Speaker 1: Welcome back to another edition of the Frida Egg Podcast.
Speaker 1: Today's episode is powered by td Ameritrade. Every stroke counts
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Speaker 1: tedomritrade dot com slash Friday Egg member SIPC. Today's episode
Speaker 1: is with Russ Myers. Russ is the head superintendent at
Speaker 1: Southern Hills Country Club down in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Russ has
Speaker 1: had a great career in the superintendent industry, working at
Speaker 1: Augusta National Ocean Reef down in Key Largo LACC, as
Speaker 1: well as two stints at Southern Hills, so he's got
Speaker 1: a lot of great stories from the masters to the
Speaker 1: PGA at Southern Hills and then also restoring both LACC
Speaker 1: and Southern Hills. Before we get to Russ, I'm excited
Speaker 1: to announce a new Print of the Week program on
Speaker 1: the Friday Egg. Each week we'll be selling some of
Speaker 1: my original photography of golf courses. Each month, print sales
Speaker 1: will benefit a different charity, so check out the pro
Speaker 1: shop on the Friday Egg today for the very first
Speaker 1: print of the week, which features a shot of Sand
Speaker 1: Valley's second hole. Twenty percent of these proceeds will go
Speaker 1: to the Daniel Murphy Scholarship Fund, an organization that gives
Speaker 1: high school scholarships and educational support to kids who need it.
Speaker 1: Now onto Russ Myers. I miss the green, for example,
Speaker 1: I'm already upset. When I find my ball in the bunker,
Speaker 1: I'm really upset. And when I find my ball in
Speaker 1: a fried egg Friday egg, the dreaded Frida egg Frida
Speaker 1: egg Frida egg egg Frida egg bride egg lie, I'm
Speaker 1: about ready to run off of the course. What's what's
Speaker 1: your favorite fruit?
Speaker 2: I don't know if I have one? Banana? Is that
Speaker 2: a fruit? Yes?
Speaker 1: A banana?
Speaker 2: Fish?
Speaker 1: You not too? I mean this is the one that
Speaker 1: you could eat every day?
Speaker 2: I think, yeah, I think that's it. It's kind of
Speaker 2: it's dryer.
Speaker 1: Where'd you grow up?
Speaker 2: Finger Lakes region of New York in a town called Odessa, New.
Speaker 1: York, Odessa, New York, not to be confused with Odessa, Texas,
Speaker 1: not even close.
Speaker 2: Flashing yellow light.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so how do you how'd you get into turf?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 1: What was the you know, what made you become a superintendent?
Speaker 2: It was probably, like most people, I like to be
Speaker 2: at the golf course, and I like the atmosphere of
Speaker 2: the golf course and the people that hung around it.
Speaker 2: I didn't even know there was an industry for turf.
Speaker 2: I was working at a nine hole public course and
Speaker 2: Walking's Going, New York called Walkin's Going Golf Club, and
Speaker 2: I kind of showed up when I wanted mode t's
Speaker 2: mode fairways whatever. Went in at night and ran irrigation
Speaker 2: on greens by throwing roller bases out and filling the
Speaker 2: pump with a tank of gas. And one summer, the
Speaker 2: club champ at the time we were sitting in the
Speaker 2: clubhouse having a beer and he said, how come you
Speaker 2: don't go to Cobleskille? And I said, why the hell
Speaker 2: would I want to go to Cobleskill. He said, because
Speaker 2: they got a career for They got a degree for
Speaker 2: what you do? I said, what do I do? He said,
Speaker 2: golf course maintenance. I had no idea it existed, and
Speaker 2: so I explored it and got into it, and it
Speaker 2: kind of picked up from there.
Speaker 1: You play a lot of sports growing up, too, and
Speaker 1: how do you get into golf, like.
Speaker 2: My father, Joey Sindelar was was a from Horses, New York,
Speaker 2: which was my dad's hometown. And my dad was a
Speaker 2: three sport coach and athletic director, and you know, he
Speaker 2: followed everybody locally, whether it was you know, Kurt man
Speaker 2: Wearing who played for the Giants in baseball, or Joey
Speaker 2: or Mike Albert, guys like that. So my dad would
Speaker 2: truck me all around the country too. We were at
Speaker 2: Joey's Wynning, Greensboro back then, and obviously at the BC Open.
Speaker 2: So it was things like that that got me introduced
Speaker 2: to the game of golf and get me going.
Speaker 1: You're one of your early jobs was Augusta working at
Speaker 1: Augusta National out of college, and then you'd obviously been
Speaker 1: involved with major championships here at Southern Hills, but then
Speaker 1: you've also been a part of a lot of major
Speaker 1: championships set up staff. How many total major championships?
Speaker 2: Wow, it takes me a while to at them up,
Speaker 2: but I would say it's comfortably north of forty probably,
Speaker 2: Well that's not true, so total tournaments would be to
Speaker 2: north of forty. They weren't all majors, you know, I've
Speaker 2: spent probably four or five straight years going to Mirrorfield
Speaker 2: for the memorial and been at a lot of different
Speaker 2: tournaments over the years, whether it was a Walker Cup
Speaker 2: or something like that.
Speaker 1: What what are some of the most memorable ones from
Speaker 1: your standpoint just in memorable moments?
Speaker 2: I guess yeah, there's a lot of them. I mean,
Speaker 2: obviously the ones I was closely involved in with Augusta
Speaker 2: and being there, you know, when Ben won and Tigers
Speaker 2: win there in ninety seven, and and some of the
Speaker 2: experiences with that. I was at Shinnacock was it a
Speaker 2: four I think, and that was obviously became pretty from
Speaker 2: our standpoint, golf course maintenance world became pretty memorable. Boy
Speaker 2: Walker Cup at Chicago Golf Club, Walker Cup at Sea
Speaker 2: Island at Ocean I think it was at Sea Island.
Speaker 2: That was a great experience. A lot a lot of
Speaker 2: them over the years, and certainly the seven PGA here
Speaker 2: was was special for me.
Speaker 1: Working across a number of different organizations Masters obviously us G, A, PGA, RNA.
Speaker 1: You you went abroad, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I did. I did. I was live them in
Speaker 2: sant Anne's and Troon for Tom Lehman and Justin Leonards wins.
Speaker 1: That's neat, Yeah, I remember that justin leonor One. How
Speaker 1: would you compare and contrast the different organizations and the
Speaker 1: relations with the setup and superintendent crew.
Speaker 2: Yeah, in a more general it's hard to pick at him.
Speaker 2: At the time I was coming up to him, I
Speaker 2: was still pretty young in the industry. I wasn't in
Speaker 2: a lot of my exposure to him was you know,
Speaker 2: I might be running the stump meter each morning and
Speaker 2: checking and you know, helping the superintendent or deciding for
Speaker 2: myself how many greens we were going to mow, so
Speaker 2: you know, it'd probably be unfair of me to to
Speaker 2: try to compare them. I think in general, I think
Speaker 2: they've all evolved, right. I think when I was first
Speaker 2: doing this and going to US opens and walker cups
Speaker 2: and working the masters, it was an experience like no other.
Speaker 2: And evolution has progressed to where they're trying to drive
Speaker 2: as much dollar out of these things as they can anymore,
Speaker 2: and it's not quite the personal relationships it used to be.
Speaker 2: When I was coming up and showed up to work
Speaker 2: and open or a US Amateur or Women's open Tim Morgan,
Speaker 2: we'd go around each hole and whether it was Tim
Speaker 2: or Mike or even Tom Meeks back then. You name it.
Speaker 2: You know, you're putting to holes and they're talking about it,
Speaker 2: and there's a lot of inner relationship with that drive to
Speaker 2: never make a mistake and try to perfect the wheel
Speaker 2: and maybe to some degree overcome what technology is doing
Speaker 2: to them and getting courses ready. Everything has become more
Speaker 2: data driven. You know, how far are they hitting it
Speaker 2: and and how fast can the greens really be? And
Speaker 2: and to some agree, do we really trust the numbers
Speaker 2: we're getting And if we get a whole location out
Speaker 2: of out of comfort zone, what was that data and
Speaker 2: how did it compare? You almost have to be ready
Speaker 2: to defend everything you do. So I think in general
Speaker 2: the organizations have tried to own their own information, separate
Speaker 2: a hair from from the days of past where they
Speaker 2: relied a lot on the local knowledge of the superintendents.
Speaker 2: It doesn't mean they don't rely on it, but but
Speaker 2: deep down they know they're the ones going to get
Speaker 2: blamed on TV. So they now bring their own, you know,
Speaker 2: local regional USGA agronomists to run a stimpmeter because they
Speaker 2: need to know that it's their people. You know, those
Speaker 2: types of things. I think the way they've evolved has
Speaker 2: been interesting and when so when I try to compare
Speaker 2: and contrast that now, I won't speak for the RNA.
Speaker 2: I wouldn't say I had a close enough working relationship
Speaker 2: with them. But but the PGA, with Carrie Haig basically
Speaker 2: being the lone face of that, I think he knows
Speaker 2: what level of risk he's willing to take there and
Speaker 2: tends to tends to do a pretty good job of
Speaker 2: finding that balance. That makes that a little less necessary
Speaker 2: and thus keeps guys like myself who want to be
Speaker 2: a part of the course set up, want to be
Speaker 2: a part of helping make the right decisions, you know,
Speaker 2: to ensure the best outcomes. It allows us to be
Speaker 2: more engaged. I don't know if that clearly answers it.
Speaker 2: I think I think the USGA has advanced beyond that
Speaker 2: stage a little farther than they were back in the
Speaker 2: late nineties. I think that relationship certainly, you know, whether
Speaker 2: that was working with Paul Atchaw Congressional or John Zimmer's
Speaker 2: at Okahat, those relationships were always there, and then to
Speaker 2: some degree posts two thousand and four shinnikok that just
Speaker 2: were never comfortable doing that fully Again, it doesn't mean
Speaker 2: they don't seek the input, doesn't mean they don't take
Speaker 2: the advice, but it kind of all of a sudden,
Speaker 2: Now we're measuring percent slopes all the time on whole locations,
Speaker 2: and we're checking firmness meteors, and we're redefining things to
Speaker 2: make sure the data fits instead of the course set up.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, what was like the the atmosphere? What do
Speaker 1: you remember most from the four open at Chinnakoka? Was
Speaker 1: there something like the maintenance facility? Was there like just
Speaker 1: a feel.
Speaker 2: Or yeah, it's a The story is who knows where
Speaker 2: this could end up. But to give you the story
Speaker 2: from my perspective, I'm a superintendent in Florida up working
Speaker 2: at Shinnecock. We have a house that we've rented right
Speaker 2: off the property. It's got a pool in the backyard.
Speaker 2: And I can still recall Johnny Miller saying best conditioned
Speaker 2: open he's ever seen the start of the play that
Speaker 2: week on Thursday, And I recall Saturday sitting in the
Speaker 2: break room at the maintenance area and watching the broadcast
Speaker 2: and David Fay was in the booth at the time,
Speaker 2: and the second to last group of the day on
Speaker 2: a Saturday that was cool and breezy and windy. The
Speaker 2: put on seventh green right there were Danna seventh. The
Speaker 2: put on seven got away from him and went off
Speaker 2: the green, and I recall hearing David Fay say on
Speaker 2: there that green was inadvertently rolled that morning, and I
Speaker 2: said to the guy sitting next to me, I said,
Speaker 2: that's not going to go well. And he said, what
Speaker 2: do you mean, And I said, he basically just stated
Speaker 2: that the golf course maintenance staff made a mistake and
Speaker 2: inadvertently rolled the green, which couldn't have been true. And
Speaker 2: by the way, it was fine for every golfer all
Speaker 2: day long until the second last one of the day.
Speaker 2: Now what happened beyond that, I don't really know all
Speaker 2: the certainties of it. There was accusations of night rolling,
Speaker 2: which I could probably say ninety nine point five percent
Speaker 2: of the chance that didn't happen, because I know people
Speaker 2: who were supposedly involved in that, and they were sitting
Speaker 2: next to me at a pool drinking a beer that night.
Speaker 2: But regardless, the fact of the matter is that happened
Speaker 2: on Saturday night, and the statement was made before anything
Speaker 2: happened on Sunday, and there was plenty of opportunity to
Speaker 2: fix that issue, but for whatever reason, it wasn't done.
Speaker 2: And I remember telling my friend on Saturday night that
Speaker 2: I wanted to catch an early flight out on Sunday.
Speaker 2: And this may come across his cowardice, but he said,
Speaker 2: well is I was a young guy at the time,
Speaker 2: and I said, because I'd like to host one of
Speaker 2: these one of these days, and if this goes bad tomorrow,
Speaker 2: which I think it's gonna because people were pretty fired up,
Speaker 2: I don't want to be standing in the backdrop while
Speaker 2: this is going on. And unfortunately there just I mean,
Speaker 2: there was a lot of people who could have solved
Speaker 2: that issue, in my opinion looking back, and I've talked
Speaker 2: about this with people who worked there at the time,
Speaker 2: and I think they all agree nobody's I mean, it's
Speaker 2: just what happens when the fingers started getting pointed, and
Speaker 2: now it's like, well, what do you want to do?
Speaker 2: I mean my understanding is Mark Michad went and said, hey,
Speaker 2: forget it, it's over, what do you want to do?
Speaker 2: And they just didn't come to the right conclusion. The
Speaker 2: next day.
Speaker 1: Tricky think it's how do you think the mentality and
Speaker 1: the collaboration with superintendents with the USGA has changed since that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think I think it's still heavily collaborative. I
Speaker 2: mean my experience with working when I consider Mike Davis
Speaker 2: a good friend, We've you know, known each other a
Speaker 2: long time, and he's certainly you know, I think his
Speaker 2: the criticisms he's taken recently to me are in unfair
Speaker 2: in a lot of ways, you know, I hear people.
Speaker 2: I mean to answer the question first, I think there's
Speaker 2: still a lot of collaboration. I just think that there's
Speaker 2: so much double checking over top of that now, and
Speaker 2: there's a lot of voices, and that there was a
Speaker 2: lot of voices in the decision. There seems to be
Speaker 2: a shift here going on recently to try to, you know,
Speaker 2: have a very clear vision moving forward, So maybe that's changing.
Speaker 2: I think there was a stretch here where there was
Speaker 2: a lot of voices in putting things, and Mike would
Speaker 2: take all that information and try to combine it into
Speaker 2: the best outcome, and I think in generally did the
Speaker 2: problem I've seen. I listened to a radio show the
Speaker 2: week of the open and this guy was talking about
Speaker 2: how the USGA has just blown it for so many years,
Speaker 2: and I was like, what exactly have they blown? I mean,
Speaker 2: you know, depending on how you want to shape your argument,
Speaker 2: you can. But they went to some news sites that
Speaker 2: they probably needed to err a little bit on the
Speaker 2: conservative side, not knowing exactly how they're going to play.
Speaker 2: They maybe got a bad whole location on Saturday at Shinnecock.
Speaker 2: Maybe they could have had a little more water whatever.
Speaker 2: But there's still great championships and you're gonna get a
Speaker 2: bad whole location. We had bad ones back in the
Speaker 2: days of Payne Stewart. When it opens, seems like we
Speaker 2: do okay with it, I don't. I think when you
Speaker 2: look at their intent and what Mike tried to do
Speaker 2: over the last fifteen years, people were gonna people were
Speaker 2: gonna be pretty positive about it in hindsight, you know.
Speaker 2: I think as far as course set up stuff, I think, yeah, I.
Speaker 1: Mean, I think he gets that they get such a
Speaker 1: bad e. Everybody goes into a US Open for some
Speaker 1: reason looking to like fight with the USG Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: an incredible that, Like it's weird because you could the
Speaker 1: same thing could happen at at an open. I remember
Speaker 1: a few years ago the wind was blowing so hard.
Speaker 1: I can't I can't. I don't think it was brokedale
Speaker 1: it was, I can't remember, but it was where brooks
Speaker 1: Kopka was yelling at a rules Officially it's like my
Speaker 1: boss moving, I'm not hidn't it, like you know, and
Speaker 1: like if that was a USGA E then would just
Speaker 1: be crucified.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, there's so much noise. Andy. I mean,
Speaker 2: I remember when I I mean, I was working at
Speaker 2: Augusta Nashnal on the crew and it was always fascinating
Speaker 2: every year because the players would come in and you'd
Speaker 2: hear them start talking either to each other or in
Speaker 2: the media about the changes that were made to certain
Speaker 2: holes and you're sitting there on I've had about eight
Speaker 2: days off since the last Masters, and trust me, that
Speaker 2: didn't happen, you know. But the mind games that just
Speaker 2: eat these guys alive sometimes, you know, I mean, they
Speaker 2: believe stuff's happening that isn't happening. And I think a
Speaker 2: lot of that happens with especially you know, the open
Speaker 2: it's let's come in guarded right out the gun, and
Speaker 2: you know, unless you're filling, you are obviously trying to
Speaker 2: take a positive approach or something, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: Watching it over the years has been has been a
Speaker 2: funny deal for me, just because being there inside of
Speaker 2: ropes and to some degree hereing some of that over time.
Speaker 2: You keep going, Man, it's amazing in this God these
Speaker 2: guys think we rebuild the twelfth Green every year at
Speaker 2: Augusta over the years, you know, and it just wasn't happening.
Speaker 2: And marsh Benson used to say, you know, you're a
Speaker 2: young guy and you'd look at Superintendent and say, we're
Speaker 2: going to speed up the greens for Sunday. And he'd
Speaker 2: march had this way where he would talk and say,
Speaker 2: the nerves will take care of that. We don't need
Speaker 2: to be doing that, you know. I mean, there's so
Speaker 2: much about the the mind of the golfer, as you
Speaker 2: know from to watch me play.
Speaker 1: You know, how does one go about ketting a job
Speaker 1: on the grounds for Augusta National? I feel, I mean,
Speaker 1: do you just apply? Is it just everything about Augustus
Speaker 1: like got this own? And I'm just curious. I've never
Speaker 1: looked at a job a turf job board and yeah.
Speaker 2: So I've told you a piece of this story. But
Speaker 2: so I grew up a gym rat son of a coach,
Speaker 2: and kind of made a vow that I was going
Speaker 2: to try something else in my life. I didn't know
Speaker 2: what it was at the time, but and UH didn't
Speaker 2: want to go into coaching, not because I didn't think
Speaker 2: I would love it. I just decided to do some else.
Speaker 2: So also, as I was going through college, the basketball
Speaker 2: coach there got me drug into the program and then
Speaker 2: asked me to stay on as an assistant coach with
Speaker 2: him student assistant and I did. And as I was
Speaker 2: finishing my last year at college, I didn't have any
Speaker 2: eligibility left. He wanted me to be. He wanted me
Speaker 2: to go do a graduate assistance job with Raleigh Massamino,
Speaker 2: who was then coaching at Cleveland State University. And there
Speaker 2: was another place as well that he had recommended. And
Speaker 2: so I sent off applications to do graduate assistant work
Speaker 2: and coaching, and I didn't know if I was going
Speaker 2: to get them, And in the meantime I fired off
Speaker 2: four resumes. I think I fired one to Augusta, one
Speaker 2: to I think the Shinnecock one to I think Oak
Speaker 2: Hill because it was somewhat local for us, and I
Speaker 2: don't know where the the other might have been Pebble
Speaker 2: or Pine Valley or something right, I don't know, but
Speaker 2: I fired off four resumes and I got a call
Speaker 2: back pretty good spot. Yeah yeah, just in case, and
Speaker 2: you know, looking for I always knew in my mind
Speaker 2: I could go back to Watkins Gun Golf Club work
Speaker 2: the summer if I needed to. And and I had
Speaker 2: done my internship for a guy named a Jim Hango
Speaker 2: who had just left Binghamton Country Club to build a
Speaker 2: course designed by h. Mark Munchum did the most of it,
Speaker 2: but Corners Stovn Munchem at the time and in Appalachia,
Speaker 2: New York. And I didn't know this, but this guy
Speaker 2: knew I had sent those and he reached out to
Speaker 2: Marsha Augusta and just said, hey, I know you're interview
Speaker 2: asked this guy to come for an interview. You really
Speaker 2: should look at him. And so I went down for
Speaker 2: the interview, and to this day, it's probably still the
Speaker 2: hardest interview I've ever had, as far as the stuff
Speaker 2: I had to do and fill out and stuff and
Speaker 2: questions like what's your favorite food on there kind of
Speaker 2: would throw me. I'm like, And I went back and
Speaker 2: fortunately they offered me a job. I went from making
Speaker 2: a I think I was making six fifty an hour
Speaker 2: at Watkins Gun Golf Club and they paid me six
Speaker 2: and a quarter to come to Augusta.
Speaker 1: So took a pay cut.
Speaker 2: Yeah it was good, but it was year round.
Speaker 1: So sometimes you gotta go down right.
Speaker 2: That's right, that's right.
Speaker 1: So you what like you graduate your this is your
Speaker 1: first job out of college and you're at Augusta National.
Speaker 1: Really you know, and uh, what what do you do?
Speaker 1: What do they start you doing?
Speaker 2: I was put in with a guy who at the
Speaker 2: time was a member of a band, and we got
Speaker 2: in a cart with sand in the back and it
Speaker 2: was just prior to overseating, so we would drive the
Speaker 2: fairways looking for a little depressions, take a sod knife
Speaker 2: and kind of wedge under him, lift them up a
Speaker 2: little bit, put some sand under him to try and
Speaker 2: level them out. That was my first day on the job.
Speaker 2: I think my second was pushing sand across the greens
Speaker 2: for the for the spur or the fall horrification.
Speaker 1: How do you start guys? We saw new member of
Speaker 1: your crew first day on the job. I mean, is
Speaker 1: it like, do you do you put them somewhere like
Speaker 1: they can do the least damage, Like is that I
Speaker 1: mean thinking about putting sand in depressions, that's probably you know, pretty.
Speaker 2: That's a good question. We probably don't do it the
Speaker 2: right way. We used to a lot of that. I mean,
Speaker 2: they have to know the holes and that's so you
Speaker 2: best to just put them with an experienced employee. Back
Speaker 2: you know, back then, that's what we did to some degree.
Speaker 2: It was more they'll figure it out type of thing.
Speaker 2: Ten twelve years ago, maybe a little sooner. But now,
Speaker 2: with the labor market the way it is, if it's
Speaker 2: hard to find people, and when you do, you better
Speaker 2: retain them. So we put a lot more effort. Our
Speaker 2: guys typically spend the first day on the job with
Speaker 2: an assistant or with me in a cart, and about
Speaker 2: half the second day before they even step into you know,
Speaker 2: jumping on a piece of aquiler. Certainly need to be
Speaker 2: trained on it all, but it's a lot hard. It's
Speaker 2: a lot more and a lot more detail into it now,
Speaker 2: just for no other reason. Is you you know, the
Speaker 2: obvious reason, you want to know what they're doing and
Speaker 2: want to be safe, but for more than that, you
Speaker 2: need them to know that you care and you want
Speaker 2: them comfortable, comfortable, so they're not leaving. It's a big shift.
Speaker 2: I mean, I've been in part of clubs where the
Speaker 2: labor market was a different time and and somebody didn't
Speaker 2: want to stay late to help with the practice, And
Speaker 2: I watch guys terminate employment. Now you're just you know,
Speaker 2: you got to navigate all the time, get over higher positions.
Speaker 2: You gotta because you just it's it's a self stretch,
Speaker 2: right or with staff.
Speaker 1: So it's crazy, it's a I mean, I think it
Speaker 1: would be a job that people would like. They just
Speaker 1: don't ever get exposed to it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I've been in it so long and so
Speaker 2: focused now I don't know that I can answer the
Speaker 2: questions as to why it's not there, you know, And
Speaker 2: I don't know what the opportunities are that that don't
Speaker 2: draw people.
Speaker 1: Getting getting back to Gussa. So what what's it like?
Speaker 1: You know, we we see it in the masters and
Speaker 1: like from from the grounds crew perspective, what's it like
Speaker 1: the weeks non you know Masters weeks like in summer
Speaker 1: and fall and winter. How's it kind of the the
Speaker 1: vibe of the place change over the seasons.
Speaker 2: Well, during the months that it's open, which Roughly speaking,
Speaker 2: I think it's mid October to end of at mid May.
Speaker 2: It's as you would expect any great club to be.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's trying to keep the maintenance tight and consistent,
Speaker 2: playing conditions and not interrupting the experience of the members
Speaker 2: that come there. They you know, they have a few
Speaker 2: parties they call them or that that aren't overwhelmingly difficult
Speaker 2: as far as you know, big crowds or anything like that,
Speaker 2: but you're you're really trying to some agree to not
Speaker 2: be seen there as you would any great club. But
Speaker 2: it's it's pretty pretty standard. Then you you know, you
Speaker 2: go through the tournament, you start start prep a few
Speaker 2: months in advance. I know they've narrowed some of that,
Speaker 2: to my knowledge, narrowed some of it down the time windows.
Speaker 2: But you know, whether that's scoreboards starting to go up
Speaker 2: or starting to go through bunkers. Back in when I
Speaker 2: was there, I mean a lot of time spent getting
Speaker 2: the bunker depths exactly perfect and firm, and then there
Speaker 2: was a light coding on back I probably changed some
Speaker 2: since I was there. So there's there's kind of a
Speaker 2: pocket of people who keep working through things and then
Speaker 2: they you know, one of the cool events there. The
Speaker 2: Jamboree is a few weeks before the week before I
Speaker 2: think the Masters, and the course is always phenomenal for that.
Speaker 2: And back in my time, we would you know, record
Speaker 2: scores and turn them into the scoreboards and members names
Speaker 2: and their guests would be up on or I think
Speaker 2: it's member members, so their members would be up on
Speaker 2: the scoreboard. And it was cool stuff like that. And
Speaker 2: then you know, you go through the Masters, and then
Speaker 2: we try to get it back to playable as quick
Speaker 2: as you can for the month after it. And we
Speaker 2: were fortunate enough to have I assume they still do
Speaker 2: it an employee appreciation week where we could bring a
Speaker 2: guest or and you know, marshals. Different people had opportunities
Speaker 2: to play that week and then it shuts down. Well,
Speaker 2: we would cover the bunkers in black plastic to keep
Speaker 2: them clean a debris, so they'd go through and cover
Speaker 2: them all for all summer. Some back then there was
Speaker 2: still some native soil greens and maybe tent those greens,
Speaker 2: and everything at that point shifted to growing a strong
Speaker 2: bermuda base to get ready for the next overseating and
Speaker 2: keeping the greens alive throughout the summer, and it was,
Speaker 2: you know, a lot of sodding For a while, I
Speaker 2: spent a lot of time on the end of a
Speaker 2: hose and managing the greens management group for Brad and marsh.
Speaker 1: See they're ninety five, ninety six, ninety seven, ninety eight, yep,
Speaker 1: so you got to see some You got Crenshaw, you
Speaker 1: got Falda, you got Tiger oh Mare. Yeah. What what
Speaker 1: kind of any cool moments from from the tournament?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean a lot.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 2: You know, they're always surreal in the in what where
Speaker 2: you're sitting with them, you know. I tell the story,
Speaker 2: so what was the first fall? Though? It was the
Speaker 2: first fall though Crenshaw. So Crenshaw was first Yeah, so
Speaker 2: ninety five, And I kind of told the story that
Speaker 2: for whatever reason, I liked to learn how to. They
Speaker 2: had a really good guy who changed cups there at
Speaker 2: the time, name of John Anderson, and he taught me
Speaker 2: how to change cups and I enjoyed doing it, and
Speaker 2: in the evenings so we didn't have to mess with
Speaker 2: in the morning, I would go change the cups on
Speaker 2: the pudding Green and I think it was the Wednesday
Speaker 2: night I'm up there changing cups late and they're the
Speaker 2: only two people putting on the green are Tom Kite
Speaker 2: and Ben Crenshaw. And it occurred to me, oh man,
Speaker 2: they just came back from mister Pennock's funeral and they're
Speaker 2: in suits. And I kind of walk up and said, hey,
Speaker 2: mister Crenshaw, I'm sorry to hear about miss panic. And
Speaker 2: he's over the pot. And never met him before my life,
Speaker 2: never spoke to him. Probably wouldn't have been surprised if
Speaker 2: he looked at me and said, you really think I
Speaker 2: want to hear about this right now? You know what
Speaker 2: I mean? You know, he pops right up and just
Speaker 2: as everybody who has ever met him, know as probably
Speaker 2: nicest man in the planet, that is so nice to
Speaker 2: you to say, I really appreciate that, shakes my hand
Speaker 2: and you know, he's sure a great man. And this
Speaker 2: is after he's probably been doing that all day long,
Speaker 2: right and and it just it sat with me, and
Speaker 2: obviously anybody who's met him has similar experiences. And to
Speaker 2: this day I met him years later at La Country
Speaker 2: Club and he's funny how he always introduced himself. You know, hey,
Speaker 2: Ben Crenshaw, and you're like, no kidding, you know, like
Speaker 2: Tiger you know, Tiger gives you his name. Yeah, really,
Speaker 2: thanks for letting me know. But it was pretty cool.
Speaker 2: And and then you know, you go on to the
Speaker 2: next year and it's similar deal. You're Greg Norman sitting
Speaker 2: there with a six stroke lead and on the putting
Speaker 2: green and and I'm changing the cop I'm on the
Speaker 2: last one, and it's the greens are really dry and firm,
Speaker 2: and they're hard to cut the cups, and I'm taking
Speaker 2: a break over the cup cutter, and he's walking towards me.
Speaker 2: I can see him out of the corner of my eye,
Speaker 2: and I'm trying to wait till he either goes by
Speaker 2: or does something else so he doesn't watch me struggle
Speaker 2: to cut this cup. And he knows I'm waiting, so
Speaker 2: he stands there and he says, no, no, I want
Speaker 2: to I want to see you cut this thing. And
Speaker 2: I said, oh, therese would be no problem, and everything
Speaker 2: I had in my power to get it kicked down,
Speaker 2: and about two kicks pulled it out and said yeah,
Speaker 2: I told you they're easy, and he just laughed and
Speaker 2: walked away, and you know, I wished him luck, and
Speaker 2: and that one was interesting in a lot of ways.
Speaker 2: I mean, like anybody. I happened to be standing left
Speaker 2: to ten Green when he came off ten that day Sunday,
Speaker 2: and you know that I kind of image of him
Speaker 2: walking by and the stare in his eyes. I mean
Speaker 2: I was right there and saw that, and and then
Speaker 2: followed that group and stood up behind eleven and the galleries,
Speaker 2: and the just awful feeling that was around that facility
Speaker 2: that day was unbelievable. I mean, you're just like, oh
Speaker 2: my gosh, this this is really bad and it's compelling moments.
Speaker 2: And then and then to turn it right back around.
Speaker 2: And I think it was ninety six Tigers first, I
Speaker 2: think it might have been an amateur. It was it ninety five.
Speaker 1: Well, he played all those years because.
Speaker 2: He was he was an amateur amateur.
Speaker 1: He was winning the US am because he won. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so he was in there.
Speaker 2: Tiger's first year there as an amateur.
Speaker 1: Would have been ninety four.
Speaker 2: I think, yeah, Okay, well maybe I didn't see his
Speaker 2: first year there, but he come down to Fairway one
Speaker 2: year and just I'm water and dryer is off in
Speaker 2: the edge of the fairways and you know, a big
Speaker 2: smile on his face, yelling put some water on the
Speaker 2: greens please, you know, I mean, little things like that
Speaker 2: were but with guys who were forever, you know, I
Speaker 2: mean shaking hands with Arnie and his five probably it
Speaker 2: seems like it was. And yeah, he's coming down town.
Speaker 2: It's it's weird to me that, you know, that's early
Speaker 2: in my career right there, ninety five, and then thirteen
Speaker 2: years later or whatever, he's winning a PGA here at
Speaker 2: seven and and I'm fortunate enough to be here. And anyway,
Speaker 2: I mean, just cool things. And you go on to
Speaker 2: the next year and and there's Tiger and that image
Speaker 2: of him pumping his fist up on eighteen and I'm
Speaker 2: standing down in the lower range waiting to open up
Speaker 2: an irrigation valve so we can start watering behind play
Speaker 2: because we'd always isolate down the system and so you
Speaker 2: didn't have a geyser or something. And I watched a
Speaker 2: lot of you know, following that stuff over the years.
Speaker 2: Just really cool.
Speaker 1: We got we got a bust of myth Okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: we're gonna move. We're gonna move to something you just
Speaker 1: talked about. But we got but we are these are
Speaker 1: these plants frozen? Is this is this real?
Speaker 2: No? No, they're not frozen.
Speaker 1: Pipe birds aren't kind of brought into pipe in chirping.
Speaker 2: Well, they certainly weren't when I was there. You know,
Speaker 2: I don't know what's going on now. If it is
Speaker 2: it is, I really don't know. But there was never
Speaker 2: any ice on him. I would I The azalias is
Speaker 2: a pretty simple concept. They actually did some great planning
Speaker 2: and and I said planning, not planting, and they did both.
Speaker 2: But but it's multiple varieties of azalias that bloom at
Speaker 2: a little different stages, and it gives the longest extent
Speaker 2: of bloom. I mean, some years are going to get
Speaker 2: all of them, some years are going to get there early,
Speaker 2: and some years you get the late. Some of you
Speaker 2: might not get any. But but no, I don't I
Speaker 2: don't think they were ever iced while I was there.
Speaker 1: You know, people come up when they don't know exactly
Speaker 1: what's going on. That's when the best conspiracies.
Speaker 2: It's exhausting, it's exhausting to listen to. And my my
Speaker 2: my favorite is that you know, everybody in the planet
Speaker 2: planet is just confident that no matter how much rain
Speaker 2: you can get that subays, these greens are going to
Speaker 2: be firm as a rock the next morning and they're
Speaker 2: just like, yeah, it just doesn't happen that way.
Speaker 1: You're not on Twitter. But you know, this year, when
Speaker 1: it was raining, I turned to my bed that I
Speaker 1: was down in here. I guess. With it started raining,
Speaker 1: I go, oh, man, we're just gonna get like one
Speaker 1: hundred subair tweets right now, and like sure enough, just oh,
Speaker 1: time to crank up the subbers. It's just rained like
Speaker 1: three inches.
Speaker 2: All right, I'm gonna tell you this story. I probably
Speaker 2: shouldn't gonna get in trouble for this, But so when
Speaker 2: I was working at LA, I got to know Fred
Speaker 2: Couples through a member out there, John McClure, and and
Speaker 2: Fred was a member at LA and big supporter of mine.
Speaker 2: You know, his comments made my life easy because he
Speaker 2: comes with a ton of credibility out there. And so
Speaker 2: when Fred was captain and the President's Cup at Mirrorfield,
Speaker 2: Paul b Letch I was a superintendent a Mirrorfield and
Speaker 2: I was a big friend of Paul's and would go
Speaker 2: out and help him for years at Mirrorfield. So I
Speaker 2: came out for the President's Cup. So it had been
Speaker 2: wet and raining, and it was sticky, and it was
Speaker 2: early in the week. So Freddy really wanted those greens
Speaker 2: fast and just as fast as you could get him
Speaker 2: because he thought the international guys were going to hit
Speaker 2: it above the hole and and they'd be, you know,
Speaker 2: in trouble, and American guys weren't going to hit above
Speaker 2: the hole. So during the prize he would I'd see
Speaker 2: him and he'd keep asking me, and and the greens
Speaker 2: were plenty fast enough, right, he was just needle and
Speaker 2: he was shooting for more and he knew I would
Speaker 2: go say something to Paul, so he was needling me.
Speaker 2: And uh So there was a couple of members of
Speaker 2: the club around that were friends of his, and I
Speaker 2: took him on the cart and we were watching the
Speaker 2: practice round and fred he's you know, as you if
Speaker 2: you can tell, he is kind of what you see, right,
Speaker 2: I mean, he's that guy. He's clowning around and needling
Speaker 2: people all the time. And he ultimately ropes me into
Speaker 2: coming out onto the green on the seventh green. You know,
Speaker 2: I'm like, no, I'm good, I'm fine, I'll stay here.
Speaker 2: He's not, come on, you're scared. I'm not scared, but
Speaker 2: let's go. So he walks me up to seven green
Speaker 2: and introduces me to Matt Kocher and introduced me to
Speaker 2: a couple other guys, Joey Lkava and Davis Lover out there,
Speaker 2: and he's needling me all along the way. I can
Speaker 2: tell Rddy's behind me. And so he introduced me to
Speaker 2: Tiger and every one of them. He's asking are these
Speaker 2: greens fast? And he's behind me, you know, given to
Speaker 2: tell him no, tell him no. So he says, Tiger
Speaker 2: me Russ Myers. I said, hey, Tiger, nice to meet
Speaker 2: chest and actually I was a superintendent oh seven Southern Hills.
Speaker 2: Freddy says, Tiger, these greens fast. He said, yeah, they're
Speaker 2: pretty quick. He says, how come they're so soft? I said, well,
Speaker 2: tigers been like ninety eight percent humidity and you know
Speaker 2: it rained the last couple of days. I said, they'll
Speaker 2: get there. He goes, don't they have supper? I go, well,
Speaker 2: it's a little bit of a myth there, Tiger. I said,
Speaker 2: it doesn't really dry out the green. It gets rid
Speaker 2: of the excess moisture, and you know it's not going
Speaker 2: to do it that quick, doesn't my house? I said, hey, Tiger,
Speaker 2: you can teach me how to run that putter. Right there,
Speaker 2: But don't teach me how to grow grass. All right now,
Speaker 2: If Fred he's loving it, he's lost his mind, you know,
Speaker 2: he's yelling, and the putters of him here and Tiger
Speaker 2: loved it. You know. They were all needle and they
Speaker 2: just they don't want to meet some guy and I
Speaker 2: go through that. So they were having a ball with
Speaker 2: the needle and the tiger starts giving it back to
Speaker 2: me about eating lead tape on his putter because the
Speaker 2: greens are too slow. So that's good stuff.
Speaker 1: That's uh, you know, tigers, you just want a tiger's guys.
Speaker 2: No, No, I think you know best I've ever seen.
Speaker 2: I respect him to death.
Speaker 1: He infamously adds like a s y to everybody's to
Speaker 1: everybody's name, like he calls brooks Up Brooksy, Steve Sands, Sansy.
Speaker 2: He's just gonna have to reverse it with me.
Speaker 1: And you're rusty, Yeah, rusty wouldn't.
Speaker 2: Work, now, that wouldn't be good. Although he did say
Speaker 2: that our greens were a little bumpy the day he
Speaker 2: lipped out to shoot sixty three.
Speaker 1: So just be let's talk about so you got got
Speaker 1: the job at Southern Hills and six a year later,
Speaker 1: you're you're hosting the PGA. What was it like doing
Speaker 1: all these major championships, not, you know, being a guy
Speaker 1: out there helping out to then becoming you know, the guy.
Speaker 2: It was comforting. I think what I learned through watching
Speaker 2: everybody was there's there's a mentality that the more you
Speaker 2: do must be better. And I'm not sure that's always
Speaker 2: the case, you know. I mean, if you're not I
Speaker 2: don't know, you know, pick your deal. If you're not
Speaker 2: hand picking twigs off the side of trees, then you
Speaker 2: must not be doing it right. And I think that's
Speaker 2: not it. I think for me, it was about focusing
Speaker 2: on what mattered inside the ropes. I never dealt with
Speaker 2: one issue that I can recall outside the ropes. I
Speaker 2: had great staff here that I had inherited superintendent before me,
Speaker 2: very successful John Zelenski now at Charlotte Country Club and
Speaker 2: left me with great guys, and I never had to
Speaker 2: mess with any of that stuff. And it allowed me
Speaker 2: to just stay focused in here with them. And so
Speaker 2: I think, you know, I watched while we got two
Speaker 2: cuts in today, let's try to get three tomorrow. And
Speaker 2: that just I'm not saying it was wrong at other
Speaker 2: places just for us. It didn't make sense. I wanted
Speaker 2: to I wanted to present the place well. I didn't
Speaker 2: want it to get worse. As the week went on,
Speaker 2: we backed off. We I don't know when the last
Speaker 2: time there was just a single cut done the day
Speaker 2: of a tournament and no nighttime cut. I mean, we
Speaker 2: did that that week just because it was just going
Speaker 2: to continue to wear collars for no added benefit. We
Speaker 2: were going to achieve the speeds we wanted in the
Speaker 2: firmnace we could get considering the heat that week, and
Speaker 2: we ended up with a great you know, Tiger went
Speaker 2: in and a great event, and you know, some of
Speaker 2: the probably most challenging, the weirdest thing about that week
Speaker 2: was nobody practiced. I mean, you know, these guys they'll
Speaker 2: sit on the tee all day long and just beat away.
Speaker 2: It was so hot they didn't want to be out there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's it. I mean, it's got to be the
Speaker 1: toughest thing with Oklahoma in June July. I mean we
Speaker 1: are out here today in July. It's just hot. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's pretty warm, and but that's that's why you got
Speaker 1: your new heating and air conditioning unit, right.
Speaker 2: That is correct, it's pretty fancy. It is correct. I
Speaker 2: was exposed to that at Augusta in the nineties. They
Speaker 2: actually put it in the mid eighties the first time
Speaker 2: on number twelve, and I have been a huge proponent
Speaker 2: of that my whole career. It's something you got to
Speaker 2: rebuild the greens to put them in. And when I
Speaker 2: was here for my first stint, I vowed to myself
Speaker 2: I wouldn't ever rebuild the green without putting them in,
Speaker 2: because I just think it has such a strong long
Speaker 2: term value to extending the life of greens and overall
Speaker 2: ability to manipulate the environment. And so we put in
Speaker 2: the infrastructure for it on both courses. And this is
Speaker 2: the best system put in by far, design wise and
Speaker 2: fully operational on all the bent grass surfaces on the course.
Speaker 2: And when I took yesterday here near fourth of July week,
Speaker 2: and I took yesterday to go up to the lake
Speaker 2: with my family, it was probably ninety six degrees outside
Speaker 2: and pretty hot, and felt pretty darn comfortable. We weren't
Speaker 2: going to deal with any stress now. This will be
Speaker 2: the first summer of it all in and we got
Speaker 2: to see where we're at. But it sure was nice
Speaker 2: to know that it was about seventy five degrees and
Speaker 2: the soil times down there.
Speaker 1: So your career, you went from Augusta. You then became
Speaker 1: superintendent down Florida. You're in Key Largo, and and then
Speaker 1: you came here to Southern Hells and then you went
Speaker 1: to LA. So with LA you went there and they
Speaker 1: did their massive restoration with with Gil, and then he
Speaker 1: came back here, and Gil sure enough came back here
Speaker 1: and did this restoration. You came back and he did
Speaker 1: this restoration. So how how would you say your views
Speaker 1: of Southern Hills changed after working at LACC.
Speaker 2: Yeah, not just Southern Hills. But I'm not sure I understood.
Speaker 2: I understood pure risk reward architecture to a degree, like
Speaker 2: location of hazards relative to how you would play into
Speaker 2: a green. Like a good example is Number one at Augusta.
Speaker 2: I always understood that the more he challenged the fairway bunker,
Speaker 2: the better your angle would be into the green. And
Speaker 2: that was about the extent of my architectural knowledge. And
Speaker 2: you know, some would argue it's probably not much beyond
Speaker 2: that now, including Jim Wagner, But I don't know that.
Speaker 2: When I looked at the property before I ever looked
Speaker 2: at it like that. When I looked at a tea
Speaker 2: box and I looked where to put tea markers, I
Speaker 2: was more worried about divot pattern or where then I
Speaker 2: probably was how the hole played. When we looked at
Speaker 2: planning a landscaping at the entrance of the club, I
Speaker 2: probably thought of it more about that individual box than
Speaker 2: how it related to the entire property and the theme
Speaker 2: of the property and what The time I spent with
Speaker 2: Gil and Jim and Jeff Shackelford out at LA just
Speaker 2: that constant reminders, and there was a lot of stuff.
Speaker 2: I didn't know what they wanted to look like, the
Speaker 2: native grasses. I didn't know quite what the look was.
Speaker 2: I didn't know how dry they wanted the roughs. And
Speaker 2: we would keep communicating after the work was done with
Speaker 2: photos and Jeff would come out a lot and say,
Speaker 2: is this the look?
Speaker 1: You know?
Speaker 2: And I kind of started to learn all through that.
Speaker 2: So now when I come back, I look at Southern
Speaker 2: Hills totally different. I look at it as the I
Speaker 2: mean when I was here the first time we had
Speaker 2: a PGA, the first year, we went through the ice
Speaker 2: storm that winter that following winter, and then we had
Speaker 2: a US amateur. There wasn't a lot of time to
Speaker 2: really digest that stuff anyway, but I wouldn't have known
Speaker 2: what to look for, and I wasn't as tuned into
Speaker 2: how whole location relation to team markers and things like that,
Speaker 2: and all that came from five, you know, five six
Speaker 2: years in LA working with those guys, and it really
Speaker 2: rejuvenated me. I mean I from the start didn't know
Speaker 2: if I was ever gonna want to be a superintendent.
Speaker 2: I've managed to like it and at times contemplated doing
Speaker 2: other things. And fortunately for me, every time I've contemplated
Speaker 2: something else, there's been a new interesting challenge that's kind
Speaker 2: of said, no, I think I want to try that.
Speaker 2: And you know, leaving here was hard. I had a
Speaker 2: It's a great club, great members, great managers, I liked
Speaker 2: who I worked for. Part of leaving was a little
Speaker 2: bit of fear. I mean I was pretty young then,
Speaker 2: and I'm sitting there going, what is this is not
Speaker 2: an easy place to go through summers on that bent
Speaker 2: grass And you start looking at your long term and say,
Speaker 2: is there a likelihood you're going to go twenty twenty
Speaker 2: five years here and retire when you're gonna have some problems.
Speaker 2: I mean, I don't care how good you are. This
Speaker 2: is a tough place to go grass in the summer,
Speaker 2: on bed grass. Some of it was geez, maybe I
Speaker 2: should look at this, but some of it was the
Speaker 2: opportunity to move away from the style of Southern Hills,
Speaker 2: in the style of Augusta National that's cleaned wall the wall,
Speaker 2: and experience this more rugged, you loose feel to things.
Speaker 2: And so when the opportunity came, it just felt like
Speaker 2: it made sense. I tell everybody I left Southern Hills
Speaker 2: for La Country Club because I was leaving for a
Speaker 2: better job. But at the time I left LA Country
Speaker 2: Club to come back here, I felt the same way.
Speaker 2: I felt like Southern Hills was a better job at
Speaker 2: that point. And part of it was the opportunities I
Speaker 2: saw that could be there for that property. It didn't
Speaker 2: know if we would do a your renovation work or
Speaker 2: anything like that at restoration, but but I had learned
Speaker 2: so much that I was like, geez, that stuff would
Speaker 2: really that type of thinking would really fit there and
Speaker 2: would advance that place.
Speaker 1: It's interesting to think too, Like you know, it seems
Speaker 1: like early in your career it was it was really
Speaker 1: you know, competitive golf, championship golf focused, and you know
Speaker 1: you had some you have so much experience in that.
Speaker 1: But then like all of a sudden, this opportunity at
Speaker 1: LA was like, you know, you go to LA and
Speaker 1: you can be part of a massive restoration project which
Speaker 1: was probably new and fresh and re energizing.
Speaker 2: It was I mean, I did we we redid the course.
Speaker 2: I was in Florida Cardsound Golf Club. We redid that.
Speaker 2: Brian Silva did it and very flat piece of land,
Speaker 2: solid rock, and Brian did a really good job there.
Speaker 2: I mean really underrated and a lot of the work
Speaker 2: he's done in my opinion, but I mean for that property,
Speaker 2: he did a great job. And I'd annoying about architecture.
Speaker 2: To me, it was all about have we gotten all
Speaker 2: the ball marks fixed? Have we got every last plade
Speaker 2: of grass? You know, as every bunker looked perfect, and
Speaker 2: as you as you evolved, you started look at it differently,
Speaker 2: and LA was like perfect imperfection, right, how could you
Speaker 2: make it look as unperfect as possible and still maintain
Speaker 2: exceptional playability? And that became fun. I mean when I
Speaker 2: say we watered, we watered the roughs at La Country
Speaker 2: Club the last couple of years. I was there like
Speaker 2: one day a month. I mean that was it. I
Speaker 2: mean we pounded him for like an hour ahead for
Speaker 2: one day, soaked him and then just let him dry down.
Speaker 2: And you know, that type of stuff was fun and
Speaker 2: it took some time. I mean, I've nobody pays attention
Speaker 2: to what I say most time anyway, so they won't
Speaker 2: remember it. But when we opened up the North Course,
Speaker 2: people were raving about it, right, And it was hard
Speaker 2: to take account molement from my perspective because the conditioning
Speaker 2: wasn't good, But the architecture carried the day for like
Speaker 2: two years there to where we finally caught up with
Speaker 2: the conditioning. And to some degree, that's what's happening here.
Speaker 2: There's a lot of smoke and mirrors and a lot
Speaker 2: of imperfections right now that are masked by bermuda that's
Speaker 2: actively growing. But we got a lot of little things
Speaker 2: to tie together, whether it's you know, edges of greens
Speaker 2: that still need to be top dressed smooth, or a
Speaker 2: ditchline that's settled and you know, goofy stuff like that.
Speaker 2: But I don't I don't panic about that stuff. Like
Speaker 2: I might have ten years ago, because it has no
Speaker 2: bearing on what's great about the playability. I just want
Speaker 2: to keep the playability as good as I can.
Speaker 1: So I guess one of the things I think's interesting
Speaker 1: with your career is you went from you know, Augusta, Florida, Tulsa,
Speaker 1: then you go to like three hundred and sixty five
Speaker 1: days a year, no no break. How tough was that transition,
Speaker 1: you know in LA, never having downtime. It's something I
Speaker 1: thought about when I was out in LA this year.
Speaker 2: It was. It was tougher than I ever would have
Speaker 2: imagined it would have been. For a couple of reasons.
Speaker 2: I don't mind him working. I don't mind being at
Speaker 2: work every day, especially if I like the place and
Speaker 2: it feels like home. There's a couple of things that
Speaker 2: going to that. First of all, it was a thirty
Speaker 2: six hole facility, so even when we were closed, we
Speaker 2: weren't closed, like if one course was closed, the other
Speaker 2: was open. A huge part of that restoration out there
Speaker 2: was course set up, a huge part, and it's the
Speaker 2: hardest thing to train other staff members on the mentality
Speaker 2: of how each hole can set up differently and how
Speaker 2: if you do one thing here, you probably want to
Speaker 2: do this somewhere else to counter it, and something as
Speaker 2: simple as a bad tea marker setup can mess that up.
Speaker 2: And it became very very hard to get away from
Speaker 2: it for me, because every day there's something going on, right,
Speaker 2: the ladies are doing this, or the seniors are playing here,
Speaker 2: and you had these setup issues, and I needed to
Speaker 2: make sure at least put my eyes on it to
Speaker 2: make sure the setup was right. Otherwise it was like, well,
Speaker 2: that's weird. Why are you playing that front right pen
Speaker 2: on the third green so long? You know what I mean?
Speaker 2: And so it was hard to get away from the place.
Speaker 2: And the second thing that added to that dynamic was
Speaker 2: we had both my wife and I, Lindsay had both
Speaker 2: our kids while we were out there, and I would
Speaker 2: walk out of that house every morning to two closed
Speaker 2: doors and get lucky if I get home at six
Speaker 2: thirty quarter or seven, maybe play with them for an
Speaker 2: hour before they went to bed. That got to be
Speaker 2: where it really wore on me. I didn't want to
Speaker 2: live my life that way with my kids, and I
Speaker 2: had to figure out how to solve that, and it
Speaker 2: was getting hard to do. I would have figured it
Speaker 2: out but it ended up luckily I didn't have to.
Speaker 1: Yeah, young kids for superintendent. The hours just are are tough,
Speaker 1: especially you know there and they go to sleep at seven, say,
Speaker 1: and then you're yeah, you're never you're done.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've gotten much better at vowing not to be
Speaker 2: that one who's every minute every day. I won't let
Speaker 2: this industry. I've had this conversation with Nix at Orchest
Speaker 2: when I came back here. I said, I, Nick, I
Speaker 2: won't let this take me away from my kids to
Speaker 2: a point where I'm not comfortable. I said, if it does,
Speaker 2: I'm just gonna have to try to do something else
Speaker 2: and and and I'm committed to that. So far, I
Speaker 2: think I've done a pretty good job. This win has
Speaker 2: been a little bit more because of the project, but
Speaker 2: but even it wasn't bad. We had a great contractor
Speaker 2: to ack of a job, in Augustine Sanchez with Heritage
Speaker 2: Lanks and obviously Foremost Irrigation and with you know, Seamus
Speaker 2: Malee was on site every day, so you know, I
Speaker 2: would I need. I say it a lot that I'm
Speaker 2: going to the lake. I tell people that all the time,
Speaker 2: and I go sometimes. I'll probably go as much as
Speaker 2: I tell people I do, but but in some ways
Speaker 2: I got it. If I don't enjoy the time with
Speaker 2: my kids, I'm gonna hate being here and I won't last.
Speaker 2: So you gotta let me do it. At some point,
Speaker 2: my kids probably won't want me around.
Speaker 1: Going to the lakes as a mental expression going.
Speaker 2: To the lake. My wife won't let me go to
Speaker 2: the bars often anymore. Now it's the lake.
Speaker 1: So so, how is so you come back and you
Speaker 1: you want to you've seen what l a CC became,
Speaker 1: and you come back and you see you've got kind
Speaker 1: of a new perspective on Southern Hills and talk to
Speaker 1: then you start to work with Gil and how did
Speaker 1: this project come about?
Speaker 2: Okay, so before I had so, I I had accepted
Speaker 2: the opportunity to come back, but I hadn't been back yet.
Speaker 2: We were starting the south Course project at l A
Speaker 2: and you know, Southern Hills knew up front I wouldn't
Speaker 2: be able to come back right away and was understanding
Speaker 2: of that, and I was there. So there was this
Speaker 2: time period in between. And during that time period, Keith
Speaker 2: Foster had stepped away from like a nineteen year relationship
Speaker 2: with the Southern Hills. I was called by Nick Si
Speaker 2: Dorcas and asked me to prepare some thoughts for the
Speaker 2: executive committee on the various architects in the industry. And
Speaker 2: I said, okay, I'll do you know, I'll compile what
Speaker 2: I can, what I know, and I had a conference
Speaker 2: call with the Executive committee to kind of go over
Speaker 2: some thoughts. Didn't, you know, lead him any one way.
Speaker 2: I just told them how each stylistically either you know
Speaker 2: what you know of them. And they asked at the
Speaker 2: time if I would have a conversation with Gil to
Speaker 2: see if he would have any interest in guiding them
Speaker 2: through a short game construction and driving range because they
Speaker 2: were going to build this teaching center or golf performance center.
Speaker 2: I said, I'd do it. I did. Gil said he
Speaker 2: would do that, probably somewhat reluctantly at the time, obviously
Speaker 2: extremely busy, and to come out and build a short
Speaker 2: game facility in the corner of a property on a
Speaker 2: flat piece of land, and you know, oversea driver range
Speaker 2: was probably not something he was totally excited about, but
Speaker 2: he also knew there was possibilities in the future. And
Speaker 2: you know, our relationship certainly probably didn't help or didn't.
Speaker 1: Hurt Wagner might say.
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, you gotta take it easy. He'll he'll needle
Speaker 2: me forever if I say something wrong. So we it's
Speaker 2: just funny because I've got this image of Jim Wagner
Speaker 2: from almost any project where he's on the excavator and
Speaker 2: as I pull up, he turns the excavator sideways and
Speaker 2: so he can face you right, and he always puts
Speaker 2: his elbows on his knees and then puts his head
Speaker 2: in his hands and invariably says, you know, what the
Speaker 2: is that guy doing over there? Back then, that's how
Speaker 2: he do it.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 2: He texts you non stop. He texts about everything he sees.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's hilarious. When it's hard to believe he
Speaker 2: can run the controls on an excavator and text. I
Speaker 2: think he must be doing it with his with his
Speaker 2: chin or something, because he's just like, there's a guy
Speaker 2: behind three, this dumb sob, you know, And it's in
Speaker 2: the text, and you're like, how's he getting anything done?
Speaker 2: He's texting NonStop. But it's and that's without even getting
Speaker 2: into the political back and forth that we have. But
Speaker 2: he is a piece of work. I've lost my train
Speaker 2: of thought on where we were we.
Speaker 1: Were talking with with Gil. So he agrees to the
Speaker 1: short course, the driving range, short game area.
Speaker 2: So the board or the executive committee and the board
Speaker 2: met with Gil and they were great excited that he
Speaker 2: would be willing to come work with us. Asked, he
Speaker 2: agreed to do that stuff, and then the board actually
Speaker 2: delayed that work by one year, and in the meantime
Speaker 2: we kind of took that opportunity to say, Hey, if
Speaker 2: we're going to delay this year, why don't we get
Speaker 2: them out here. Let's let them go through and look
Speaker 2: at the whole property and kind of give us overall
Speaker 2: thoughts of it. They thought that was great. Gil found
Speaker 2: time to do it and and it resulted in the
Speaker 2: you know, the master plan or whatever you want to
Speaker 2: call it, of the of the of the work, with
Speaker 2: no you know, no recommendation of anything. It just said,
Speaker 2: these are the things I think you should look at
Speaker 2: and do. This board, I've said it before, and it's wisdom.
Speaker 2: It was in the middle of some facility planning stuff
Speaker 2: as far as tennis what we called the cartbarn being
Speaker 2: rebuilt and the lockeromen's locker room, not to mention the
Speaker 2: teaching center, and they they didn't want to affect the
Speaker 2: membership more than once. So they piled this whole thing
Speaker 2: into one project, which turned out, you know, ultimately to
Speaker 2: be this. You know, our end of it ended up
Speaker 2: being ten and a half million for everything and that
Speaker 2: you know that includes million and a half in hydronics,
Speaker 2: and so, you know, defend Gil a little it. Sometimes
Speaker 2: they get thrown in that the numbers of their projects
Speaker 2: are getting inflated. Certainly wasn't here. I mean we were
Speaker 2: golf course alone. We were probably under nine million for
Speaker 2: that work.
Speaker 1: So and that was all new Greens, all.
Speaker 2: New Greens, bonkers, Tea's creek restorations, tree removal, fairway expansion,
Speaker 2: all that stuff.
Speaker 1: Well, what would you say, was the thing that you
Speaker 1: didn't expect that's turned out like that? You didn't foresee that,
Speaker 1: you know, in a good way, or you know, in
Speaker 1: a bad way. I mean, I don't think it will
Speaker 1: be a bad way, Bud.
Speaker 2: That's a good question. I mean I probably came into
Speaker 2: it with such high expectations because I just knew how
Speaker 2: my I mean, I knew how good those guys were,
Speaker 2: and I knew what because gone through it, I was
Speaker 2: always pretty confident people were going to love it. I
Speaker 2: just could never get a sense that the membership fully
Speaker 2: understood where we were going with it. There were times
Speaker 2: I was I got a little concerned that because they
Speaker 2: trusted so much of it to the board and to
Speaker 2: Nick and Carrie and myself, and obviously probably that trust
Speaker 2: came because of Gil and Jim, but but they trusted
Speaker 2: so much of it was that they didn't They weren't
Speaker 2: standing there every step of the way. And it was
Speaker 2: one of these deals where I felt like we were
Speaker 2: going to do the big reveal and they were like
Speaker 2: going to be like, well, why did we do that?
Speaker 2: But it wasn't. And so I had analyzed so much
Speaker 2: of two and the split fairway there and ten and
Speaker 2: adding the creek, and that I wasn't surprised by those things. Seventeen.
Speaker 2: I knew they were going to I felt very confident
Speaker 2: those were going to be great. Probably the one that
Speaker 2: I didn't know coming into it. And I've never been
Speaker 2: quite able to figure that hole out that I think
Speaker 2: is so great now it's probably gonna end up being eleven.
Speaker 2: I just think that it was kind of an to me.
Speaker 2: It was always kind of a nondescript hole there in
Speaker 2: the corner with bunkers wrapped around it. You just had
Speaker 2: to hit the green and boom and now you got
Speaker 2: to hit it. But there's a lot of dynamics there
Speaker 2: with with the creek down to the left being put
Speaker 2: back in. I just don't think that's that. I think
Speaker 2: that it reminds me a lot of the British holes
Speaker 2: there in the Scottish holes and the postage stamps.
Speaker 1: Now it's funny, I I when I watch Southern Hills
Speaker 1: when in seven and three or four or oh one,
Speaker 1: oh one, I uh like, just you know, there was nothing,
Speaker 1: you know, memori memorable, and then you look at a topa,
Speaker 1: you look at a Google Earth image and there's nothing.
Speaker 1: Then you get out here and it's just like it's
Speaker 1: unbelievable the land and everything. But the par three's are
Speaker 1: really fascinating, I think because they're all in corners of
Speaker 1: the property and they all they're all connector holes kind
Speaker 1: of that connect you to the next great part four,
Speaker 1: from one great part four to the next great hole.
Speaker 1: Like you know, eleven's a perfect example. It's on this
Speaker 1: terrain that's it's too severe to put a part four
Speaker 1: or par five with the way that bank comes down,
Speaker 1: but then you know it's connect It connects ten and twelve,
Speaker 1: like two of the most iconic holes on the golf course. Now, yeah,
Speaker 1: and it's just it's such a fascinating and eleven's just
Speaker 1: it's a really cool hole, and you know it's you've
Speaker 1: got that prevailing wind and that ridge line almost like
Speaker 1: blocks the wind. And I think you're going to see
Speaker 1: so many guys just miss it right there because now
Speaker 1: with that left side where it shaved down and runs
Speaker 1: right into the creek, it's like you're so scared of
Speaker 1: that you can't and you think this wind's going to
Speaker 1: push it over there, and it just doesn't do anything
Speaker 1: to it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And that funny thing is, if you've played the
Speaker 2: whole before, you don't think right front or right is
Speaker 2: that bad, but it is now. I mean, you'd rather
Speaker 2: be hitting from the tee than hitting from the right
Speaker 2: of the green because you know the green's half as
Speaker 2: deep from the right side and you're aiming towards that creek.
Speaker 2: So I just I think that became a really special change.
Speaker 2: And by the way, it made twelve tea look immensely better.
Speaker 2: Twelve tea was just kind of down there, flat and
Speaker 2: didn't really you know, it stood up in the middle
Speaker 2: of this open area. It just was weird. And now
Speaker 2: it gives that area of body and character. But I
Speaker 2: didn't really mention it or think about it at the time.
Speaker 2: But the thing that came out better and it's not
Speaker 2: as you know, I had high expectations for the golf
Speaker 2: course stuff, but that area up around the first tee
Speaker 2: came out. Every bit is good and better than I
Speaker 2: could ever picture of it. The vista's up there now,
Speaker 2: or it's always been incredible off of one tee, but
Speaker 2: you just don't feel enclosed in up there anymore. And
Speaker 2: it feels like there's an atmosphere and a vibe and
Speaker 2: in an area to hang out and communicate with the
Speaker 2: small putting green in there, and that that whole thing's
Speaker 2: changed a.
Speaker 1: Lot to me. Just the place has such character now
Speaker 1: and like it's it's got that that intimacy that you
Speaker 1: see with all the greens close together in different spots,
Speaker 1: and there's just you know, you go to points on
Speaker 1: the golf course and everywhere you go you can see
Speaker 1: multiple holes and multiple shots from if you're if you're spectating,
Speaker 1: it's it's just such a neat spot.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's funny. I walk on golf courses now and
Speaker 2: I look at them and I think, probably I'm you know,
Speaker 2: my exposure to working with Gill and Jim and Jeff
Speaker 2: over the years. I think I look at it and
Speaker 2: I go, I would do this or I would do that.
Speaker 2: But it's not really I would do this. It's like
Speaker 2: I think they would do this, that or this, and
Speaker 2: and I find myself doing that when I go play
Speaker 2: golf courses. It's like, yeah, I think this needs to
Speaker 2: be more like this. And uh, and I think that's
Speaker 2: so much of that rejuvenation for me. I mean it's
Speaker 2: I mean, it's just that relationship ship really got me
Speaker 2: fired up. I look at this property now and I
Speaker 2: don't do that as much now that it's done right,
Speaker 2: I don't see anything that that I'm itching to modify
Speaker 2: and and I know La North. We finished, and we
Speaker 2: spent the next four years doing more stuff. It was
Speaker 2: all under Gill's you know, advice, but it was just
Speaker 2: a function of how much was done in the original
Speaker 2: main body of the project and what was continued later.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So there was one day. Were there any other
Speaker 1: differences in the projects like and running it like any
Speaker 1: noticeable different like, well, no.
Speaker 2: I don't I don't know if there was. I think uh,
Speaker 2: I think most of the North Course was all like
Speaker 2: Jim Gillen and uh, Jeff and and they kind of
Speaker 2: clearly had these functional roles that they were playing as
Speaker 2: far as construct but there was the collaborative side. They
Speaker 2: were communicating a lot here. That was more Jim and
Speaker 2: Seamus and and Gil. So I think maybe that's the
Speaker 2: only real dynamic difference. The time that Jim may have
Speaker 2: spent on the excavator at La Country Club was probably
Speaker 2: replaced by Seamus doing it here and taking that lead
Speaker 2: role as far as the actual day to day operation.
Speaker 2: And then when Jim would come in and out, he
Speaker 2: would you know, fill in and I fill in. He
Speaker 2: would take charge for a few days and then hand
Speaker 2: it back to Seamus, and it was kind of more
Speaker 2: that way. Yeah, fill in is not really something Jim does.
Speaker 1: So he was like a good player.
Speaker 2: Yeah, sixth man Like Rasion Rondo, Oh, Lebron, that's my ball.
Speaker 1: Rondo had a moment again and that running for a
Speaker 1: hot second was the Lebron Stopperron. That was when Lebron
Speaker 1: was having some issues, you know, like he that was
Speaker 1: Everybody was like, you know, can Lebron actually win this?
Speaker 1: But Rajon Rondo was shutting him down a sixty one
Speaker 1: point guard.
Speaker 2: Still, I was thinking, trying to think back. I think
Speaker 2: Lebron's ever been called for a charge in his life,
Speaker 2: only he's ever committed one.
Speaker 1: Yeah, his reactions being a Bulls fan and being a
Speaker 1: bull season ticket holder when when the heat and him were,
Speaker 1: you know, and just his reactions anytime he gets called
Speaker 1: for a foul. It's like we get off on basketball
Speaker 1: for I know it will be the next podcast will
Speaker 1: be all about you know, this free agency boom that's
Speaker 1: happening right now. So with uh with Southern Hills in
Speaker 1: the future, you guys are now like probably twenty thirty
Speaker 1: your TVD.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, to my understanding, that's that's the committed date.
Speaker 2: Was still some outside possibility of it moving up. Don't
Speaker 2: know where it stands officially.
Speaker 1: It'll be exciting, you know. I walked away. I'm like,
Speaker 1: I can't wait till then watch to watch major championship
Speaker 1: coffee in coorse.
Speaker 2: Well, I'm with you. I got to get the again
Speaker 2: that there's that drive there. They're gonna get some.
Speaker 1: Ratings Yeah, so you're one of the biggest and you
Speaker 1: alluded to this earlier, one of the biggest issues in
Speaker 1: the churf industries, that is the labor. How have you
Speaker 1: gone about tackling finding labor and you know, wages and
Speaker 1: all of that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so finding labor on the base staff level is
Speaker 2: still the same basic tactics as for our full time staff.
Speaker 2: We're still trying to find you know, local people looking
Speaker 2: for long term employment, good good place to work, good benefits.
Speaker 2: It's this in our environment. It's the seasonal that had
Speaker 2: dried up a lot. There just wasn't there. So, you know,
Speaker 2: we had Scott Boordener, a friend of mine in Chicago
Speaker 2: golf club, had mentioned to me a couple of years
Speaker 2: ago that he was having good luck with high school kids,
Speaker 2: and we were left with no choice but to try
Speaker 2: some things like that and reached out to the local
Speaker 2: schools and guidance counselors and just got inundated with unbelievable
Speaker 2: amount of requests for employment. And it's been great. I mean,
Speaker 2: we overhire them just because we kind of take the
Speaker 2: approach of we're going to try to get you to
Speaker 2: go Tuesday through Sunday six thirty in the morning until whatever,
Speaker 2: eleven o'clock eleven thirty. If they want to work a
Speaker 2: bunch more, great, But you can still be a high
Speaker 2: school kid. You can have your summers, you can do whatever.
Speaker 2: We'll over hire the number of them, so if they
Speaker 2: want a day off here or there, we're not going
Speaker 2: to fight with them about it. You know, hey, go
Speaker 2: for it. We got plenty of guys, and financially that's
Speaker 2: made sense. And they've been much better than most of
Speaker 2: the planet thinks they would be. You know, I mean,
Speaker 2: they get they get off my lawn. World of these
Speaker 2: these new kids these days, they don't know how to work,
Speaker 2: hasn't shown to be true to me. They've been very reliable.
Speaker 2: They've been at high energy. They bring a pulse to
Speaker 2: this operation that we were probably missing. So that's been
Speaker 2: a big part. Now it leaves us a little exposed
Speaker 2: right when they go back to school for you know,
Speaker 2: a month, and right before they come for a month,
Speaker 2: and we've got to still try to figure that out.
Speaker 2: It's tough. I mean, you drop twenty eight thirty guys
Speaker 2: and you're still growing and you got to mow for
Speaker 2: about a month. That can be tough. Until the grass
Speaker 2: shuts down enough that we're not pushed. Probably out of
Speaker 2: that thirty, probably fifteen percent of them our college kids
Speaker 2: put some of them are one that worked for us
Speaker 2: in high school that are coming back and doing it
Speaker 2: in college.
Speaker 1: Is that I mean that seems like a smart way
Speaker 1: to do. That's how you got into it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Yeah, there's there are a lot of them that
Speaker 2: would be very good at this, and be better at
Speaker 2: it than I was.
Speaker 1: It's a fascinating thing I think about. I grew up caddying,
Speaker 1: you know, but I was I also worked in the
Speaker 1: backroom at the country club that I caddy at. I
Speaker 1: mean I was out there at like five point thirty
Speaker 1: opening up the backroom and you know, setting up the
Speaker 1: range and everything, and you know, in many way I
Speaker 1: would work with the superintendent of getting the range stuff done.
Speaker 1: But like you know, like that was a great job.
Speaker 1: I spend all day outside.
Speaker 2: Well look at this. I mean, this place right now
Speaker 2: is think about this. So right now I've got on
Speaker 2: our staff roughly thirty high school kids or freshman sophomore
Speaker 2: in college. We've got I'm going to guess another thirty
Speaker 2: working at the pool, and then with this club, has
Speaker 2: it set up where the caddy program that Carrie has
Speaker 2: been building up here and developing through the freshman caddies,
Speaker 2: he trained some two hundred kids or caddies, and a
Speaker 2: lot of them high school kids. So they're somewhere in
Speaker 2: the neighborhood of two hundred and sixty local high school
Speaker 2: kids coming out here four days a week whatever they
Speaker 2: are right, and they're being exposed to leaders in the
Speaker 2: community and working with them and walking with them, and
Speaker 2: they're embracing that that stuff is what clubs were about
Speaker 2: when you started caddying and when you know people were
Speaker 2: coming up my age. It's a pretty cool thing. If
Speaker 2: we can sustain and if it builds the way you want.
Speaker 2: I mean, the number of people you talk to they
Speaker 2: are members of this club that got their start to
Speaker 2: the game of golf through caddy and is huge. So
Speaker 2: whether it's golf course maintenance or caddy and whatever they
Speaker 2: like to do, it can't hurt the game to get
Speaker 2: them going. And that's a lot of kids. I mean,
Speaker 2: that's that's just under half the number of members we
Speaker 2: got that are working here that are all, you know,
Speaker 2: still in their educational formative years.
Speaker 1: The caddy program, how much has that helped with reducing
Speaker 1: say cart play and the traffic just on the golf course.
Speaker 2: It's had a well, the first year of it was
Speaker 2: a minor impact, had a very small impact. It's a
Speaker 2: big culture change here at the club that, to be
Speaker 2: quite honest, I don't know how far it's going to go.
Speaker 2: It's we open the course back up of walking only,
Speaker 2: and it's been an unbelievable vibe and feel out here.
Speaker 2: It just feels like the best of the best. I mean,
Speaker 2: you know, forget golf course, you know, golf Digest rankings,
Speaker 2: but if you look at him. The last time I
Speaker 2: looked at him, I was trying to make a case
Speaker 2: to the club about walking and and I asked them
Speaker 2: to stop me when they got to the course on
Speaker 2: the list that did more or the same amount of
Speaker 2: heart rounds as we were doing, and it was below us,
Speaker 2: I mean, the top thirty. I mean, you know, maybe Pebble,
Speaker 2: but Pebble's doing it on car paths only. So I
Speaker 2: guess to Southern Hills's credit, we were, you know, the
Speaker 2: highest ranked of the courses that are allowing a high
Speaker 2: amount of golf carts. So when when we first institute
Speaker 2: Carrie first kind of built the program. It had a
Speaker 2: little bit of an impact, had about a seven percent impact,
Speaker 2: but that wasn't going to really move the needle. And
Speaker 2: and so now coming out of this we're walking only
Speaker 2: for the first month. We're about to shift to a
Speaker 2: cap of thirty six carts a day, which is going
Speaker 2: to sound like a lot to some clubs, not like
Speaker 2: not many to others. Dere, Yeah, it is hot, and
Speaker 2: but that's seventy two golfers, and and we've we've been
Speaker 2: doing pretty good numbers in the walking only stage, so
Speaker 2: we think there's a better than average chance that that
Speaker 2: thirty six will accommodate all we need. There may be
Speaker 2: some days where it doesn't, but we're hopeful that that'll
Speaker 2: work well and it'll be embraced by the membership. But
Speaker 2: at some point in August, we're to shift to where
Speaker 2: our tea we have sixteen times an hour, two of
Speaker 2: them are going to be reserved for walking only, which
Speaker 2: in and of itself is a big shift from where
Speaker 2: we were. I mean, that's thirty three percent and we
Speaker 2: were doing ninety three percent cart rounds. So we'll see,
Speaker 2: we're working at it. It's being the people walking are
Speaker 2: embracing that like crazy got push carts for the first
Speaker 2: time and I don't know what fifty years.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's interesting. And then from your standpoint, it makes
Speaker 1: your life a lot easier just from the acronomics.
Speaker 2: With into the stream of place in a ton of
Speaker 2: ways people don't. I mean, it's hard to even quantify it,
Speaker 2: but it's almost impossible when you're a pack t sheet
Speaker 2: with carts out there, it's almost impossible to mowe rough
Speaker 2: productively because they're they're zinging in and around and you're
Speaker 2: trying not to disturb their experience and they're just moving
Speaker 2: left to right so quick you don't even know where
Speaker 2: they're going, so there's no predictability to so your efficiency
Speaker 2: drops and you have to mow. And time have we
Speaker 2: mow rough on Mondays now when we're closed, instead of
Speaker 2: doing productive maintenance oriented work like venting or something to
Speaker 2: smooth stuff out. We're getting rough modes so we don't
Speaker 2: have to be out there mowing amokst play. That's not ideal,
Speaker 2: but it's where we're at now, So yes, it helps
Speaker 2: to help them well being of our members. Yes, it
Speaker 2: creates an atmosphere that feels more like a classic facility. Yes,
Speaker 2: it steadies the pace of what's going on out there,
Speaker 2: and it allows us to find openings to work without
Speaker 2: interfering with golfers. You know, there could be a three
Speaker 2: hole gap and if there's cards singing around, somebody's just
Speaker 2: going to jump over there in that gap and start playing.
Speaker 2: And we're in the middle of trying to I don't know,
Speaker 2: fertilized dry you know, weak areas around a bunker, and
Speaker 2: then you got our sprinklers are trying to water them
Speaker 2: in and so there's such a huge benefit to getting it,
Speaker 2: as I'm preaching to the choir, I know, but but
Speaker 2: it's a it's a three six here with the walk
Speaker 2: and only you know, it's just really cool.
Speaker 1: I imagine given the temperatures and like the growing that
Speaker 1: happens in the summer here, there's a lot more in
Speaker 1: day maintenance that you have to do than say, like
Speaker 1: an la would you say that, I don't know.
Speaker 2: I don't know if that's on greens there was without
Speaker 2: the hydronics and what we've seen so far there certainly,
Speaker 2: I mean we were four guys on the greens all
Speaker 2: day long. You know, whether that was cooling, syringing, constant
Speaker 2: inspection and then fans and so I think from the
Speaker 2: greens on the Bermuda, I don't. I don't know that
Speaker 2: that's the case. I mean good news about you know,
Speaker 2: I was talking to it's actually talking to Paul b
Speaker 2: and Phil Phil KAfari in the last few weeks and
Speaker 2: told the story. You know, they're both about either doing
Speaker 2: opening their course from a project or about to do one.
Speaker 2: And and I said, it's funny. You know, we open
Speaker 2: the course May something late May May twenty ninth. And
Speaker 2: the good news about our project is when we open,
Speaker 2: we're the worst we're going to be. We're going to
Speaker 2: get better each day because we get into more heat
Speaker 2: and that bermuda is going to grow more and we
Speaker 2: can do more with their projects and coolst seasoned grasses.
Speaker 2: They're now if they open at that time, the best
Speaker 2: they're going to be is probably when they open that summer,
Speaker 2: because now you're implementing imperfections and stresses and so so
Speaker 2: there's some advantage to being down here from that standpoint.
Speaker 1: Yeah, how crazy do you have anything? Do you have
Speaker 1: to worry about? Like ice damage and stuff on the
Speaker 1: greens and in the winter, like that's something that happens
Speaker 1: big in the upper Midwest.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the ice damage would be more on poa plants.
Speaker 2: I think with us we we are not likely to
Speaker 2: get ice damage on bent grass for sure, and certainly
Speaker 2: not with the hydronics heating them now. But but uh,
Speaker 2: that's an interesting dynamic. And and you know, if some
Speaker 2: scientists will probably call you and debate this, but you know,
Speaker 2: I'm speaking pretty openly about my opinions on stuff, which
Speaker 2: never gets me anywhere. But this whole dynamic of getting sand, sand,
Speaker 2: sand injected to everything has has had latent impacts. I mean,
Speaker 2: I don't know that the ice damage was ever as
Speaker 2: bad in the in the Northeast as it is in
Speaker 2: recent years. And it makes me wonder how much of
Speaker 2: that is the incorporation of sand, and this a lot
Speaker 2: of these native soil, you know, push up greens because
Speaker 2: obviously it's colder, you know, in the sand, and you
Speaker 2: know there's benefits in the in the summer. But but
Speaker 2: you now have probably an increase in additional issues like
Speaker 2: nematodes or or or ice damage due to due to
Speaker 2: years of trying to incorporate sand into these things.
Speaker 1: So the uh we you're doing, you're using the robot
Speaker 1: moors on the nine hole course here, and I'm just curious,
Speaker 1: you know, if there's one major innovation in the maintenance industry,
Speaker 1: what would.
Speaker 2: You like to see. That's a pretty big one, the
Speaker 2: robotics across the board. I mean, we incorporated the greens
Speaker 2: robotics one because it was what was available and it
Speaker 2: and it's working well for us. On our West nine
Speaker 2: we went from it took five people to set up
Speaker 2: that course on a daily basis. We're now doing that
Speaker 2: with three. And if you come to the you know,
Speaker 2: I'm not quite ready on the champ yet for odd reasons.
Speaker 2: But the biggest thing that impacts us on the Championship
Speaker 2: course it's kind of twofold, but they both revolve around
Speaker 2: the same thing. I wish I could eliminate figure out
Speaker 2: clippings on fairways without having to use blowers to do
Speaker 2: it and get the same effectiveness because that noise is
Speaker 2: a big shoe. But for us to mow fairways and
Speaker 2: deal with clippings, it's a twelve person job. There's eight
Speaker 2: fairway moors and four blowers out there. That's a lot.
Speaker 2: So if there was a way to get that robotics
Speaker 2: on large areas like that. That would be huge. I
Speaker 2: know there's robotics now for range pickers and stuff like that.
Speaker 2: I think it's common.
Speaker 1: It's just rae.
Speaker 2: It's pretty awesome.
Speaker 1: Man. That was like my summer.
Speaker 2: That's pretty awesome. Yeah, nobody anymore. No, I'm sure they'll
Speaker 2: find another another role.
Speaker 1: But whenever I had a hangover, I'd go sleep sleep
Speaker 1: in the back of the range picker.
Speaker 2: So I'm going to pick the range well. I never,
Speaker 2: I've never I've only ran a range picker here. I
Speaker 2: think it's the only place I've ever run one that fun.
Speaker 2: It doesn't look like much fun.
Speaker 1: So thanks for coming up. We're looking forward to seeing
Speaker 1: Southern Hills more majors, you know, hopefully hopefully sooner than later.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that would be nice. I gotta I gotta do
Speaker 2: it before I'm not around to do it.
Speaker 1: I know they got they got to bump it up.
Speaker 2: I don't have that influence.
Speaker 1: I'll just keep saying it all right. Thanks for coming
Speaker 1: on Ross.
Speaker 2: Thank you you've.
Speaker 1: Been listening to the Egg podcast. We do the digging
Speaker 1: for you.