WEBVTT - The Evolution of Modern Golf Architecture with Bruce Hepner 0:00:00.040 --> 0:00:02.520 I miss a green, for example, I'm already upset. 0:00:02.640 --> 0:00:04.920 When I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset. 0:00:05.000 --> 0:00:06.320 And when I find my ball. 0:00:06.120 --> 0:00:08.920 In a bride Egg Friday Egg, the dreaded Frida Egg, 0:00:09.039 --> 0:00:11.840 Frida Egg, Frida Egg Egg, Frida Egg, Bride Egg. 0:00:11.720 --> 0:00:14.080 Lie, I'm about ready to run off the golf course. 0:00:34.600 --> 0:00:37.599 Welcome to the Frida Egg Golf Podcast. I'm Garrett Morrison, 0:00:37.920 --> 0:00:41.280 and today we're talking about the evolution of modern golf 0:00:41.360 --> 0:00:45.519 architecture with Bruce Hepner. I've wanted to have Bruce on 0:00:45.560 --> 0:00:48.120 the podcast for a long time. He is a bit 0:00:48.159 --> 0:00:51.280 of a legend in the golf architecture business. Definitely one 0:00:51.320 --> 0:00:54.880 of the people who helped drive the restoration movement, the 0:00:55.240 --> 0:00:59.640 rediscovery of Golden Age architecture, the design build trend, really 0:00:59.680 --> 0:01:02.200 so much such of what defines this current era of 0:01:02.320 --> 0:01:05.160 golf course design. Bruce was there for all of it. 0:01:05.880 --> 0:01:09.160 He served as the vice president of Tom Doakes's Renaissance 0:01:09.240 --> 0:01:13.039 Golf Design from nineteen ninety three to twenty ten, which 0:01:13.160 --> 0:01:15.440 was the period when Renaissance kind of went from an 0:01:15.560 --> 0:01:19.520 outsider band to one of the busiest and most influential 0:01:19.560 --> 0:01:23.600 firms in the industry. Bruce worked on courses like Pacific Dunes, 0:01:23.760 --> 0:01:27.920 Old MacDonald, Rock Creek Cattle Company, the Renaissance Club, and 0:01:27.959 --> 0:01:31.280 he was the lead associate at Ballyneial, Cape Kidnappers and 0:01:31.319 --> 0:01:35.280 stream Song Blue So Pretty sturdy resume. He also handled 0:01:35.280 --> 0:01:39.160 a lot of Renaissance golf designs, consulting and restoration commissions, 0:01:39.280 --> 0:01:42.360 and when he left Renaissance thirteen years ago, he continued 0:01:42.400 --> 0:01:44.679 working with many of those courses. A few of his 0:01:44.760 --> 0:01:49.120 most significant restorations have been at Essex County Club in Massachusetts, 0:01:49.480 --> 0:01:53.240 tim Iquana in Florida, Piping Rock and New York, Blue 0:01:53.240 --> 0:01:57.559 Mound and Wisconsin, and Cape Arundle in Maine. One reason 0:01:57.600 --> 0:01:59.720 I'm talking to Bruce right now is that he just 0:01:59.760 --> 0:02:03.480 fit a renovation at Percy Warner, which is a municipal 0:02:03.840 --> 0:02:06.920 nine hole course in Nashville, and that job is a 0:02:06.920 --> 0:02:09.680 great example of how much can be done at an 0:02:09.680 --> 0:02:14.360 affordable public course with a relatively low budget. You know, 0:02:14.560 --> 0:02:16.919 so much of what I've been thinking about lately when 0:02:16.919 --> 0:02:20.960 it comes to golf architecture, Bruce represents. You know, I've 0:02:20.960 --> 0:02:26.240 been thinking about affordability, sustainability, the virtues of being patient 0:02:26.360 --> 0:02:28.359 with a golf course as opposed to trying to get 0:02:28.400 --> 0:02:32.079 everything done all at once. You know, in Bruce's career 0:02:32.320 --> 0:02:36.400 he really pursued so much of that, and so I'm 0:02:36.400 --> 0:02:39.720 excited to hear his perspective on how the industry has 0:02:39.800 --> 0:02:43.400 changed since he entered it thirty five years ago, what 0:02:43.520 --> 0:02:47.360 he makes of the current state of golf architecture, and 0:02:47.400 --> 0:02:50.520 what some of his key experiences have been along the way. 0:02:51.080 --> 0:02:53.240 So all that is coming up. But before we get 0:02:53.280 --> 0:02:56.440 to my conversation with Bruce Hepner, a quick word from 0:02:56.440 --> 0:03:02.160 our sponsor for this episode, Fat Cork is all about champagne. 0:03:02.400 --> 0:03:06.880 They work exclusively with small, family run grower champagne houses 0:03:07.280 --> 0:03:11.360 to bring you the highest quality couves from France. Grower 0:03:11.440 --> 0:03:15.120 champagne is produced by people who also grow the grapes 0:03:15.200 --> 0:03:19.239 and tend divines on their own land. It is expressive 0:03:19.320 --> 0:03:22.959 of a particular vineyard. It's made with care, and it's 0:03:23.000 --> 0:03:27.280 often produced through methods that have been passed down through generations. 0:03:27.400 --> 0:03:30.320 So it's champagne with a real sense of place and 0:03:30.400 --> 0:03:34.120 sense of history. So we've got a holiday coming up here. 0:03:34.600 --> 0:03:38.040 Thanksgiving is approaching, and you know what's really good to 0:03:38.080 --> 0:03:42.680 have for Thanksgiving is some excellent unique champagne. If you 0:03:42.720 --> 0:03:45.800 show up to Thanksgiving dinner or Black Friday for that matter, 0:03:46.080 --> 0:03:48.760 with fat Cork, you will be the hero of the day. 0:03:48.880 --> 0:03:52.520 So now is the time to get some champagne shipped 0:03:52.720 --> 0:03:56.160 to you. There are lots of options on fat Cork's 0:03:56.200 --> 0:03:59.920 gift page at fatcork dot com or at our Custom 0:04:00.160 --> 0:04:05.120 Friday Golf page at fatcork dot com slash golf. There's 0:04:05.320 --> 0:04:08.960 everything from single bottles to magnums for the Thanksgiving table, 0:04:09.080 --> 0:04:11.480 to gift sets that you can bring to your mother 0:04:11.520 --> 0:04:15.400 in law. Whatever champagne related need you have for the holidays, 0:04:15.720 --> 0:04:18.800 fat cork has you covered. And make sure to use 0:04:18.800 --> 0:04:22.960 the code golf goolf to get free shipping on any 0:04:23.000 --> 0:04:27.800 of Fatcork's products. Again, that's fatcork dot com slash golf, 0:04:28.320 --> 0:04:32.159 great small business. They support us, we support them. And 0:04:32.240 --> 0:04:40.080 with that, here is Bruce happening. All right, Bruce, I 0:04:40.120 --> 0:04:43.880 hear you like music. So do you ever listen to 0:04:44.000 --> 0:04:46.200 music when you're on a construction site? 0:04:47.040 --> 0:04:49.320 Oh, we all do. Everybody that work for Tom and 0:04:49.680 --> 0:04:51.880 I still do. We all have EarPods. We all they 0:04:51.880 --> 0:04:56.279 have the latest, greatest EarPods and we're always listening to music. 0:04:56.360 --> 0:04:59.480 Sharing music with the other guys also listen to a 0:04:59.520 --> 0:05:02.080 lot of books, which is kind of really you know, 0:05:02.080 --> 0:05:04.920 when you're sitting in an excavator building bunkers for eight 0:05:04.920 --> 0:05:08.160 to ten hours, you can burn through some books in 0:05:08.200 --> 0:05:11.040 no time. So we do a little bit of both. 0:05:11.320 --> 0:05:15.440 I've heard in the different things about whether it's really 0:05:15.600 --> 0:05:18.479 possible to listen to a book or to a podcast 0:05:18.560 --> 0:05:22.920 for that matter, while you're shaping features and things like that. 0:05:23.040 --> 0:05:25.680 Some guys say that, you know, it's too distracting to 0:05:25.800 --> 0:05:28.919 have a people talking in their ear. Are you not 0:05:28.960 --> 0:05:29.679 one of those people. 0:05:30.200 --> 0:05:32.599 I'm definitely not one of those, because you know, shaping 0:05:32.720 --> 0:05:37.159 is is being intuitive, it's it's letting it go. You know, 0:05:37.200 --> 0:05:39.840 good shapers let it just let it fly, and they 0:05:39.920 --> 0:05:42.520 let they let their instincts go. You know, you give 0:05:43.080 --> 0:05:45.200 as an architect, you give a shaper where tom and 0:05:45.200 --> 0:05:47.120 give us a few cues and then he wants to 0:05:47.160 --> 0:05:49.559 go do our best work. And I do that still 0:05:49.560 --> 0:05:52.080 now when I shape bunkers, I just kind of I 0:05:52.120 --> 0:05:55.760 don't have any kind of too many preconceived notions, so 0:05:56.279 --> 0:05:59.479 I kind of let, you know, just let the freedom go. 0:05:59.600 --> 0:06:01.880 And I don't mind if there's music and it kind 0:06:01.920 --> 0:06:05.840 of keeps It keeps my mind occupied a little bit, 0:06:05.920 --> 0:06:08.680 but I'm obviously focusing on what I do. But yeah, 0:06:08.839 --> 0:06:10.960 it definitely helps me. It gets me in a good mood. 0:06:11.240 --> 0:06:13.160 You know, happy shaper. You know, I always learned just 0:06:13.240 --> 0:06:17.799 running projects, happy shapers are great shapers. If they're they're 0:06:17.880 --> 0:06:22.520 they're irritated because their internet is down at the house 0:06:22.640 --> 0:06:25.600 or something like that. Uh, you know, they're not doing 0:06:25.640 --> 0:06:27.720 great work. So you know, my job a lot of 0:06:27.760 --> 0:06:31.400 times running project for Tom was keep the keep the 0:06:31.480 --> 0:06:34.720 happy people happy. And you wouldn't believe how much great 0:06:34.720 --> 0:06:35.520 work comes out of that. 0:06:35.920 --> 0:06:37.520 What kind of music do you like to listen to? 0:06:38.080 --> 0:06:40.280 I listened to all, you know I was. I listened 0:06:40.279 --> 0:06:42.080 a bunch of jazz, and I just got a new 0:06:43.400 --> 0:06:45.760 I have a pretty nice stereo down in the main room, 0:06:45.800 --> 0:06:47.520 so I just got a new piece of equipment. So 0:06:49.160 --> 0:06:50.760 I listened to a lot of jazz. But you know, 0:06:50.760 --> 0:06:53.280 I'm a rock and roll guy. I've got, you know, 0:06:53.279 --> 0:06:56.480 fifteen hundred albums and you name it, I listened to it. 0:06:57.040 --> 0:06:59.680 You've got you've got the physical collection as opposed to 0:06:59.720 --> 0:07:00.799 just the digital collection. 0:07:01.200 --> 0:07:03.720 I'm I do because it's a leftover from when I 0:07:03.760 --> 0:07:06.000 was a kid. But and I have a turntable sitting 0:07:06.040 --> 0:07:08.279 right next to my there's my vinyl system is up here, 0:07:08.320 --> 0:07:11.920 but downstairs it's all digital. It's all streaming, high end streaming, 0:07:11.960 --> 0:07:15.200 and that's really opened up a great world of music. 0:07:15.680 --> 0:07:19.400 Where we used to, you know, go to borders or 0:07:19.520 --> 0:07:21.240 you know, when I was a kid, we went to Corvettes, 0:07:21.240 --> 0:07:24.200 which is an offshoot of kmarts, and just filter through 0:07:24.280 --> 0:07:27.160 the albums and just pick one out and get five 0:07:27.840 --> 0:07:32.280 or three for five bucks. That isn't available nowadays, so 0:07:32.360 --> 0:07:34.840 you have to get your music online, which is really hard. 0:07:35.520 --> 0:07:38.720 So streaming has really opened up a new world for me. 0:07:39.840 --> 0:07:42.800 Yeah, you know, it's interesting how music discovery has changed. 0:07:43.000 --> 0:07:47.080 When I was really getting into music on my own, 0:07:47.120 --> 0:07:50.160 which tends to happen when people are teenagers, I suppose 0:07:51.040 --> 0:07:54.080 burning CDs was the big thing, right, that's and if 0:07:54.120 --> 0:07:55.920 you mentioned that to a kid today, they don't know 0:07:55.920 --> 0:07:58.640 what the hell you're talking about. But that was really 0:07:58.680 --> 0:08:01.800 exciting that you could, essentially, I mean it's not good 0:08:01.800 --> 0:08:04.520 for the musicians, but you could you could just get 0:08:04.560 --> 0:08:06.760 whatever your friends had. You could you could burn the 0:08:06.800 --> 0:08:10.400 CD and and start building up a pretty big physical 0:08:10.480 --> 0:08:14.120 music collection. That way folks, and that's kind of gone away. 0:08:14.160 --> 0:08:16.640 You know, people don't curate their music collections as much 0:08:16.640 --> 0:08:18.320 anymore because it is all streaming. 0:08:18.560 --> 0:08:20.960 No, and you know what was the missing element which 0:08:21.000 --> 0:08:22.880 is kind of coming back with a new new thing 0:08:22.960 --> 0:08:26.040 called Rune. You know, I, I, me and my buddies, 0:08:26.040 --> 0:08:28.360 we're all. You know, we were in the liner notes 0:08:28.360 --> 0:08:31.760 and seeing who who played guitar on that that song 0:08:31.840 --> 0:08:33.680 or who is the drummer? And then you then you 0:08:33.720 --> 0:08:37.120 went over and picked out his albums and you know, 0:08:37.280 --> 0:08:41.920 nowadays liner notes engineering where it was recorded, all that 0:08:42.000 --> 0:08:44.200 kind of stuff is gone, but it's coming back with 0:08:44.559 --> 0:08:46.000 some of the digital formats. 0:08:46.320 --> 0:08:48.920 Do you ever drop parallels between the way music is 0:08:48.960 --> 0:08:51.200 made and the way golf courses are built, just in 0:08:51.240 --> 0:08:54.320 the way that it's produced, Right, You have these different 0:08:54.360 --> 0:08:58.120 people with these different roles, and sometimes you bring in 0:08:58.960 --> 0:09:01.679 the you know, the crack guitarist. 0:09:02.840 --> 0:09:06.200 You know, Tom has his house band, you know which 0:09:06.240 --> 0:09:08.760 I always said it was the Funk Brothers from MotorCity 0:09:08.760 --> 0:09:13.080 because I'm Detroit. You know, Gil's got the the caveman. 0:09:13.960 --> 0:09:16.679 Gill's got his you know, the crew, and it is 0:09:16.720 --> 0:09:19.080 it's it's like having the wrecking crew it's it's like 0:09:19.160 --> 0:09:22.600 having you know, the Funk Brothers is having you know, 0:09:22.600 --> 0:09:25.880 the guys from Stacks, you know, and MGS as your 0:09:25.880 --> 0:09:28.920 house band, and then you bring in you know, that 0:09:29.160 --> 0:09:32.000 was you always talk about bally Neil. When I ran 0:09:32.080 --> 0:09:34.959 bally Neil, I was just rolling the rock stars through that. 0:09:35.280 --> 0:09:37.599 There was so much talent coming through, and I have 0:09:37.679 --> 0:09:39.439 him come in through a couple of weeks. Some of 0:09:39.440 --> 0:09:41.600 the court you know, Dan Proctor was there for the. 0:09:41.600 --> 0:09:45.360 Beginning, and really because because he's mainly known for working 0:09:45.400 --> 0:09:46.559 with Corn Crenshaw. 0:09:46.679 --> 0:09:48.439 Yeah, so I you know, we had a couple of 0:09:48.480 --> 0:09:51.640 those guys, and I was rolling the you know, the 0:09:51.679 --> 0:09:54.960 Renaissance talent, and you know, Kay Goldby and Schneider and 0:09:55.000 --> 0:09:58.400 I were there full time and Eric Iverson would come 0:09:58.440 --> 0:10:01.400 in for a whiles, Schneider, Unk would come in, Don 0:10:01.440 --> 0:10:05.160 Plasic would bring him, put him an ondozer. He was 0:10:05.360 --> 0:10:09.559 uh you know, and that that was part of orchestrating 0:10:09.640 --> 0:10:12.080 the talent. And I did the same thing as stream Song, 0:10:12.240 --> 0:10:14.720 you know, we you just kind of bring them in, 0:10:15.200 --> 0:10:17.280 give him a few cues. All right. I need you 0:10:17.360 --> 0:10:19.160 to go work on those two holes because I don't 0:10:19.160 --> 0:10:21.160 need to worry about him because I'm worried about this, 0:10:21.400 --> 0:10:23.920 and just go do it. You think it's cool, and 0:10:23.960 --> 0:10:26.360 Tom will come through and uh, you edit it. That's 0:10:26.400 --> 0:10:29.480 why Thomas the great editor and uh he just let it, 0:10:29.559 --> 0:10:32.640 let it, let us flow, give us our best, our 0:10:32.679 --> 0:10:38.920 best work without any in ambitions, and he come through 0:10:38.920 --> 0:10:41.480 and edit it, and it's it's it's it's a great 0:10:41.720 --> 0:10:44.600 It's that that has great parallels with music. I guess 0:10:44.600 --> 0:10:44.920 you're right. 0:10:45.000 --> 0:10:47.800 Yeah, he's sort of the producer, Yeah yeah, yeah, and 0:10:47.840 --> 0:10:50.760 the I'm not I'm not sure if there's a construction 0:10:50.880 --> 0:10:54.120 site supervisor equivalent in the music industry, but that's sort 0:10:54.160 --> 0:10:56.440 of what you're describing as what your role was at 0:10:56.520 --> 0:10:59.600 least at stream Song bally Neil. I know, I think 0:10:59.600 --> 0:11:01.840 you did that work at Cape Kidnappers as well, so 0:11:01.880 --> 0:11:04.040 that's an interesting role. I have all sorts of things 0:11:04.080 --> 0:11:06.440 I want to talk to you about, Bruce, but maybe 0:11:06.440 --> 0:11:09.560 we should start with one of your recent projects, which 0:11:09.640 --> 0:11:13.760 was a renovation of a nine hole municipal course in Nashville, 0:11:13.800 --> 0:11:18.560 Tennessee called Percy Warner. There was a ribbon cutting ceremony 0:11:18.600 --> 0:11:20.959 for the new course last month. My understanding is that 0:11:21.240 --> 0:11:25.280 it's sort of official public opening for play is going 0:11:25.320 --> 0:11:29.160 to be next year. Yeah, So how did you get 0:11:29.200 --> 0:11:32.360 involved in this project? You live in Traverse City. Nashville 0:11:32.400 --> 0:11:34.400 is a long way from Traverse City. What was the 0:11:34.400 --> 0:11:35.040 connection there. 0:11:35.559 --> 0:11:38.160 I've been working at Hillwood Country Club in Nashville for 0:11:38.960 --> 0:11:43.680 probably well over twenty years, and obviously with music, you know, 0:11:43.840 --> 0:11:45.760 they talked me into coming down. I'm like, I don't know, 0:11:45.840 --> 0:11:47.960 but I've never been never been to Nashville. 0:11:47.960 --> 0:11:50.040 Now, yeah, I was gonna say, if you're a music fan, 0:11:50.480 --> 0:11:52.559 Nashville is appealing in an obvious way. 0:11:52.640 --> 0:11:54.960 Yeah, that was like like a second home for me. 0:11:55.720 --> 0:11:58.840 But I been working at Hillwood and I have, you know, 0:11:58.880 --> 0:12:01.439 for twenty years. I'm a member that now or honorary member, 0:12:01.640 --> 0:12:05.480 and a really dear friend of mine, Stuart Smith, who 0:12:05.520 --> 0:12:07.160 was a member there. He used to play in the tour. 0:12:07.200 --> 0:12:09.840 He was an All American at University of Tennessee. Great guy, 0:12:10.080 --> 0:12:12.440 just a dear friend. And I was shaping bunkers. I 0:12:12.440 --> 0:12:16.160 think it was twenty eighteen. He goes, hey, you bored. 0:12:16.200 --> 0:12:19.000 I'm like yeah, I go yeah, I could use a break. 0:12:19.040 --> 0:12:20.800 He goes, let's go over and I want to show 0:12:20.840 --> 0:12:23.720 you the golf course I grew up playing as a kid, 0:12:24.040 --> 0:12:26.080 and we went over this little nine holders just down 0:12:26.080 --> 0:12:28.160 the road from Bellmead Country Club. It's in bell Mead 0:12:28.520 --> 0:12:31.200 and Percy Warner Park, so nine to ole. He was 0:12:31.280 --> 0:12:36.280 really beat up. They had winter in summer greens, you know, 0:12:36.320 --> 0:12:38.160 two sets of greens went for the winter one of 0:12:38.240 --> 0:12:41.439 the summer, hardly any grass on the place. Just built 0:12:41.440 --> 0:12:45.520 a new clubhouse and it's like within the confines of 0:12:46.640 --> 0:12:49.080 a beautiful park, just this man. You know, I don't 0:12:49.080 --> 0:12:52.280 know how many thousand acre park this is. And he 0:12:52.400 --> 0:12:54.960 was We started walking and I'm like, I'm walking and 0:12:54.960 --> 0:12:56.920 I'm walking. I'm like, the routing is really good, the 0:12:57.000 --> 0:12:59.400 green sites are really good. I go, man, this has 0:12:59.440 --> 0:13:02.520 a lot of potential and it had fallen on the 0:13:02.559 --> 0:13:06.079 wayside because, you know, in the Nashville park system that 0:13:06.200 --> 0:13:09.080 was owned by the Metro Parks, they had kind of 0:13:09.080 --> 0:13:11.280 lost their way in maintaining they you know, they didn't 0:13:11.280 --> 0:13:13.599 think off was that important at the time that you 0:13:13.640 --> 0:13:15.840 know now they're they're starting to realize it. So they 0:13:15.880 --> 0:13:18.040 didn't really sink a lot of resources into these golf 0:13:18.080 --> 0:13:19.839 courses and they're they're playing the hell out of these 0:13:19.840 --> 0:13:22.920 golf courses. You know that I always I always tell 0:13:22.960 --> 0:13:25.760 the stories, like when we were there, I'm on the 0:13:25.760 --> 0:13:28.760 first tee and there was two kids with their hats 0:13:28.800 --> 0:13:31.440 on backwards and their shirts untucked, one guy with a 0:13:31.440 --> 0:13:34.000 bud Light t shirt and an old guy with Cyprus 0:13:34.120 --> 0:13:39.880 point shirt and was it pulling a trolley? And that's 0:13:39.920 --> 0:13:44.439 the clientele they have, and it's very diverse, and it 0:13:44.520 --> 0:13:47.640 was just a cool facility. And he goes, well, they've 0:13:47.679 --> 0:13:50.760 they'd been trying to rebuild this for years, but you know, 0:13:50.800 --> 0:13:53.320 the money, you know, the wrong people got involved, and 0:13:53.400 --> 0:13:56.120 the price tag was up to five million to rebuild it, 0:13:56.400 --> 0:14:00.560 and it just died. And it was like his vision. 0:14:00.640 --> 0:14:02.520 It was prior guized to him, but he was the 0:14:02.520 --> 0:14:06.439 impetus behind it, and he's a trustee on the Tennessee 0:14:06.480 --> 0:14:11.440 Golf Foundation. I go, I could see this. It was 0:14:11.480 --> 0:14:13.480 like I always tell people, I saw it in slow motion. 0:14:13.640 --> 0:14:17.320 How cool this place could be. It's a hub for 0:14:17.360 --> 0:14:20.560 all these walkers, you know, they park in the parking 0:14:20.600 --> 0:14:22.640 lot and go up and hike in the mountains there. 0:14:23.360 --> 0:14:26.400 The Mountain Biking group is out of that parking lot 0:14:26.400 --> 0:14:29.040 in clubhouse too, and then there's this cute little nine 0:14:29.080 --> 0:14:31.400 hole golf course. I think it was part thirty four, 0:14:32.400 --> 0:14:34.520 and I could just see it. You know, I grew 0:14:34.600 --> 0:14:37.160 up playing public nine hole, public golf courses in Detroit, 0:14:37.320 --> 0:14:39.520 okadd eat and all that stuff, so I could see 0:14:40.320 --> 0:14:42.360 how this could be. The more people I talked to 0:14:42.480 --> 0:14:44.640 that was the first golf ball they had ever hit 0:14:44.760 --> 0:14:47.440 was on that place, especially all the people there in 0:14:47.520 --> 0:14:53.480 Belle Meat, which is a pretty steep neighborhood. So I said, yeah, 0:14:53.520 --> 0:14:55.760 this is doable. Let me do a drawing while I'm here. 0:14:56.640 --> 0:14:59.440 So on the side, you know, on the side at night, 0:14:59.480 --> 0:15:02.560 I was doing little design plans for it, and that 0:15:02.640 --> 0:15:03.720 kind of got the ball rolling. 0:15:04.520 --> 0:15:07.560 How did the funding end up coming together? What was 0:15:07.600 --> 0:15:10.000 your budget and what ended up being the scope of 0:15:10.000 --> 0:15:10.560 the project. 0:15:10.640 --> 0:15:14.080 Yeah, so they said the only way we're going to 0:15:14.200 --> 0:15:16.160 do this. You know, there was always a group called 0:15:16.160 --> 0:15:20.560 the Friends of Warner Park that Jenny Hannon ran that, 0:15:20.840 --> 0:15:24.640 and she they heard a mechanism to raise funds for 0:15:24.880 --> 0:15:27.240 Warner Park and they were putting millions and dollars into 0:15:27.240 --> 0:15:33.240 the park doing these great allays and masonry work. So 0:15:33.280 --> 0:15:35.960 the mechanisms in there, and then the Tennessee Golf Foundation 0:15:36.080 --> 0:15:39.600 got involved, you know, through Stuart, So we had turned 0:15:39.600 --> 0:15:42.960 by the president of that and then Jim Seaberry, two 0:15:43.160 --> 0:15:45.960 very powerful guys in the uh you know, Tennessee Golf 0:15:47.000 --> 0:15:50.560 got involved and we and I think Stuart what he 0:15:50.600 --> 0:15:53.600 did is he played golf. He heard the Mayor Cooper 0:15:55.720 --> 0:15:59.000 was a golfer. It was like a like a closet golfer. 0:15:59.360 --> 0:16:03.240 After a long day, he'd been seen on Harborth Hills, 0:16:03.240 --> 0:16:06.280 which is around the corner, playing golf at six o'clock 0:16:06.280 --> 0:16:08.920 at night, pulling his own you know, carrying his own bag. 0:16:09.600 --> 0:16:11.400 And Stuart goes, we need to get a hold of 0:16:11.440 --> 0:16:14.600 that guy. Stewart invited him to some kind of an 0:16:14.600 --> 0:16:18.280 outing and befriended him and said, hey, listen, you know 0:16:19.120 --> 0:16:21.520 this would be pretty cool. You know, the park system 0:16:21.600 --> 0:16:25.160 is not really funding these you know, these golf courses 0:16:25.200 --> 0:16:29.520 as well. Prissy Warner had two guys maintaining that golf course. 0:16:29.680 --> 0:16:33.520 That's all it was. So we got into the Mayor 0:16:33.560 --> 0:16:36.560 Cooper John Cooper's ear, and that kind of got the 0:16:36.560 --> 0:16:42.680 ball rolling. So then between Mayor Cooper, the Tennessee Golf 0:16:42.680 --> 0:16:46.360 Foundation and the friends at Warner Park, they put it 0:16:46.400 --> 0:16:50.640 all together and we started having fund raising events so 0:16:50.680 --> 0:16:53.280 they'd fly me in and we'd have a cocktail party 0:16:53.480 --> 0:16:57.280 at somebody pretty famous as a house, you know, and 0:16:57.440 --> 0:17:01.720 just bringing people in and started raising fun We wanted 0:17:01.720 --> 0:17:05.639 to raise two and a half million dollars and so 0:17:05.800 --> 0:17:08.679 it was it was a grassroots movement and all I 0:17:08.680 --> 0:17:12.639 would go to these meetings and you know, Sarah, Sarah Ingram, 0:17:12.720 --> 0:17:16.080 like kirs Cut captain, you know, she was at these meetings, 0:17:16.200 --> 0:17:19.359 you know, and she was all on board. So we 0:17:19.400 --> 0:17:21.800 had people like that in the month. Once the money, 0:17:21.800 --> 0:17:23.760 once we got raised over a million bucks, we knew 0:17:23.800 --> 0:17:27.080 we could pull this off. So they pulled me in officially. 0:17:27.480 --> 0:17:29.760 I brought in Mcurret Golf out of Florida because I 0:17:29.840 --> 0:17:32.680 have such a good relationship with them. The contractor, I said, 0:17:32.680 --> 0:17:34.440 we're just going to come in as a package deal. 0:17:35.760 --> 0:17:38.879 I think the budget my budget was one point seven 0:17:38.920 --> 0:17:42.720 million dollars, twelve new greens, you know, nine new greens, 0:17:42.800 --> 0:17:46.240 and then I built a big short game practice facility 0:17:46.280 --> 0:17:50.680 for the PJ junior program, a big putting course. So 0:17:50.720 --> 0:17:54.280 we had twelve new greens, twelve brand new bunkers, used 0:17:54.320 --> 0:17:57.879 bunker solutions, you know, the latest technology, all new tea's 0:17:58.359 --> 0:18:01.800 in a brand new single row irrigation system. So what 0:18:01.840 --> 0:18:05.320 we did was, I knew this still had to be maintainable, 0:18:05.560 --> 0:18:10.520 sustainable and playable. So you know, we didn't go hogwhile 0:18:10.680 --> 0:18:14.080 like some of these projects, whether it's and and you 0:18:14.119 --> 0:18:17.160 know one point there are two point five million dollars 0:18:17.240 --> 0:18:19.159 is a lot easier to raise than twenty million. 0:18:19.680 --> 0:18:21.119 Oh yeah, and so. 0:18:21.200 --> 0:18:24.480 It it it. The ball kept rolling. I'm like, I 0:18:24.560 --> 0:18:26.879 look at Stewart, I'm like, I think we're gonna actually 0:18:26.920 --> 0:18:29.440 do this, you know, and we actually pulled it off 0:18:29.600 --> 0:18:34.359 and started last year, and that you know, there was 0:18:34.400 --> 0:18:36.840 there was some hesitation from the city. You know, they 0:18:36.840 --> 0:18:38.600 were kind of setting their ways and like now we're 0:18:38.760 --> 0:18:40.639 we're just gonna do this. We're going to hand it 0:18:40.640 --> 0:18:43.119 to you, but we're also we all also need to 0:18:43.160 --> 0:18:46.280 know that you guys are on board and gonna maintain this. 0:18:47.520 --> 0:18:51.240 So we squeezed the bureaucracy and you know, between us 0:18:51.320 --> 0:18:53.800 and Mayor Cooper on the top, we squeezed down into 0:18:53.920 --> 0:18:56.479 him and they started believing it and it was just 0:18:56.520 --> 0:19:00.840 a project of passion for everybody. Jim Nance got involved 0:19:00.840 --> 0:19:04.040 because Jim lives seven doors down the road, and so 0:19:04.080 --> 0:19:05.760 he'd come out and walk the golf course with me 0:19:05.880 --> 0:19:08.280 and uh, you know a lot of people involved, so 0:19:08.440 --> 0:19:11.440 it was, you know, a great pleasure for all of us. 0:19:11.520 --> 0:19:14.600 It's turned out really good. We got a little bit 0:19:14.640 --> 0:19:17.720 of a late start, you know, hooking up a water 0:19:17.800 --> 0:19:21.119 line to the city water line. Didn't didn't realize how 0:19:21.200 --> 0:19:23.320 much red tape that would be. We thought we'd just 0:19:23.359 --> 0:19:25.200 tap into the waterline, would be good. But you know, 0:19:25.280 --> 0:19:28.159 you got to go through all kinds of agencies. But 0:19:28.240 --> 0:19:30.240 we so we had a little late starting grass and 0:19:30.280 --> 0:19:34.399 the greens. So that's why we had the formal ribbon 0:19:34.440 --> 0:19:37.200 cutting last month with you know, Jim and I were 0:19:37.359 --> 0:19:39.760 Jim nance was there to speak and I gave a 0:19:39.760 --> 0:19:42.840 speech too, and all the donors got to be there 0:19:42.880 --> 0:19:45.840 and hand out all these cool hats and stuff like that. 0:19:45.880 --> 0:19:48.640 And we're going to open up sometime early summer when 0:19:48.680 --> 0:19:49.760 it's it's perfect. 0:19:50.560 --> 0:19:53.280 You know, a lot of municipal courses would love to 0:19:53.359 --> 0:19:58.159 have a couple million dollars, but that is such a 0:19:58.240 --> 0:20:04.200 small budget compare to most golf construction projects these days. 0:20:04.200 --> 0:20:07.439 Even if you're talking about a little renovation, like a 0:20:07.480 --> 0:20:11.160 little tweak here and there, the millions start adding up 0:20:11.320 --> 0:20:15.480 really quickly. How do you do a project like this 0:20:16.160 --> 0:20:18.679 on that kind of budget, or I guess that the 0:20:18.760 --> 0:20:22.480 real question is how do you produce good golf course design? 0:20:22.560 --> 0:20:27.920 Because you made some fairly dramatic changes out there, How 0:20:27.960 --> 0:20:31.199 do you make good golf course design happen on a 0:20:31.240 --> 0:20:34.919 budget that small? What do you kind of extract from 0:20:35.240 --> 0:20:37.520 the usual process. What do you say, Okay, we don't 0:20:37.520 --> 0:20:39.480 need that, and then what do you focus on? 0:20:40.359 --> 0:20:42.080 I didn't pay much back, you know. The one thing 0:20:42.200 --> 0:20:44.520 was building the greens is Bermuda greens. You know, you 0:20:44.520 --> 0:20:47.200 don't need the USGA greens. We just we just build 0:20:47.200 --> 0:20:49.240 them on the top so and spread some sand on 0:20:49.320 --> 0:20:51.560 top and put some drainage and called it good. So 0:20:51.600 --> 0:20:53.840 that's a million dollar thing right there, lop off of 0:20:53.920 --> 0:20:57.800 somebody else's budget. I only had twelve bunkers, you know. 0:20:57.880 --> 0:21:01.440 Tom Tom was always like bunkers overrated, you know, gust 0:21:01.560 --> 0:21:04.080 only as thirty. You know, it's all about ground features, 0:21:04.080 --> 0:21:07.840 and that's what I did. I concentrated on building really 0:21:07.840 --> 0:21:11.400 cool greens that were accessible. So there, you know, say 0:21:11.840 --> 0:21:13.639 the first first hall, we have a bunker on the 0:21:13.720 --> 0:21:15.720 left hand side that you could tuck the pin behind, 0:21:16.280 --> 0:21:19.480 but have open approach and fair way all the way around, 0:21:19.600 --> 0:21:21.520 even to the backside of the green, so it's chipping, 0:21:21.920 --> 0:21:27.480 chipping all the way around, and that's sustainable because the 0:21:27.560 --> 0:21:29.919 mainans crew, you know, we're hoping to have four people 0:21:29.960 --> 0:21:33.119 maintain this golf course when we open up. We've asked 0:21:33.160 --> 0:21:35.720 for that, and he just takes the fairwaym over and 0:21:35.840 --> 0:21:38.240 rams it, you know, goes right around the green and 0:21:38.280 --> 0:21:41.359 the backside. So building all these cool short grass areas, 0:21:43.400 --> 0:21:46.240 which I love in the first place, are easier to 0:21:46.280 --> 0:21:49.760 maintain for them. So we rolled that short grass right 0:21:49.800 --> 0:21:52.919 into the second te so you're just constantly walking on 0:21:52.960 --> 0:21:56.560 short grass. So it's it is sustainable and it's maintainable 0:21:56.600 --> 0:21:59.200 and it's very playable. You know, I didn't. I didn't 0:21:59.200 --> 0:22:01.440 pull any punches on the greens. They're cool greens. There's 0:22:01.440 --> 0:22:06.160 some contour them, but they're accessible because at least half 0:22:06.200 --> 0:22:09.800 of the approach is open, so you know, high handiciffers 0:22:09.840 --> 0:22:12.399 can run the ball in. And there's always you know 0:22:12.440 --> 0:22:16.960 a couple of really tasty hull locations for for really 0:22:16.960 --> 0:22:19.280 good players. You know, we plan and have some cool events, 0:22:19.359 --> 0:22:22.760 amateur events there just because the places you know, place rocks. 0:22:23.400 --> 0:22:25.600 So you know, I didn't, I didn't. I would say 0:22:25.600 --> 0:22:29.200 I didn't dumb me down the design. I just figured 0:22:29.240 --> 0:22:32.600 out how to maintain it with least amount of money. 0:22:32.720 --> 0:22:35.560 And the tea's are just top soil tees, you know, 0:22:35.720 --> 0:22:38.200 it's fine. Single row irrigation was huge. 0:22:38.680 --> 0:22:40.200 I was gonna ask about that. 0:22:40.200 --> 0:22:42.159 That's old school, that's oht school. And that's all you 0:22:42.160 --> 0:22:45.680 did when the when the fairways are thirty five yards wide, 0:22:45.720 --> 0:22:49.320 because we have tree lines, that's all you need. And 0:22:49.320 --> 0:22:51.920 it's bermuda, you know that. And we and we didn't 0:22:51.920 --> 0:22:55.800 regrass the fairways. We only regrassed around the greens around 0:22:55.800 --> 0:22:59.760 the tees. And these fairways, you know, Darrowin had kicked 0:22:59.800 --> 0:23:03.360 in for many years. It's the you know, the survival 0:23:03.400 --> 0:23:06.159 of the fittest. These great fairways were pure. You know, 0:23:06.560 --> 0:23:10.080 last winter most of the country clubs had winter kill 0:23:10.119 --> 0:23:13.080 in their bermuda, and we had no winter kill, you know, 0:23:13.119 --> 0:23:16.680 because it's just old school, unrrigated. You know, the irrigation 0:23:16.800 --> 0:23:18.960 system they had before we got there were quick couplers. 0:23:20.080 --> 0:23:23.159 You know, that's that's somebody walking around night watering and 0:23:23.200 --> 0:23:25.840 they hadn't done it a long time. So but the grass, 0:23:25.880 --> 0:23:29.040 so the grass knew how to grow without all the nutrients. 0:23:29.200 --> 0:23:32.760 All the high profile stuff, so it was laying there, 0:23:33.600 --> 0:23:36.679 and to me, it's just, you know, it's kind of 0:23:36.680 --> 0:23:38.960 going back to you know, all the great courses that 0:23:39.000 --> 0:23:42.000 I've studied, and you know, we all studied as kids, 0:23:42.040 --> 0:23:45.760 and everything built before nineteen twenty was just like I 0:23:45.840 --> 0:23:49.199 built now. So you know, that's how you do it. 0:23:49.480 --> 0:23:52.919 You just build old school and just be fine. You know, 0:23:52.960 --> 0:23:55.800 we're not going to have the greens thirteen on the 0:23:55.840 --> 0:23:58.160 stint meter. You know, we're going to mower a tease 0:23:58.200 --> 0:24:00.480 at a half inch as the same as the airways 0:24:01.000 --> 0:24:04.080 because you're using the tea, and we're gonna mow the greens, 0:24:04.720 --> 0:24:08.320 you know, obviously an eighth inch or lower. But you 0:24:08.359 --> 0:24:12.440 know they all surface drained, we have good soils under them, 0:24:12.920 --> 0:24:16.639 and we have you know, we did do ins and 0:24:16.680 --> 0:24:20.520 out irrigation heads around the greens so we can control 0:24:20.560 --> 0:24:23.080 the water and the greens versus the outside. But it 0:24:23.119 --> 0:24:24.920 wasn't that hard. It was just kind of going back 0:24:24.960 --> 0:24:27.199 to your roots and going you know a lot of this, 0:24:28.000 --> 0:24:31.840 these fifteen million dollars renovations. I just pulled my hair out. 0:24:31.840 --> 0:24:35.000 I'm like, where are you is spending the money I'm 0:24:35.040 --> 0:24:37.000 used to If you look at my projects. You know, 0:24:37.040 --> 0:24:40.600 I just just came from Weathersfield Country Club in Hartford. 0:24:41.440 --> 0:24:43.520 They used to have the Sammy Davis, the g h 0:24:43.560 --> 0:24:47.160 O was there before they moved over the and we 0:24:47.160 --> 0:24:50.080 we rebuilt all the bunkers and I regrassed, you know, 0:24:50.760 --> 0:24:55.600 all the short gas around the greens, expanded the fairways, built, 0:24:55.920 --> 0:24:58.520 built a handful of tea's for well under a million dollars. 0:24:59.160 --> 0:25:02.160 And that's just as that's just as good as anybody else's, right, 0:25:02.400 --> 0:25:04.480 you know, the fifteen million dollars. So I don't know 0:25:04.480 --> 0:25:07.120 where the extra zero is going. Hopefully it's in their pockets, 0:25:07.400 --> 0:25:10.960 somebody's podcasts. But I think, you know, some of the 0:25:11.200 --> 0:25:14.440 some of the modern construction is a bit excessive, and 0:25:14.560 --> 0:25:15.439 so that's how we did it. 0:25:16.040 --> 0:25:18.679 Yeah, I think it's important to, you know, say it 0:25:18.720 --> 0:25:21.840 louder for the people in the back. Like that's even 0:25:21.840 --> 0:25:25.600 in an environment of rising costs, it's possible to find 0:25:25.640 --> 0:25:28.640 ways to do these things without spending enormous amounts of money. 0:25:28.640 --> 0:25:32.359 And that's really important for these municipal facilities especially. You know, 0:25:32.920 --> 0:25:37.320 a lot of municipal courses that I see spend a 0:25:37.320 --> 0:25:40.560 lot of money on bunkers are frustrated with their bunkers. 0:25:40.720 --> 0:25:44.160 Their bunkers are sort of money pits, so to speak. Right, 0:25:45.480 --> 0:25:49.320 and and and you know, some end up getting rid 0:25:49.359 --> 0:25:52.760 of them or not maintaining them very well, or you know, 0:25:52.880 --> 0:25:57.560 finding solutions that are maybe not ideal for the quality 0:25:57.560 --> 0:26:02.040 of the golf course. You built a new set of 0:26:02.080 --> 0:26:04.760 bunkers at Percy Warner. There aren't many of them, as 0:26:04.800 --> 0:26:08.080 you mentioned, you don't need many. But when it comes 0:26:08.160 --> 0:26:11.920 to shaping a bunker for a facility like this, what 0:26:11.960 --> 0:26:15.359 does an easily maintainable bunker look like? 0:26:16.200 --> 0:26:19.399 You know, there's simple forms. You know, I'm still an artist, 0:26:19.400 --> 0:26:21.240 so I you know I snuck in some cool stuff 0:26:21.240 --> 0:26:21.760 into them. 0:26:21.840 --> 0:26:24.040 Yeah, I mean, you don't. I Bruce Heppner doesn't just 0:26:24.080 --> 0:26:26.399 want to go and build ovals, right, you want to 0:26:26.480 --> 0:26:28.000 You want to do something else? So how do you 0:26:28.040 --> 0:26:30.640 do that while also making them easily maintainable. 0:26:30.720 --> 0:26:35.040 Here's what we did is you know, obviously, you know 0:26:35.080 --> 0:26:37.320 the two guys that maintain the golf gross oh my god, 0:26:37.359 --> 0:26:39.000 you know, get rid of the bunkers. We can't, you know, 0:26:39.160 --> 0:26:40.720 I go first of all, get rid of that Sampro. 0:26:40.920 --> 0:26:43.120 I go there, sanm Proo is not getting in my bunkers. 0:26:43.800 --> 0:26:46.200 Second of all, we're going to hand rate these bunkers 0:26:46.320 --> 0:26:49.119 only when they need them. If somebody was not in 0:26:49.200 --> 0:26:51.679 that bunker head yesterday, why are we raking it today? 0:26:52.520 --> 0:26:55.760 And third I took that right off their their plate 0:26:55.880 --> 0:27:01.000 because Kevin Ford, who's the golf pro over it over 0:27:01.080 --> 0:27:04.040 this in Harbeth Hills, he has one of the great 0:27:04.320 --> 0:27:08.280 a great PGI junior program, you know, Jim Nantz's kids 0:27:08.280 --> 0:27:10.920 in it. He has a hundred and some odd kids 0:27:10.920 --> 0:27:13.280 in his programs. So I built that facility for him. 0:27:13.640 --> 0:27:17.679 The first lesson of the program is go learn how 0:27:17.720 --> 0:27:20.160 to fix ballmarks and go to learn how to rake bunkers. 0:27:20.480 --> 0:27:23.320 So the kids are going to rake the Bunkers's how 0:27:23.320 --> 0:27:27.159 I did that. And they're gonna fix ball marks first 0:27:27.640 --> 0:27:30.439 before they ever hit a ball. So I took that 0:27:30.520 --> 0:27:33.560 off them. But to build them, you know, they're not 0:27:33.680 --> 0:27:36.240 high flashes, but we use bunker solutions, which is that 0:27:36.320 --> 0:27:39.479 kind of carpeting you put on the floors. So if 0:27:39.520 --> 0:27:41.600 I did flare and he sand I flared to stand up, 0:27:41.840 --> 0:27:44.800 it'll it'll it'll stay up in the face to keep it, 0:27:44.880 --> 0:27:48.560 you know, keep the bunkers from being contaminated and the 0:27:48.640 --> 0:27:50.680 rule is, and I do this at all my courses. 0:27:51.680 --> 0:27:55.200 What I've realized is bunker maintenance wears up bunkers, not golfers, 0:27:55.960 --> 0:27:58.240 you know. And the only reason we have to maintain 0:27:58.280 --> 0:28:00.879 bunkers because golfers do a crap be job breaking their 0:28:00.920 --> 0:28:06.160 own bunkers. So my motto is, you know, hand rake, 0:28:07.119 --> 0:28:09.760 but only spot rake. Only rake the area where that 0:28:10.000 --> 0:28:11.920 it was disturbed, where somebody did a bad job of 0:28:12.000 --> 0:28:14.800 raking yesterday, or if nobody was in it, stay out 0:28:14.800 --> 0:28:17.439 of it and keep those sandpros out of there. You know, 0:28:17.440 --> 0:28:19.280 they're the ones that chew things up. They think it's 0:28:19.320 --> 0:28:23.199 easy to do, and they just destroy bunkers. And they're small, 0:28:23.760 --> 0:28:26.679 they're thousand square foot bunkers or less. They're not huge, 0:28:27.359 --> 0:28:30.120 and they're perfectly located, and uh, you know, I also 0:28:30.200 --> 0:28:33.840 build them, you know, properly build bunkers, don't allow water 0:28:33.960 --> 0:28:35.879 to run into them from the outside. So you know, 0:28:35.920 --> 0:28:39.200 I know how to build bunkers. So you'll see that 0:28:39.520 --> 0:28:43.240 there's some art to them, but they're very maintainable. 0:28:43.960 --> 0:28:46.280 So I understand there's more work for you on the 0:28:46.360 --> 0:28:51.480 docket at Nashville's municipal courses. What what can you tell 0:28:51.520 --> 0:28:53.400 me about that. What more is going to happen? 0:28:53.600 --> 0:28:56.600 Luckily, Mayor Cooper is not the may anymore. He was 0:28:57.160 --> 0:29:00.000 that was his last term, but he was so excited 0:29:00.200 --> 0:29:03.120 and so happy of the product we did at Percy 0:29:03.160 --> 0:29:07.040 Warner just before he left office. That you know, they know, 0:29:08.000 --> 0:29:10.360 I don't know what a budget of a Nashville city, 0:29:10.400 --> 0:29:12.480 but it's probably close to a billion dollars, you know, 0:29:12.800 --> 0:29:16.960 in of a budget. He gifted us are granted us 0:29:17.440 --> 0:29:21.080 the Tennessee Golf Foundation two million dollars out of the 0:29:21.120 --> 0:29:25.560 city funds to go over and take on Shelby Golf 0:29:25.600 --> 0:29:28.560 Club golf course, which is over in East Nashville, which 0:29:28.640 --> 0:29:30.880 is kind of the hipster area. A lot of people 0:29:30.880 --> 0:29:33.640 are moving there. You know, a lot of guys walking 0:29:33.680 --> 0:29:36.400 around jeans rolled up and work boots and. 0:29:36.320 --> 0:29:39.320 You know, beards, and they didn't just come from a 0:29:39.360 --> 0:29:43.840 construction site to a bar now. 0:29:43.920 --> 0:29:46.440 But it's a nineteen twenty three Ross course. You know, 0:29:46.520 --> 0:29:49.040 Ross never built it, but he did drawings for it 0:29:50.160 --> 0:29:53.120 and it's his routing, so they have it is the 0:29:53.200 --> 0:29:56.320 least played golf course in the Nashville circuit. Nashville owned 0:29:56.360 --> 0:30:00.360 seven golf courses. Brent Seneker grew up playing there. Lou 0:30:00.440 --> 0:30:04.360 Graham grew up playing there. So we've got them involved. 0:30:05.720 --> 0:30:09.760 So basically, you know what I can do for two 0:30:09.800 --> 0:30:13.040 million bucks. I did a plan and we just said 0:30:13.040 --> 0:30:14.720 we're capping at two million bucks. So we're going to 0:30:14.760 --> 0:30:16.960 rebuild all the greens because they have the winter and 0:30:16.960 --> 0:30:20.120 summer greens. They are also push them together, build like 0:30:20.160 --> 0:30:23.400 five to six thousand square foot greens, same kind of 0:30:23.720 --> 0:30:27.360 technology we OpEd up Percy re irrigate the green sites. 0:30:27.480 --> 0:30:31.040 They have a relatively new irrigation system throughout the whole place. 0:30:31.800 --> 0:30:35.880 And then move some cart pass. You know, they've never 0:30:35.920 --> 0:30:39.360 had an architect working in natural public golf course. Hey 0:30:39.400 --> 0:30:41.040 we need a car pass. So they send some guy 0:30:41.080 --> 0:30:42.479 out there and need paints them and half of them 0:30:42.600 --> 0:30:43.920 like down the middle of a fairway. 0:30:44.680 --> 0:30:45.560 You see this a lot. 0:30:45.760 --> 0:30:47.360 Yeah, I get out of it. You know. I was like, 0:30:47.440 --> 0:30:49.680 oh my god. And the tree luckily they had they 0:30:49.680 --> 0:30:51.880 had a tornado come by, which is good and bad, 0:30:51.920 --> 0:30:54.640 but tornado came by and wiped out all the really 0:30:54.680 --> 0:30:58.200 bad trees that were poorly planted. And so we're going 0:30:58.280 --> 0:31:00.840 to rebuild all the bunkers, do a little bit of drainage, 0:31:01.160 --> 0:31:04.800 and any money we have left over from the project, 0:31:04.880 --> 0:31:07.760 we'll build some tees and then just down the hill 0:31:07.800 --> 0:31:10.120 from that there is a place called the Vinnie Lynks 0:31:10.920 --> 0:31:13.040 and Vince Gill was involved in that. So it's a 0:31:13.040 --> 0:31:17.480 little nine hole part three course for kids and anybody. 0:31:18.120 --> 0:31:21.960 Very cool facility run by the Tennessee Golf Foundation. Just 0:31:22.000 --> 0:31:24.680 these cool little short holes. You go over there and 0:31:24.760 --> 0:31:28.320 you take two clubs with the endplay. There's a great 0:31:28.720 --> 0:31:32.000 kids program there too. But they when they built them, 0:31:32.040 --> 0:31:34.040 the greens are great. They're going to have like four 0:31:34.080 --> 0:31:37.920 bunkers and they're starting to maintain those well. But the 0:31:37.960 --> 0:31:40.400 teas are small. They have a little strip of AstroTurf 0:31:40.440 --> 0:31:42.320 and the tea's are like a thousand square feet. So 0:31:43.960 --> 0:31:46.440 I did a plan to triple the size of the 0:31:46.480 --> 0:31:48.640 t so you can off of grass all year round, 0:31:49.080 --> 0:31:53.320 and we're hoping to raise some private money to do 0:31:53.360 --> 0:31:55.440 that while we're in town, and I m Cure Golf 0:31:55.520 --> 0:31:58.080 is still going to be the contractor. They love them, 0:31:58.320 --> 0:32:00.480 I do. I've worked with all them Cure for years, 0:32:01.240 --> 0:32:04.360 and they get how cool of a project these are. 0:32:04.480 --> 0:32:08.120 So we're going there. And then at the last at 0:32:08.120 --> 0:32:12.520 the ribbon cutting, Jim Nance talked about The next golf 0:32:12.560 --> 0:32:16.000 course we'd like to do is Ted Rhoads. Ted Rhads 0:32:16.040 --> 0:32:19.360 obviously the famous you know African American golfer, you know, 0:32:19.480 --> 0:32:24.320 teacher and Tiger mentioned him when he won Augusta. It 0:32:24.440 --> 0:32:29.040 was one of his heroes. And so Jim Nance kind 0:32:29.040 --> 0:32:30.920 of looked at the new the new mayor of Freddie 0:32:30.920 --> 0:32:34.640 O'Connell and looked at him and said, after we do Shelby, 0:32:34.720 --> 0:32:36.200 I want to be involved, and we want to go 0:32:36.240 --> 0:32:38.080 to Ted Rhods. He goes, I want to be part 0:32:38.080 --> 0:32:41.360 of that. So mister mayor, hold on your hats, you know. 0:32:41.960 --> 0:32:44.320 So I'm I've already done a plan for that place too. 0:32:44.360 --> 0:32:46.360 It's it's actually not bad shape. We just have to 0:32:46.360 --> 0:32:49.040 do a few things and potentially build a range. So 0:32:49.320 --> 0:32:52.280 that's down the road, and then all our eyes are 0:32:52.280 --> 0:32:55.320 on Harbor Hills, which is the golf course on the 0:32:55.400 --> 0:32:58.640 other side of the park from Percy Warrener, which is 0:32:59.840 --> 0:33:02.760 the great golf course of Nashville. It's just unfortunate it's 0:33:02.840 --> 0:33:05.920 run by the city, but it's uh. They always have 0:33:06.040 --> 0:33:10.000 the open qualifiers there and it's I've told people, if 0:33:10.000 --> 0:33:13.320 you let you let me get my mits on that 0:33:13.480 --> 0:33:16.080 it could be the best course in Tennessee. It's that 0:33:16.280 --> 0:33:18.600 if the greens are great, the routing is great. I 0:33:18.640 --> 0:33:20.520 just have to get the car pass out of the way, 0:33:21.080 --> 0:33:23.800 got a bunch of trees down, and then you know, 0:33:23.840 --> 0:33:25.800 rebuild it, you know, reconfigure the bunkers so be a 0:33:25.840 --> 0:33:28.560 little more interesting strategic. So we have three or four 0:33:28.720 --> 0:33:30.280 more years of working in Nashville, which is. 0:33:30.280 --> 0:33:33.040 Great for me and making your way through the municipal 0:33:33.080 --> 0:33:35.080 golf system of Nashville. I love it. 0:33:36.760 --> 0:33:39.120 I stay right downtown, and you know, my wife's not 0:33:39.160 --> 0:33:40.840 always happy because I always come back with a couple 0:33:40.880 --> 0:33:44.680 of more guitars and go see live music every pretty 0:33:44.720 --> 0:33:47.080 much every night. So it's it's a it's a great, 0:33:47.160 --> 0:33:50.920 great city, great vibes. You know, it's a cool place, 0:33:51.240 --> 0:33:51.600 all right. 0:33:51.680 --> 0:33:54.360 So I'd like to talk a bit about your career 0:33:54.760 --> 0:33:59.240 more broadly, and I think something that's interesting about your 0:33:59.280 --> 0:34:02.440 career is that it really spans this current era of 0:34:02.600 --> 0:34:06.240 architecture that we find ourselves in. You were there toward 0:34:06.320 --> 0:34:09.640 the beginning of the restoration movement, toward the beginning of 0:34:09.680 --> 0:34:12.839 the minimalist movement or the Second Golden Age, or whatever 0:34:12.880 --> 0:34:15.600 you want to call it, and you were helping to 0:34:15.920 --> 0:34:18.200 shape the direction of all of this. Right, you were 0:34:18.239 --> 0:34:21.440 working for a firm that was right at the center 0:34:21.480 --> 0:34:24.440 of it, even though you know it sort of started 0:34:24.480 --> 0:34:28.879 as this kind of outsider band. Now it's the very 0:34:28.920 --> 0:34:32.600 center of what's happening in golf course construction, I think. 0:34:32.640 --> 0:34:35.439 So I'm excited to get your perspective on how that's 0:34:35.480 --> 0:34:39.280 all unfolded. So if we go back to the beginning 0:34:39.320 --> 0:34:43.080 of your career in golf architecture about thirty five years 0:34:43.080 --> 0:34:46.880 ago or so, as I understand it, it was somewhat 0:34:47.040 --> 0:34:51.640 unusual at this time to be interested in restoring golf courses. 0:34:52.000 --> 0:34:55.319 It's true, it wasn't obvious to many people or to 0:34:55.400 --> 0:34:59.359 many clubs that restoration as opposed to redesign or modernization, 0:34:59.640 --> 0:35:03.200 was the way to go. So what got you interested 0:35:03.239 --> 0:35:04.840 in golf course restoration? 0:35:05.920 --> 0:35:07.400 When I was in college, I went to I have 0:35:07.440 --> 0:35:10.359 an Internet Injury from Michigan State on Michigan Tech. And 0:35:11.200 --> 0:35:15.880 luckily the president of the club or of the college 0:35:16.040 --> 0:35:19.279 was a golfer, and in the library had they had 0:35:19.360 --> 0:35:22.719 ron went and spoke the golf course. It was only 0:35:22.800 --> 0:35:24.239 him and me to ever check it out. 0:35:25.520 --> 0:35:29.200 So you know that's wild, say you know, people this book, 0:35:29.360 --> 0:35:32.839 its book is incredible. Butever I ask anybody, how did 0:35:32.840 --> 0:35:36.040 this all start? So many people mentioned this book by 0:35:36.120 --> 0:35:36.680 Ron Whitten. 0:35:36.920 --> 0:35:39.000 Yeah, it was his first version, and man, that was 0:35:39.160 --> 0:35:41.839 I you can only check it out for two weeks 0:35:41.840 --> 0:35:43.800 at a time, and I'd put it back in the 0:35:43.840 --> 0:35:46.400 school library and all of a sudden he'd check it 0:35:46.400 --> 0:35:49.360 out and I'd be mad. So finally one day I 0:35:49.680 --> 0:35:53.560 went here. They had like open, open visitation chats with 0:35:53.640 --> 0:35:56.680 the president and I walked in and it was usually people, 0:35:56.680 --> 0:35:59.960 you know, students bitching about something, you know, some political 0:36:00.040 --> 0:36:02.880 thing or something. And I walked in. I'm like, how 0:36:02.920 --> 0:36:04.880 come you're always checking out the how come here you 0:36:05.000 --> 0:36:07.560 stealing my book? And he looked at me and we 0:36:07.640 --> 0:36:10.560 became fast friends. He ended up being the green chairman 0:36:10.600 --> 0:36:14.200 of vent Tanna Canyon out and when he retired out 0:36:14.239 --> 0:36:18.480 in Tucson, but we sat He's like I was a 0:36:18.480 --> 0:36:21.320 breath of fresh air. But you know, I studied that book, 0:36:21.960 --> 0:36:25.000 forward him back and then you know, sent out three 0:36:25.080 --> 0:36:28.120 hundred resumes. You know, that was the boom period right 0:36:28.280 --> 0:36:31.880 nineteen ninety golf. That's when National Golf Foundation was proclaiming 0:36:31.920 --> 0:36:33.440 we had to build a golf course for every day 0:36:33.440 --> 0:36:35.600 of the year, you know, to keep up to the man. 0:36:36.320 --> 0:36:39.719 So I saw these resumes out and had a bunch 0:36:39.719 --> 0:36:44.600 of job offers and Mike, luckily Mike Kurdson, had sent 0:36:44.680 --> 0:36:47.200 my resume to Ron Force, who had just started a 0:36:47.320 --> 0:36:50.840 year before that, like maybe six months in the business. 0:36:51.719 --> 0:36:53.359 And I thought that, you know, I was thirty at 0:36:53.360 --> 0:36:55.520 the time. I was an older student and I was 0:36:55.640 --> 0:36:58.000 I was a golf I was an auto designer before that. 0:36:58.239 --> 0:37:01.160 So I was late coming in the into the business 0:37:01.719 --> 0:37:04.080 and my age wise, and Ron gave me the best 0:37:04.080 --> 0:37:07.120 opportunity to start jump in right away. And Ron was 0:37:08.000 --> 0:37:10.280 Ron was a big reason, you know. He was into 0:37:10.280 --> 0:37:14.040 the old architecture and h Granted we were struggling just 0:37:14.080 --> 0:37:15.839 trying to get any job. We could rebuild a green 0:37:15.920 --> 0:37:19.200 here there. But the first course we worked, I was 0:37:19.280 --> 0:37:22.520 Lancaster Country Club in in Lancaster, Ohio. 0:37:23.360 --> 0:37:23.600 Oh. 0:37:24.160 --> 0:37:31.279 Nine holes of Ross, Pennsylvania. Yeah, Jack, Jack Killman, I 0:37:31.320 --> 0:37:33.600 think Mike Kurtzon and Kittle, I think it was Jack 0:37:33.680 --> 0:37:38.120 Kileman and did nine holes there. And when we we 0:37:38.120 --> 0:37:40.640 we got the job and we started seeing these old 0:37:40.680 --> 0:37:43.160 drawings and how cool the Ross course was different from 0:37:43.239 --> 0:37:47.799 Jack's course that got us into that, and so Ron 0:37:47.840 --> 0:37:51.560 and I, Tom and Gill. You know, Tom was I 0:37:51.600 --> 0:37:54.919 think working at Piping Rock via via Pe at the time, 0:37:55.880 --> 0:37:59.080 so they were doing it. And Brian Silla, you know, 0:37:59.120 --> 0:38:02.680 because he wrote that the one article about Ross. We 0:38:02.680 --> 0:38:05.280 were the only ones doing this kind of stuff actually 0:38:05.280 --> 0:38:08.440 going around, you know, and you know, part of Ron's 0:38:08.440 --> 0:38:10.360 in my studies were going to see as many courses 0:38:10.480 --> 0:38:12.839 we could, you know, we go consult somewhere and then 0:38:12.880 --> 0:38:16.320 go see ten Gough courses. So the more we went around, 0:38:16.360 --> 0:38:19.759 we realized, I think the collective group of us, Tom 0:38:19.800 --> 0:38:24.319 and Gill and Ron and I and Brian that you know, 0:38:24.360 --> 0:38:27.200 most of these courses have been modernized, you know, in 0:38:27.239 --> 0:38:31.200 the fifties, sixties, seventies and eighties. You know, modern architects 0:38:31.200 --> 0:38:33.640 were better than the old masters. Nobody knew these guys, 0:38:33.960 --> 0:38:36.520 you know, until Frank Hannagin wrote that. Hannagin wrote that 0:38:36.760 --> 0:38:39.279 wrote that article about Albert, telling us nobody knew who 0:38:39.320 --> 0:38:43.480 he was. So we were going around and I was 0:38:44.200 --> 0:38:46.920 co calling all these clubs and going wow, you know, 0:38:47.400 --> 0:38:50.320 and just kind of peeling through the layers and seeing 0:38:50.320 --> 0:38:53.920 these old drawings that maybe these original architects were pretty 0:38:53.920 --> 0:38:56.920 good and then they were onto something originally, and so 0:38:57.040 --> 0:39:00.640 that's kind of how we started getting work. And you know, 0:39:00.719 --> 0:39:02.840 so Ron and I we built a few a handful 0:39:02.880 --> 0:39:05.720 of golf courses. But that was you know, that sparked 0:39:05.760 --> 0:39:09.879 my fire. This was fascinating the history, doing the archaeology 0:39:10.880 --> 0:39:12.799 and kind of how easy it was to see how 0:39:12.840 --> 0:39:16.640 things had changed. And I remember my courage and told Ron, 0:39:16.680 --> 0:39:18.359 he goes the best way to learn, you know, asked 0:39:18.360 --> 0:39:20.680 about me, like, the best way he can learn is 0:39:20.760 --> 0:39:25.960 to go remodel or consultant clubs and learn how people, 0:39:26.280 --> 0:39:30.239 learn from people's mistakes and learn from people's successes, how 0:39:30.239 --> 0:39:33.760 to be against consultants. So I earned my chops with Ron. 0:39:34.440 --> 0:39:37.560 And then three years later I was I was kind 0:39:37.560 --> 0:39:39.920 of getting either homesick. I wanted to get back to Michigan. 0:39:40.120 --> 0:39:43.440 You know, Uniontown, Pennsylvania wasn't where it was happening for 0:39:43.480 --> 0:39:46.520 me and my wife. So I had a few architects 0:39:46.520 --> 0:39:48.719 interested in bringing me on because I started to make 0:39:48.719 --> 0:39:52.040 a reputation for myself. And then Gil had left Tom 0:39:52.520 --> 0:39:56.120 at the time, and I'd call Tom like once a 0:39:56.160 --> 0:39:58.239 month and asked him some stupid questions. It was like, 0:39:58.320 --> 0:40:01.799 Chris Farley, you know, hey, man, it was really cool 0:40:01.960 --> 0:40:02.440 you did that. 0:40:03.760 --> 0:40:07.480 And uh so you remember when yeah, remember when you 0:40:07.480 --> 0:40:08.200 built high Point. 0:40:08.360 --> 0:40:11.400 Yeah exactly. And I called Bill Core and he called me. 0:40:11.440 --> 0:40:13.640 You know, I called all those guys and I was 0:40:13.680 --> 0:40:16.160 just bugging everybody because I was I have a thirst 0:40:16.200 --> 0:40:19.839 for it. It was a passion for this. And when 0:40:19.880 --> 0:40:24.600 Gil left, Tom heard that I might be I had 0:40:24.640 --> 0:40:28.000 a job offer from Jerry Matthews. It was kind of 0:40:28.000 --> 0:40:31.200 a regional architect in Michigan and Tom didn't like him 0:40:31.200 --> 0:40:34.239 at all. They didn't like each other. And because you're 0:40:34.239 --> 0:40:36.200 not gonna go work for Jerry, you have to come 0:40:36.239 --> 0:40:37.960 work for me, I'm like, okay. 0:40:37.840 --> 0:40:41.600 Good, Oh that's classics. So Tom was prompted to hire 0:40:41.640 --> 0:40:47.240 you because Jerry Matthews was gonna hire you. 0:40:45.760 --> 0:40:49.919 You didn't want me to make him good. So yeah. 0:40:49.960 --> 0:40:52.879 So then you know, early on with Tom, we didn't 0:40:52.880 --> 0:40:55.719 have a whole lot of work. But my deal with 0:40:55.760 --> 0:40:59.239 Tom is I got to keep doing consulting, and that 0:40:59.440 --> 0:41:03.279 was I've done that for thirty years now, you know, 0:41:03.840 --> 0:41:06.399 and I probably did while I was there for seventeen years. 0:41:06.440 --> 0:41:08.759 I probably did eighty eighty percent of the consulting work 0:41:08.760 --> 0:41:12.120 from Renaissance, all on my own, my own jobs, and 0:41:12.160 --> 0:41:13.719 Tom was fine with that as long as it didn't 0:41:13.760 --> 0:41:18.760 interfere with new projects. So when I was running bally 0:41:18.880 --> 0:41:22.000 Neil or stream Song or something like that, when the 0:41:22.000 --> 0:41:24.239 Shapers would go home for two weeks, I would go 0:41:24.880 --> 0:41:28.440 build bunkers somewhere else, and I built in. I had 0:41:28.440 --> 0:41:30.040 a built in business when I left Tom. 0:41:30.800 --> 0:41:35.000 Yeah, for sure. So early days at Renaissance Golf Design 0:41:35.160 --> 0:41:40.080 with Tom Doak, I assume it was more or less you, Tom, 0:41:40.400 --> 0:41:43.640 Jim Orbina. It was in the mid nineties, That's pretty much. 0:41:43.840 --> 0:41:45.800 What were those early days like in that firm? 0:41:45.960 --> 0:41:48.120 Oh they're fun, you know, Okay, we had so much fun. 0:41:48.520 --> 0:41:51.200 We didn't have a whole lot of work. So, you know, 0:41:51.320 --> 0:41:54.759 Jim Tom and hired Jim just before Gil left and 0:41:54.840 --> 0:42:00.520 Jim was running Charlotte Golf Club. And so I moved 0:42:00.560 --> 0:42:03.439 to Travors City, which was great for us, my wife 0:42:03.480 --> 0:42:05.759 and I because we love Trevor City. And so the 0:42:05.760 --> 0:42:08.879 first year, you know, I just govered Tom's house for 0:42:08.960 --> 0:42:11.880 an hour. We'd play with some drawings and get on 0:42:11.920 --> 0:42:13.800 the phone and try and we didn't even have an office. 0:42:14.480 --> 0:42:16.480 Try and you know, drum up some work and luckily 0:42:16.520 --> 0:42:19.160 my consulting business so as his was doing fine, paying 0:42:19.160 --> 0:42:22.960 the bills but not much. And then I think the 0:42:23.000 --> 0:42:27.480 first job we got was either Evansville coil crossing, I 0:42:27.520 --> 0:42:30.520 think of that, and that's where I didn't necessarily want 0:42:30.520 --> 0:42:32.120 to run. I wanted to learn how to shape. You know, 0:42:32.200 --> 0:42:33.960 Jim was a good shaper coming from the die and 0:42:34.000 --> 0:42:37.759 Tom was an adequate shaper too, and so I wanted 0:42:37.760 --> 0:42:39.520 to That's what I wanted to learn how to do. 0:42:40.400 --> 0:42:43.000 And so those early days where it was all hands 0:42:43.000 --> 0:42:46.120 on deck, we brought Tom Meat on board. He was 0:42:46.160 --> 0:42:49.520 an ex superintendent. So it's kind of the four of us. 0:42:50.840 --> 0:42:56.120 And you know those early jobs in h if Jim 0:42:56.120 --> 0:42:59.480 would run a job, I'd help shape or vice versa. 0:43:00.600 --> 0:43:03.480 And then we started bringing on young talent. You know, 0:43:03.560 --> 0:43:06.120 when we were building Beach Tree in Baltimore, that was 0:43:06.160 --> 0:43:08.840 my first job to run on my own, and so 0:43:08.960 --> 0:43:12.439 Jim was shaping, I was doing some shaping. Tom Mead 0:43:12.480 --> 0:43:15.400 would come into a little shaping. And then we had 0:43:15.400 --> 0:43:18.080 Brian Slank was my intern from Michigan State and he 0:43:18.200 --> 0:43:22.040 lived with me, and uh, you know that that that 0:43:22.120 --> 0:43:24.200 I've told people that was a game changer bringing him 0:43:24.239 --> 0:43:26.719 on board because he was all about the finish work 0:43:27.680 --> 0:43:31.879 and uh, but we'd all be on site work all day, 0:43:32.000 --> 0:43:34.600 set up to sundown, just having a ball and then 0:43:34.719 --> 0:43:37.280 going out at night, going to the bars a night drinking, 0:43:37.440 --> 0:43:41.560 hanging out. Just the camaraderie is insane. And then you know, 0:43:41.680 --> 0:43:45.640 he kept building. Don Placer got on board, you know, 0:43:45.719 --> 0:43:49.160 we got brought in. He started running the office that 0:43:49.239 --> 0:43:51.120 so that got me out completely out in the field 0:43:51.120 --> 0:43:54.239 of shape and run projects. Then Eric Iverson came on, 0:43:54.680 --> 0:43:59.400 then Brian Schneider and I remember when we were building, 0:43:59.480 --> 0:44:03.400 uh we finished Cape Cape Kidnappers, we had the Renaissance 0:44:03.440 --> 0:44:05.320 Cup and I was in the cart with John Ashworth. 0:44:05.760 --> 0:44:07.680 Here's a dear friend of all of ours who runs 0:44:08.080 --> 0:44:10.400 lank Saul. Now he goes, man, you guys are like 0:44:10.600 --> 0:44:14.680 you guys are like the Stones because you guys having 0:44:14.719 --> 0:44:17.040 so much fun. You guys are rock stars and like, no, 0:44:17.200 --> 0:44:19.160 not really, but we do have fun. But you know, 0:44:19.200 --> 0:44:22.120 those early days were just you know, having that much 0:44:22.160 --> 0:44:26.719 talent on one job and just doing that, having fun, 0:44:26.760 --> 0:44:28.800 building great golf courses that we knew we were building 0:44:28.800 --> 0:44:31.959 great stuff. You know, we were working for Tom. Yeah, 0:44:32.239 --> 0:44:34.520 you know, the the energy was huge. 0:44:34.520 --> 0:44:36.720 And that team kind of came together over the course 0:44:36.760 --> 0:44:39.200 of the of the late nineties. It seems like right 0:44:39.239 --> 0:44:42.360 because he started as a very small firm and eventually 0:44:42.440 --> 0:44:46.160 assembled this uh this all star now all star cast 0:44:46.440 --> 0:44:50.920 around you. You know. Some one thing that happened in 0:44:51.000 --> 0:44:53.919 those early days at Renaissance Golf Design was that sand 0:44:53.960 --> 0:44:59.479 Hills come online. I wonder what your memories are of 0:45:00.040 --> 0:45:03.680 the impact of that project or what impressed you about 0:45:03.719 --> 0:45:07.600 what they were doing, what was new anything like that. 0:45:07.640 --> 0:45:09.520 How did sand Hills affect you back then? 0:45:09.719 --> 0:45:11.760 No, it's huge, you know. It was a game changer. 0:45:11.760 --> 0:45:13.440 It was basically, if you build it, they will cal 0:45:13.520 --> 0:45:15.800 him kind of deal and you could build it anywhere. 0:45:16.000 --> 0:45:18.160 All you had do was find great land. I remember 0:45:18.200 --> 0:45:20.759 talking to Bill one of my dumb phone calls to Bill, 0:45:21.400 --> 0:45:24.600 you know, bugging him. He was talking about sand Hills. 0:45:24.719 --> 0:45:27.239 You know, it was still just in its infancy. He 0:45:27.280 --> 0:45:31.160 had just got back, He and Ben had just got 0:45:31.239 --> 0:45:35.640 back from there. They were traveling around in a helicopter 0:45:35.920 --> 0:45:40.320 with Ron Witten, Doug Peterson, and Dick Young's cap looking 0:45:40.360 --> 0:45:42.800 at sites. And he was telling me, he goes, Bruce, 0:45:42.840 --> 0:45:46.040 you know you know, Bill, he's so humble. He goes, Bruce, 0:45:46.080 --> 0:45:48.399 you're not going to understand how great this land is. 0:45:48.520 --> 0:45:50.920 You know, it's in the middle of nowhere, so we 0:45:50.960 --> 0:45:54.960 don't know how this is going to work. And we 0:45:55.000 --> 0:45:59.040 had all we'd all heard the stories, you know, Dave 0:45:59.120 --> 0:46:03.160 Excellent and Dan were the great Finnish guys, and we 0:46:03.280 --> 0:46:06.720 always heard these stories about them handwraking the entire golf 0:46:06.719 --> 0:46:09.680 course or whatever. It was all about finish work in 0:46:09.719 --> 0:46:13.920 the details, and that's what you know, got Brian Slok 0:46:14.000 --> 0:46:16.279 and all of us like really interested in that, you know, 0:46:16.400 --> 0:46:21.840 sand pro work, handwork, hand edging bunkers not bulldozers, and 0:46:22.880 --> 0:46:25.799 you know, and that kind of turned us on where like, 0:46:25.960 --> 0:46:28.560 that's what we all want to do. That sounds cool. 0:46:28.880 --> 0:46:33.840 And I did. I saw it just at you know should. 0:46:33.840 --> 0:46:35.840 I spent five days there playing golf with these guys 0:46:35.960 --> 0:46:39.200 you know there, and it was just mind boggling, like 0:46:39.280 --> 0:46:41.760 this is this is what should be done. And luckily 0:46:41.800 --> 0:46:45.759 Mike Kaiser became a member so that could be done. 0:46:45.760 --> 0:46:49.000 And then Mike started searching the world for great Land 0:46:49.040 --> 0:46:51.480 and ended up in Oregon, and you know, we got 0:46:51.520 --> 0:46:54.320 involved in that, but that it it was the game changer. 0:46:54.480 --> 0:46:58.560 You know. We had a we had an architectural event 0:46:58.600 --> 0:47:00.880 that you know Thomas so self, he wanted to get 0:47:00.920 --> 0:47:04.800 all these architects together, you know, and not dictate the future, 0:47:04.840 --> 0:47:06.600 but talk about the future. So we had this event 0:47:07.200 --> 0:47:11.680 gathering architects and we came called it Archipelaza for a 0:47:11.680 --> 0:47:14.360 stupid name, and that's what we called it. The first 0:47:14.400 --> 0:47:18.200 one was we invited everybody in the business to come 0:47:19.400 --> 0:47:24.080 and let's get all this architect get architects together somewhere 0:47:24.160 --> 0:47:27.560 very cool and hash things out. Where's the future of architecture? 0:47:27.560 --> 0:47:29.319 Where are we going? And that's how cool Tom is. 0:47:29.320 --> 0:47:32.879 He's forward thinking. So we had it at the sand Hills. 0:47:33.000 --> 0:47:35.400 We figured, if only the places, this is the future 0:47:35.400 --> 0:47:38.279 of golf. None of the main architects showed up. They 0:47:38.280 --> 0:47:40.799 sent all their associates, which are all dear friends of 0:47:40.800 --> 0:47:43.359 mine now and they're all good architects now. They didn't 0:47:43.360 --> 0:47:45.359 want to come because they put their nose up to Tom. 0:47:45.400 --> 0:47:47.360 They didn't known them like Tom at the time. So 0:47:47.480 --> 0:47:51.560 Bill Courr's there, and Ron Forrest, you know, Ian Andrews. 0:47:51.640 --> 0:47:53.799 There a lot of people, you know, a lot of 0:47:53.800 --> 0:47:55.680 cool All the cool people in the business showed up. 0:47:55.680 --> 0:47:59.080 To that thing, and we played golf, and at night 0:47:59.120 --> 0:48:00.680 we sat here and talked to about things, and we 0:48:00.719 --> 0:48:03.080 all introduce each other. And I got up in front 0:48:03.080 --> 0:48:05.440 of everybody a little nervous, and I said, you know, 0:48:06.560 --> 0:48:09.120 what you saw today is the benchmark we will all 0:48:09.160 --> 0:48:11.680 be judged at from this point on. This is how 0:48:11.760 --> 0:48:14.680 epic this place is. And some people are like rolling 0:48:14.719 --> 0:48:17.959 their eyes, but I knew that that was that would 0:48:17.960 --> 0:48:21.920 be the most important modern course for the next hundred 0:48:21.960 --> 0:48:26.720 years because it sets the tone of minimalism, finding great land, 0:48:27.640 --> 0:48:31.360 finding golf on the land, and obviously having Bill and 0:48:31.400 --> 0:48:34.359 Ben do at the same time. It's pretty cool. And 0:48:34.680 --> 0:48:37.520 it's true that was the benchmark, and we're always going 0:48:37.560 --> 0:48:40.200 to be judged on that. Granted, you know, I think 0:48:40.280 --> 0:48:43.160 bally Neils could go toe to toe Pacific Students has 0:48:43.200 --> 0:48:47.279 an ocean, but you'll never It's like Muhammad Ali, it's 0:48:47.280 --> 0:48:49.040 give me the raining champion forever. You're never going to 0:48:49.120 --> 0:48:51.239 knock them out, so don't try. But you're going to 0:48:51.320 --> 0:48:54.400 be real close seconds, you know. So I you know, 0:48:54.520 --> 0:48:56.800 working for Tom all those years, that was our stride. 0:48:56.840 --> 0:48:59.160 We were, you know, bally Neil. I spent a lot 0:48:59.200 --> 0:49:03.640 of time at sand Hills, learning from it, mistakes, good things, 0:49:03.680 --> 0:49:06.440 bad things, whatever, wherever we could peel from that to 0:49:06.520 --> 0:49:09.440 make Bally Meal different. I didn't want to make Saniels 0:49:09.480 --> 0:49:12.360 two point zero, so I wanted to be completely different, 0:49:12.680 --> 0:49:15.560 and we did. You know, we on the mowing lines, 0:49:16.200 --> 0:49:20.759 the native edges, the positioning of the bunkers, things like that. 0:49:20.840 --> 0:49:22.760 I learned a ton from that golf course. 0:49:23.160 --> 0:49:25.839 Reminds me of the Beach Boys and the Beatles going 0:49:25.880 --> 0:49:28.799 back and forth in the sixties, m with you know, 0:49:29.400 --> 0:49:33.840 pet sounds, revolver, Sergeant Pepper's, you know, just kind of 0:49:33.920 --> 0:49:39.239 raising the game, and certainly Pacific Dunes. My impression is 0:49:39.280 --> 0:49:42.239 that it was a It was a new level for 0:49:42.719 --> 0:49:46.120 Tom Duk and for renaissance golf design. What do you 0:49:46.160 --> 0:49:49.040 think allowed that to happen? Was the inspiration of sand 0:49:49.080 --> 0:49:52.839 Hills part of it? What were some of the what 0:49:52.920 --> 0:49:56.040 was the mixture that allowed that course to be so good? 0:49:57.080 --> 0:50:00.000 It was Tom? You know, Tom was a great leader. 0:50:00.280 --> 0:50:02.879 Tom was always comfortable his own skin. You know, he's 0:50:02.880 --> 0:50:06.640 always understated of the elegant. He never Tom had never 0:50:06.719 --> 0:50:09.279 overcooked the soup, so he knew it was appropriate and 0:50:09.320 --> 0:50:12.120 we just followed his lead and we all knew going in, 0:50:13.520 --> 0:50:15.600 you know, this is our big this is our big deal, 0:50:15.800 --> 0:50:17.799 this is our sand Hills, and so we all took 0:50:17.800 --> 0:50:20.160 it seriously. Jim, you know, Jim obviously ran it. I 0:50:20.200 --> 0:50:22.240 was out there sit almost one hundred and fifty days. 0:50:22.960 --> 0:50:26.520 Don Plask was there, Brian Slog came into his own 0:50:27.360 --> 0:50:33.160 and we banded dudes existed, So we knew that, but 0:50:33.280 --> 0:50:35.160 we didn't want to build that. That was more you know, 0:50:35.200 --> 0:50:37.080 it was David Kidd's first project was more of a 0:50:37.080 --> 0:50:41.200 modern golf course on an epic site. But we knew 0:50:41.239 --> 0:50:42.960 ours was going to be that good because the routing 0:50:43.080 --> 0:50:48.279 was brilliant, the landforms were there, and we just we 0:50:48.440 --> 0:50:50.759 all had I'll never forget the first day we were there, 0:50:50.920 --> 0:50:52.879 the hair and I Becker next. It's still up right 0:50:52.920 --> 0:50:56.279 now thinking about it, walking that site and look at 0:50:56.280 --> 0:51:00.360 each other. It's just porn rain. We're all walking on 0:51:00.480 --> 0:51:03.600 trudging around this property, and uh, you know, and Tom 0:51:03.600 --> 0:51:06.920 and I visited the site probably two years before that, 0:51:07.200 --> 0:51:12.279 just before David was building. Bandon Bill she and one 0:51:12.320 --> 0:51:14.920 of Tom's great friends from Chicago told it, you know, 0:51:15.120 --> 0:51:19.160 kind of hooked up Tom with Mike Kaiser. Mike says, well, 0:51:19.200 --> 0:51:21.839 come out and look at it. You know, David's my guy. 0:51:24.160 --> 0:51:26.919 But if he fails, you're on deck and then maybe 0:51:26.920 --> 0:51:30.279 you can maybe, you know, look at the second course. So, uh, 0:51:30.520 --> 0:51:32.080 Tom and I went out there before we went to 0:51:32.120 --> 0:51:36.360 San Francisco Turf Show. Spent a few days walking with 0:51:36.400 --> 0:51:39.120 Shorty down Now they're just opening Shorty's the nineteen hole 0:51:39.120 --> 0:51:41.440 golf course. But Shorty that was the caretaker and that 0:51:41.560 --> 0:51:43.280 was a great day. We you know, we were walking 0:51:43.400 --> 0:51:46.359 on our walking around what we thought would have been 0:51:46.400 --> 0:51:49.160 our property, and we peeked over the hill and looked 0:51:49.160 --> 0:51:51.759 at this and oh my, you know, David, go ahead 0:51:51.800 --> 0:51:53.640 and go ahead and build that golf course. We want 0:51:53.640 --> 0:51:56.600 to build that. And Mike hadn't known the property yet, 0:51:57.040 --> 0:51:59.399 but Tom told him, if you ever have a chance, 0:51:59.480 --> 0:52:03.160 open that, you know, by that land north of abandoned dunes. 0:52:03.680 --> 0:52:05.120 And it came up for sale a couple of years 0:52:05.160 --> 0:52:08.719 later and got Tom involved, and and you know, Tom 0:52:08.719 --> 0:52:11.080 and Jim worked on it hard on the routings, and 0:52:11.160 --> 0:52:13.520 we all came out and but it was just the 0:52:13.600 --> 0:52:16.000 vibe we all and for some reason, you know, don 0:52:16.239 --> 0:52:19.960 if you go in the maintenance building, Ken Nice, the 0:52:20.000 --> 0:52:23.680 superintendent was hitting his stride. But if you go in 0:52:23.719 --> 0:52:26.880 the maintenance building, there's still a drawing the Don Placic 0:52:26.960 --> 0:52:30.719 Don Placic. You know, he's a brilliant artist. And he 0:52:30.760 --> 0:52:36.800 did it on a whiteboard with a black pan, drew 0:52:36.920 --> 0:52:40.720 all the planets in line like this. All the plants 0:52:40.719 --> 0:52:43.040 were up in a row. And that's what we all said, 0:52:43.040 --> 0:52:45.960 the plants are in a row. Movie built Pacific Dunes, 0:52:45.960 --> 0:52:46.520 And it's true. 0:52:47.520 --> 0:52:50.279 Who is the best shaper that you've ever worked with? 0:52:51.400 --> 0:52:55.120 Eric Iverson and he came on board, he was part 0:52:55.120 --> 0:52:58.080 of that late nineties. Yeah, this is. 0:52:58.080 --> 0:53:01.000 The most all he basically taught. You know, Jim was 0:53:01.040 --> 0:53:02.839 a good shaper, but Jim and Jim had always leave 0:53:02.840 --> 0:53:04.040 a mess, and he kind of taught us all to 0:53:04.120 --> 0:53:07.480 run bulldozers. But when Eric came on board, Eric's the 0:53:07.480 --> 0:53:10.560 most elegant shaper. You know, every pass has a purpose, 0:53:11.239 --> 0:53:15.080 and he kind of mentored both Brian's and they're fantastic 0:53:15.080 --> 0:53:18.160 shapers now they're equals to him. But he kind of 0:53:18.160 --> 0:53:21.560 taught us all, you know, and I'm kind of self 0:53:21.600 --> 0:53:24.600 taught in an excavator. You know, we had so much 0:53:24.640 --> 0:53:28.000 good talent on bulldozers and bulldoze beat that beat the 0:53:28.000 --> 0:53:30.040 crap audio. You know, I was, I was the older guy, 0:53:30.080 --> 0:53:32.120 and like, you know, I'd be okay getting out of 0:53:32.160 --> 0:53:34.960 one of those things. And that's when we started using excavators, 0:53:34.960 --> 0:53:36.400 and I'm like, I think I'm gonna getting get in 0:53:36.480 --> 0:53:38.799 one of those because you're just sitting there and the 0:53:38.800 --> 0:53:41.160 only thing you can get is Carple Tunnel Center basically. 0:53:42.840 --> 0:53:45.359 And so I got really good in that. Well, everybody else, 0:53:45.400 --> 0:53:48.440 you know, the rock Stars are still the great great 0:53:48.480 --> 0:53:52.200 Shapers are still bulldozer operators who can jump into excavators too, 0:53:52.280 --> 0:53:56.080 but they're still They built the landforms, they built the greens, 0:53:56.960 --> 0:53:58.920 and I got really good at excavator because then I 0:53:58.920 --> 0:54:02.880 could be I like on the bunkers. But Eric is 0:54:03.360 --> 0:54:09.600 is still He's brilliant, brilliantly elegant. You know, I call 0:54:09.640 --> 0:54:13.680 him the Binkie. When Tom, Tom needs the go to guy, 0:54:13.800 --> 0:54:19.640 brings in Eric, you know, and both other Brian's and 0:54:19.760 --> 0:54:23.560 kais a great Shaper he'd brings. He'd bring Schneider in 0:54:23.600 --> 0:54:26.360 when he wanted something wild hair, you know, some crazy 0:54:26.440 --> 0:54:30.160 has grain he'd bring him. And same with with Kai, 0:54:30.680 --> 0:54:35.080 he know, something really crazy, bringing Kai and then Brian 0:54:35.160 --> 0:54:37.440 Sloank somewhere in between. You know, I spent the summer 0:54:38.760 --> 0:54:40.640 on the weekends, I was shaping over at high Point 0:54:40.719 --> 0:54:44.680 building bunkers, and Brian Slank is basically building the whole 0:54:44.719 --> 0:54:48.400 damn thing himself, you know, And God's he good. He is. 0:54:48.560 --> 0:54:52.040 Just he's going so far beyond me. It's scary. You know. 0:54:52.080 --> 0:54:54.520 He's my intern. He lapped me the year or two. 0:54:55.040 --> 0:54:59.000 That guy. He's a smart dude, and ah got such 0:54:59.040 --> 0:55:01.799 a great eye. He's a musician too, so that's kind 0:55:01.800 --> 0:55:04.040 of cool. But he's got such a great eye and 0:55:04.160 --> 0:55:06.759 a great, great shaper. Now, I was pretty fun. I 0:55:06.800 --> 0:55:09.680 hadn't worked with him in ten twelve years. To hang 0:55:09.719 --> 0:55:11.480 out a high Point this summer and watch him and 0:55:11.520 --> 0:55:15.000 Tom work together, I just, you know, I'm usually the 0:55:15.040 --> 0:55:17.440 guy walking with Tom, so I just was in the background, 0:55:18.160 --> 0:55:21.439 just prouds can be. Like, man, these cats still got it. 0:55:21.960 --> 0:55:25.600 When it comes to elegance and shaping or that little 0:55:26.520 --> 0:55:30.200 layer of finish work that just makes a golf course 0:55:31.400 --> 0:55:35.319 something better. Yep, what do you look for? Is there 0:55:35.360 --> 0:55:37.959 a way even to describe that. I have a hard 0:55:37.960 --> 0:55:40.880 time with this As somebody who writes a lot about 0:55:41.239 --> 0:55:44.000 golf architecture, I really have a hard time describing to 0:55:44.040 --> 0:55:48.480 people in words, why this bit of shaping is just 0:55:48.560 --> 0:55:51.920 a little bit better than this other bit of shaping 0:55:52.200 --> 0:55:56.040 that is similar, maybe inspired by some of the stuff 0:55:56.440 --> 0:55:59.880 that you and the team did at Renaissance Golf design 0:56:00.080 --> 0:56:02.759 or that Corn Crunshaw did you know, But it's but 0:56:02.840 --> 0:56:09.360 it's not there, it's not fully there. How do you 0:56:10.200 --> 0:56:15.080 identify that or describe that extra bit of excellence in shaping? 0:56:15.680 --> 0:56:18.319 What it is is knowing how soon to get off it? 0:56:19.320 --> 0:56:22.080 Build something running over with a dozer and a sampro 0:56:22.200 --> 0:56:24.960 and get off it. That's what nature is. Nature is 0:56:25.000 --> 0:56:28.600 get You know, natural can't. Landforms are beat up, beat 0:56:28.640 --> 0:56:34.000 up by wind, by erosion, by things of nature. You know, 0:56:34.040 --> 0:56:36.680 it's not it's not pretty. And I always tell people 0:56:36.840 --> 0:56:42.080 human nature is to make things pretty to their eye. 0:56:42.320 --> 0:56:46.360 And I see a lot of golf, a lot of shaping, 0:56:46.480 --> 0:56:49.399 and a lot of golf courses polish too much. It's 0:56:49.480 --> 0:56:53.480 I always say, it's like when you're polishing a nice 0:56:53.520 --> 0:56:57.319 fine piece of furniture, when do you stop? There's no point, 0:56:57.400 --> 0:56:59.720 you know, you just keep buffing and buffing and buffing. 0:57:00.239 --> 0:57:03.279 We know when to stop buffing. You stop buffing right 0:57:03.440 --> 0:57:06.400 really soon you don't. We don't want them to be pretty. 0:57:06.440 --> 0:57:08.799 We don't have to be natural. So you know, we're 0:57:08.800 --> 0:57:12.120 building Pacific Dunes. Jim Wild go away for a couple 0:57:12.120 --> 0:57:14.480 of weeks, and then I'm remember vividly working on the 0:57:14.560 --> 0:57:17.760 ninth Ferry with Brian, Brian Slanik and I we had 0:57:17.760 --> 0:57:21.160 two weeks just we call it f and up that fairway, 0:57:21.360 --> 0:57:24.360 you know, and you know it's like go with a 0:57:24.880 --> 0:57:27.360 you know, D four and gouge some you know, just 0:57:27.520 --> 0:57:31.120 randomly gouge and then come in with a samprone run 0:57:31.160 --> 0:57:35.080 them over and just it's random contours. It's it's it's 0:57:35.120 --> 0:57:38.200 fighting your human nature to make something perfect. That's how 0:57:38.240 --> 0:57:40.120 you do it. And you know, when you get off it, 0:57:40.720 --> 0:57:43.600 I'm like, oh yeah, that's good, move on. You know, 0:57:43.600 --> 0:57:45.680 if I spend too much more time on that, it's 0:57:45.680 --> 0:57:48.320 going to look like a human built it. So that's 0:57:48.320 --> 0:57:52.560 to me, that's the key. I I remember teaching guys 0:57:52.560 --> 0:57:55.680 how to build mounds or moguls. You know, we hate mounds, 0:57:55.800 --> 0:57:59.320 you know, modern mounds. It's like Tom goes, when you start, 0:57:59.360 --> 0:58:01.200 when you build a when do you stop? You have 0:58:01.280 --> 0:58:03.360 to keep building them just to time in all of 0:58:03.400 --> 0:58:06.680 each other. You know these faux links golf courses that 0:58:06.760 --> 0:58:09.480 have mounds on them that look just got awful. They 0:58:09.520 --> 0:58:14.440 don't look natural. So Pete Diovis, you say change the 0:58:14.520 --> 0:58:16.560 rate of change. That was a great I always thought 0:58:16.600 --> 0:58:18.400 that was a great thought. If you have a mound, 0:58:18.440 --> 0:58:21.040 you know, you say you have four or five mounds 0:58:21.080 --> 0:58:24.480 sitting there, five mounds because you want them odd. You 0:58:24.480 --> 0:58:26.200 want them all to be different. You want them to 0:58:26.200 --> 0:58:28.920 look like wind blown. So wind blown dunes have a 0:58:29.000 --> 0:58:31.480 leeward side where it's long and then drops off at 0:58:31.520 --> 0:58:34.280 the end. You know, some are pointed mounds, some are 0:58:34.320 --> 0:58:37.440 flat tops, some are round, some are awkward. You're just 0:58:37.440 --> 0:58:41.080 trying to make them awkward. That's nature. And also look around, 0:58:41.560 --> 0:58:44.520 you know, the biggest key for me is like nature's everywhere. 0:58:45.160 --> 0:58:46.520 Just go look at the woods and look at the 0:58:46.600 --> 0:58:51.360 contours in the woods and just replicate those there. You 0:58:51.480 --> 0:58:53.880 just got your eyes open. It's it's not that hard. 0:58:53.920 --> 0:58:57.600 It's just you have to fight your human instinct to 0:58:57.680 --> 0:59:02.200 make something pleasing to your eyes, even though natural is 0:59:02.200 --> 0:59:05.800 more pleasing. You just your brain doesn't work that way. 0:59:05.880 --> 0:59:07.960 So that's kind of how I always tell shapers, Hey, 0:59:08.440 --> 0:59:10.200 just go make a mess. We'll clean it up, and 0:59:10.240 --> 0:59:13.720 it might look really cool, and usually go. 0:59:13.760 --> 0:59:16.400 Make a mess, start cleaning it up, and stop before 0:59:16.440 --> 0:59:19.240 you get all the way all the way to win it. 0:59:21.120 --> 0:59:24.080 You know, you know Slanak and Schneider and Eric, they're 0:59:24.160 --> 0:59:27.200 just brilliant at building those fairway contours, and so as 0:59:27.280 --> 0:59:29.880 you know Angela, you know all the young things that 0:59:29.920 --> 0:59:31.919 we've trained over the years, they're all good at it too. 0:59:33.280 --> 0:59:35.640 It's just going on quirky. You got to make sure 0:59:35.640 --> 0:59:42.040 it drains. You don't understand drainage, but just understand how 0:59:42.160 --> 0:59:46.200 natural dunes work and how the wind blows one side 0:59:46.200 --> 0:59:49.160 and the other side steep or back and forth. Just 0:59:49.200 --> 0:59:53.120 don't know over I always say, I always give Tom 0:59:53.160 --> 0:59:56.800 credit for teaching us restraint. And Tom is the best 0:59:56.840 --> 0:59:59.960 at it. He does know his go not his guy. 1:00:00.000 --> 1:00:03.200 Golf courses are over eye candied. He thinks, you know, 1:00:03.280 --> 1:00:08.480 eye candy is just unnecessary nuisance to get pictures taken 1:00:08.480 --> 1:00:10.840 of their golf course. Tom is all about ground features 1:00:10.880 --> 1:00:15.600 and greens and bunkers are bunkers are important, But the 1:00:15.640 --> 1:00:18.720 frilliness of the bunkers he couldn't care less about. He 1:00:18.800 --> 1:00:21.520 was like, and he gets it. Bill. You know, I 1:00:21.520 --> 1:00:25.800 always tell people Bill and Tom are the great architects 1:00:25.840 --> 1:00:28.720 because they think about golf all the time, and we 1:00:28.760 --> 1:00:31.280 were building golf courses. For Tom, he was about golf, 1:00:31.920 --> 1:00:33.480 and he gave us a little bit of time to 1:00:33.520 --> 1:00:36.000 make it look cool because we wanted to look cool. 1:00:36.080 --> 1:00:38.960 You know, it's all the chunkying and all that frilly bunkers. 1:00:39.240 --> 1:00:41.000 He only gave us so much time as like, hey, man, 1:00:41.280 --> 1:00:43.760 move on to the next hall. So we snuck in 1:00:43.840 --> 1:00:47.360 the artwork where I think modern golf courses now are 1:00:47.400 --> 1:00:50.919 all about artwork, not a lot about golf. And those 1:00:50.960 --> 1:00:54.960 two guys are still you know, Thomas Thomas back to 1:00:55.040 --> 1:00:57.280 number one right now. That work he's putting out is 1:00:57.320 --> 1:01:00.880 insane and so different than anybody else. You know, when 1:01:00.920 --> 1:01:04.600 everybody's zigging, he's zagging because he's not smarter than everybody. 1:01:04.600 --> 1:01:08.000 And the golf courses he's cranking out in this short 1:01:08.000 --> 1:01:11.680 period right now are so diverse and so good and 1:01:11.760 --> 1:01:14.760 so understated. You know, not a lot of freely bunkers. 1:01:15.440 --> 1:01:18.720 You know, they're just pure golf. So that's kind of 1:01:18.720 --> 1:01:20.200 how we look at it, you. 1:01:20.160 --> 1:01:25.040 Know, Bruce, we haven't talked yet about restoration, and that's 1:01:25.040 --> 1:01:29.840 been a lot of your work, especially since you left 1:01:29.880 --> 1:01:35.800 Renassance Golf Design about thirteen years ago. I think around 1:01:36.160 --> 1:01:39.080 right after you built stream Song Blue you ran that construction. 1:01:39.640 --> 1:01:42.480 Actually, it's like Tom came to me just we were 1:01:42.560 --> 1:01:44.920 just starting, you know, Jim and just been let go 1:01:45.040 --> 1:01:47.960 a year before that by Tom, and he came to 1:01:47.960 --> 1:01:50.640 me and said, we're just about to start stream Song 1:01:50.680 --> 1:01:52.240 and I wanted to do that, and he goes everything 1:01:52.240 --> 1:01:53.560 about going on your own, and he goes, I'm signing 1:01:53.560 --> 1:01:58.040 all these contracts of all your projects. Go yeah, I 1:01:58.040 --> 1:02:00.280 can see the writing on the walls. Twenty ten, you know, 1:02:00.320 --> 1:02:02.800 stock market just crashed and he was trying to cut 1:02:03.400 --> 1:02:08.200 cut salaries. Yeah, that nice timing. But he said he 1:02:08.240 --> 1:02:10.720 can take all your clients with you, they'd be fine, 1:02:10.760 --> 1:02:13.240 And so I ran stream Song Is under Hepner Golf 1:02:13.240 --> 1:02:17.200 Design and then I had I had thirty clients right 1:02:17.200 --> 1:02:19.640 out of the box. So I've been going pretty strong 1:02:19.680 --> 1:02:20.600 since a. 1:02:20.640 --> 1:02:23.400 Lot of those are long term clients, clients that you've 1:02:23.680 --> 1:02:26.320 you know, you started with under Renaissance Golf Design and 1:02:26.360 --> 1:02:29.240 have continued to work with even to the present day. 1:02:29.920 --> 1:02:32.280 You know, this might be a hard question to answer, 1:02:32.400 --> 1:02:34.760 like picking your favorite kid or something but what is 1:02:34.800 --> 1:02:37.760 the most satisfying restoration that you've been part of? 1:02:38.240 --> 1:02:41.000 They're all good, you know. The cool part is probably 1:02:41.040 --> 1:02:43.040 once once I went on my own, a lot of 1:02:43.080 --> 1:02:46.720 them start the rest. You know, all my restorations are 1:02:46.760 --> 1:02:50.360 slow burns. You know, I have thirty three clients. I 1:02:50.400 --> 1:02:53.120 had to did a list. I have thirty three current clients. 1:02:54.040 --> 1:02:57.680 Fifteen of them are twenty five years or older I've 1:02:57.680 --> 1:03:00.160 had as a client, and so a lot of them 1:03:00.200 --> 1:03:03.680 are slow burns. We're not doing these fifteen million dollar jobs. 1:03:03.760 --> 1:03:06.240 We've been doing slow burns over the years and restoring 1:03:06.280 --> 1:03:08.360 these places, and it takes you know, a lot of 1:03:08.400 --> 1:03:11.240 these early on, they weren't nobody was in. It wasn't 1:03:11.240 --> 1:03:13.400 in vogue like it is today to drop fifteen million 1:03:13.440 --> 1:03:17.400 bucks on a classic golf course. They didn't even know 1:03:17.440 --> 1:03:19.760 they had a classic golf course when it first started. It, 1:03:20.600 --> 1:03:23.760 so we would, you know, pick pick away at the 1:03:23.760 --> 1:03:30.120 golf courses. So about about twenty ten, a lot of 1:03:30.120 --> 1:03:33.840 them started to really come together. Like Blue Mount. It 1:03:33.880 --> 1:03:35.640 took a long time to get Blue Mount where it is, 1:03:35.720 --> 1:03:37.280 and we still got some ways to go. I'm gonna 1:03:37.320 --> 1:03:39.320 rebuild all the bunkers next year. 1:03:39.440 --> 1:03:44.360 And this is a Seth Rainer design in Wisconsin. Just yeah, 1:03:44.640 --> 1:03:47.480 really classic Seth Rainer stuff now, but it didn't look 1:03:47.520 --> 1:03:49.000 like that about twenty years ago. 1:03:49.560 --> 1:03:52.400 Full of pine tree, you know, spruce trees. So you 1:03:52.440 --> 1:03:54.560 know a lot of them are starting to come together 1:03:55.440 --> 1:03:58.680 and like wow, you know, I could see it. You know, 1:03:58.720 --> 1:04:00.520 I can see the force from the true on these 1:04:00.520 --> 1:04:03.120 old designs, So it's pretty obvious to me. It's just 1:04:03.160 --> 1:04:08.600 not obviously everybody else, especially the members. So I don't think, 1:04:08.760 --> 1:04:12.320 you know, I just like my body of work, it's all. 1:04:13.000 --> 1:04:15.000 I always tell people I work at the coolest clubs 1:04:15.040 --> 1:04:18.080 in the country. You know, they're not. There's a handful 1:04:18.120 --> 1:04:20.440 of Top hundred courses there and I've worked at a 1:04:20.440 --> 1:04:22.680 bunch of them and built a few, but a lot 1:04:22.680 --> 1:04:25.880 of them are like just like the second hundred, like 1:04:25.960 --> 1:04:28.520 below the radar, you know, obviously Cape Rundell and places 1:04:28.560 --> 1:04:31.480 like that. A hundred go up a fairfield. A lot 1:04:31.520 --> 1:04:35.120 of those just small ones that they've allowed me to 1:04:35.280 --> 1:04:39.600 do my job. And that's my sens right now. That's 1:04:39.760 --> 1:04:43.320 that's all I you know, I'm getting not close to retiring, 1:04:43.360 --> 1:04:45.680 but I'm slowing things down a bit, and I just 1:04:45.720 --> 1:04:47.200 want to help. I want clubs that want to be 1:04:47.240 --> 1:04:50.560 helped and let me help them. And I have a 1:04:50.600 --> 1:04:54.040 whole stable full of them. So there's you know, it's 1:04:54.040 --> 1:04:56.800 hard to pick. I got thirty three of them. There's 1:04:56.840 --> 1:04:59.439 some cool ones and nobody's heard of North Shore Golf 1:04:59.440 --> 1:05:03.680 Club up and Wisconsin on North Lakewood and Bago. That's 1:05:03.720 --> 1:05:07.400 unbelievably cool. You know, there's a lot of Belvedere obviously 1:05:07.480 --> 1:05:10.720 up here is getting a lot of ink. Tim Acquana 1:05:10.800 --> 1:05:12.920 down Jacksonville starting to get a marine because he just 1:05:13.000 --> 1:05:16.120 you know, Jim Firkez event. I couldn't be more proud 1:05:16.120 --> 1:05:18.200 of that. That's that could be some of my best 1:05:18.240 --> 1:05:19.000 work there. 1:05:19.160 --> 1:05:20.320 At tim Aquana in Florida. 1:05:20.440 --> 1:05:23.120 Oh man, it turned out really good. I'm I'm luckily 1:05:23.160 --> 1:05:26.600 I'm a member there now, so I plan on. I 1:05:26.600 --> 1:05:28.640 don't know if I'm retired there. I spent a lot 1:05:28.680 --> 1:05:32.480 more time there because it's just a golf course, so walkable, 1:05:32.720 --> 1:05:37.560 so playable, so much fun, challenging. I just love it. 1:05:37.880 --> 1:05:40.360 Yeah, it looks great. I haven't been there myself, but 1:05:40.400 --> 1:05:44.160 I'd really like to go sometime. You know. Essex County 1:05:44.160 --> 1:05:46.960 Club is one that you've worked on for a long time. 1:05:47.040 --> 1:05:50.120 And that's one of my very favorite courses. And the 1:05:50.160 --> 1:05:52.680 superintendent there, Eric Richardson, is one of the best of 1:05:52.680 --> 1:05:55.080 the business. My impression is that he could work at 1:05:55.080 --> 1:05:58.320 just about any club he wanted to, but he wants 1:05:58.360 --> 1:05:58.840 to work there. 1:05:59.160 --> 1:06:00.840 I just did a big two. I was like said, 1:06:00.840 --> 1:06:02.919 I was on the East Coast before I drove back home. 1:06:02.960 --> 1:06:06.840 I was there Cape Rundle, there and Booth Bay Harbor, 1:06:06.920 --> 1:06:10.400 all in three different days. And Eric is just the best. 1:06:10.480 --> 1:06:12.640 You know. They they came hard at him, really hard 1:06:12.640 --> 1:06:15.360 for Brookline before they put it up. They came twice 1:06:15.360 --> 1:06:19.280 hard at him, and he is he could be the 1:06:19.320 --> 1:06:22.360 best by far. And we're going to rebuild all those 1:06:22.400 --> 1:06:25.320 bunkers over the next five years. He's got two excavators. 1:06:25.800 --> 1:06:29.120 I'm just gonna, you know, jet In build ten bunkers. 1:06:29.120 --> 1:06:31.600 He's going to put him back together. That's a slow 1:06:31.640 --> 1:06:34.920 burn too, And and it's a lot of it has 1:06:34.960 --> 1:06:37.520 to do one is a lot has to do with superintendent, 1:06:37.840 --> 1:06:40.200 but it also has to do with the comfortable how 1:06:40.240 --> 1:06:44.760 comfortable the membership is in their skin. Essex County is 1:06:45.280 --> 1:06:49.280 just the greatest membership. They're just so chilled and they 1:06:49.280 --> 1:06:52.360 don't care about anybody else, Brookline and all you know, 1:06:52.560 --> 1:06:55.000 Charles River and all those other ones. They just do 1:06:55.120 --> 1:06:58.160 their own thing, and that's those are great clubs. I 1:06:58.200 --> 1:06:59.440 love working at those places. 1:07:00.160 --> 1:07:03.760 That's such an important point. There's a lot of monkey see, 1:07:03.760 --> 1:07:08.360 monkey do among American private clubs right now. 1:07:08.400 --> 1:07:09.000 It's the worst. 1:07:09.800 --> 1:07:13.680 Everybody's doing the same stuff. Yeah, yeah, and you know, 1:07:13.920 --> 1:07:17.960 and it's better stuff than was done in the open 1:07:18.040 --> 1:07:23.080 doctor era, I think. But you have to appreciate a 1:07:23.120 --> 1:07:25.800 place like Essex County or a place like cap Arundle, 1:07:25.800 --> 1:07:31.720 which I also absolutely love, because you've worked there with 1:07:32.120 --> 1:07:37.920 the superintendent's hand in hand and with the membership over decades. 1:07:38.560 --> 1:07:42.560 It's been so patient. And something that I think is 1:07:42.840 --> 1:07:46.720 really important about that process is that it allows the 1:07:46.760 --> 1:07:51.520 golf courses to continue to feel like themselves, to continue 1:07:51.560 --> 1:07:52.640 to feel old. 1:07:53.280 --> 1:07:53.440 Right. 1:07:53.560 --> 1:07:55.480 This has been a big hobby horse of mine lately. 1:07:55.560 --> 1:07:58.600 People who have read some of my recent writing might 1:07:58.640 --> 1:08:00.640 be bored of me talking about it again. But I 1:08:00.680 --> 1:08:04.280 love when a course feels as old as Essex County does. 1:08:04.600 --> 1:08:08.800 Even though you're there, Eric is there dialing things in, 1:08:08.960 --> 1:08:13.000 making things better, still feels like nineteen seventeen out there. 1:08:13.200 --> 1:08:17.559 That's the key in these these new projects. My wife 1:08:17.640 --> 1:08:20.000 made her really get my wife, deb it's a beautiful woman. 1:08:20.080 --> 1:08:23.280 Yesterday we were talking about this and she goes, our 1:08:23.360 --> 1:08:26.680 current generation and this this has to do with the 1:08:26.720 --> 1:08:29.800 projects being built, these fifteen to twenty million dollars renovations. 1:08:29.920 --> 1:08:32.760 Yeah, that happened all at once, right, yeah, one one 1:08:32.880 --> 1:08:35.240 off season, all of a sudden boom. 1:08:34.960 --> 1:08:38.840 And what what she and I call it? Clickbake architetract architecture. 1:08:38.960 --> 1:08:42.280 It's Instagram architecture, and it's built for the photograph. You know, 1:08:42.320 --> 1:08:44.639 it's like boom and they are you know, you look 1:08:44.640 --> 1:08:48.800 at you know, all these open courses being built or 1:08:48.960 --> 1:08:52.400 BGA courses being built, and they are stunning, but they 1:08:52.400 --> 1:08:55.439 don't look old. And my wife said yesterday, she goes, 1:08:55.680 --> 1:08:59.280 we have five senses in this. A lot of people 1:08:59.280 --> 1:09:02.280 are only using one on their eyes and the feel 1:09:02.320 --> 1:09:05.080 of golf. And that's why you go to Cape Arundel. 1:09:06.040 --> 1:09:08.800 You taste it, you smell it, you hear it the 1:09:08.840 --> 1:09:12.400 wind blowing, you feel it in your feet, you feel 1:09:12.400 --> 1:09:14.600 it in your hands as well as your eyes. But 1:09:14.680 --> 1:09:17.719 you're using all your senses when you play a great 1:09:17.760 --> 1:09:24.080 old golf course. And these rebuilt wonders are mono stands 1:09:24.080 --> 1:09:30.160 of perfect grass, perfect you know, crush quartz sand which 1:09:30.200 --> 1:09:34.959 isn't even natural, Billy bunkers under them, which is not natural. 1:09:35.040 --> 1:09:35.320 You know. 1:09:37.160 --> 1:09:40.240 Our systems USGA spec all that, oh. 1:09:40.160 --> 1:09:46.960 Yeah, you know, the air system precision air underneath just absurd. 1:09:47.000 --> 1:09:50.000 And that's how you get to twenty million dollars. And 1:09:50.080 --> 1:09:52.800 I've looked at them all and they don't feel old. 1:09:52.840 --> 1:09:55.000 They just feel like, you know, it feels like a 1:09:55.080 --> 1:09:57.000 resto mod you know, I'm in the cars too, so 1:09:57.040 --> 1:09:59.559 it feels like a You watch Meekham and you see 1:09:59.560 --> 1:10:03.280 this great Mustang come by and it's got a brand 1:10:03.320 --> 1:10:05.479 new engine and it's got big jig spinner wheels on it. 1:10:05.560 --> 1:10:07.360 You're just like yuck, you know, And that's what some 1:10:07.400 --> 1:10:09.840 of these feel like. You know, they're they're done really well, 1:10:09.840 --> 1:10:14.040 they're they're spectacular, but do they feel old? Do they 1:10:14.040 --> 1:10:16.920 play old? No, they don't. They don't have the modeled grass. 1:10:16.960 --> 1:10:20.679 They have that that one hundred years of fairway turf 1:10:20.760 --> 1:10:24.919 that we have at Cape Runnell play so beautifully and 1:10:25.040 --> 1:10:29.840 the greens, you know, just insane obviously. But yeah, that's 1:10:29.920 --> 1:10:32.559 that's what I have a little issue with, and that's 1:10:32.560 --> 1:10:34.240 why I like working at my old clubs. You know, 1:10:34.720 --> 1:10:38.479 I got projects one to two million dollar projects. I'm 1:10:38.479 --> 1:10:40.280 fixing a golf course and it's just as good as 1:10:40.280 --> 1:10:43.000 the fifteen million dollar one next door. It might even 1:10:43.000 --> 1:10:45.879 be better because it feels it still has that smell, 1:10:46.400 --> 1:10:49.200 taste feel of an old golf course. 1:10:49.640 --> 1:10:52.439 Yeah, maybe that's why you work at so many of 1:10:52.479 --> 1:10:55.639 these kind of blue blood New England clubs, because that's 1:10:55.680 --> 1:10:56.360 sort of the vibe. 1:10:56.400 --> 1:11:00.439 Right. Yeah, they're they're you know, but they're they're changed 1:11:00.439 --> 1:11:03.400 into they're all you know, it's the new blood coming in, 1:11:05.520 --> 1:11:07.160 you know, the young. You know, I'm used to working 1:11:07.720 --> 1:11:10.800 you know my I always worked with the elders and 1:11:10.840 --> 1:11:13.080 there you know, when i was thirty, they were all fifty. 1:11:13.760 --> 1:11:16.920 Now I'm close to I'm sixty, they're all eighty. You know, 1:11:16.920 --> 1:11:18.920 they're all getting pushed out the boardroom. 1:11:20.439 --> 1:11:22.400 They're getting overwhelmed on the green committee. 1:11:22.600 --> 1:11:25.160 It's happening. It's pretty systemic in my business, so it's 1:11:25.240 --> 1:11:27.840 kind of it's it's disheartening. I've had to let go 1:11:27.880 --> 1:11:30.280 a few clubs because they're going in the wrong direction 1:11:30.479 --> 1:11:34.479 and kind of breaking my heart. But but that's it's happening. 1:11:34.520 --> 1:11:36.840 Even in some of the old blue blood courses. So 1:11:36.880 --> 1:11:39.599 it's it's I don't don't. I don't want to sound 1:11:39.640 --> 1:11:41.880 like a grumpy old guy, but it's it's definitely changing, 1:11:42.040 --> 1:11:45.520 and the money's the moneys are being spent or just outrageous, 1:11:45.960 --> 1:11:51.000 and I don't know if these things are if it's sustainable. Yeah, 1:11:51.000 --> 1:11:54.360 I think Derek, you Derek Duncan when you're I think 1:11:54.360 --> 1:11:55.080 it's a great guy. 1:11:55.560 --> 1:11:57.679 Yeah. He was one of our one of our colleagues 1:11:57.680 --> 1:12:00.040 in the podcasting in the Architecture space. 1:12:00.160 --> 1:12:03.400 Interviewing Don Plask a couple of months ago last month, 1:12:03.439 --> 1:12:05.000 and he kept going, I think we're going in the 1:12:05.000 --> 1:12:07.799 wrong direction. You know, didn't we learn from the eighties 1:12:08.200 --> 1:12:10.600 in the early nineties of our spending, you know, the 1:12:10.720 --> 1:12:13.599 Nicholas Fazio eras, which they did great jobs, but they 1:12:13.600 --> 1:12:16.599 were spending twenty million dollars building golf courses. Now everybody 1:12:16.640 --> 1:12:20.320 spending forty million. But did we learn our lessons from 1:12:20.320 --> 1:12:23.280 maybe that that the greatest courses that were built in 1:12:23.320 --> 1:12:27.120 the last twenty five years were by Tom Doak and 1:12:27.120 --> 1:12:29.559 Bill Kohr, and they were like three million dollars. You know, 1:12:29.560 --> 1:12:32.760 Pacific Dunes might have been three ballian, you know, I 1:12:32.800 --> 1:12:36.320 think you get safe to say that ballly Neil Pacific 1:12:36.400 --> 1:12:41.160 Dunes in Barnbogle were built less than ten million dollars combined, 1:12:41.880 --> 1:12:44.400 and now we're now we're spending more than ten million 1:12:44.439 --> 1:12:50.439 dollars restoring a golf course. It just doesn't make sense 1:12:50.479 --> 1:12:50.680 to me. 1:12:52.280 --> 1:12:55.519 Yeah, it's kind of striking. I mean, it's always interesting 1:12:55.560 --> 1:13:00.760 to see which lessons we learn from history, because we 1:13:00.880 --> 1:13:05.280 definitely learn something. I'm not of the of the mind 1:13:05.320 --> 1:13:09.519 that we learn nothing. And specifically, I think that we've 1:13:09.600 --> 1:13:14.400 learned about the virtues of tree removal and wider corridors 1:13:14.720 --> 1:13:20.519 and features that look you know, have the shape of 1:13:20.560 --> 1:13:25.240 being restored or vintage, looking at old photographs and trying 1:13:25.240 --> 1:13:28.880 to replicate that stuff. But there might be a more 1:13:28.920 --> 1:13:33.599 important underlying lesson or series of lessons that we haven't 1:13:33.680 --> 1:13:43.080 learned about maintainability, sustainability, financial frugality, and just about being 1:13:43.160 --> 1:13:46.040 yourself and not just doing what everybody else is doing. 1:13:46.439 --> 1:13:48.920 It seems like those lessons have been more difficult for 1:13:48.960 --> 1:13:50.160 some reason than the others. 1:13:50.640 --> 1:13:54.720 No, I agree, my big saying everywhere I where I 1:13:54.920 --> 1:13:58.120 work now, could trying to be the Joneses be the Joneses, 1:13:58.240 --> 1:14:01.000 you know, let's lead. Let's be the be comfortable in 1:14:01.040 --> 1:14:03.040 your own skin in the neighborhood. People are going to 1:14:03.080 --> 1:14:06.160 start looking at you instead of you like, well, they 1:14:06.240 --> 1:14:08.400 just spend seventeen million. You know, I have a lot 1:14:08.439 --> 1:14:11.640 of clubs like, well, they spend seventeen million rebuilding their 1:14:11.640 --> 1:14:13.439 golf course. How come are I doing that? I'm like, well, 1:14:13.800 --> 1:14:17.360 you're kind of good. You're probably better than them. Why 1:14:17.360 --> 1:14:21.920 would you Well, it's envy, you know, it's and it's 1:14:21.960 --> 1:14:23.240 a lot of has to do with, you know, the 1:14:23.360 --> 1:14:26.519 kind of group of people taking power now. They're they 1:14:27.040 --> 1:14:29.360 want to be someone who they're not. I want to 1:14:29.400 --> 1:14:33.000 be them. Like, man, you're luckily most of my clubs 1:14:33.560 --> 1:14:35.120 and you know, I think I've been the right guy 1:14:35.200 --> 1:14:37.920 for them. Is like, no, we're pretty cool. We're good. 1:14:37.920 --> 1:14:40.719 We're comfortable in our own skin. This golf course is fine. 1:14:40.760 --> 1:14:43.439 We don't need to have pure grass everywhere. We don't 1:14:43.479 --> 1:14:47.400 have to have the the expensive bunkers. They're just fine. 1:14:47.520 --> 1:14:50.960 Used the cheap sand, You're just it's just sand, you know, 1:14:52.280 --> 1:14:54.120 you know, it's as long as a place. Well, why 1:14:54.160 --> 1:14:56.360 would we spending two hundred bucks a ton to bring 1:14:56.400 --> 1:15:01.400 it in from Ohio or somewhere. So it's just where 1:15:01.400 --> 1:15:05.760 we're going in the business with a little disheartening. I 1:15:06.280 --> 1:15:09.200 got just I've become really good friends with Doddie Pepper 1:15:09.200 --> 1:15:13.439 and David Memorial, you know, and David's he is a 1:15:13.439 --> 1:15:15.840 true soul. He's a deep rooted in the history of 1:15:15.840 --> 1:15:18.240 the game. And I was at their house a couple 1:15:18.280 --> 1:15:21.599 of weeks ago, spent the night and David just got 1:15:21.600 --> 1:15:24.400 back from playing like the dinner matches at Urfield or 1:15:24.439 --> 1:15:26.080 something like that, just flew. 1:15:25.880 --> 1:15:28.439 Back just cool things that David normal does. 1:15:29.280 --> 1:15:32.080 It's like unbelievable the clubs he's a memorat. But there's 1:15:32.120 --> 1:15:35.799 nobody I know in golf that's more steeped in the history. 1:15:36.760 --> 1:15:38.559 And we were we were, you know, he and Donnie 1:15:38.560 --> 1:15:41.160 and I were sitting having dinner and talking about where 1:15:41.200 --> 1:15:43.479 golf is going, and it was just right after the 1:15:43.520 --> 1:15:47.080 Ryder Cup, and just the taste of that was just awful, 1:15:47.120 --> 1:15:50.760 and then the live and the money situation with the 1:15:50.840 --> 1:15:53.760 players and and where a lot of architectures going. And 1:15:53.800 --> 1:15:55.759 he goes, I think we're losing the soul of the game, 1:15:56.880 --> 1:15:59.160 you know, And for him, someone like that just say, 1:15:59.160 --> 1:16:02.160 it really struck me, and I agree it's like in 1:16:02.200 --> 1:16:04.040 my business, I think we're losing some of the soul 1:16:04.080 --> 1:16:06.640 of the game too. And there's plenty of architects out 1:16:06.640 --> 1:16:09.640 they're more unhappy to spend the twenty million bucks you know. 1:16:09.880 --> 1:16:12.760 Oh shit, yeah, I'll do that. Yeah, yeah, I'll find 1:16:12.800 --> 1:16:15.080 a way. I'll give you my version of you know, 1:16:15.800 --> 1:16:19.760 I think I think Tom said this recently. He goes, oh, 1:16:19.840 --> 1:16:22.639 there's a lot of restorers of restorers going on right now. 1:16:22.760 --> 1:16:24.599 You know, all these courses have been restored to getting 1:16:24.600 --> 1:16:25.519 restored again. 1:16:25.760 --> 1:16:29.240 I know there's courses where where it's we're restoring and 1:16:29.280 --> 1:16:32.200 I'm like, wait a minute, yeah, did you just do that. 1:16:32.360 --> 1:16:34.240 There's a handful of mine that are you know that 1:16:34.320 --> 1:16:36.599 I've left, and like, I think I left it in 1:16:36.600 --> 1:16:38.679 pretty good shape and I only spent like a million 1:16:38.680 --> 1:16:42.599 bucks restoring that. And the next the young guys coming 1:16:42.600 --> 1:16:46.040 in going yeah, we're gonna let's drop rebuild everything, and 1:16:46.120 --> 1:16:48.280 the younger members will be like yeah, because they did 1:16:48.280 --> 1:16:52.880 it over there, so it's happening. But I thought David 1:16:53.320 --> 1:16:56.599 was very poignant. You know, we're the game of golf 1:16:56.680 --> 1:17:00.120 is not very fun to watch on TV anymore, you know. 1:17:00.200 --> 1:17:01.960 Jim Nansen talked to him about it. He goes, yeah, 1:17:02.000 --> 1:17:04.280 it's just it's not a very good product. You know, 1:17:04.280 --> 1:17:08.240 they're they're they're struggling. You know, the fields are you know, 1:17:08.280 --> 1:17:10.240 with live coming in and we all know what that. 1:17:10.360 --> 1:17:13.080 You know, we all have our opinions about that. That's 1:17:13.120 --> 1:17:15.439 just pure money. And then you know the west of 1:17:15.439 --> 1:17:17.600 the products is watered down. You know, you're going to 1:17:17.640 --> 1:17:19.400 watch them. We're going to watch the Open, We're going 1:17:19.439 --> 1:17:22.080 to watch Augusta and maybe a couple other events. But 1:17:22.120 --> 1:17:24.760 the other stuff is almost unwatchable unless it's a great 1:17:24.800 --> 1:17:25.360 golf course. 1:17:25.800 --> 1:17:29.240 Yeah. Well, there's a reason I opened this podcast by 1:17:30.120 --> 1:17:34.000 talking to you for twenty minutes about Percy Warner, because 1:17:34.040 --> 1:17:37.600 I think that if we're searching for hope somewhere, that 1:17:37.680 --> 1:17:40.200 it's got to be in projects like that. And so 1:17:40.640 --> 1:17:42.639 I think that's something, right. 1:17:42.560 --> 1:17:45.040 Those great hope. You know, every major city, you know, 1:17:45.080 --> 1:17:47.000 I grew up in all the public courses of Detroit, 1:17:47.840 --> 1:17:51.840 the city, Detroit city courses, Rackham, ro Gal or all 1:17:51.880 --> 1:17:53.639 Donald Rossers. I grew up pointing them. 1:17:53.600 --> 1:17:57.280 Those are cool, Yeah, Rackham is yeah, very I. 1:17:57.280 --> 1:17:59.360 Grew up playing. I worked there, you know, I tried 1:17:59.360 --> 1:18:03.679 to fix the whole that were changed by the when 1:18:03.720 --> 1:18:05.600 the highway got put in. So I worked there for 1:18:05.680 --> 1:18:08.560 a while. When I was early working from Iran, I 1:18:08.600 --> 1:18:12.000 got the original Ross plan. You know, Joe Louiy used 1:18:12.000 --> 1:18:14.719 to play as he used to have the black PG 1:18:15.040 --> 1:18:19.080 events there. Right every major city, you know, they're great 1:18:19.080 --> 1:18:22.080 cities right now. Memphis has a great city program. They've 1:18:22.120 --> 1:18:25.120 sunk a lot of money into it. San Antonio, San 1:18:25.120 --> 1:18:28.760 Antonio has an insane public sister. 1:18:28.760 --> 1:18:30.479 Is it Brett Brackenridge Park? 1:18:31.040 --> 1:18:34.439 Telling us, yeah, telling us. So we're modeling what we're 1:18:34.439 --> 1:18:37.280 doing in Nashville. You know, Luckily, what we have some 1:18:37.400 --> 1:18:40.400 smart people Stewart with and Jim, you know, from the 1:18:40.400 --> 1:18:45.400 Tennessee Golf Foundation. They've actually put together a committee to 1:18:45.520 --> 1:18:48.880 work with the city and their motto is golf people 1:18:48.960 --> 1:18:52.280 run golf, and golf money stays in golf. And if 1:18:52.280 --> 1:18:56.120 we do that in Nashville, we're going to you know, 1:18:56.200 --> 1:18:58.800 Nashville has the bones. They have seven great, you know, 1:18:58.920 --> 1:19:01.200 really good golf courses that just needs some minor work 1:19:01.240 --> 1:19:03.040 and all of them, I'm just fixing what needs to 1:19:03.080 --> 1:19:05.880 get fixed. I'm not blowing any of them up. And 1:19:05.920 --> 1:19:08.240 that's how we're keeping the budget to two million less. 1:19:08.880 --> 1:19:12.160 And that's how it's sustainable, because you know, once it 1:19:12.200 --> 1:19:15.160 gets north of two three million bucks, people are like, 1:19:16.160 --> 1:19:19.080 what are you doing? You know, people get disinterested. You 1:19:19.080 --> 1:19:22.240 can't raise the money that way. The two million dollars 1:19:22.360 --> 1:19:26.040 is kind of easy to raise. And and if you 1:19:26.040 --> 1:19:27.880 have someone like me that's only going to go there, 1:19:27.960 --> 1:19:29.840 fix it what needs it to get fixed, and everything 1:19:29.840 --> 1:19:32.680 else is fine, you know, it's amuni. Just fix the 1:19:32.720 --> 1:19:36.400 things that are important to make the golf sustainable more interesting, 1:19:36.439 --> 1:19:40.840 which is the greens and and move on. Let let's 1:19:41.040 --> 1:19:43.439 let's let them play golf. You know, eighteen bucks a 1:19:43.479 --> 1:19:47.320 buck a hole, I'll play all day long, you know. 1:19:47.439 --> 1:19:49.519 So that's I think that is the future. You know. 1:19:49.640 --> 1:19:55.240 Luckily the Links Trust, you know, Will and Mike mccarton 1:19:55.400 --> 1:19:58.080 who all worked for us, they're running that and that's 1:19:58.120 --> 1:20:03.120 got some good momentum, you know, Cops Creek if they 1:20:03.200 --> 1:20:04.760 ever get that thing going. You know they've been talking 1:20:04.760 --> 1:20:08.639 about it's a lot of talk. Yeah, what I'm proud 1:20:08.680 --> 1:20:11.280 of Stuart Smith, who is you know, my dear friend 1:20:11.280 --> 1:20:14.320 in Nashville. He goes, they're all talking. We did it, Yeah, 1:20:15.320 --> 1:20:17.559 right on, brother, So we're gonna keep doing it, But 1:20:17.600 --> 1:20:21.559 I think you're right. That's here's here's the interesting about Nashville. 1:20:21.840 --> 1:20:24.360 There are no seats at the table. All these Nashvill's 1:20:24.360 --> 1:20:28.320 are booming, booming town. They think maybe another million people 1:20:28.320 --> 1:20:30.719 moving there in the next ten years. Yeah, and there's 1:20:30.800 --> 1:20:34.320 no golf spots. Every country club has a three hundred 1:20:34.320 --> 1:20:39.439 person waiting list initiate. Initiation fees at Hillwood are going 1:20:39.520 --> 1:20:42.720 up to one hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Wow, it's 1:20:42.760 --> 1:20:46.639 like what you know. So there's just no room. There's 1:20:46.640 --> 1:20:51.080 no place to play. And these high end guys making 1:20:51.080 --> 1:20:54.439 good money working for Pinnacle and Amazon moving to town, 1:20:54.479 --> 1:20:56.120 they want a place to play. They have to they 1:20:56.120 --> 1:20:58.519 have to play the public golf courses, and they're forced 1:20:58.520 --> 1:21:01.599 to play courses that are under maintain and under man 1:21:01.680 --> 1:21:05.640 We have thirty seven employees maintaining seven golf courses in 1:21:05.760 --> 1:21:10.160 Nashville in their packed So all we're trying to do 1:21:10.280 --> 1:21:13.559 is increase the budget of each golf course to make 1:21:13.600 --> 1:21:17.439 it decent golf, and then fix all the little things 1:21:17.439 --> 1:21:19.920 at each golf course that we have to make it. 1:21:20.280 --> 1:21:24.599 You know, where it's good golf, it's sustainable, it's playable, 1:21:24.640 --> 1:21:28.040 it's fun. And we're hoping that we get Nashville to 1:21:28.040 --> 1:21:30.160 be the best system in the country. 1:21:30.960 --> 1:21:33.519 Bruce, it's been a real pleasure talking to you. Good 1:21:33.640 --> 1:21:35.840 luck with all of your projects, and hope to talk 1:21:35.880 --> 1:21:36.519 to you again soon. 1:21:36.800 --> 1:21:38.280 Thank you so much, appreciate it. 1:21:47.960 --> 1:21:51.680 This episode of the Friday Golf Podcast was produced by 1:21:51.720 --> 1:21:55.559 Matt Rusius. Thank you, Matt. If you've been enjoying what 1:21:55.600 --> 1:21:58.320 we've been doing on the Friday Golf Podcast lately, then 1:21:58.720 --> 1:22:01.760 give us a rating and or review wherever you might 1:22:01.800 --> 1:22:05.040 be listening to us. Those really help us grow and 1:22:05.120 --> 1:22:07.720 find new listeners. It's a quick thing that you can 1:22:07.760 --> 1:22:10.240 do to support us. Thank you so much for listening, 1:22:10.520 --> 1:22:12.360 and we'll be back with another episode soon.