Speaker 1: Welcome back to another edition of the Frida Egg Podcast.
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Speaker 1: back with another episode and today we are joined by
Speaker 1: Craig Moore. He is the head of Grounds at Marquette
Speaker 1: Golf Club all the way up in the Upper Peninsula
Speaker 1: of Michigan. Craig is a golf course, architecture, golf history
Speaker 1: nut and takes meticulous care of the courses up at Marquette.
Speaker 1: He has both a Golden Age design in the Langford
Speaker 1: Moreau nine Heritage course at Marquette as well as the
Speaker 1: modern Mike Devreese eighteen holes at Gray Walls. So Craig
Speaker 1: is deeply into our architecture and also maintains a course
Speaker 1: in one of the most one of the harshest and
Speaker 1: shortest seasons in the United States. So we talk a
Speaker 1: little bit about architecture of the courses and the unique
Speaker 1: challenges that he has up in Marquette, Michigan. Enjoy the podcast.
Speaker 1: I miss a Green. For example, I'm already upset when
Speaker 1: I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset.
Speaker 2: And when I find my ball.
Speaker 1: In arid egg Frida egg, the dreaded Frida, egg Frida,
Speaker 1: egg Frida, egg bride egg Lie, I'm about ready to
Speaker 1: run off the course. All right, all right, Craig, we're
Speaker 1: here in Marquette, Michigan.
Speaker 2: What's silly?
Speaker 1: Yeah, what's it like living here?
Speaker 2: It's like a fantasy, man, I'll just be honest with you.
Speaker 2: It's it's crazy good. You know, you got the extreme
Speaker 2: of all four seasons. Summers. You can't beat it. If
Speaker 2: you like winter recreation, you cannot beat it. Because winter comes,
Speaker 2: we get snow and it stays. So yeah, it's like
Speaker 2: a fantasy for me.
Speaker 1: How much snow and how cold are we talking? I mean,
Speaker 1: you're almost the northern tip of the continent, all you guys.
Speaker 2: Sure, yeah, yeah, we're I mean we're the north coast
Speaker 2: of America up here, we like to call it. We
Speaker 2: get right right around two hundred and thirty inches here
Speaker 2: in the Marquette area. And so when it comes and
Speaker 2: when it's winter. It's here, but we do have the
Speaker 2: lake that kind of moderates the temperature so it doesn't
Speaker 2: get brutally brutally cold. We do some stretches, but nothing
Speaker 2: like like you see in the Dakotas or Minnesota.
Speaker 1: So it's say it's an air conditioner in the summer.
Speaker 1: The lake Superior is an air conditioner in the summer
Speaker 1: and heater in the winter. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, so we'll get our we'll get our ninety degree
Speaker 2: days in the summer, but it's usually not all day long.
Speaker 2: We get a little push from the lake and boom
Speaker 2: back down to seventies. So it's a glory. It's a
Speaker 2: glorious thing.
Speaker 1: So you've been at Gray Walls. You came here right
Speaker 1: at the construction start. So you in Marquette Golf Club's interesting.
Speaker 1: It's a unique situation where you're semi private model. You've
Speaker 1: got members, two golf courses, one modern one one classic.
Speaker 1: You kind of have all. You have a nine building
Speaker 1: the sixties, so you got you got every type of
Speaker 1: golf architecture. Here. Tell us about your life at Marquette
Speaker 1: Golf Club.
Speaker 2: Well, it started out my wife's born race here in
Speaker 2: Marquette Okay, grew up in Lawa, Michigan, and my father
Speaker 2: in law has been a member here for god probably
Speaker 2: going on forty years now. And so my wife was
Speaker 2: on this property when she was younger. But I started
Speaker 2: dating here back at ninety nine two thousand, started really
Speaker 2: coming up here a lot and and playing the course,
Speaker 2: and by then I had done the Kingsley Club. So
Speaker 2: I got to know Mike obviously real well, and we
Speaker 2: hit it off, and he'd do sit visits up here,
Speaker 2: and if I was up here, i'd go on the
Speaker 2: site visit with him. Got to meet Pete Schevratt, who
Speaker 2: was the previous superintendent and project manager for the Gray
Speaker 2: Walls course when we're building it, and you know, we
Speaker 2: just kind of really hit it off. So that kind
Speaker 2: of got me up here. My wife got in to
Speaker 2: get her PhD, so we had to leave for two years.
Speaker 2: We went down to MSU, she completed that. Then the
Speaker 2: job opened, the head job opened up here, and this
Speaker 2: was after the construction everything. We left for a couple
Speaker 2: of years. So two thousand and six I got a
Speaker 2: call from Mike saying, Hey, I'm Pete's leaving. You'll probably
Speaker 2: get a call from somebody at the club here and
Speaker 2: lo and behold, Kenny Roushill gave me a call and
Speaker 2: came out up for an interview. And it was one
Speaker 2: of those situations where I walked out the interview walking
Speaker 2: out and I'm like, well, yeah, I just I know
Speaker 2: it's a good fit, and I'm pretty sure they do too.
Speaker 2: And it was kind of an how we're never situation
Speaker 2: for me is like, either this is the time to
Speaker 2: come up and and be and be up here, or
Speaker 2: it wasn't gonna happen in this area. So went back
Speaker 2: talked to my wife. She was just done with the coursework,
Speaker 2: she could do her dissertation anywhere, and and we had
Speaker 2: headed up here. So made the decision, came up. She's
Speaker 2: a professor here at Northern Now and so everything worked
Speaker 2: out really well.
Speaker 1: You grew up golf family, you know, family of golf nuts,
Speaker 1: and when did you decide that you really wanted to
Speaker 1: do the turf.
Speaker 2: So, yeah, my dad was one of the just a
Speaker 2: great animateur player, and he was one of the best
Speaker 2: in the state for many years, and so our summer
Speaker 2: vacation kind of revolved around his his golf schedule. We
Speaker 2: spent a lot of time on in Potaski Charlotoy area
Speaker 2: while he was playing the Michigan am was his big.
Speaker 1: Things that Belvetere every year for a really long time.
Speaker 2: Absolutely yeah, And so that kind of you know, playing
Speaker 2: the courses back down there, you know, and then going
Speaker 2: up there and walking around to watch him play. It
Speaker 2: was just like, wow, this is different, Like this is
Speaker 2: really cool, Like what's different about this? So that got
Speaker 2: me thinking about it. So then I just started reading
Speaker 2: on it. And then everything I could read on on
Speaker 2: architecture what I just started picking up back then and reading,
Speaker 2: and uh, it was I went over to my parents,
Speaker 2: moved to Traverse City, and my brother, my older brother Chris,
Speaker 2: actually went to look for work for us for summer.
Speaker 2: He went over to this course called Mistwood, went over there.
Speaker 2: They were doing another nine. Okay, they had eighteen. They
Speaker 2: built another nine, and went over there and did the
Speaker 2: construction on that nine. And I worked for Dan Lucas,
Speaker 2: who's currently at the Kingsley Club, did the Kingsley Club.
Speaker 2: And that's what got me hooked. Like right then, like
Speaker 2: that summer of construction, I was like, wow, this is
Speaker 2: really cool. And from then I just I just stayed
Speaker 2: focused and and I just you know kind of person
Speaker 2: where well that's what I'm gonna do. I'm just gonna
Speaker 2: go do it, you know. And so I just went
Speaker 2: and did it. So I went to Michigan State and
Speaker 2: got the Crop and Soil Science degree and turf grass
Speaker 2: management and yeah, so.
Speaker 1: That's that's where you met Mike was at kings.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's where I met Mike Deres at Kingsley Club.
Speaker 1: That had to be a pretty cool experience bill that course.
Speaker 2: It was awesome, awesome. Yeah, I was able to another
Speaker 2: young man but the name of Tim Hall came over
Speaker 2: from Manchester and so he joined our crew too, and
Speaker 2: him and I h a lot of handwork with with
Speaker 2: Mike on the golf course, so a lot of the
Speaker 2: finishing stuff. Mike was so hands on with that project.
Speaker 2: You know, everything got got a landscape break at the
Speaker 2: end before we seedd it. So we would do all
Speaker 2: that finishing work with him and then him and I
Speaker 2: was pretty much seeded the place, so behind every all
Speaker 2: the other activity.
Speaker 1: So and then you were part of this bill at
Speaker 1: gray Wallace.
Speaker 2: Absolutely.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So when I came up here in three Pete who
Speaker 2: was here before me, became the project manager and it
Speaker 2: was just too much for him to even do anything
Speaker 2: on the heritage course, so brought me up. He said, here,
Speaker 2: take this over. When you get when the guys are gone,
Speaker 2: come over here and give me a hand. So that's
Speaker 2: why I did, so, you know, running the h and
Speaker 2: then at the end of the day, I was just
Speaker 2: coming over here and whatever Pete needed, whoever Mike needed,
Speaker 2: I would just come over here, and you know we'd
Speaker 2: work till dark.
Speaker 1: So but uh, I guess, you know, being part of
Speaker 1: two bills, it's like, how would you compare and contrast
Speaker 1: the two properties, and and you know with gray Walls,
Speaker 1: is I think like one of these experiences like completely
Speaker 1: different type of golf course than anywhere in America, but
Speaker 1: in Kingsley is also just this wonderful place. But like
Speaker 1: what what do you would you say are similarities and
Speaker 1: differences between the two projects.
Speaker 2: Well that you saw, you know, similarities just the way
Speaker 2: Mike's Bills is greens for instance, you know, with favorable
Speaker 2: locations and maybe not so favorable locations. You just gotta
Speaker 2: really think when you're going into the into the green
Speaker 2: complex where you want to be. Okay, So and you
Speaker 2: got to think in your previous shot as well, like,
Speaker 2: where do you want to put on the fairway? Hey,
Speaker 2: you got a massive fairway, but guess what, you know,
Speaker 2: you might want to be on the left side. You
Speaker 2: might not alway want to be on that right side,
Speaker 2: but you have to think about it you go around.
Speaker 2: So those are the similarities. There's a lot of banks
Speaker 2: and stuff you can work with, backstops that you can
Speaker 2: work with that maybe make some greens that are already big,
Speaker 2: even bigger than what they actually are because you do
Speaker 2: have those backstops.
Speaker 1: So that's uh, the I mean the routing here at
Speaker 1: gray Wallace is I mean, it's just unbelievable that there's
Speaker 1: able to get a golf course. I mean, what were
Speaker 1: your first impressions when you came to this site?
Speaker 2: That that yeah, that is that is good. So doing
Speaker 2: safe visits with Mike this is it was a heavily
Speaker 2: forested piece of property, okay, and that you wouldn't even
Speaker 2: know that a lot of these rock out crops existed
Speaker 2: because they were just you know, covered in trees, buried
Speaker 2: in trees. And so you're walking through these areas and
Speaker 2: we're wearing the orange vest, you know, and he's telling
Speaker 2: you how to stand here. So you can go up here,
Speaker 2: up there and laser back to your orange vest and
Speaker 2: kind of get yardages. And yeah, it was just I'm
Speaker 2: coming across in these areas and just shaking my head
Speaker 2: in my mind. You know, I get a lot of
Speaker 2: agronomic thoughts going through my mind, like, how the hell
Speaker 2: are we gonna go grass here? You know, how the
Speaker 2: hell is this gonna happen? And uh, and Mike was persistent, Oh,
Speaker 2: it's gonna work, It's gonna work. It's gonna be so cool.
Speaker 2: And I mean we worked. It was just it's worked out.
Speaker 2: But it took the routing here. He had to be
Speaker 2: I don't know how many hours might put in on it,
Speaker 2: but he had. He had just been a major head
Speaker 2: scratcher for him and he had a lot of holes
Speaker 2: out there that just didn't work out obviously to make
Speaker 2: things connect and keep flowing. But the end routing, the
Speaker 2: end result is is awesome because not only the geology
Speaker 2: the topography we have with the hills and the rock,
Speaker 2: but we also have the gas line that runs through
Speaker 2: the property that you don't even know who they are
Speaker 2: and if you're a golfer, and then we also have
Speaker 2: the Oreana which which separates the prior to two courses,
Speaker 2: and so he had those two environmental restrictions to work
Speaker 2: with to route around as well, So it wasn't just
Speaker 2: the rock.
Speaker 1: What and in terms of build obviously your season is
Speaker 1: very short here.
Speaker 2: Yeah, what what.
Speaker 1: Was the building construction process like with such a condensed
Speaker 1: time to get eighteen holes done? Did it take? Was
Speaker 1: it a year? Year and a half? Two years?
Speaker 2: So that that was a big difference from the Kingsley Club. Okay,
Speaker 2: at Kingsley we were the construction crew. Like we you know,
Speaker 2: we did everything. I mean Dan ran heavy equipment. Mike
Speaker 2: was obviously on heavy equipment, which he was here too,
Speaker 2: but just not to the extent that he was in
Speaker 2: the Kingsy Club. So we had a company called Northern
Speaker 2: Clearing out of Northern Wisconsin that came and did the construction.
Speaker 2: So that was definitely different. And they cranked it out.
Speaker 2: I mean two thousand and three was the big construction year,
Speaker 2: and those guys humped it. I mean they got her done.
Speaker 2: Treeworks started, you know, the previous years. It did some
Speaker 2: small blasting previous years, but that two thousand and three
Speaker 2: was the big year, and I mean we were mowing
Speaker 2: turf by the end of the year.
Speaker 1: So talk tell us a little bit about, you know,
Speaker 1: the for people that haven't been to Gray Walls, tell
Speaker 1: us a little bit about the unique the kind of
Speaker 1: the landscape of the area and the golf course, how
Speaker 1: it kind of winds its way through the property.
Speaker 2: Sure. So Marquette, Michigan sits on the southern tip of
Speaker 2: the Canadian Shield. Okay, so you got this huge, massive
Speaker 2: granite formation up in Canada, comes underneath Lake Superior, and
Speaker 2: then it kind of ends here in Marquette. So you
Speaker 2: exit Marquette, you get through the Market Mountain range, you
Speaker 2: get past the ski hill and just flattens out and
Speaker 2: it's just sand. Okay, So we just have this wild,
Speaker 2: just bizarre terrain right here all right, and full of
Speaker 2: rockout crops Okay, very weathered rock out crops, but there
Speaker 2: the scale of them is is just amazing. When you
Speaker 2: do get into an open area and you see it,
Speaker 2: it just you're like, Wow, what the heck is that? Yeah,
Speaker 2: it's really cool.
Speaker 1: So so you know, with this golf course, you've got
Speaker 1: to you know, you've got Marquette Golf Club and Gray Walls,
Speaker 1: which Marquette Golf Club the original nine was built by
Speaker 1: lang from a Row. Yes, and then David Gill came
Speaker 1: in and and built nine holes. You know, before you
Speaker 1: got here, what did you know about lang from a Row?
Speaker 1: And and you know, how is that you know kind
Speaker 1: of changed, you know and educated. Obviously there's some spectacular
Speaker 1: golf alls out there. And uh, a little bit about
Speaker 1: how Langford Morreau got up here. I just asked you
Speaker 1: like seventeen questions.
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, yeah, I'll take that run.
Speaker 1: So yeah.
Speaker 2: So obviously Langford Merur the Chicago district. You know, they
Speaker 2: worked their way north, okay, and as they started getting
Speaker 2: into northern Wisconsin into the up it's things back then
Speaker 2: they did things different back then, you know, they didn't
Speaker 2: they couldn't just go to a bank and get a
Speaker 2: loan to the build a place. So they had the
Speaker 2: raise of funds to do it. So and then up
Speaker 2: in the in the north woods up here, there wasn't
Speaker 2: as much money, okay, so they would just start with
Speaker 2: nine holes, all right. A lot of them never went
Speaker 2: back to the other nine. They just stayed nine holes.
Speaker 2: So so Langford and meryal so they might have designed
Speaker 2: drawn up eighteen, but they just it just didn't get done, okay,
Speaker 2: and then a lot of the clubs just kind of
Speaker 2: lost the history of it, you know, and just didn't
Speaker 2: even realize what they had, which happened here for many, many,
Speaker 2: many years. So when Mike got on the scene, okay,
Speaker 2: then all of a sudden, you know, he's a big
Speaker 2: obviously a big golf architecture guy, history guy, I am
Speaker 2: as well, and so we started kind of just bringing
Speaker 2: that here to the club and getting these people to
Speaker 2: read it, okay, And they actually didn't even they didn't
Speaker 2: even know they had the original routing from lakerd Bureau
Speaker 2: for all eighteen up until gosh, it was probably two
Speaker 2: thousand and two thousand and one when when Ron Woitten
Speaker 2: actually found a copy of it and brought to the
Speaker 2: club's attention. Now going back in the Minutes, the history
Speaker 2: of the Minutes and the club, they did actually find
Speaker 2: a small copy of that, but they just didn't realize
Speaker 2: they had it. So then they started recognizing, wholl you know,
Speaker 2: we do have something really cool here. And and so
Speaker 2: it's kind of been a pet project to mind because
Speaker 2: we don't have much money up here, you know, to
Speaker 2: just kind of blow things up. We can just they're
Speaker 2: here for golf, they want to play golf, and then
Speaker 2: and then that's super cool, and and so we don't
Speaker 2: we don't want to disrupt that much either. So kind
Speaker 2: of a pet project to mind has been that there
Speaker 2: was original nine holes over over on the heritage course
Speaker 2: to kind of one. It was the green pads a
Speaker 2: trunk up like always happened. Okay, so you had all
Speaker 2: those laws lost, the greens pad, lost corridors on the
Speaker 2: green so rowing those out to approach height was huge.
Speaker 2: So you can see the pad, okay, and now we're
Speaker 2: in the process that, yeah, let's start getting some out
Speaker 2: to green height so we can get those pins back.
Speaker 2: So we got one back to green's height. The restaurant
Speaker 2: just mode at least that approach height. So it's pretty cool.
Speaker 2: So we're doing some tree work, bringing back some shot
Speaker 2: options off some teas that we had lost, and there's
Speaker 2: there's a little bit of bunker work. They didn't do
Speaker 2: a ton of changes, like I said, they never had
Speaker 2: a lot of money, but there is some changes in
Speaker 2: the bunkers and it wouldn't be real tough to bring
Speaker 2: it back. But it's just not a huge priority right
Speaker 2: now because you know, the focus is short of golf season.
Speaker 1: Let's tea baby, Yeah, talk about the short I mean,
Speaker 1: it's a golf crazed community here. What type of volume
Speaker 1: are you doing on the on each course and over
Speaker 1: the course of what and what's your season?
Speaker 2: Like we always we always joked that we always call
Speaker 2: it the factory. Its place is just the factory, man,
Speaker 2: because people are just rolling. They love their golf carts
Speaker 2: and they love just going. And we've had seasons upwards
Speaker 2: of fifty five thousand rounds on the two courses, which
Speaker 2: is insane you think about it. But that was a
Speaker 2: season where we actually got we got going in March, okay,
Speaker 2: and it was a long fall we got. They played
Speaker 2: all the way till into November that year. Okay. It's
Speaker 2: usually right around forty five or so in the two courses,
Speaker 2: which is still a lot. Majority of that play now
Speaker 2: is on the Gray Walls Course, okay, just because we
Speaker 2: get a lot of outside play and so a lot
Speaker 2: of the out of towners obviously they come up here
Speaker 2: to play the Gray Walls course, and and so it's
Speaker 2: just not as much on the Heritage, but we still
Speaker 2: do get a lot of rounds on the Heritage it
Speaker 2: seems like every year. It kind of we're kind of
Speaker 2: keeps building with that.
Speaker 1: With that volume in the short season, you don't have
Speaker 1: a lot of time, you know, you can't afford a
Speaker 1: one week shut down to do a project. So like
Speaker 1: like you illuminated too, you don't have a huge budget here, No,
Speaker 1: not a big staff. You've got a small staff. How
Speaker 1: what are the ways that you've been kind of thrifty, innovative,
Speaker 1: creative and getting stuff done?
Speaker 2: So yeah, so we have our total budget is right
Speaker 2: around seven hundred for thirty six holes. Okay, not a lot,
Speaker 2: And if you play this place, you'd think no way,
Speaker 2: you know, because it's I got a great crew and
Speaker 2: we're able to We're able to get a lot of
Speaker 2: stuff accomplished with with not a lot our shoulder seasons
Speaker 2: some years they don't exist, okay, And that's when clubs
Speaker 2: do work on golf courses in the shoulder seasons, and
Speaker 2: there's some years we just mow mosters. We just don't
Speaker 2: have it. So that's why we can't do a lot
Speaker 2: of that stuff. You know, when the snow melts, they
Speaker 2: literally want the golf course open within a day or two. Okay,
Speaker 2: So we are grinding it to get it open for him,
Speaker 2: because we understand because we want to golf too, and
Speaker 2: we all love golf too, and we want to see
Speaker 2: it right behind them. So we're gonna get it done
Speaker 2: for him. And and then the same thing in the fall.
Speaker 2: I mean, they want to play right up to till
Speaker 2: when when when the snowflies. So so that's why a
Speaker 2: lot of that stuff can't can't get done. And it's
Speaker 2: like saying the shortest seasons. We don't want to disrupt
Speaker 2: their season either with a lot of projects. So so
Speaker 2: the treework on the heritage course that we that we
Speaker 2: wanted to get done, we decided to do that this
Speaker 2: past winter. Okay, Well, how are we gonna pay for it? Okay?
Speaker 2: Because the stuff in the Heritage course was all handwork,
Speaker 2: and so now you know spinding, like, how can we
Speaker 2: make this work? How can we make this work? So
Speaker 2: we had some lumber, some lumbered acreage over here in
Speaker 2: the Gray Walls course okay, And we were able to
Speaker 2: get a logger in and they were able to do
Speaker 2: a select cut through these areas okay, And we were
Speaker 2: able to make some coin on the on the lumber,
Speaker 2: which was awesome. So now we were able to take
Speaker 2: that those moneyes those dollars and pay for the work,
Speaker 2: the handwork, the head to get done on the heritage course.
Speaker 2: And so it worked out. So that was one creative
Speaker 2: way that we were able to get get some treework
Speaker 2: done in the wintertime, which I'm telling you right now
Speaker 2: it wasn't easy. Trying to keep an ice rode open
Speaker 2: in the middle of a golf course up here in
Speaker 2: the wintertime was not easy. Is trying my patience. But
Speaker 2: we we I knew the importance of it. So we
Speaker 2: we beer downing and got her on that first location
Speaker 2: that we worked on.
Speaker 1: Well, it's an interesting thing where you're kind of restoring
Speaker 1: a classic nine holes. Yeah, and you're working on this
Speaker 1: restoration work, but then you've also got this modern golf
Speaker 1: course where you're constantly you're trying to mature it. And
Speaker 1: we played this morning. You said, this place keeps getting
Speaker 1: better and better. What what type of things do you do?
Speaker 1: How do you take a golf course? And we see
Speaker 1: so many what happened to your nine hole Langford Moreau
Speaker 1: where green shrink, it deteriorates after opening, and you see
Speaker 1: it so many places like I played a place a
Speaker 1: couple May last year, which hadn't been open that long,
Speaker 1: and you're like, God, you already are seeing what you see.
Speaker 1: You know, usually eighty years later you're starting to see
Speaker 1: the first effects. So how do you keep a golf course?
Speaker 1: You know, playing to the architects intent?
Speaker 2: So I kind of have I kind of have the
Speaker 2: advantage because I know Mike so well, okay, and just
Speaker 2: building on the construction for two of his properties with him,
Speaker 2: you know, so I kind of I know what kind
Speaker 2: of what I know what Mike wants, okay, And we
Speaker 2: talk a lot, okay about stuff, especially when it comes up.
Speaker 2: We're constantly just talking about things on the golf course. Okay.
Speaker 2: So when you when you first when we first built
Speaker 2: the place, you just don't know how everything is gonna
Speaker 2: happen on the golf course, okay. You don't know exactly
Speaker 2: how the ball is going to react okay in certain locations,
Speaker 2: and you just have to watch. Okay. I play a
Speaker 2: lot of golf, and I play got a lot of
Speaker 2: golf for a reason. I'm I consider myself a surface manager. Okay.
Speaker 2: We manage the surface for the game, okay, and that's
Speaker 2: then that's my priority, okay. And to me, it's like
Speaker 2: the best way I do that is actually play okay,
Speaker 2: and watch people play and see where they end up okay,
Speaker 2: and see some frustrations and can you alleviate those frustrations okay.
Speaker 2: So on this on the Graywls property here, there's a
Speaker 2: lot of areas, some of the native areas okay, that
Speaker 2: maybe grew in some locations that maybe we shouldn't have
Speaker 2: had it okay, So we made some adjustments there okay.
Speaker 2: Or maybe we want it there, but it's just not
Speaker 2: growing the way we want it, okay. So we go
Speaker 2: in and we manage it differently. We do a lot
Speaker 2: of flail mowing and cutting just to kind of knock
Speaker 2: it back. So if your ball does go in there, boom,
Speaker 2: you see it, you can go in there, get some
Speaker 2: iron on it, get it out, move on. You're still
Speaker 2: happy okay. And you're not in there, you know, on
Speaker 2: your hands and knees trying to find it okay. So
Speaker 2: we're always trying to look at those areas okay. And
Speaker 2: then the other part is trying to keep the forest back. Okay.
Speaker 2: That's you want to keep these you want to keep
Speaker 2: these corridors open, okay. That the original quarters that Mike
Speaker 2: opened up for the golf course. And if you don't
Speaker 2: do anything, the saplings are going to grow in. Saplings
Speaker 2: turn into trees. You know, trees turn into a lousy
Speaker 2: golf course. So it's it's constantly fighting that back and
Speaker 2: managing those locations and keeping it open so people can
Speaker 2: see those rock features and can see that with you know,
Speaker 2: on the golf course and have that to work with.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I imagine with like a forest, it's a living thing.
Speaker 1: So if you say, if you had to estimate, I
Speaker 1: never thought about this before, but if you just don't
Speaker 1: do anything, how much do you think a forest would
Speaker 1: encroach on a yearly basis, like a number of feet?
Speaker 1: Like I've talked to superintendents in the South that say,
Speaker 1: you know the Bermuda greens. If you don't, you know,
Speaker 1: there's a natural creep that are shrinking the greens. But
Speaker 1: like with a with a with a forest, would you
Speaker 1: you know, would you lose a couple of feet every
Speaker 1: every year?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Maybe more? Yeah, you don't even realize it is amazing.
Speaker 2: A lot of photos. I'd look back at a lot
Speaker 2: of my pictures and kind of see where the lines
Speaker 2: are and see, Okay, well, we got to get back
Speaker 2: to that line. Okay, we might have lost them. It
Speaker 2: had some sapling growth in there, and so we got
Speaker 2: to get back to that line just to keep that,
Speaker 2: keep that in place.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what's you You talked a little bit about uh
Speaker 1: doing making a change to the golf course, Like is
Speaker 1: there a specific one that comes to mind like that
Speaker 1: after watching people play or playing yourself or you know,
Speaker 1: you got three boys that all play, so you play
Speaker 1: a ton with them. Yep.
Speaker 2: Big one was the right of number one green. Okay,
Speaker 2: there was a native area that kind of pushed up
Speaker 2: on one green and that was a frustration points. If
Speaker 2: you missed that green, it rolled in there. Now you're
Speaker 2: hitting not only are you hitting on this trying to
Speaker 2: lob it up there, but you got to hit on
Speaker 2: this hay. So that that went by by, okay, And
Speaker 2: that was a that was a big move, right A.
Speaker 2: Number two was another really big one. You miss right
Speaker 2: on that fairways kind of kick right into the natural area, okay,
Speaker 2: and it was just two thack and too nasty. And
Speaker 2: so we just had a completely you know, change the
Speaker 2: way we managed that area and now it's much much
Speaker 2: more playable. You just get in there whack your shadow.
Speaker 2: You're still kind of penalized for hitting it right, but
Speaker 2: there's you're not gonna have lost ball that you go
Speaker 2: in the woods and and you can just get in
Speaker 2: there and hit it out. So those are two big areas.
Speaker 1: On the Marquette course. On the original the Langford you've
Speaker 1: done a ton of tree removal, like you were alluding to.
Speaker 1: And how how have you with membership fought you know, Oh,
Speaker 1: you're taking out trees. You're making this easier, or you're
Speaker 1: expanding the green there's more short grass, you're making this easier.
Speaker 1: Has that been a struggle?
Speaker 2: No, it really hasn't. There's there's some that kind of
Speaker 2: ask what's going on and kind of question it, you know,
Speaker 2: and they might think it might get easier until they
Speaker 2: actually get out there and see it when it's all
Speaker 2: when it's all done. Also, you got this gorgeous so
Speaker 2: that you didn't even have before looking across from one
Speaker 2: fair to the other and they're like whoa, whoa, Okay, okay.
Speaker 2: And as far as the greens, no, I mean it's
Speaker 2: they've pretty much embraced it now for the most part
Speaker 2: that that this is really cool and this is the
Speaker 2: way way it should be.
Speaker 1: So I noticed the the greens played really on that
Speaker 1: on that golf course, they're really firm and and I'm
Speaker 1: guessing that when you got here with the trees and
Speaker 1: the shrunken greens, was it a softer fee.
Speaker 2: It you know, I wouldn't say it was softer it was.
Speaker 2: It's still played really firm back over there. We've always
Speaker 2: had some uh, some water issues on this golf course.
Speaker 2: They the water supply some years isn't adequate to keep
Speaker 2: things nuclear green, which obviously we don't want to do,
Speaker 2: but some places do. So they were never they never
Speaker 2: had the ability to do that, okay, And so that
Speaker 2: was actually a good thing because over time, you know,
Speaker 2: they they'd run out of water in the summer, they
Speaker 2: keep just enough to kind of get by with the
Speaker 2: greens and teas and so things weren't you know, overly
Speaker 2: over really done. So that was that was actually a
Speaker 2: good thing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what's what's been your process with getting reclaiming those greens,
Speaker 1: because you've done a ton of it, and I think
Speaker 1: there's so many golf courses that fight this problem with
Speaker 1: shrunk and greens, and what's worked really well for you?
Speaker 1: What maybe that you've done hasn't worked that well.
Speaker 2: So I had I had a backup mower that I
Speaker 2: was able to dedicate to lowering these lonely these areas down, okay,
Speaker 2: lowering the height down because they were at two and
Speaker 2: a half inches, they were motor at rough height.
Speaker 1: Okay. And also like what are we talking from, you know,
Speaker 1: say ten years ago till now? How much? How much?
Speaker 1: How much green surface are we talking about mowing out
Speaker 1: that you were missing on a lot.
Speaker 2: Of these Oh geez, probably some of them. You know,
Speaker 2: if you had a let's say you had a five
Speaker 2: thousand square foot green, you know, you might hit four
Speaker 2: thousand square feet that was gone missing. It was rough
Speaker 2: mode is rough and some of those big, big lank
Speaker 2: for greens. So yeah, so there's a lot and so
Speaker 2: we took it at rough. I did a lot of airrifying, okay,
Speaker 2: a lot arifying trying to get some of that thatch out,
Speaker 2: and then a lot of vertical mowing okay, and then
Speaker 2: slowly you was just bumping it down. And then every
Speaker 2: time I erified, I'd introduce some some bank grass in
Speaker 2: there as well to kind of get that growing, get
Speaker 2: that going, okay, and then it was just slowly lowered
Speaker 2: down a little extra fertility to keep it going. And
Speaker 2: uh yeah, and it probably took about it takes about
Speaker 2: a year, i'd say, to get it down to a
Speaker 2: pro tpe where it looks pretty good. And then from
Speaker 2: there it would take probably another good year to get
Speaker 2: it down to Green's height where it looked good, played good. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and the density was up where we.
Speaker 1: Wanted, and then the bent started to take out.
Speaker 2: And the band would take over. Yeah, And you can
Speaker 2: see all those now you go out to twelve where
Speaker 2: we reclaimed, you can just see the bent lines that
Speaker 2: right on the edge of the collar from where I
Speaker 2: stopped seating.
Speaker 1: Yes, it's incredible how how much it's it's got, you know,
Speaker 1: and it looks really great because you can see the
Speaker 1: whole contours now. Yeah, and it's you know, there's so
Speaker 1: many great pins that weren't.
Speaker 2: There totally lost.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's it's remarkable, Like especially you see it on
Speaker 1: like you know, the back of twelve, you've got those
Speaker 1: that you know, has it do you is there any
Speaker 1: you know obviously like a big thing is irrigation always
Speaker 1: and you said I saw on twelve, like you've got
Speaker 1: the heads just in the green. It is what it is.
Speaker 2: It is what it is.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we're not going to change that until we replace
Speaker 2: the irrigation system. It doesn't matter at this point. You know,
Speaker 2: it's not worth the club's money to go in there
Speaker 2: and move those when they when it's no big deal,
Speaker 2: you know, not right now. You know, we'll get there
Speaker 2: when we do one day, when the irrigation is replaced,
Speaker 2: we'll move them to the edge. Yeah, but right now
Speaker 2: it's it's not worth it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because I feel like so many people would would say, like,
Speaker 1: you know what, we shouldn't do that because then we'll
Speaker 1: have this irrigation head. But it's like, you know, how
Speaker 1: many golfers is that going to affect?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Not many. In fact, every every round of played there,
Speaker 2: which is a lot because my kids play out there
Speaker 2: a lot, I can count on one hand that I've
Speaker 2: actually just moved them all over just a little bit,
Speaker 2: just to put around the head.
Speaker 1: Is that the local rule?
Speaker 2: Yeah, just move it over a little bit. It's no
Speaker 2: big deal.
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Speaker 1: back to Craig Moore. You know, it's interesting. We talked
Speaker 1: a little bit about grass and how like the bent
Speaker 1: takes over eventually. And one of the things I found
Speaker 1: most interesting at at gray Walls was when you were
Speaker 1: talking about your guys' choice with the grass, and it's
Speaker 1: a it's a hybrid where you have you have fescue,
Speaker 1: but ninety six what ninety eight percent of your rounds
Speaker 1: or cart maybe more. It's walkable golf course. I would
Speaker 1: recommend walking in, but you know, I thought I had it.
Speaker 1: You feel like you get a workout in and it's
Speaker 1: it's not that bad of a walk.
Speaker 2: No tea green proximities right there, which for me, when
Speaker 2: you're looking at a place to walk, as long as
Speaker 2: you have that, I'm fine. I'll climb a mountain, I
Speaker 2: don't care. But as long as you know you got that,
Speaker 2: you're not walking long distances between the two holes, that's
Speaker 2: what gets me. Yeah, And and that's obviously when Mike
Speaker 2: crowded the place, he wasn't gonna let that happen. So
Speaker 2: but you have to going back to the grasses on
Speaker 2: the fairway. So when we seated the Greywalls golf course,
Speaker 2: it was a mix of fine fascue and low o
Speaker 2: Kentucky blue grass. Okay, thought process there is Okay, we
Speaker 2: know these people love their golf carts, they love cartballing, Okay,
Speaker 2: and that's fine, that's cool. I mean, it's it's their course,
Speaker 2: you know. So we had to come up with a
Speaker 2: grass situations.
Speaker 1: That rescue doesn't handle carts right.
Speaker 2: No, no, not as well as other grass, not as
Speaker 2: well as the bank grass wood or not as well
Speaker 2: as like a blue grass wood. Okay, But we did
Speaker 2: not want to go with bank grass fairways here because
Speaker 2: the cost of going the cost of chemicals, and the
Speaker 2: the inputs it would need to keep it really really nice, Okay,
Speaker 2: especially in the winter time up here with the snowbold
Speaker 2: pressure that we get up here, that would be a
Speaker 2: matrix bends to just spray those all those fairways. So
Speaker 2: going in, what can we do?
Speaker 1: Okay?
Speaker 2: So we started looking at all the antap trials and
Speaker 2: looking at you know, all the data on the grasses.
Speaker 2: So so we came up we wanted to go with
Speaker 2: a fine fast U for the low input situation. Okay, Well,
Speaker 2: what can we add with it? Okay? Ryegrass doesn't do
Speaker 2: well up here? Okay, So well, let's go the bluegrass,
Speaker 2: which is awesome with traffic. Okay, So now you sit
Speaker 2: back and you look at look at the golf course.
Speaker 2: You can sit back in the fairways, you can look
Speaker 2: and you can see exactly where the high traffic areas
Speaker 2: are because that's where the lowo Kentucky blue dominates the stand. Okay,
Speaker 2: all your larger open corridors where there's a lot of
Speaker 2: room that that's where the fine fester dominates the stand okay.
Speaker 2: And so it's really it's been really fun watching that
Speaker 2: evolve from the beginning and see and it's doing exactly
Speaker 2: what we wanted it to do. So it's performing perfectly.
Speaker 1: It's amazing. And then like you've got your your cart
Speaker 1: boundaries where they can't go around the greens and around
Speaker 1: every green it's just pure fat everywhere. Yeah, it just
Speaker 1: reacts perfectly.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's so around the greens, you gotta high population
Speaker 2: will find fascue. And then a lot of the bank
Speaker 2: grass bleed off that came off the greens. So combination.
Speaker 1: So I've gotten some messages people people say like, ah,
Speaker 1: courses like the greens just got me. What what do you?
Speaker 1: What is that a complaint that you hear a lot
Speaker 1: with it with you know, I think one of the
Speaker 1: things is understanding architecture is a huge benefit if you.
Speaker 2: Play here, right, huge benefit. You have to think, Okay,
Speaker 2: people don't want to think. They want to play mindless
Speaker 2: golf in between chugging a beer. Okay, that's not this place,
Speaker 2: you got it. You gotta think, okay, and if you
Speaker 2: do that, that's fine, But don't get upset about the result. Okay.
Speaker 2: You just have to really think about, you know, not
Speaker 2: only the shot in the green, but maybe the shot
Speaker 2: before you where you want to be. You know, where
Speaker 2: you're going to get that best angle to get in
Speaker 2: and have an opportunity to get on the putting surface. Okay,
Speaker 2: because there's a few that that'll they'll get you, you know,
Speaker 2: one in fourteen or two perfect examples. I mean, if
Speaker 2: you're if you don't execute that shot, I mean, you're
Speaker 2: the bunker list greens too, bunker list greens, but they
Speaker 2: can get you. And those are two that probably hear
Speaker 2: about the most.
Speaker 1: So yeah, it's it's interesting, like playing today, perfect example
Speaker 1: was too. It's on this back to her and you're
Speaker 1: hitting over a ravine to get to it, and from
Speaker 1: the pharaoeh. I just hit it like twenty five yards
Speaker 1: left of the pen. It is magical and it almost
Speaker 1: went in. And it's you don't even have to take
Speaker 1: on the ravine that the greens sitting over over you
Speaker 1: don't don't ever even have to, but you just I
Speaker 1: think that's you have to look away so much. And
Speaker 1: it's the same way at Kingsley, where you have to
Speaker 1: aim a way to hit it close. A lot of times.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, the direct the best approach might not be the
Speaker 2: direct line to the pin. You know, you think about it,
Speaker 2: and it's just it. It might not be so because
Speaker 2: it's a very visually intimidate any place. Okay, both golf cours,
Speaker 2: kings Leanne and grey Wolves are both visually intimidate. You
Speaker 2: get over that, you'll that's step one, okay, and then
Speaker 2: step two is get creative, you know, get creative, look
Speaker 2: at the landforms, okay, and maybe work with the land
Speaker 2: a little bit, you know, just don't try to tack
Speaker 2: the pin.
Speaker 1: Mm hmm. It's it's it's neat. It's such a cool place.
Speaker 1: And I think like the more you play it, the
Speaker 1: more you get it. That's the other thing is that
Speaker 1: that first time around is it's like you can get
Speaker 1: sensory overload from all that's happening, the rock out croppings,
Speaker 1: this unbelievable golf holes that you've never seen before, but understanding,
Speaker 1: like if you will allow yourself to have this open
Speaker 1: mind of like okay, maybe I should look five yards
Speaker 1: left of a flag, yeah, and see, Okay, I could
Speaker 1: play it over there and it's going to bank in.
Speaker 1: But or if you're going around a second time, you'll
Speaker 1: start to pick up on it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And that's exactly what happened with with our membership too. Yeah.
Speaker 2: So our Women's Association, they first few years when after
Speaker 2: grey Walls open, they still held their league on the
Speaker 2: Heritage golf Course. Okay, after a couple of years of
Speaker 2: playing out here a little more, they're like, whoa, we
Speaker 2: like that, Like that's what we want every league night,
Speaker 2: and so they move their league right over here. And
Speaker 2: so they play over here now and it's been and
Speaker 2: they love it. It's wonderful. We get loads of women
Speaker 2: that play out here and just have a fantastic time.
Speaker 1: Oh, there's so many ways for for a low trajectory
Speaker 1: player to hit the ball close out here, Like every
Speaker 1: pin's accessible if you understand where to play it and
Speaker 1: use the contour. You never outside of six, the par
Speaker 1: three up the hill, like that might be the only
Speaker 1: shot you have to hit in the air. Yeah, you
Speaker 1: know everything else you can run up on the ground.
Speaker 2: You can play the ground. Yeah, so you got you
Speaker 2: always have that. You've got that option. Okay, So there's
Speaker 2: there's always, there's always the And that's the thing I
Speaker 2: like about Mike and Mike's course hits, and I preach
Speaker 2: just everybody, what makes the best golf course is a
Speaker 2: golf course that provides lots of options. And the reason
Speaker 2: being for me, is because that opens windows for all
Speaker 2: the different kinds of golfers to enjoy that golf and
Speaker 2: all the different kind of golf swings that are out there. Okay,
Speaker 2: not everybody hits the same damn shot.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: Some people play left right, some people play right to left.
Speaker 2: Some people hit a low trajectory, some people hit a
Speaker 2: high trajectory. Okay. And the fact that he can build
Speaker 2: these places that kind of cater to all the different
Speaker 2: shot options or shot to I guess the way they
Speaker 2: hit the golf ball. You know, it's just it's amazing.
Speaker 1: So you know, we're we're here to August. We're recording it.
Speaker 1: It's wonderful. It's like seventy five wonderful. Man, what's the
Speaker 1: what's the idea if say we're you know, somebody in
Speaker 1: the Midwest coming up here, and I think after spending time,
Speaker 1: like I think, I'm gonna try and come up every
Speaker 1: single summer the rest of my life or every year
Speaker 1: because it's a magical place. But what what is like
Speaker 1: an ideal trip to to Marcatta or the up like
Speaker 1: I should should it be just you know, golf? Like
Speaker 1: what are the other things you should do?
Speaker 2: Okay, so you come up here to play golf, which
Speaker 2: I highly highly encourage everybody to come up and play
Speaker 2: because it's so cool. Don't just come up here to golf, though,
Speaker 2: absolutely do not just come up here to golf. Spend
Speaker 2: some time. Munising's forty five minutes away. We have pictured rocks. Okay,
Speaker 2: the other side amusing. You've got Grand Murray and the
Speaker 2: Grand's Apple Dunes, which are just mind blowing. It's two
Speaker 2: hundred foot drop of just sand down to Lake Superior
Speaker 2: that you can you can walk down. It's crazy. The
Speaker 2: waterfalls all over the place. There's little mini hikes all
Speaker 2: around Marquette that you can just go on. You walk
Speaker 2: up Sugar Loaf, you can walk up hogs Back, presqu
Speaker 2: Isle right here in the city park here Marquette is
Speaker 2: mind blowing and you get out there and it's just
Speaker 2: it's it's so beautiful. This little peninsula out in the lake.
Speaker 2: It's got rock out crops that you can jump off
Speaker 2: into lake. You can go swim, and there's there's there's
Speaker 2: some rocky beaches or sandy beaches, and it's it's really neat. There's.
Speaker 2: The other thing is is biking is huge up here.
Speaker 2: So if you're into single track riding, you know, with
Speaker 2: mountain bikes, you can ride the roads too. There's really
Speaker 2: good trails for road biking. But the mountain biking up
Speaker 2: here insane. It is so good, so good.
Speaker 1: And good breweries and good breweries.
Speaker 2: Yes, shout out to Black Rocks or Doc.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, you can go down to Vierling they've been here
Speaker 2: a little longer than the others and get a blueberry
Speaker 2: beer if you want. The blueberries are locally grown here.
Speaker 2: But yeah, it's great beer. Absolutely. It comes from great water.
Speaker 2: You know, it's Lake Superior.
Speaker 1: That's what they say. Superior water, superior water.
Speaker 2: Man's that's why it's superior beer.
Speaker 1: I had never seen anything like like superior. My wife
Speaker 1: and I pointed on a hike yesterday and it was unbelievable.
Speaker 1: You get we got to this beach. We hiked, you know,
Speaker 1: three miles to this beach and I mean, the clearest
Speaker 1: water I've ever ever seen in the sandiest beach, no
Speaker 1: rocks anywhere. Like we were talking, I was like, I mean,
Speaker 1: do you remember and you know the Caribbean ever seeing
Speaker 1: and she's like, no, nothing like this, Like it's it's
Speaker 1: absolutely unbelievable.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we're so. You think about the whole shore of
Speaker 2: Lake Superior and you think rock, Okay, rock, it's a
Speaker 2: very rocky place because it's kind of engulfed in the
Speaker 2: Canadian Shield. But here from Marquette Dimunising, we're blessed with
Speaker 2: beautiful sand beaches and uh yeah, it's it's rare to
Speaker 2: find then the rest of the shoreline.
Speaker 1: So when when's the best time for golf if somebody's
Speaker 1: coming to golf.
Speaker 2: Well, all summer. Really it's a dynamite. June, July, August, September.
Speaker 2: It is unreal to me. My favorite month is September,
Speaker 2: that's my favorite month up here. Got cooler nights. And
Speaker 2: then you start getting into the color change with the trees,
Speaker 2: and that's that adds a whole new element to this property.
Speaker 2: When those leaves change. Holy cow, it's going from the
Speaker 2: third week of September into you know, first couple of
Speaker 2: weeks of October. It's just absolute beauty.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a it's a special place. So we'll get
Speaker 1: you out of here on the last one. You know,
Speaker 1: Langford Moreau. When you get that fully like you've played
Speaker 1: how many other you've played Lasnia.
Speaker 2: Sonzaki, Iron River, and then just just reading everything about
Speaker 2: you know, Langford Morrow and and and every picture.
Speaker 1: You got to talk about your discovery. Yeah, yeah, tell
Speaker 1: us a little bit about it. So it's funny. I
Speaker 1: was telling Craig. I was like, oh, I got this
Speaker 1: Langford book, this really cool Langor book that somebody sent me. Uh,
Speaker 1: I gotta send it to you and and uh and
Speaker 1: sure enough tell us about it.
Speaker 2: So yeah, so started getting the club really really into
Speaker 2: uh Langford Moreau. The Green Committee, you know, really getting
Speaker 2: into it. And and one where Green Committee members John
Speaker 2: Bordo came across this document that that Langford Moreau had
Speaker 2: had or Langford wrote on a short short document like
Speaker 2: sixteen pages or something like that, and there was only
Speaker 2: one copy of it, and it was down in the
Speaker 2: ms U archive, okay, down in Michigan State. Well it
Speaker 2: was a really it was really rough shape and it
Speaker 2: was like in a safe and they wouldn't let anybody
Speaker 2: touch it. And at the time, my wife was PhD studing.
Speaker 2: So then I'm mag I got I gotta I gotta
Speaker 2: have that. I gotta see that. So she kind of
Speaker 2: looked into it.
Speaker 1: And what was your wife saying saying to you when
Speaker 1: you were trying to course her, Go guy, then this
Speaker 1: is safe.
Speaker 2: She she thinks I'm a lunatic. Okay, she thinks I'm
Speaker 2: looney because I talk about this stuff and that's like
Speaker 2: what I do, Like I I can't stop, you know,
Speaker 2: I'm addicted to like continue to like reading it on
Speaker 2: the subject. And she thinks I'm nuts. And so you
Speaker 2: got to get this for me, like I got to
Speaker 2: see it, like John found it. It's down there. I
Speaker 2: know you can get access to it. And so she
Speaker 2: went and talked to the library and that was in
Speaker 2: charge there, and they were like, no, no, we can't.
Speaker 2: It's it's in too bad a shape. We can't we
Speaker 2: can't touch that. And she's like, no, no, you don't understand.
Speaker 2: My husband needs this. He keeps bugging me, like I
Speaker 2: want to get this for him. So at the end
Speaker 2: of the day she was able to convince them to
Speaker 2: pull it out and make photos copies of it. She
Speaker 2: wasn't allowed to touch it. They could touch it, but
Speaker 2: they made photo copies and she brought it back and
Speaker 2: and I was like, oh god, just one of the
Speaker 2: but Jillian Readons is why I love that woman, Okay,
Speaker 2: And so she got she got it for me, and
Speaker 2: so then yeah, I get mug at copy and then
Speaker 2: we just started getting around and it's great. I mean,
Speaker 2: it's awesome. I'm so glad that that people do have
Speaker 2: copies of it and it's kind of going around and
Speaker 2: people see it because there's not enough really knowing about
Speaker 2: Langford Morrow. I mean, there's just not enough. There's not
Speaker 2: as much talk. You know, it's you hear everything about
Speaker 2: Ross and and Mackenzie and and you know Cold Nelson,
Speaker 2: and you know, you just don't hear as much about
Speaker 2: Langford Morrow.
Speaker 1: I think so much of it is where they did
Speaker 1: their work, you know, so much of it. Like you know,
Speaker 1: there aren't a lot of people that have been to
Speaker 1: Marquette and you know, Losnias.
Speaker 2: My little Sony is like in my top five. Absolutely.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this place is unbelievable, but it's remote. It's hard
Speaker 1: to go get to. I was a guy I know,
Speaker 1: he was texting me who's like a very well traveled
Speaker 1: uh architecture not you know, right stuff, And he was
Speaker 1: texting me he was at Lostonia earlier this summer. He's like,
Speaker 1: this splace is absolutely unbelievable. Yeah, and it's like that's
Speaker 1: it's a scale.
Speaker 2: The scale of that place. It's so massive and open,
Speaker 2: and so you just see the vista across the golf
Speaker 2: course and it's just like, oh my gosh.
Speaker 1: And the greens there are amazing. But part of me
Speaker 1: like looking at the greens that you have here, I
Speaker 1: mean there they there are some better greens here than
Speaker 1: they got at Lastonia.
Speaker 2: Yeah. But by the time I retire up here, I
Speaker 2: hope to have it all back. Yeah, the Langford greens back.
Speaker 1: So the Langford is intermixed in the course. Has there
Speaker 1: ever been talk about about putting it back as a
Speaker 1: standalone nine.
Speaker 2: Just nine to nine. Yeah, I've talked about it. I've
Speaker 2: never really pushed it, but I actually kind of made
Speaker 2: a little scorecard one day on it and showed how
Speaker 2: it could work. But yeah, it hasn't past that though.
Speaker 1: It would be neat if they did that. It would
Speaker 1: It's like, yeah, it's you know, that's the way it
Speaker 1: was designed.
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly. Then that's why they played it for forty years.
Speaker 1: And it's got a cadence and a flow and it walks.
Speaker 1: That's that's something you start to think about, and it's
Speaker 1: really evident. Here is like the idea of walking the property,
Speaker 1: you know, where the routing's kind of naturally how you
Speaker 1: walk a property and how you would go up like
Speaker 1: you know, and and here's you know that it embodies
Speaker 1: it well, like it would be the natural way you'd
Speaker 1: walk that property. The Langford nine, Yeah, where you kind
Speaker 1: of walk out and you'd be like, oh, then you
Speaker 1: come and you kind of zig zag over towards the
Speaker 1: other edge and it's interesting.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and even the one hole you kind of gotta
Speaker 2: jet back just a little bit, but you just drop
Speaker 2: your bag off halfway there, you know, because it's part three.
Speaker 2: So hopefully you're on the green. You just grab your
Speaker 2: butter walk up there and you kind of walk back.
Speaker 2: So yeah, you know it flows really really well the
Speaker 2: original ninth.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, that'll be special and you get all the
Speaker 1: greens back and yeah, it'll be a.
Speaker 2: Little slow process. Up her baby steps up patience.
Speaker 1: That's right, man, you got all winter to think about
Speaker 1: it and read more about it, and yeah, yeah, how
Speaker 1: fired up are you when it like when the snow
Speaker 1: melts in it? You got your first day?
Speaker 2: Oh god, I'm so excited. Man, I just want to
Speaker 2: like I just everybody says, oh, he's got a lot
Speaker 2: of pressure, get open. I'm like, there's the pressure I
Speaker 2: get from them is nothing compared to when I'm putting
Speaker 2: on myself to get this place open because I want
Speaker 2: to see it. Man, let's go always go time. You know,
Speaker 2: we got to get this stuff done. Let's he gets
Speaker 2: gets placed cleaned up. Let's play.
Speaker 1: Yeah. What kind of stuff do you do all winter?
Speaker 2: Well, so all winter long, a lot of preparation. So
Speaker 2: the equipment prep okay, because because when the snow does melt,
Speaker 2: we get out there, I want everything ready. I don't
Speaker 2: want to be working on equipment. It's I want it
Speaker 2: done all of it. So we're our one hundred percent
Speaker 2: focus is on the playing services, getting cleaned up, getting prepped,
Speaker 2: getting ready for for golf. So that's a big part
Speaker 2: of planning. Okay, we don't have a general manager at
Speaker 2: the club. It's myself and and our head professional Mark Gilmore,
Speaker 2: and our clubhouse manager Maggie, and there's an office manager Bev.
Speaker 2: Between the four of us. I mean, we operate the
Speaker 2: club for the for board of directors, and so we
Speaker 2: have to do a lot of that obviously, that work
Speaker 2: that end and so budget, budget work, you know, planning work,
Speaker 2: just setting everything up for the year because it's a
Speaker 2: madhouse one of the years here. Okay, we don't have
Speaker 2: time to mess out around a lot of that stuff.
Speaker 2: So the planning is key going into the season and
Speaker 2: having a dial. And then on the flip side, said,
Speaker 2: I have three boys. They're big into hockey, so I
Speaker 2: spend a lot of time in a hockey rink in
Speaker 2: the wintertime.
Speaker 1: So it's a good place for hockey.
Speaker 2: It is a good place for hockey. Snowshoeing too. I'm
Speaker 2: a big snowshoes so and I snowshoe the property two
Speaker 2: or three days a week. Just checking on it makes
Speaker 2: things sure, things are good, checking for ice snow, you know,
Speaker 2: digging down while I still can't. Then it builds up
Speaker 2: until point where it's it's hard to dig down, can't
Speaker 2: really get to the bottom of a.
Speaker 1: Yeah, ice damage your biggest kind of fear on the
Speaker 1: golf course.
Speaker 2: It is it is, and that if and that will
Speaker 2: occur if we get if we get a meltdown or
Speaker 2: a rain event or something in December, that's when I worry, okay,
Speaker 2: because then at that point it can take out a
Speaker 2: lot of the a lot of the bank grass as well.
Speaker 2: If we later on the year and we'll get some
Speaker 2: ice that say we uh lately late season, I don't
Speaker 2: worry about too much because it might just take out
Speaker 2: some pole, which is fine. I'm good with that.
Speaker 1: So what do you have to do? You cover your
Speaker 1: greens or anything, or with sand.
Speaker 2: I bury them in sand, bury them in sand and molrganite,
Speaker 2: and the morganite helps them melt off in the spring.
Speaker 2: It does really really well, kind of gets up in there.
Speaker 2: So it's on human poop, yes, yeah, composted human waste.
Speaker 2: Great product, great product.
Speaker 1: I gotta get something from my own yard. You do. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, it works wonderful for the homeowner.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, all right, So you gotta go. You got
Speaker 1: you got your boys in a golf tournament today, so
Speaker 1: we we gotta get cut you Lucy, you can go
Speaker 1: wash and play. So thanks so much for coming on.
Speaker 1: I hope a bunch of people come visit you in
Speaker 1: the next few months and then next year.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, come on up. We welcome you with open arms
Speaker 2: up here. You'll have a great time.
Speaker 1: So