it comes to controlling post seedheads. Was if 0:44:39.920 --> 0:44:43.480 you want, if you want perfect poe of greens, you 0:44:43.560 --> 0:44:46.680 basically you know, you see them benkrass and wait seven 0:44:46.719 --> 0:44:53.319 years you'll have it. But you know, there is something 0:44:53.360 --> 0:44:55.960 to say with these monostands. And I understand what people 0:44:55.960 --> 0:44:58.759 are striving for. You know, when I was working at 0:44:58.760 --> 0:45:02.520 Caves Valley as a young sure like that was the 0:45:02.560 --> 0:45:04.480 hardest place to grow grass. Transition zones one of the 0:45:04.520 --> 0:45:07.680 hardest places grow grass in the country. And and you 0:45:07.680 --> 0:45:10.080 know you're on the fence. Do I do warm season? 0:45:10.120 --> 0:45:15.040 Do I do cool season grasses? And and having that 0:45:15.040 --> 0:45:17.880 that mono stand that kind of with stands, they heat better, 0:45:18.880 --> 0:45:22.560 less disease, it's better with disease. Pressure can be cut 0:45:22.600 --> 0:45:25.880 a little lower. All that stuff is helpful. And you 0:45:25.920 --> 0:45:29.680 do see some you know, you do see the equality 0:45:29.719 --> 0:45:32.719 of golf is the quality of the turf, not necessarily 0:45:32.719 --> 0:45:38.400 the golf. It is noticeable at times, but it's not like, uh, 0:45:39.680 --> 0:45:43.000 you know again, it's still going to just kind of 0:45:43.120 --> 0:45:45.960 revert to what it naturally wants to be, you know, 0:45:48.040 --> 0:45:51.000 over time. You know, I always joke also with my 0:45:51.000 --> 0:45:54.080 brothers in Philly, right, Philadelphia Cricket Club, and they just 0:45:54.080 --> 0:45:57.080 do an amazing job over there when they did their renovation. 0:45:57.160 --> 0:45:59.239 They went to one hundred percent mole of stands everywhere, 0:45:59.320 --> 0:46:03.120 you know. They they killed off the fairways, reseated them, 0:46:03.680 --> 0:46:07.799 rested all of their rough and then sat it out there. 0:46:07.880 --> 0:46:11.960 Creams approached his t's and you know, it's slowly over time, 0:46:12.000 --> 0:46:13.520 the poe is going to come in no matter what, 0:46:13.719 --> 0:46:16.160 and you don't notice it out there. Like it's been 0:46:16.200 --> 0:46:18.839 a while now since that work's been done, and it 0:46:18.840 --> 0:46:20.960 feels as good as it did the date opened. So 0:46:21.400 --> 0:46:24.600 you know, I don't I don't see that much value 0:46:24.600 --> 0:46:25.880 in it either, you know, I really don't. 0:46:27.760 --> 0:46:31.120 I heard you were camping on site during the project. 0:46:33.000 --> 0:46:35.080 What was that? What was that? 0:46:35.280 --> 0:46:41.840 So? So my role during this project as many hats, 0:46:42.920 --> 0:46:44.760 but the number one roll is to make sure everybody's 0:46:44.800 --> 0:46:47.600 planning it cool. Right, I think it was at a 0:46:47.600 --> 0:46:50.000 point in the project where you know, you can't see 0:46:50.000 --> 0:46:51.359 the light at the end of the tunnel. But we've 0:46:51.360 --> 0:46:53.640 been out here for a long time eating dust. We 0:46:53.640 --> 0:46:55.279 were in a major drought this year, and it was 0:46:55.560 --> 0:47:00.000 perfect for construction, terrible for watering sod. And everybody was 0:47:00.200 --> 0:47:05.759 just like, oh God, somebody shoot me. It was a 0:47:05.800 --> 0:47:08.359 long stretch. And at the same time we had this 0:47:08.760 --> 0:47:11.319 feature coming up one in eight, which is now are 0:47:11.360 --> 0:47:15.680 going to be our ten and seventeenth and and I 0:47:15.719 --> 0:47:18.279 couldn't visualize what these guys were seeing. And I don't 0:47:18.320 --> 0:47:20.160 know if they had an idea what they were seeing yet, 0:47:20.600 --> 0:47:24.080 but I knew everybody needed a good night. A neighboring club, 0:47:24.120 --> 0:47:27.440 Reading Reading Country Club, brett chap and the superintendent there 0:47:27.560 --> 0:47:31.399 hosted us that day. He said, Hey, come on out, 0:47:31.640 --> 0:47:33.160 I want to talk to you about our golf course, 0:47:33.200 --> 0:47:35.120 and you know, we'll have play some golf and have 0:47:35.160 --> 0:47:36.919 some dinner. So this is like the only day off 0:47:36.920 --> 0:47:39.640 we took all like throughout the entire time, you know, 0:47:41.480 --> 0:47:43.080 And we went over there and played some actually worked 0:47:43.120 --> 0:47:44.760 in the morning, but they went over there, played golf, 0:47:44.760 --> 0:47:48.200 had dinner, came back to what I have this big, large, 0:47:48.440 --> 0:47:51.560 old Booie turned into a fire like a fire pit. 0:47:51.600 --> 0:47:54.759 It's really it's really cool. It's it's as cool as 0:47:54.800 --> 0:47:59.080 like as the Polish pyramids. But we had this set 0:47:59.160 --> 0:48:03.120 up between the old one in eight future ten seventeen, 0:48:03.640 --> 0:48:08.600 and you know, we had some adult beverages. We had 0:48:08.760 --> 0:48:12.480 tents set up. Zach Varney, the project manager from Labar, 0:48:13.000 --> 0:48:16.480 set up a little miniature tent in a bunker, so 0:48:16.719 --> 0:48:22.080 that bunker will forever be Zach's bunker. Steve Kabicki, our 0:48:22.080 --> 0:48:25.040 golf course superintendent here he set up underneath the tree, 0:48:25.200 --> 0:48:27.560 similar tent underneath the tree. Jaeger and I ended up 0:48:27.600 --> 0:48:30.000 driving back to my airstream and I was like, you 0:48:30.040 --> 0:48:31.680 stay on that side of the airstream. I'll stand this 0:48:31.719 --> 0:48:35.880 side of the airstream. But yeah, we walked the property, 0:48:36.080 --> 0:48:41.640 had drank some adult beverages and laughed and talked and 0:48:41.760 --> 0:48:44.040 looked at what we had done and talked about what 0:48:44.080 --> 0:48:46.759 we should do. And that night I think again, I'm 0:48:46.760 --> 0:48:48.720 gonna take full credit to what might be the greatest 0:48:48.719 --> 0:48:51.799 surprise on property, which is that one in eight complex. 0:48:52.440 --> 0:48:55.000 If you follow us on Instagram, you'll see some of 0:48:55.000 --> 0:48:57.640 the pictures have come out. Jaeger posted a couple. I've 0:48:57.640 --> 0:49:04.760 posted a couple. It's spectacular. It's like it's so good, 0:49:05.040 --> 0:49:06.640 and it used to be just two greens kind of 0:49:06.680 --> 0:49:09.160 butted up with like a fox hole in the middle 0:49:10.280 --> 0:49:12.920 where the fox hole kind of stopped the interaction of 0:49:12.960 --> 0:49:16.200 the two holes kind of playing together. So instead of 0:49:16.280 --> 0:49:20.600 butting up, one went six feet higher and slightly right 0:49:20.640 --> 0:49:22.880 and the other one, as you're playing it went slightly 0:49:22.920 --> 0:49:26.120 lower and slightly right. So they kind of like are 0:49:26.200 --> 0:49:29.680 and intertwined with these really great bunkers. It's really great bunkering. 0:49:30.120 --> 0:49:33.160 And it might be the coolest surprise on the property. 0:49:33.160 --> 0:49:35.480 And it's our golf pro Chris Kenny called it that 0:49:35.520 --> 0:49:39.359 it's the best surprise that we've had so far. And 0:49:39.560 --> 0:49:42.640 I one hundred percent Nick Mills came up with this 0:49:43.080 --> 0:49:45.600 and I have to take full credit because it was 0:49:45.600 --> 0:49:48.920 on our camp out that that I'm taking full credit for. 0:49:49.800 --> 0:49:53.000 That idea came to came to existence, so and then 0:49:53.080 --> 0:49:59.360 Yager plowed it into you know, painted in with his dozer. Gosh, 0:49:59.360 --> 0:50:01.080 so much fun, so much fun. 0:50:01.520 --> 0:50:03.880 I mean it kind of ties. It's a great idea, 0:50:04.280 --> 0:50:06.759 you know, when you when you think about, like how 0:50:06.800 --> 0:50:09.920 do we make this this fun. And it sounds like 0:50:10.120 --> 0:50:13.600 in the particular time the camp out happened in the 0:50:13.680 --> 0:50:17.600 doldrums of the project as as a baseball fan would say, 0:50:17.640 --> 0:50:21.799 the dog days of August. Yes, is kind of when 0:50:21.880 --> 0:50:26.120 you in that project timeline infusing fun. And I think 0:50:26.160 --> 0:50:29.000 that's like, you know, the one of the hard things 0:50:29.239 --> 0:50:33.160 with anything, you know, you you as the superintendent, you're 0:50:33.480 --> 0:50:37.160 kind of you set the culture for you know, the 0:50:37.160 --> 0:50:40.239 the you know, outside of probably the weight staff at 0:50:40.239 --> 0:50:43.400 a club, the largest team at at a club, you 0:50:43.480 --> 0:50:47.400 set the culture and and it's important, you know, to 0:50:47.560 --> 0:50:52.440 know when you need to infuse something special or something 0:50:53.000 --> 0:50:57.439 into something to lighten the mood. And I think these 0:50:57.480 --> 0:51:01.359 people having been on site, it's these projects, they it 0:51:01.480 --> 0:51:05.279 is just such a uh, it's such a grind day 0:51:05.280 --> 0:51:09.040 in day out, and if you don't lighten that mood, 0:51:09.120 --> 0:51:12.360 it it you know what you said, how do we 0:51:12.400 --> 0:51:15.640 have the most fun? That's where it can turn in 0:51:15.760 --> 0:51:19.520 terms of of I always imagine that you're at the 0:51:19.560 --> 0:51:22.640 point you guys have done the raw construction work. And 0:51:22.719 --> 0:51:27.319 I always feel like if you're moving houses, you get 0:51:27.360 --> 0:51:29.279 done with all the big stuff and you're like, I'm 0:51:29.320 --> 0:51:32.400 almost done, But then you realize that you've got like 0:51:33.280 --> 0:51:35.560 just as much work with all the little stuff getting 0:51:35.600 --> 0:51:38.759 it into boxes. And the last is the seeming end 0:51:38.840 --> 0:51:40.919 of a move, is the worst part of the move. 0:51:41.440 --> 0:51:44.200 What is it? What's left for you guys? Now that 0:51:44.280 --> 0:51:48.280 you've you've got all the construction done, the grass is down, 0:51:49.160 --> 0:51:51.880 What are the kind of finan final pieces you have 0:51:51.960 --> 0:51:54.799 to do before opening day? And what does that look 0:51:54.880 --> 0:51:56.360 like for you and your team? 0:51:57.239 --> 0:51:59.919 Oh, we're yeah, we're gonna be sprinting to opening day. 0:52:00.160 --> 0:52:02.839 Like I mean, we have endless stuff to tie up. 0:52:02.840 --> 0:52:05.520 There's not a hole that's like done right, there's car 0:52:05.560 --> 0:52:10.120 path edges, there's car paths, there's there's endless workout there 0:52:10.200 --> 0:52:13.600 to be done. We still have a couple of teas 0:52:13.640 --> 0:52:16.319 to finish up. We have the driving range and the 0:52:16.360 --> 0:52:18.920 practice areas that are right up next to the clubhouse. 0:52:18.920 --> 0:52:21.120 Work that are going to kind of be last. So 0:52:21.200 --> 0:52:23.680 we will be you know, we'll be fighting it right 0:52:23.719 --> 0:52:25.520 to the very end, and then when we open up, 0:52:25.520 --> 0:52:28.719 we'll probably stuf have some other stuff to do. You know. 0:52:28.760 --> 0:52:31.160 One of the things I always joke with our members 0:52:31.239 --> 0:52:34.200 is I'm you know, my president might put a little 0:52:34.280 --> 0:52:36.759 choke collar on me right now because I'm usually used 0:52:36.760 --> 0:52:39.719 to annoying just my president or my grounds chair. But 0:52:40.600 --> 0:52:42.200 you know, I always joke with people that we're not 0:52:42.200 --> 0:52:43.920 going to settle down. We're not going to let it rest. 0:52:44.200 --> 0:52:46.239 We're going right into what I call beyond the rough, 0:52:46.840 --> 0:52:49.799 so beyond the plane areas basically right, We're gonna do 0:52:49.840 --> 0:52:55.080 more rock art, We're gonna do more beehives, pollinator pathways. 0:52:56.480 --> 0:52:58.200 You know, how can we We want to do a 0:52:58.239 --> 0:52:59.960 little pumpkin gardens so I don't have to buy its 0:53:00.000 --> 0:53:03.759 defensive pumpkins every year, you know, right next to our nurseries. 0:53:04.040 --> 0:53:06.680 So there's endless work to be done after the project, 0:53:06.800 --> 0:53:09.080 but it's going to be a race to the end. 0:53:09.160 --> 0:53:11.520 And then you know, we have this horse farm next 0:53:11.520 --> 0:53:14.239 door that's owned by the autubond and they have a 0:53:14.360 --> 0:53:18.960 life the horse farm has a lifetime lease, so you know, 0:53:19.000 --> 0:53:21.759 when that thing comes available someday down the road, that's 0:53:21.800 --> 0:53:24.040 our pollinator par three. And then we hope we can 0:53:24.040 --> 0:53:27.000 get a beach club someday. And you know, so it's 0:53:27.040 --> 0:53:28.920 long range planning is the name of the game, and 0:53:29.120 --> 0:53:31.759 just you know, just keeping everybody focused on the big 0:53:31.760 --> 0:53:35.600 picture down the road. So I'll be distracting people with 0:53:35.640 --> 0:53:37.960 that while we're tying up the loose ends, getting ready 0:53:38.000 --> 0:53:40.919 to open up this golf course. But you're never done, 0:53:40.960 --> 0:53:41.840 You're never done. 0:53:42.719 --> 0:53:47.160 Awesome, Well, Jason, I can't wait to come out and 0:53:47.360 --> 0:53:50.120 see Patterson Club. It's going to be on my short 0:53:50.120 --> 0:53:53.960 list of places to see in twenty twenty six. I 0:53:55.160 --> 0:53:58.200 got to play more golf in Connecticut, so you know, 0:53:58.280 --> 0:54:01.799 it's a good place to start. And thanks for coming on. 0:54:01.960 --> 0:54:04.840 I hope you have a great holidays, and most importantly, 0:54:05.520 --> 0:54:06.120 go bears. 0:54:06.480 --> 0:54:09.839 Yeah, bear down, buddy, bear down. Happy holidays. Thank you 0:54:09.880 --> 0:54:11.920 so much for having me. Great stuff. 0:54:12.239 --> 0:54:26.960 Cheers all right, big thanks for listening to our final 0:54:27.040 --> 0:54:29.919 podcast of the year. Big thanks to everybody for making 0:54:29.960 --> 0:54:33.160 this a great year, as well as a thank you 0:54:33.200 --> 0:54:38.279 to PJ Clark, our faithful editor and who's produced this 0:54:39.080 --> 0:54:43.239 podcast brilliantly over the course of the year. PJ and 0:54:43.280 --> 0:54:46.280 I had a long call about next year. Really excited. 0:54:46.320 --> 0:54:49.200 We're going to cook up some new stuff and try 0:54:49.200 --> 0:54:52.480 and push this podcast up another level. So thank you 0:54:52.520 --> 0:54:54.719 to everybody who's been with us for a long time. 0:54:54.800 --> 0:54:58.040 Thank you to everybody who listened to their first episodes 0:54:58.080 --> 0:55:01.239 this year. Can't wait for twenty twenty six and to 0:55:01.239 --> 0:55:04.480 get back on the grind. I hope everybody has a 0:55:04.520 --> 0:55:08.640 great holiday season and a great, safe new year. We'll 0:55:08.680 --> 0:55:10.040 see you in twenty twenty six.