WEBVTT - Yolk with Doak 5: Renaissance Golf 0:00:00.240 --> 0:00:02.840 Welcome back to another edition of The Yoke with Dok. 0:00:03.279 --> 0:00:07.640 This episode is a three part podcast. In Part one, 0:00:07.720 --> 0:00:11.720 we discuss the background of some of Renaissance Golf's associates 0:00:12.200 --> 0:00:14.520 and how the golf course design business works. 0:00:15.040 --> 0:00:16.400 In Parse two and three, we. 0:00:16.440 --> 0:00:20.319 Dive into George Thomas, bel Air Country Club and much more. 0:00:21.120 --> 0:00:22.440 These podcasts will. 0:00:22.360 --> 0:00:26.319 Be available later this week. As a reminder, if you 0:00:26.440 --> 0:00:29.520 enjoy these talks on architecture with Tom, be sure to 0:00:29.600 --> 0:00:33.640 check out his books. I highly recommend The Confidential Guides 0:00:33.760 --> 0:00:37.120 and The Little Red Book of Golf Course Architecture. Both 0:00:37.159 --> 0:00:43.080 are available on Renaissance website www dot Renaissance goolf dot com. 0:00:43.920 --> 0:00:47.559 One final announcement, fried Egg hats are available on our 0:00:47.600 --> 0:00:51.360 pro shop. Check them out on the website fried egg 0:00:51.479 --> 0:00:55.880 dot com. Without further ado, here's the latest edition of 0:00:55.920 --> 0:00:56.840 The Yoke with Doke. 0:01:04.880 --> 0:01:07.839 Tom Doak is back and as usual, he's not holding back. 0:01:10.280 --> 0:01:14.480 But don't toss the yolk and the famously candied Doak 0:01:14.600 --> 0:01:19.320 doesn't pull any punches. How do I make natural looking contour? 0:01:20.319 --> 0:01:22.320 Hire the biggest pool in the village and told him 0:01:22.319 --> 0:01:23.000 to make it flat? 0:01:23.880 --> 0:01:24.199 First? 0:01:24.240 --> 0:01:29.479 Overrated, underrated, rough, terribly overrated, over the years. 0:01:37.360 --> 0:01:40.360 Ladies and gentlemen, Welcome back to another edition of the 0:01:40.480 --> 0:01:42.440 Yoke with Doak Tom. 0:01:42.520 --> 0:01:46.480 How's it going, Hi, Andy, we're bel Air Hills of 0:01:46.480 --> 0:01:49.600 Los Angeles today. I'm glad to be back. Yeah. 0:01:49.680 --> 0:01:53.680 Today we have a couple special guests here up in 0:01:53.760 --> 0:01:58.560 the hills of bel Air overlooking the city of Los Angeles. 0:01:58.600 --> 0:02:04.520 Who's with us? I've got my construction crew for the 0:02:04.560 --> 0:02:07.440 renovation we're doing at bel Air right now. Eric Iverson, 0:02:07.480 --> 0:02:10.639 one of my senior associates who's the lead associate on 0:02:10.760 --> 0:02:14.280 this job. Brian Schneider one of my other senior associates 0:02:14.320 --> 0:02:18.240 who's done some shaping here and is headed to Australia 0:02:18.280 --> 0:02:21.280 with me in a couple of days for the project 0:02:21.360 --> 0:02:25.240 we're doing down there. Kai Golby, who's doesn't work for 0:02:25.320 --> 0:02:28.320 my company but has built ten or twelve golf courses 0:02:28.360 --> 0:02:31.680 with us over the last twenty years. And Blake Conant, 0:02:31.880 --> 0:02:34.840 who's been doing the same thing for us, but for 0:02:35.160 --> 0:02:36.760 only about five or six years now. 0:02:38.400 --> 0:02:40.760 Yeah, So you know today you're going to get a 0:02:41.040 --> 0:02:46.119 behind the scenes look at how Renaissance works and some 0:02:46.160 --> 0:02:50.240 of the names behind some of the work and the 0:02:50.240 --> 0:02:53.640 shaping and the building of the greens, the construction aspect 0:02:53.680 --> 0:02:56.919 of golf course design. So, Eric, why don't you start 0:02:57.000 --> 0:03:00.800 us off and give us a little bit about yourself, 0:03:00.840 --> 0:03:04.560 how you got into golf course construction and where you 0:03:04.600 --> 0:03:05.639 grew up golfing. 0:03:07.600 --> 0:03:12.040 I grew up in just north of Denver, the suburbs 0:03:12.080 --> 0:03:15.040 of Denver, and started playing golf at a really early 0:03:15.080 --> 0:03:18.840 age at arguably the worst course in the metro area, 0:03:19.040 --> 0:03:22.880 Lake Arbor Golf Course. But it was a great environment, 0:03:24.160 --> 0:03:27.280 great place to kind of grow up and hang out 0:03:27.320 --> 0:03:32.640 as a kid and learn a lot about just being 0:03:32.680 --> 0:03:36.920 around golf. And I knew I loved it. And you know, 0:03:37.000 --> 0:03:41.360 at some point you kind of make the realization that 0:03:42.600 --> 0:03:44.760 you know, maybe playing golf is not for me, but 0:03:44.920 --> 0:03:48.440 how else might I get into it? And the timing 0:03:48.520 --> 0:03:53.600 was really good, and it just kind of found me, 0:03:53.760 --> 0:03:58.320 really and it was a great thing, and I thought, 0:03:59.320 --> 0:04:04.760 this is really first project I was working on was 0:04:04.800 --> 0:04:09.600 where I first saw Tom doing his thing, Riverdale Dunes, 0:04:09.840 --> 0:04:12.680 and the oldest guy on that project was twenty six 0:04:12.760 --> 0:04:17.640 years old. So my first impression of a golf course 0:04:17.720 --> 0:04:22.800 architect was that it was unattainable. Some sort of image 0:04:22.839 --> 0:04:25.920 of Desmond muirhead in a plaid jacket smoking a pipe 0:04:25.960 --> 0:04:27.599 was what I thought it was all about. And it's like, 0:04:28.240 --> 0:04:29.880 this is just a bunch of knuckleheads. You were a 0:04:29.880 --> 0:04:33.960 little older than me, you know, so maybe this is 0:04:34.040 --> 0:04:36.880 something that could turn into something someday. 0:04:37.000 --> 0:04:40.120 So just kind of ended up. 0:04:40.200 --> 0:04:44.200 Joining the traveling circus and now I'm hanging out in 0:04:44.200 --> 0:04:45.320 this house above bel Air. 0:04:47.800 --> 0:04:49.120 All right, Brian. 0:04:52.160 --> 0:04:55.080 I grew up in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, and we were really 0:04:55.160 --> 0:04:58.120 lucky in that town. Not because we had a bunch 0:04:58.160 --> 0:05:02.320 of great golf, but we had immuni course that when 0:05:02.320 --> 0:05:03.760 I was a kid, my buddies and I could go 0:05:03.800 --> 0:05:05.360 there and show up before nine o'clock and we could 0:05:05.360 --> 0:05:06.520 play all day for three bucks. 0:05:07.000 --> 0:05:09.599 And that's how we spend our summers. You know. We'd 0:05:09.600 --> 0:05:10.560 throw our clubs. 0:05:10.240 --> 0:05:12.640 On our bag on our back and jump on our 0:05:12.640 --> 0:05:15.760 bikes and head out early and we'd be on the 0:05:15.760 --> 0:05:18.159 golf course all day. And it was just a great 0:05:18.160 --> 0:05:20.240 place to learn, and you know, got to meet a 0:05:20.279 --> 0:05:24.720 bunch of local characters there. And the golf wasn't great, 0:05:24.800 --> 0:05:26.040 but we had a lot of fun doing it. 0:05:26.600 --> 0:05:29.640 And yeah, I've played since I was little. 0:05:29.680 --> 0:05:31.480 My grandfather was a good player and he would take 0:05:31.520 --> 0:05:33.120 me out when I was three or four years old. 0:05:33.720 --> 0:05:37.080 His brother owned a par three course in a driving range, 0:05:37.120 --> 0:05:39.040 so I got to spend much of time with my 0:05:39.040 --> 0:05:43.400 grandpa there when I was just a little kid. Then 0:05:43.440 --> 0:05:46.120 as I got to play more, you know, I lived 0:05:46.160 --> 0:05:49.159 about a forty five minute trive from Lasnia, so my 0:05:49.880 --> 0:05:51.839 you know, my family would make that a special trip. 0:05:52.200 --> 0:05:54.279 Occasionally we go over there and see that. And to me, 0:05:54.360 --> 0:05:58.560 that was a place that felt really different than anywhere 0:05:58.560 --> 0:06:01.800 else i'd played around town. And that's probably where I 0:06:01.839 --> 0:06:05.640 first noticed that architecture could be a thing that, you know, 0:06:05.839 --> 0:06:10.120 there could be more deliberate efforts to build something unique 0:06:10.200 --> 0:06:14.240 and fun, and it was just unlike anything I'd seen 0:06:14.480 --> 0:06:16.719 up to that point. So it had an influence on me, 0:06:17.520 --> 0:06:20.000 just the realization that architecture was a thing. 0:06:21.040 --> 0:06:23.880 You know, I heard the course. Did you grow up 0:06:23.920 --> 0:06:26.440 playing Lakeside? It's been in the news Late Lake. 0:06:26.320 --> 0:06:32.839 Shore, Yeah, it's it's it's a shame. A good friend 0:06:32.920 --> 0:06:35.200 of mine has been the golf pro there for years 0:06:35.200 --> 0:06:37.120 and he's looking for a job now because the city's 0:06:38.360 --> 0:06:40.240 made the decision to sell that land off to a 0:06:40.960 --> 0:06:43.240 pretty prominent local corporation. 0:06:44.200 --> 0:06:45.560 But the golf course will be no more. 0:06:46.120 --> 0:06:48.599 Yeah, if if anybody wants to hear more, I think 0:06:48.600 --> 0:06:51.160 golf dot com did a whole podcast about it. It's 0:06:51.160 --> 0:06:54.320 a it's an interesting situation, but probably pretty sad to 0:06:54.320 --> 0:06:57.320 see local local And it was an old course too, 0:06:57.440 --> 0:06:59.680 like over what over one hundred years old? 0:06:59.760 --> 0:07:03.240 Right, Yeah, there was a lot of conversation in the 0:07:03.279 --> 0:07:07.039 newspaper and a lot of locals against it, but you know, 0:07:07.200 --> 0:07:08.920 economically it makes sense for the town, I. 0:07:08.880 --> 0:07:13.160 Think, so yeah, so Kai, how about you. 0:07:14.840 --> 0:07:18.200 I grew up in Belleville, Illinois, which is just across 0:07:18.200 --> 0:07:23.080 the river from Saint Louis, Missouri, And when I grew up, 0:07:23.120 --> 0:07:27.400 I probably lived about two blocks from a private golf club. 0:07:27.440 --> 0:07:29.200 Everybody else is growing up on public and it was 0:07:29.240 --> 0:07:31.440 a private club, but it was a very blue collar, 0:07:31.600 --> 0:07:35.760 small town, blue collar private club, and so I was 0:07:35.800 --> 0:07:37.680 playing at that course probably from the time I was 0:07:38.680 --> 0:07:40.600 six years old. It would ride our bikes over and just 0:07:40.600 --> 0:07:43.080 hang out at the golf club basically all summer long, 0:07:43.480 --> 0:07:45.760 and a lot of times during the school year as well. 0:07:46.720 --> 0:07:48.720 My cousin who lived up the street from me, was 0:07:48.760 --> 0:07:51.120 also a good player, so we basically played golf together 0:07:51.480 --> 0:07:55.120 all the time, and that was kind of how I 0:07:55.120 --> 0:07:57.640 got started. Now, I did get started because my dad 0:07:57.720 --> 0:08:01.320 was kind of okay at golf. He played the tour 0:08:01.480 --> 0:08:05.440 for many years and won the Masters in nineteen sixty eight. 0:08:05.480 --> 0:08:08.040 So growing up I did see some pretty good golfers. 0:08:08.120 --> 0:08:12.400 And my cousin that lived up the street was Jay Haas, 0:08:12.880 --> 0:08:16.160 so we had, you know, some pretty quality golfers. And 0:08:16.200 --> 0:08:17.840 so the golf course that we grew up on everyone 0:08:17.880 --> 0:08:20.200 that grew up on that same course. My dad actually 0:08:20.280 --> 0:08:24.160 caddied there as a kid, and I didn't know it 0:08:24.200 --> 0:08:26.600 at the time, and I don't think anyone did. But 0:08:26.880 --> 0:08:30.280 as I grew older and became more interested in architecture, 0:08:30.360 --> 0:08:32.880 I started kind of looking into the golf course because really, 0:08:32.880 --> 0:08:35.120 God some cool stuff. And then I played a William 0:08:35.160 --> 0:08:38.920 Langford course Donald Seitherdone was like, wow, that's really similar 0:08:38.960 --> 0:08:40.920 to what I grew up on, and I kind of 0:08:40.960 --> 0:08:43.320 started researching it. Found out it was a William Langford 0:08:43.360 --> 0:08:45.360 golf course that we had been playing on, and no 0:08:45.400 --> 0:08:49.000 one had any idea who William Langford was. So that 0:08:49.200 --> 0:08:52.000 was a little bit how the architecture bug got in 0:08:52.040 --> 0:08:53.920 my head. I think it was almost through osmosis. You 0:08:54.080 --> 0:08:56.000 just were playing this course every day, and there was 0:08:56.040 --> 0:08:58.520 a lot of cool shots to play and interesting greens, 0:08:58.559 --> 0:09:03.559 and so I think it wasn't some of these guys 0:09:03.559 --> 0:09:06.360 I think had a little more interest in architecture early age, 0:09:06.440 --> 0:09:09.160 knowing they wanted to be golf architects. I wasn't really 0:09:09.200 --> 0:09:11.360 thinking though. I just liked to play and wanted to 0:09:11.440 --> 0:09:15.240 kind of compete, and the architecture thing just kind of 0:09:15.280 --> 0:09:19.400 got into me at a later stage. And how that 0:09:19.440 --> 0:09:22.520 actually occurred. I played golf in college, and by the 0:09:22.559 --> 0:09:24.600 senior year of college I was just sick of golf. 0:09:24.600 --> 0:09:27.080 I wasn't as good as guys in our team and 0:09:27.360 --> 0:09:30.280 just got tired of playing. Went to Boston after college 0:09:30.320 --> 0:09:32.880 to work in the financial business. Did that for a 0:09:32.920 --> 0:09:37.959 few years and was not really enjoying myself in the offices. 0:09:39.000 --> 0:09:40.720 Kept looking outside. I was like, man, I'd rather be 0:09:40.720 --> 0:09:44.600 outside and had an opportunity. Actually, my dad got an 0:09:44.600 --> 0:09:47.200 opportunity in our hometown to do a golf course, and 0:09:47.240 --> 0:09:49.560 so I quit the financial business and went back to 0:09:50.120 --> 0:09:53.680 Belle Illinois to help him build a golf course. Got 0:09:53.720 --> 0:09:55.360 into that and it was like, hey, this is kind 0:09:55.400 --> 0:09:58.240 of fun, and just kept at it and eventually he 0:09:58.240 --> 0:10:00.800 got in touch with Tom a few years later, and 0:10:01.520 --> 0:10:02.360 just like Eric, here we. 0:10:02.320 --> 0:10:08.120 Are all right, that's a pretty cool story with the 0:10:08.160 --> 0:10:10.280 family lineage is quite strong. 0:10:12.120 --> 0:10:17.800 I'm the black sheep, so blake, what about you. 0:10:19.760 --> 0:10:23.520 I grew up in Omaha, Nebraska picking golf balls from 0:10:23.520 --> 0:10:26.400 a driving range called Schmidley's for three twenty five an hour, 0:10:27.040 --> 0:10:28.599 but I would get all the free golf balls that 0:10:28.640 --> 0:10:31.440 I could hit, so I would do that after or 0:10:31.440 --> 0:10:36.720 before baseball games where the Keystone ball fields were just 0:10:36.760 --> 0:10:40.640 across the street. So that's sort of how I started 0:10:40.679 --> 0:10:45.400 playing and honing my swing. And then my stepdad was 0:10:45.400 --> 0:10:48.840 a member at a club in Omaha called Ironwood, which 0:10:48.880 --> 0:10:52.280 was formerly Highland Country Club, which was an old Langford 0:10:52.320 --> 0:10:55.280 that I think had been butchered in the fifties or sixties, 0:10:55.320 --> 0:10:59.280 but the routing was still intact for the most part. 0:10:59.559 --> 0:11:02.520 So a lot of just like Twilight nine whole rounds there. 0:11:03.760 --> 0:11:09.000 And got into golf. And then I went to school 0:11:09.240 --> 0:11:13.439 for a painting degree up in Montana. So I graduated 0:11:13.480 --> 0:11:16.200 in two thousand and nine with an art degree, which 0:11:16.320 --> 0:11:22.120 led to zero jobs, in which case I started asking 0:11:22.160 --> 0:11:26.600 myself what do I really want to do? And I 0:11:26.760 --> 0:11:31.280 liked golf. I was pretty good at math and still 0:11:31.360 --> 0:11:34.080 wanted to be in some type of creative field. And 0:11:34.120 --> 0:11:38.000 I really blamed my mom because she's an enabler who 0:11:38.000 --> 0:11:40.120 would just say, yeah, man, go for it, you know, 0:11:40.920 --> 0:11:44.160 go to art school in Montana, or yeah, go try 0:11:44.200 --> 0:11:45.439 to get into golf architecture. 0:11:45.480 --> 0:11:46.080 You can do it. 0:11:46.280 --> 0:11:49.480 And so that's what I did. I went to a 0:11:49.720 --> 0:11:54.920 master's landscape program down in Georgia and got in contact 0:11:54.960 --> 0:11:59.000 with Tom, who then immediately pawned me off on Don Placic, 0:11:59.559 --> 0:12:01.679 who I can communicated with for a year and a 0:12:01.720 --> 0:12:06.040 half before getting an internship in Dismal River. Then hooked 0:12:06.080 --> 0:12:10.360 up with these guys and nobody's fired me yet, so 0:12:10.440 --> 0:12:12.120 I'm still hanging around. 0:12:13.120 --> 0:12:16.360 It's always interesting with the people that come on the podcast. 0:12:16.400 --> 0:12:19.160 So many people, with the exception of Kai, you know, 0:12:19.240 --> 0:12:23.240 grew up playing public golf. But for this conversation, Tom, 0:12:23.280 --> 0:12:26.120 I think it would be great if you could walk 0:12:26.200 --> 0:12:31.079 us through kind of what happens from renaissance side. After 0:12:31.120 --> 0:12:34.560 you guys went a bit and you get awarded a project, 0:12:34.720 --> 0:12:36.400 you know, what are kind of the first steps and 0:12:36.480 --> 0:12:39.400 how do you determine who's going out to that project. 0:12:40.920 --> 0:12:43.040 Well, the first thing I should say is our process 0:12:43.120 --> 0:12:47.960 is pretty different from the status quo of the golf business, 0:12:48.000 --> 0:12:50.199 or at least the status quo of golf business ten 0:12:50.280 --> 0:12:53.120 or twenty years ago. I mean I learned from Pete Dye, 0:12:53.200 --> 0:12:56.760 who is very hands on construction based person, so I 0:12:56.800 --> 0:13:00.920 am too. But a lot of architects doing a renovation 0:13:01.960 --> 0:13:05.079 rely on golf course contractors to do all the work. 0:13:05.120 --> 0:13:09.120 And they don't have guys like this that they bring 0:13:09.200 --> 0:13:13.320 into a job. They just they do plans, they go 0:13:13.360 --> 0:13:16.120 and inspect it as it's happening from time to time 0:13:16.280 --> 0:13:19.080 like I do. But they rely on a contractor to 0:13:19.160 --> 0:13:23.040 come up with shapers and people to run the equipment 0:13:23.080 --> 0:13:28.200 and build stuff. And that's the whole key of doing 0:13:28.320 --> 0:13:31.760 renovation worker, especially restoration work. I mean, if you think 0:13:31.760 --> 0:13:35.040 about it, you know, clubs get all interested in master 0:13:35.200 --> 0:13:39.560 plans and you know this whole big process of how 0:13:39.600 --> 0:13:41.079 do we you know, how do we do a master 0:13:41.160 --> 0:13:43.800 plan and sell it to the membership. You know, if 0:13:43.840 --> 0:13:48.360 you're restoring bell Air to George Thomas's design, every single 0:13:48.440 --> 0:13:51.720 architects master plan should be the same. It's all about 0:13:51.760 --> 0:13:54.520 execution and being able to build that and make it 0:13:54.679 --> 0:13:57.320 look right. And unfortunately, when you do that with a 0:13:57.360 --> 0:14:02.640 contractor they're not as engaged as these guys are, so 0:14:03.440 --> 0:14:06.480 you know they're there to do a pretty good job 0:14:06.559 --> 0:14:12.240 and make money. And that means that, you know, you'll 0:14:12.280 --> 0:14:15.800 get guys that don't really know anything about George Thomas 0:14:15.920 --> 0:14:20.040 or what he was about, and it's very hit or miss. 0:14:20.080 --> 0:14:24.160 And you know, as an architect, I don't know how 0:14:24.200 --> 0:14:26.040 I would get a bunch of guys that don't care 0:14:26.080 --> 0:14:29.880 about George Thomas to build something that looks like George 0:14:29.880 --> 0:14:37.000 Thomas's work. So I bring golf rats in, guys that 0:14:37.080 --> 0:14:39.640 are really interested in golf and think this is a 0:14:39.680 --> 0:14:43.640 cool project to work on. And they see an old 0:14:43.680 --> 0:14:47.920 picture of the twelfth hole at bel Air with this 0:14:48.040 --> 0:14:51.240 big mound in front of the green and go, okay, 0:14:51.280 --> 0:14:54.280 we got to get that to look just like this picture. 0:14:54.360 --> 0:14:57.280 How are we going to do that? And keep working 0:14:57.320 --> 0:14:59.960 on it. I mean, Kai was did the most work 0:15:00.000 --> 0:15:03.040 work on that whole, and we what like three or 0:15:03.040 --> 0:15:05.560 four times. We you know, we we we thought we 0:15:05.600 --> 0:15:07.160 had a close and then we get there and we're 0:15:07.200 --> 0:15:09.240 looking at the picture it's like, Nope, need a lot 0:15:09.240 --> 0:15:13.200 more full still, Just back to the drawing board, get 0:15:13.240 --> 0:15:15.640 some more fill. In there until this thing really looks right. 0:15:16.600 --> 0:15:18.160 And that's kind of what it takes to do a 0:15:18.280 --> 0:15:21.480 restoration and get it right. So I don't you know, 0:15:21.880 --> 0:15:25.320 there is another approach, but I just I don't have 0:15:25.360 --> 0:15:27.440 any idea how that would work for me anyway. 0:15:28.320 --> 0:15:32.600 It's most people that listen to this podcast are in 0:15:32.640 --> 0:15:35.040 the business world, and I think everybody would agree that 0:15:35.320 --> 0:15:38.560 when you get a third party involved it, it kind 0:15:38.560 --> 0:15:41.760 of muddies things up and makes things more difficult. That's 0:15:41.760 --> 0:15:44.520 from my experience. Obviously, there are some third parties that 0:15:44.560 --> 0:15:47.480 do good, good work and stuff, but from the for 0:15:47.560 --> 0:15:52.280 the most part, having a club, a contractor, and a designer, 0:15:52.320 --> 0:15:56.000 I think would make communication more difficult and more difficult 0:15:56.040 --> 0:15:58.480 to align everybody on the same mission. 0:15:58.600 --> 0:16:01.440 Yes, and let me not misrepresent either. There is a 0:16:01.440 --> 0:16:03.920 golf course contractor involved in this. This is like an 0:16:03.960 --> 0:16:06.800 eight or nine million dollar project. It's a huge project, 0:16:06.880 --> 0:16:09.600 and these four guys can't do all that work. So 0:16:09.800 --> 0:16:12.480 there's a big golf course contractor involved, and there's an 0:16:12.520 --> 0:16:16.800 irrigation contractor putting in irrigation, and there's there's all kinds 0:16:16.800 --> 0:16:20.920 of laborers and guys cutting down trees and all kinds 0:16:20.920 --> 0:16:25.400 of subcontractors working out here. But for us, the key 0:16:25.480 --> 0:16:29.800 thing is you know, shaping bunkers, shaping greens, getting those 0:16:29.920 --> 0:16:33.080 details to look just like they're supposed to look. And 0:16:33.120 --> 0:16:34.840 that's the part that I don't want to sub out 0:16:34.880 --> 0:16:35.640 to somebody else. 0:16:36.640 --> 0:16:39.320 So is it is it a team effort with trying 0:16:39.360 --> 0:16:43.680 to find the old aerials, the old pictures or when 0:16:43.840 --> 0:16:45.560 when does the team kind of get picked? 0:16:48.600 --> 0:16:50.600 Well, the hard thing when you sign up you don't 0:16:50.640 --> 0:16:52.960 know exactly when the construction is going to happen, so 0:16:53.000 --> 0:16:55.040 you can't pick the team. Yeah, you know you can't. 0:16:55.200 --> 0:16:58.160 I can't ask Kai to you know, block off some 0:16:58.280 --> 0:17:00.280 time for me at some point down the road, but 0:17:00.320 --> 0:17:02.320 I don't know when yet. 0:17:02.600 --> 0:17:04.359 If it was for Bill Air, i'd say okay. 0:17:05.600 --> 0:17:08.040 But so in the beginning, it's just me and Eric, 0:17:08.760 --> 0:17:11.000 you know, doing the master plan and trying to get 0:17:11.000 --> 0:17:13.439 a budget together and figure out how much work this 0:17:13.600 --> 0:17:16.280 is going to be, so we can you know, go 0:17:16.359 --> 0:17:19.120 through all the political stuff at the club and get 0:17:19.119 --> 0:17:23.679 them to say okay, once we get past that point, 0:17:24.760 --> 0:17:27.200 then we can start thinking about, Okay, here's a realistic 0:17:27.240 --> 0:17:29.520 construction schedule for when this is going to happen and 0:17:29.600 --> 0:17:32.040 how long it's going to take and how much work 0:17:32.040 --> 0:17:33.800 have we got to do and how much help do 0:17:33.840 --> 0:17:36.760 we need to do it? And we start putting the 0:17:36.800 --> 0:17:43.919 team together, and you know, we've got probably eight to 0:17:44.040 --> 0:17:46.240 twelve people that we've worked with in the past on 0:17:46.320 --> 0:17:48.959 other projects that we can call up and see if 0:17:48.960 --> 0:17:51.800 they're interested or you know, are you busy over this 0:17:51.840 --> 0:17:54.359 winner are you are you working for somebody else? Or 0:17:54.400 --> 0:17:57.320 what are you doing? You know, I've got three of 0:17:57.320 --> 0:18:01.000 the guys would be on my payroll, and generally one 0:18:01.000 --> 0:18:03.159 of them is going to run a job and be 0:18:03.200 --> 0:18:06.520 the lead associate, and depending on how busy we are, 0:18:06.560 --> 0:18:08.560 the other guys might be able to chip in and 0:18:08.600 --> 0:18:11.440 help a bunch. And sometimes there are in three different places, 0:18:11.480 --> 0:18:14.679 and you know, like Brian Slanik, the third guy is 0:18:14.680 --> 0:18:19.080 in Australia right now running a big renovation project there, 0:18:19.320 --> 0:18:21.760 so he can't really help out it all here, so 0:18:21.800 --> 0:18:25.960 he's running that, Eric's running bel Air, Brian Schneider with 0:18:26.080 --> 0:18:28.920 me is jumping back and forth in between them helping out. 0:18:29.359 --> 0:18:32.760 And then you know, we'll pull in two or three 0:18:32.800 --> 0:18:35.600 other people as we need to get the work done 0:18:35.640 --> 0:18:38.399 in a timely manner and kind of the key for 0:18:38.480 --> 0:18:42.119 me is you know a lot of people ask like 0:18:44.760 --> 0:18:48.080 but they ask more about new courses than renovations, like, well, 0:18:48.080 --> 0:18:50.400 don't you go back and want to change stuff after 0:18:50.440 --> 0:18:52.879 you get all done, because certainly you can't just be 0:18:53.000 --> 0:18:55.679 perfect and get it all right the first time. And 0:18:55.760 --> 0:18:58.760 I say, well, no, I don't get it all right. 0:18:58.800 --> 0:19:01.119 I wouldn't get it all right the first time. Except 0:19:01.160 --> 0:19:05.080 it's not just me. You know, there's four really talented 0:19:05.119 --> 0:19:07.080 guys who spend a lot more time out here than 0:19:07.119 --> 0:19:12.280 I am. You know, they get it right. They get 0:19:12.320 --> 0:19:16.040 it mostly right before I show up. You know, we 0:19:16.160 --> 0:19:18.399 kind of walked through what what the goals are, and 0:19:18.440 --> 0:19:20.760 we've got a bunch of pictures to work with. They 0:19:20.760 --> 0:19:22.880 get it mostly right before I show up, and then 0:19:22.880 --> 0:19:25.520 I can deal with the really fine details and the 0:19:25.560 --> 0:19:28.480 stuff that's more about the playability of the whole instead 0:19:28.520 --> 0:19:31.520 of at bunkers in the wrong place or it doesn't 0:19:31.520 --> 0:19:34.760 look like they've already got that, and they're you know, 0:19:34.800 --> 0:19:38.399 they're really working with each other. It's very collaborative. You know, 0:19:38.640 --> 0:19:42.359 it's more fun on a new project because you're you know, 0:19:42.440 --> 0:19:46.000 it's creative and you're getting creative input from other guys. 0:19:46.600 --> 0:19:49.800 But on a renovation. It's you know, how are you 0:19:49.840 --> 0:19:52.119 going to make a mistake because three other guys are 0:19:52.160 --> 0:19:54.159 going to point right at it and say that's not 0:19:54.280 --> 0:19:54.640 right yet. 0:19:56.760 --> 0:19:59.800 So Eric, in terms of you're the day to day 0:20:00.359 --> 0:20:02.840 lead on a project, what's that look like? 0:20:05.560 --> 0:20:08.120 It's a good question. Excuse me. 0:20:09.040 --> 0:20:11.280 The main thing is to just spend a little bit 0:20:11.280 --> 0:20:15.720 more time during your day looking ahead. You know, you've 0:20:15.880 --> 0:20:19.200 you've got to just work with the golf course superintendent 0:20:19.240 --> 0:20:22.560 and the contractor just kind of forecasting what's coming down 0:20:22.560 --> 0:20:26.199 the pike to make sure that you're you're kind of 0:20:26.240 --> 0:20:31.560 tackling each whole, each portion of the whole. Each there's 0:20:32.280 --> 0:20:35.160 materials coming for Green's construction at the end of the week, 0:20:35.240 --> 0:20:37.880 so you need to have this done by this day 0:20:37.920 --> 0:20:41.159 and that done by the next day. That type of 0:20:41.160 --> 0:20:47.200 coordination of our work is it's really the primary responsibility 0:20:47.240 --> 0:20:53.399 of doing that, and it's really not that but you know, 0:20:53.440 --> 0:20:58.160 it's not that much fun relative to the project as 0:20:58.200 --> 0:21:00.840 a whole what you're doing, but it's an important part 0:21:00.840 --> 0:21:02.560 of it. And that's kind of the day to day 0:21:02.560 --> 0:21:08.160 and nuts in Bolt's part, and then the larger aspect 0:21:08.800 --> 0:21:10.760 for me and what's what's a lot more fun is 0:21:10.840 --> 0:21:15.720 just the collaborative part that Tom mentioned, where you know, 0:21:15.800 --> 0:21:21.159 you're kind of going around and looking as a group, 0:21:21.359 --> 0:21:23.879 you know who's going to work on what next, kind 0:21:23.920 --> 0:21:26.600 of leap frogging around. And I think we all have 0:21:26.720 --> 0:21:30.679 worked together a lot over the years, and and you know, 0:21:30.720 --> 0:21:35.960 one of the things I think everybody appreciates when we're 0:21:36.000 --> 0:21:39.399 working together is that we we try pretty hard to 0:21:39.560 --> 0:21:44.000 not pigeonhole anybody into one role and kind of stuck 0:21:44.040 --> 0:21:48.399 doing all of the teas or all of the bunkers 0:21:48.520 --> 0:21:51.120 or just greens that type of thing, and and kind 0:21:51.160 --> 0:21:53.960 of let everybody have a chance to do some of 0:21:54.000 --> 0:21:56.639 the really fun stuff, like whether it's you know, putting 0:21:56.680 --> 0:21:59.400 back the May West Mound. That's a pretty cool thing. 0:21:59.600 --> 0:22:04.399 Tom took three or more goes to really feel like 0:22:04.440 --> 0:22:07.119 we had it right, and Kai and Tom had it 0:22:07.160 --> 0:22:12.280 absolutely right about three weeks ago, and then just random 0:22:12.400 --> 0:22:14.600 somebody trying to be helpful with the box blade was 0:22:14.640 --> 0:22:16.600 on top of it, took the top of it down 0:22:16.640 --> 0:22:20.080 towards the bottom got to cleaning it up. So it's 0:22:20.080 --> 0:22:24.359 actually been through its fourth and fifth iteration and it 0:22:24.400 --> 0:22:26.760 has sod on it now and we feel like we 0:22:26.800 --> 0:22:32.000 got it back right, But it makes the These types 0:22:32.040 --> 0:22:36.840 of projects are always set up to be done and 0:22:37.480 --> 0:22:41.800 not quite enough time so that, you know, because people 0:22:41.840 --> 0:22:44.639 don't want to give up their golf course, and it 0:22:44.720 --> 0:22:48.480 can be a bit of a high pressure situation that 0:22:49.800 --> 0:22:54.800 all of Tom's new courses turn out best because or 0:22:54.800 --> 0:22:57.560