Speaker 1: Welcome back to another edition of the Fried Egg Podcast
Speaker 1: and our Superintendent series, which is brought to you by
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Speaker 1: Follow at Toro Golf on Twitter and reach out to
Speaker 1: your local Toro distributor to schedule a demo. Today's episode
Speaker 1: is with Nick Nate. Nick is the superintendent at South
Speaker 1: Bend Country Club. He got his art working on Warren
Speaker 1: Golf Course at the end of their construction. Nick is
Speaker 1: a golf nut. He does it really for the love
Speaker 1: of golf. He's superintendent and I was really exciting to
Speaker 1: talk to him about turf and his career. So without
Speaker 1: further ado here is Nick Nate I miss a green.
Speaker 1: For example, I'm already upset. When I find my ball
Speaker 1: in the bunker, I'm really upset.
Speaker 2: And when I find my ball in a brid egg
Speaker 2: Friday egg the dread Frida egg Frida egg egg Frida
Speaker 2: egg bride egg Lie, I'm about ready to run off
Speaker 2: the golf course.
Speaker 1: So are you a big Notre Dame fan?
Speaker 2: Huge Notre Dame fan? Grew up here? Love it, been
Speaker 2: going to football games my whole life.
Speaker 1: What's the take like? Are you know should they join
Speaker 1: a conference or.
Speaker 2: It's tough because they've joined the conference for for all
Speaker 2: the other sports except for football, and from a money
Speaker 2: side of things, it wouldn't be good for the university.
Speaker 2: And they like their anonymity so they can stay separate
Speaker 2: and do their own thing and have a better chance
Speaker 2: to get into the playoffs. So I don't think they
Speaker 2: ever will for football, but they have for all the
Speaker 2: other other sports.
Speaker 1: It's uh so what uh? Any tips on?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 1: Somebody people make the pilgrimage to come to see a
Speaker 1: Notre Dame game all the time? What are what are?
Speaker 1: What are a couple of local inside tips?
Speaker 2: You want to get here? Early enough and actually walk
Speaker 2: around see the tailgate and watch the team come walk
Speaker 2: walk from the basilica over to the university. That's a cool,
Speaker 2: cool little thing that they do, and it's it's really
Speaker 2: neat to watch. And note getting over to the linebacker
Speaker 2: is a must at some point.
Speaker 1: What's the line bar.
Speaker 2: It's a bar that's right there off a campus that
Speaker 2: it's just a kind of a tradition, but it's a
Speaker 2: great actual, great place to go to.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, one of your great tips was if
Speaker 1: you don't like football, the best time to play golf
Speaker 1: in South Bend is on Saturday afternoons.
Speaker 2: Very true, very true, because it's a you can hear
Speaker 2: the game actually going on when you're at the golf
Speaker 2: course on the with the Warren golf Course. The Brick
Speaker 2: golf course is closed at that time, but every golf
Speaker 2: course in town is virtually wide open. You could play
Speaker 2: anywhere here at that point, especially Warren.
Speaker 1: When did you decide that you wanted to get into turf.
Speaker 2: I was going to business school at IU South Bend
Speaker 2: and I was working at the Warren golf Course.
Speaker 1: And what year would this be?
Speaker 2: It was two thousand, I was there nineteen ninety nine
Speaker 2: and two.
Speaker 1: Thousand, So that's like right after it opened.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yep, it was. It was it was during well,
Speaker 2: they were still doing some of the sootting I started there.
Speaker 2: We were still doing some of the sotting at the
Speaker 2: golf course, and we were getting truckloads a day. I really,
Speaker 2: I just I just realized that I didn't want to
Speaker 2: do my business side of things and decided I was
Speaker 2: going to go to school at Rutgers and my boss
Speaker 2: there at the time really helped me out doing that.
Speaker 1: And so you're in business school and then you just
Speaker 1: so you already had gone to undergrad.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, I was already three years into business school.
Speaker 1: Three years into business school, and you just to make
Speaker 1: an abrupt change. You were in school. You were in
Speaker 1: school for a long time.
Speaker 2: I was, and then I moved went out to Jersey
Speaker 2: and went to Rutgers for turf and decided that, uh,
Speaker 2: that was my path. And it just it just something
Speaker 2: triggered me. I love golf, always have and grew up
Speaker 2: playing it with my with my dad and just absolutely
Speaker 2: loved it.
Speaker 1: Where'd you grow up playing around here?
Speaker 2: I played Morse Park and Brookwood golf Course, and my
Speaker 2: dad really played all over the place. Took me kind
Speaker 2: of everywhere in this area, Erskine, Elbell here, South End
Speaker 2: country Club, just all over the place.
Speaker 1: What was it like, you know where people must have
Speaker 1: been really excited about Notre Dame getting a new course
Speaker 1: and then you were a part of it. And then
Speaker 1: what was it like when it opened? Was it was
Speaker 1: it really busy with with locals and students alike, or
Speaker 1: how how was that whole transition?
Speaker 2: It was very busy, very very busy right when it opened.
Speaker 2: It was a phenomenal golf course still is They They
Speaker 2: offered a lot of a lot of neat things for
Speaker 2: people to come play there around the area, So it
Speaker 2: was it was jam packed, uh for a good five
Speaker 2: ten years where everybody got to come play it. And uh,
Speaker 2: the the locals really really took to the fact of
Speaker 2: having Bill Core and Ben Crenshaw build a golf course
Speaker 2: in in this area.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was early on and there it probably was
Speaker 1: so much different than everything around too.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean it was it was basically like a
Speaker 2: celebrity coming to building a golf course in your area.
Speaker 2: But you know, at that point he was still playing
Speaker 2: pretty and so they h it was it was a
Speaker 2: really big deal in the area.
Speaker 1: It's you probably his celebrity definitely gave him more license
Speaker 1: to do different stuff.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and there it was. It's not like any any
Speaker 2: golf course we have in the area. It's a it's
Speaker 2: a newer model golf course and it was one of
Speaker 2: their first and just uh it's it's held the test
Speaker 2: of time over the last twenty years. It's been a
Speaker 2: great golf course.
Speaker 1: That's the thing that I look at with it is
Speaker 1: like how well it's aged. You know, it's essentially effectively
Speaker 1: almost twenty getting close to twenty five years old, and
Speaker 1: it just seems like everything still works just perfect the
Speaker 1: way it was worked the first day it was built.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they both. They both when they built the golf course,
Speaker 2: they really looked at it from a standpoint of maintenance
Speaker 2: issues and how the golf course can stay stay healthy
Speaker 2: in the way way they built it from a maintenance standpoint,
Speaker 2: because the maintenance practices haven't changed much and they still
Speaker 2: keep the golf course in pristine condition and they've only
Speaker 2: they've only changed a few things over there. They added
Speaker 2: some bunkers and stuff for the for the Senior Open
Speaker 2: that they had a couple of years ago, but golf courses,
Speaker 2: it's great.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what do you do? You have any moment do
Speaker 1: you was there a specific moment that you remember that
Speaker 1: made you say, I, I don't want to do you know,
Speaker 1: go work in the business world. I wanted to be
Speaker 1: a superintendent. Is there like a did you have a
Speaker 1: specific away at like moment that you remember back to
Speaker 1: or is it just kind of like a did it
Speaker 1: just build over the time that you were working at Warren.
Speaker 2: In two thousand and one, I went and volunteered for
Speaker 2: the Buick Open up at Warwick Hills in Michigan, and
Speaker 2: that was my first real besides some of the college
Speaker 2: tournaments that they held at Warren, I'd never been a
Speaker 2: part of a big tournament like that, and I realized
Speaker 2: that that point on, I wanted to be at golf
Speaker 2: course that was holding holding tournament events. And so that's
Speaker 2: what propelled me to go to Rutgers and then and
Speaker 2: then be on from that to Saint Andrews.
Speaker 1: Talk about that talk with America gone working at St. Andrews.
Speaker 2: Once I realized I needed to do an internship in
Speaker 2: the summer, I really I wanted to go to the
Speaker 2: best place I could and so I called Gordon Moyer,
Speaker 2: who was the head of the UH runs all the
Speaker 2: golf courses at Sant Andrews Leaks. He actually just retired
Speaker 2: last year, and asked him how I could apply, and
Speaker 2: he said, you could come over here for an interview.
Speaker 2: And so my brother lived in London at the point
Speaker 2: that time, so I flew over and stayed with my
Speaker 2: brother for a week, went up to Saint Andrew's for
Speaker 2: a day and met with him, and from then on
Speaker 2: I got the job. And the following two months later
Speaker 2: I was there working.
Speaker 1: What did you work at all the courses or just
Speaker 1: the old course, the old course, just the old course, yep.
Speaker 1: I mean, how many people apply for that that internship?
Speaker 2: I don't know. We had We had six other interns
Speaker 2: at the other golf courses and I was the only one.
Speaker 2: Not that I was anything special, but they gave the
Speaker 2: original plan was for everybody to flip flop and get
Speaker 2: a chance on all the different courses, and for whatever reason,
Speaker 2: they just kept me on the old course, and I
Speaker 2: loved every minute of it. I got to learn how
Speaker 2: they how they they still used a lot of the
Speaker 2: practices that they did back in the day with old
Speaker 2: Tom Morris. We topped dressed by hand with a knapsack
Speaker 2: over our like we were carrying a backpack, and we
Speaker 2: would throw it out a specific way. It was just
Speaker 2: it was a very neat experience for me.
Speaker 1: Was that your first time to Scotland? Yes, at that point, yeah,
Speaker 1: for that interview. Yes, you went up for one day,
Speaker 1: it came back up for one day, it came back
Speaker 1: and then you're then you get that and you're there
Speaker 1: for two months.
Speaker 2: Oh, I stayed there for eight months?
Speaker 1: Eight months, okay? And that so where what did you
Speaker 1: start by doing? Like what year were you in interf
Speaker 1: school at that point and what how did your kind
Speaker 1: of like progression and in the internship work? How did
Speaker 1: it work?
Speaker 2: That was my first year. That was after my first
Speaker 2: year interf school and we needed to do an internship.
Speaker 2: And once I first started there, my first probably two
Speaker 2: weeks I was there, I did nothing but rake bunkers
Speaker 2: pretty much all day every day because the wind would
Speaker 2: blow and we would need to push up bunkers. And
Speaker 2: then they've slowly graduated me to doing course setup and
Speaker 2: mowen greens and moan fairways and everything. And by the
Speaker 2: end of it he was letting me supervise different things.
Speaker 2: It's like supervise the fairway crew and things like that.
Speaker 2: My direct boss was Eddie Adams and he works for
Speaker 2: the European Tour now as an agronomist and he was
Speaker 2: great for me. He's helped me a lot in my career.
Speaker 2: Him and Gordon both have been really good. And at
Speaker 2: that point Gordon McKee, who's the superintendent of the old
Speaker 2: course now, he was the superintendent of the strath Tyron
Speaker 2: Course and so I still know a lot of the
Speaker 2: guys that are over there and still talk to him
Speaker 2: now and again. So it was a great group of
Speaker 2: guys that really helped me on my career.
Speaker 1: What was your favorite job of all of them? Was
Speaker 1: it the setup or the mowing the green? Like what
Speaker 1: do you think think back to the.
Speaker 2: Muff, Probably the walk mowing of the greens and the
Speaker 2: top resting of the greens. Those were two things because
Speaker 2: when you walk mode the greens over there, which wasn't
Speaker 2: every day, we'd triplex them sometimes, but walk mowing the
Speaker 2: greens over there was a six hour job for six
Speaker 2: guys because the greens are so big and when you're
Speaker 2: taking that long route going side to side. You're talking
Speaker 2: about one hundred and fifty one hundred and fifty yard
Speaker 2: pass and conditioning over there was everything. I mean, you
Speaker 2: didn't have to do a lot of things that we
Speaker 2: do here in the States, and so the molling lines
Speaker 2: being straight, bunkers and good edges was everything over there.
Speaker 2: That was what kept the course interesting.
Speaker 1: Condition Did you think about ever just staying over there
Speaker 1: and not going back to America?
Speaker 2: I really did, and I decided to come back. I've
Speaker 2: been back there a few times, but I've yes, there
Speaker 2: were a couple of points I regretted not staying over there,
Speaker 2: and longer, what do you go.
Speaker 1: Back now as a superintendent, Like what are the things
Speaker 1: that you look at that they do in you know,
Speaker 1: the UK that you wish was more of a common
Speaker 1: practice here.
Speaker 2: Bunkers are hazards over there, and they treat them that way,
Speaker 2: and they're not meant to be perfect, and I you know,
Speaker 2: over here, we've gotten to the point where bunkers need
Speaker 2: to be just absolutely pristine on a day in, day
Speaker 2: out basis, and they keep them a little bit more
Speaker 2: natural over there and makes it a little bit tougher
Speaker 2: to get out of them. And I really like that
Speaker 2: and everything is simple over there. It's there. You know,
Speaker 2: we only had nine nine, well twelve crew members total
Speaker 2: on the old course, and over here you're having crews
Speaker 2: of fifteen to twenty on a on a normal golf course.
Speaker 2: And that's the thing about courses in the world.
Speaker 1: The old courses like the crown jewel of you know,
Speaker 1: maybe all of all of golf. But like if you
Speaker 1: compare it to many how many guys are on the
Speaker 1: curre at Pine Valley probably forty.
Speaker 2: Fifty easily, easily at least thirty five.
Speaker 1: Or yeah, so so you got four times the amount
Speaker 1: of people almost, yep, just to it's interesting, yep. A
Speaker 1: lot less inputs, right.
Speaker 2: A lot less inputs. The only applications we put on
Speaker 2: the year I was there was we did a little
Speaker 2: bit of herbicide along the edge of the the smoke
Speaker 2: and burn, and a few a few other fertilizer inputs.
Speaker 2: But it was pretty much take what mother nature gives
Speaker 2: you over there.
Speaker 1: And of course, like it's a completely different setting.
Speaker 2: So comparing, oh yeah, definitely that comes into play.
Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, So what'd you do after Saint Andrews and
Speaker 1: how and how disappointing was the next next thing.
Speaker 2: The next thing was disappointing just just leaving there in general,
Speaker 2: because it was, you know, it was it was such
Speaker 2: a simple time and you only worked forty hours, and
Speaker 2: so every day after work I would go play golf.
Speaker 2: And so going from that to coming over here, moving
Speaker 2: to Chicago and going to the was a huge change
Speaker 2: because then you're going to work in eighty plus hours
Speaker 2: a week and doing everything from watering every day, fertilizing,
Speaker 2: spraying every day, and just it's a different maintenance practices
Speaker 2: all in general. But it was good. I was at
Speaker 2: Madina from two thousand and three to two thousand and eight,
Speaker 2: and I loved it. I had a good time there.
Speaker 2: Had a great bosson Tom Lively who really took care.
Speaker 1: Of us and furthered my career had a major.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we had the two thousand and six PGA Championship
Speaker 2: while I was there, and it was a lot of
Speaker 2: fun hosting that and a lot of other small events
Speaker 2: that we had that were great as well.
Speaker 1: What about tournament golf really kind of let your passion
Speaker 1: for being a superintendent.
Speaker 2: Just having that course in pristine condition, for having the
Speaker 2: best players in the world come and play is just
Speaker 2: puts it at another level. In my opinion, I just
Speaker 2: love it. I love setting up a course for a
Speaker 2: tournament and having those players come and play it and
Speaker 2: being able to show what you do you off it
Speaker 2: means a lot to me.
Speaker 1: What how do you kind of go about the process
Speaker 1: like it? If you're six months out, what are you
Speaker 1: trying to do and are there certain milestones that you're
Speaker 1: trying to hit as you go along? You just finished
Speaker 1: having a Cemetra event here at South Bend. Yeah, you
Speaker 1: know this has got to be fresh in your mind.
Speaker 2: Yeah. About about six months and months ago we started
Speaker 2: working on some of the bunker issues that we had
Speaker 2: and redoing those with a better billy bunker and getting
Speaker 2: the mowing lines sitelines good for the girls coming to play,
Speaker 2: and getting the greens where we want them from a
Speaker 2: firmness standpoint and moisture standpoint, and just basically getting those
Speaker 2: projects done. We added a few tea and complexes for it,
Speaker 2: those those things. Getting those issues resolved about six months out,
Speaker 2: But once you get to that three weeks out is
Speaker 2: when you start getting the course in just prescene condition,
Speaker 2: all the details, everything trimmed up, everything mode properly. We
Speaker 2: dealt with a little rain this past week for the
Speaker 2: for the Cemetro event, but other than that we had
Speaker 2: everything where we wanted it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, big a little bit of rain understatement.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we had. We had eight inches of rain this
Speaker 2: on during during the week. So by by Wednesday afternoon
Speaker 2: when we had the pro ams, it was it was
Speaker 2: dicey to say the least, where we had a lot
Speaker 2: of water on the property. My crew absolutely killed it
Speaker 2: getting the h with squeegees and pumps and getting everything
Speaker 2: off the course. We did. We it worked out really well.
Speaker 2: We had the greens, the greens were fine. The greens
Speaker 2: drained well here, so we had those good to go.
Speaker 2: But it was the fairways and some of the rough
Speaker 2: spots getting those in good shape. But it worked out
Speaker 2: really well and by by by Friday, Saturday, Sunday, we
Speaker 2: were good to go.
Speaker 1: So, you know, while you're at Medina, what what type
Speaker 1: of stuff did you take away from that experience from
Speaker 1: like how different it was from Saint Andrew's to Madonna,
Speaker 1: Like you know, obviously that's it. It's a big chasm,
Speaker 1: but both like especially at that time, landmarks of you know,
Speaker 1: American golf, landmark of UK golf.
Speaker 2: It was more about the conditioning. So being at St Andrews,
Speaker 2: I really learned everything was about pristine condition and that's
Speaker 2: what that's what the we did there there. There wasn't
Speaker 2: a lot of other things to do. You didn't have
Speaker 2: to worry about hamwatering every day. It was the basics.
Speaker 2: It was top dressing, it was the mowing lines, straight
Speaker 2: mowing lines and everything like that. And I really took
Speaker 2: that to Madina that that really has helped me in
Speaker 2: my career, just making sure detailed work is done and
Speaker 2: roll prepped up for the golf course.
Speaker 1: Where were the places you were playing when you were
Speaker 1: You said you played a lot of golf when you're
Speaker 1: at St Andrews because you're you know, forty hours a week.
Speaker 2: Yep.
Speaker 1: Where where were you were you exploring all over the
Speaker 1: country or was it mostly centrally located around around the
Speaker 1: old course?
Speaker 2: Mostly entry located, But I Kings Barnes is right down
Speaker 2: the road. I played there a lot. I played all
Speaker 2: all six of the courses at St Andrews now they
Speaker 2: have seven, but played the Old course probably at least
Speaker 2: two times a week, And which is I've felt spoiled
Speaker 2: being able to do that. That was probably the worst
Speaker 2: part of coming back here, but Kings Barns, Mierfield, Carnusti
Speaker 2: I would go kind of, I would go all over,
Speaker 2: but mainly the St Andrews courses and Kings Barnes were
Speaker 2: my favorites to play.
Speaker 1: Now that you go back as like a visitor more so,
Speaker 1: are there pockets or courses that you've kind of discovered
Speaker 1: that you wish you had played more when you're around.
Speaker 2: Yes, I wish I would have got to Golane and
Speaker 2: some of the other ones that I never really never
Speaker 2: really made it to, And I plan on going back
Speaker 2: next year and hopefully I'll get to go to some
Speaker 2: of the other ones because there's still a lot of
Speaker 2: courses over there that I haven't hit Berwick and some
Speaker 2: of those they're just great golf courses.
Speaker 1: How does you're obviously you you travel, You play a
Speaker 1: lot of golf, and you travel a fair amount to
Speaker 1: see places. How does that help you as a superintendent?
Speaker 1: You know, when you go see places.
Speaker 2: I think it's really important to go see other golf
Speaker 2: courses because you can see what other people are doing
Speaker 2: and pick things up. Anywhere I go. I've been able
Speaker 2: to pick things up that other people do, and it
Speaker 2: helps you maintain your own golf course and see what
Speaker 2: things you can add to make your golf course better,
Speaker 2: because you can always make it better. And I've learned
Speaker 2: that at every place that I've gone to.
Speaker 1: Do you have any examples of things that you've brought
Speaker 1: back from somewhere else.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Over the past past couple of years, I've played
Speaker 2: some really good golf courses, and I would say I
Speaker 2: would say the mowing lines and visuals going to a
Speaker 2: place like Seminol that I went there a few years
Speaker 2: ago and just seeing some of the visuals that you
Speaker 2: have going up to the holes and trying to bring
Speaker 2: those into your own course of how you see a hole,
Speaker 2: and not so much that comparing anything that I have
Speaker 2: to Seminole, but just how you visualize a hole, making
Speaker 2: you realize how you can visualize certain holes at your
Speaker 2: golf course. It really impacts what we've done here from
Speaker 2: a member standpoint and how they view our course now
Speaker 2: on some of the holes.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So you're at South Bend. It's a nineteen sixteen
Speaker 1: George O'Neill design. You've been in the process of, you know,
Speaker 1: trying to take out some trees and start to restore
Speaker 1: some features that we're here. And obviously that probably Seminole
Speaker 1: would be interesting because you know that place doesn't have
Speaker 1: a lot of trees. The trees it has are very
Speaker 1: skinny and unobtrusive to sight lines.
Speaker 2: Yep.
Speaker 1: But talk about the process of kind of starting to
Speaker 1: bring back some of the features that have been lost
Speaker 1: over the years here at South Bend.
Speaker 2: So over the years have been a lot of changes.
Speaker 2: The greens have gotten a lot smaller, and wanting to
Speaker 2: bring those out to the way George O'Neil had it
Speaker 2: was on one of the first things I wanted to
Speaker 2: do here. We're in discussions about trying to do some
Speaker 2: of that and that open it out. We've lost probably
Speaker 2: about half our green size over the years. There weren't
Speaker 2: a lot of trees when they built a golf course,
Speaker 2: and so that's been the other thing. We've taken out
Speaker 2: twelve hundred trees in the last five or six years,
Speaker 2: and so.
Speaker 1: We've still there's for everybody that loves trees, there's still
Speaker 1: a million trees.
Speaker 2: Still, there's still a million trees out here. Could we
Speaker 2: could keep going easily and we could get to two thousand,
Speaker 2: you'd still see plenty of trees out here, so they
Speaker 2: were not short on planting trees out here. But beyond that,
Speaker 2: there's beyond the greens expansions some of the visuals that
Speaker 2: we've had a lake. We've really expanded it where you
Speaker 2: can see the lake from a lot of points. Before
Speaker 2: you and I were out on fifteen t earlier today
Speaker 2: and five years ago, you couldn't see the lake from
Speaker 2: fifteen to T and now you have a whole clear
Speaker 2: view of that whole of chain of lake out there
Speaker 2: and out here where we're sitting now you can see
Speaker 2: part of the lake, but we still have a decent
Speaker 2: amount to go to get get to that point.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So with this with this club, obviously you you're
Speaker 1: very well traveled. I think you've you've got members that
Speaker 1: are you have a large national member contingent, But then
Speaker 1: you have members that have traveled, members that haven't really
Speaker 1: in South Bend Country Club is like a very good
Speaker 1: course and you know a lot of members that haven't
Speaker 1: seen stuff. Do you Is there some struggle with getting
Speaker 1: them on board with pushing towards you know, something different
Speaker 1: than what they've played for a number of years.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's always a struggle with getting everybody on the
Speaker 2: same page. It's never going to happen getting everybody on
Speaker 2: the same page. But as we've done things here, guys
Speaker 2: have realized that there is a purpose for it and
Speaker 2: what it's brought to the table. So there's been a
Speaker 2: lot of people who weren't happy with certain things we've done,
Speaker 2: but they've realized the endpoint is is something that they
Speaker 2: that they would want and so we're we're slowly making
Speaker 2: progress with that and I think we'll we'll eventually get there.
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Speaker 1: Toro distributor today. Now back to Nick Nate, what you
Speaker 1: know into in terms of, you know, agronomically would have
Speaker 1: been the biggest things that have happened with the with
Speaker 1: the tree removal that you've seen, you know, dat to day.
Speaker 2: It's drastically helped our drainage issues and on some of
Speaker 2: the holes and helped really the shade issues for the
Speaker 2: most part on the greens. So we had a lot
Speaker 2: of greens that had trees way over into the canopy
Speaker 2: that most courses wouldn't even think about having. And so
Speaker 2: we had some challenging spots on the greens and we've
Speaker 2: removed most of the ones around the greens from an
Speaker 2: economic standpoint, but down on the low holes, we had
Speaker 2: a lot that was the roots were growing through drainage
Speaker 2: lines and everything from that standpoint, so we really opened
Speaker 2: that up, helped drain the low holes. We've added some
Speaker 2: a lot of drainage over the last ten years and
Speaker 2: this course to help pump it off because most of
Speaker 2: our fairways on the low holes are actually below lake
Speaker 2: level and so we have a lot of challenges there
Speaker 2: when the sea walkns sometimes come up over.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's got to be the hardest thing. I used
Speaker 1: to work at a club that had flooding issues with
Speaker 1: a river, and I you know, you sympathized with the
Speaker 1: superintendent of the days that it came over. You know,
Speaker 1: in terms of what's been like the outside of the
Speaker 1: tree removal, it would have been some other things that
Speaker 1: you've done that have really worked well that helped move
Speaker 1: water off off the golf course.
Speaker 2: We've added some new pumping pumping stations around the course
Speaker 2: to pump the water back into the back into the lake.
Speaker 2: We've added about twenty thousand square feet of linear feed
Speaker 2: of drainage throughout the golf course and a lot of
Speaker 2: those are French trains, but most of it is hooked
Speaker 2: up to our drainage system. We have done a drainage
Speaker 2: master plan and we hope to start that to kind
Speaker 2: of finalize the getting the water off the golf course.
Speaker 2: We have a lot of places to take it, but
Speaker 2: sometimes we have the issues where if we get too
Speaker 2: much rain the lake comes up over and so sometimes
Speaker 2: that stuff doesn't do us any good.
Speaker 1: At that doesn't seem like that as an avoidable.
Speaker 2: That's not available. You wouldn't be allowed to build the
Speaker 2: golf course.
Speaker 1: It can be able to raise the golf course.
Speaker 2: No, you wouldn't be able to build a golf course
Speaker 2: here nowadays with the wetland restrictions from Army Corps engineers
Speaker 2: and things like that. So it's it's what kind of
Speaker 2: makes it a special place. But they build this back
Speaker 2: in the day, and virtually half the course could be
Speaker 2: deemed as a wetland if it wasn't already grandfathered in
Speaker 2: as a golf course. So it's it's kind of a
Speaker 2: unique property where we half the other half the properties
Speaker 2: up high and half the properties down low. So it's very,
Speaker 2: very challenging to maintain.
Speaker 1: Yeah, talk about that. I mean you've got like you've
Speaker 1: got the up the upholes which are in you know,
Speaker 1: kind of like roll along a high ridge with rolling
Speaker 1: hills and it's sandy and uh. And then you've got
Speaker 1: the lower holes that are down at below in some
Speaker 1: cases you're the lake level, and you know, you've got
Speaker 1: two distinctly different almost like nine holes split. How do
Speaker 1: you go about, like, how do difficult is it to
Speaker 1: manage properties that to effectively two different properties within one.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's a lot of times where we will be
Speaker 2: removing water off of the low holes with drainage pumps
Speaker 2: and while watering on the high holes. So it's it
Speaker 2: makes it incredibly difficult, and we have a lot of
Speaker 2: different irrigation programs in our computer just specifically for that,
Speaker 2: because we have basically high hole watering and low hole
Speaker 2: watering and it's very, very different. So it's very not
Speaker 2: very common that we are watering both the holes at
Speaker 2: the same both low holes and high holes at the
Speaker 2: same time. And the we top dress all of the
Speaker 2: fairways on the low holes just to try and make
Speaker 2: those play as play as the high holes do.
Speaker 1: Because the high holes are real bounce here, right.
Speaker 2: Real bouncy, very sandy property up there, straight sand all
Speaker 2: the way down and on the low holes we have
Speaker 2: a very very high clay content and below that is
Speaker 2: straight sand actually from back in the day. So if
Speaker 2: you go to about a foot or two down, then
Speaker 2: it's straight sand from then then on really, so it's
Speaker 2: almost something where you if you ever wanted to flip
Speaker 2: flop it, you could try and just flipop it, but
Speaker 2: it would be a monstrosity of a project.
Speaker 1: Is the sand uh is the lake of sand bottom micee?
Speaker 1: Oh wow?
Speaker 2: Yeah, So so it's it's it's it's a very unique
Speaker 2: property from that standpoint.
Speaker 1: Nobody would think South Bend sand site. Nope, but here
Speaker 1: we are.
Speaker 2: Here, we are Yes, the it the fair ways. With
Speaker 2: all the top racing we've been doing over the years,
Speaker 2: are are starting to match up with the high holes
Speaker 2: pretty pretty good.
Speaker 1: So where do you get do you get the sand
Speaker 1: from just on site? Do you dig a hole or something?
Speaker 2: Or we we have we have a top racing mix
Speaker 2: that that we that we matched up and uh, that
Speaker 2: works well for.
Speaker 1: Those You're not like sand hills where they just go
Speaker 1: dig a.
Speaker 2: Hole and no, it's not like that. When we topped
Speaker 2: a scene Andrews, we took it from the beach. You
Speaker 2: just just went over, rent over and we would dig
Speaker 2: a hole right at the beach and load up, load
Speaker 2: up and go.
Speaker 1: That's it makes it your life a little bit easier,
Speaker 1: right yep. That's so how do you go about kind
Speaker 1: of pushing things that you wanted to do through? I
Speaker 1: don't you guys don't have an architect right of record
Speaker 1: like that that's on retainer per se. You've got a committee,
Speaker 1: you've got yourself. How does how does decision making go through?
Speaker 1: What works?
Speaker 2: Well?
Speaker 1: What's you know? Maybe one challenge of the setup you
Speaker 1: guys have here.
Speaker 2: I've had some really good boards over the years here
Speaker 2: that have that have really been good. I've had one
Speaker 2: green chairman uh my entire time here and he's been
Speaker 2: he's been very receptive to making changes to the golf course,
Speaker 2: doctor Jim Granger, and he's been He's been really good
Speaker 2: for me from seeing seeing the visual of what we
Speaker 2: need in the future. The rest of the boards of
Speaker 2: you know that they're always going to have their questions
Speaker 2: on what we should do and want to do, and
Speaker 2: there's always debates. We had a membership meeting this year
Speaker 2: where we discussed removing more trees and what we need
Speaker 2: to do as a membership. But it all in all,
Speaker 2: getting it approved has has gone pretty well. The only
Speaker 2: hiccup we have right now is approving one of these
Speaker 2: master plans to really go for We've had a master
Speaker 2: plan done and some other ideas that we've been kicking around,
Speaker 2: but everybody's under the same assumption that we really need
Speaker 2: to restore the golf course back to what George O'Neil
Speaker 2: did here because it's a really great layout. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you can tell the bones, you know, just from
Speaker 1: like the greens and getting kind of the corners back,
Speaker 1: and you know, obviously, like one of the tough things
Speaker 1: that happens with all these courses, you know, is over
Speaker 1: time the golf course, the memories, memberships or have get
Speaker 1: locked into what the course was at that time of
Speaker 1: you know, the great shot, the great home one, or
Speaker 1: the great round I shot. You know, I was behind
Speaker 1: this tree and I hid an unbelievable hook shot, and
Speaker 1: those those memories become like sentimental moments that lock in,
Speaker 1: like we need to keep this tree, or we need
Speaker 1: to keep the whole of the way it is, because
Speaker 1: this is the way it always was. But you know,
Speaker 1: in terms of your golf course, you look back, it's
Speaker 1: like it's very clear where the great history was. It
Speaker 1: was when it was hosting Western Opens in the forties
Speaker 1: and and Western Ams, and you know, you look at
Speaker 1: the NTA Championships. You've got you know, Frank Stranahan one here,
Speaker 1: one of the great amateurs of all time, Sandy Tatum
Speaker 1: wanted an individual national championship here, that's the golf course,
Speaker 1: and you've got a program with pictures that's the golf course.
Speaker 1: That probably was the best iteration of South Bend Country Club.
Speaker 1: But getting there when you're so far away from it
Speaker 1: has got to be the big, big hurdle it is.
Speaker 2: We have a long way to go to get it there.
Speaker 2: And yes, that was that was the best time of
Speaker 2: this place. It was. The golf course was amazing. It
Speaker 2: was one of the it is it's still one of
Speaker 2: the top ones in the area. But it it can
Speaker 2: go so much further by get taking it back to
Speaker 2: that design. And it's just the removing the trees is
Speaker 2: one of the first step. And and not necessarily all
Speaker 2: the trees, but the trees that are in play that
Speaker 2: are that are blocking those visuals and we really have
Speaker 2: some bunkers we need to add and some some sight
Speaker 2: lines and some mowing lines that are around the greens,
Speaker 2: uh to bring it back, because the size of the
Speaker 2: greens then, uh, and the shape of the greens then
Speaker 2: where he had he had a lot of fingers that
Speaker 2: came out up towards the tops and top sides. And
Speaker 2: they still they still have the same slope that they
Speaker 2: have then. But the additions to those edges and the
Speaker 2: perimeters of them where they mow right into the bunkers,
Speaker 2: where you mowed right into the bunkers, that that's a
Speaker 2: special special thing that we could do. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And you know when you go from the small like
Speaker 1: the ovals, which I mean this is a majority of
Speaker 1: golf courses have this. You know, you go from you've
Speaker 1: got very sloping greens and small green green sections. Like
Speaker 1: you know, from your setup standpoint, you're very limited as
Speaker 1: to where you can put pins. And the effective result is,
Speaker 1: you know, members play the almost the identical golf course
Speaker 1: every day. You know, a pin might be five yards
Speaker 1: up or five yards back, but you know, you get
Speaker 1: some of these corners back the greens go back to
Speaker 1: even if you're seventy percent, All of a sudden, you
Speaker 1: add these new pins that might dictate you know, different
Speaker 1: types of shots into greens that you need to hit,
Speaker 1: or different thoughts because you get these these pins that
Speaker 1: loom over bunkers as opposed to you know, kind of
Speaker 1: five yards away from them.
Speaker 2: Yep. You know, the stuff that would bring into play
Speaker 2: on these green complexes would be so foreign for most
Speaker 2: are members, and they would love it once we got
Speaker 2: to that point, because there's a lot of when you
Speaker 2: look at the old old pictures and the old aerials,
Speaker 2: you can see how he funneled a lot of shots
Speaker 2: onto the green from those edges and it was all
Speaker 2: kind of sloped, sloped in towards spots, and so it
Speaker 2: would open up a lot of great pin positions around here.
Speaker 2: And we are very limited at this standpoint where you
Speaker 2: are your point essentially the same golf course every day.
Speaker 2: And by by adding some of those some of those
Speaker 2: green complexes the way they need to be, it would
Speaker 2: it would really open up this golf course to just
Speaker 2: make it even more special than it is.
Speaker 1: It's something that I find interesting just with in general,
Speaker 1: with golfers as they become these creatures of have it
Speaker 1: and it's like they you join a club where you
Speaker 1: play the same public course every day and you play
Speaker 1: the exact same teas every time you play, and it
Speaker 1: doesn't make any sense to me, Like why don't you
Speaker 1: change things up one day, play up here and back here.
Speaker 1: And I think a lot of it has to do
Speaker 1: with the handicap system, like that's the thing that's ingrained.
Speaker 1: It is, like I have to play here in order
Speaker 1: to keep my score. But you know, I always dream
Speaker 1: a big some sort of position at some golf course
Speaker 1: where I could set up having back teas in front
Speaker 1: of you know, middle tis some holes because I want
Speaker 1: to see you know, the players that play back teas
Speaker 1: usually play up and see what they do. I think
Speaker 1: that more variety is something that like, you know, you
Speaker 1: play somewhere every day, but it would be like if
Speaker 1: you went to the same restaurant every day in order
Speaker 1: the exact same thing every time you went. What what's
Speaker 1: going on?
Speaker 2: You know, you want some differences, you gotta have. You
Speaker 2: gotta have differences when you're playing the same golf course
Speaker 2: every day and you want to be able to you
Speaker 2: should be moving, moving teas around, t complexes around, and
Speaker 2: by doing what we would do do with the greens,
Speaker 2: it would make it so much better and you could
Speaker 2: have so many options where you wouldn't feel like you're
Speaker 2: playing the same golf course every day and you just
Speaker 2: have all those options. And that's one of the reasons
Speaker 2: why I love going playing different golf courses around the
Speaker 2: country and the world, just because you see all these
Speaker 2: different options that courses have and if you can bring
Speaker 2: some of those to your to your own golf course,
Speaker 2: it's it's made me a better superintendent.
Speaker 1: So I hate the favorite courses question. And you know,
Speaker 1: you travel, you play a lot of golf, but I'm
Speaker 1: more interested in your favorite places, so it could it's
Speaker 1: not necessarily a favorite course. But let's just say like
Speaker 1: three favorite places that you've visited, had a chance to play,
Speaker 1: but like not necessarily all just hey, this golf course
Speaker 1: was the best, but just your favorite place.
Speaker 2: Saint Andrew's is by far, by by far number one.
Speaker 2: Just just the whole living in the town and playing
Speaker 2: those golf courses all as one is just the experience
Speaker 2: is amazing. Second second is Cyprus Point, just out in Monterey,
Speaker 2: is just great. The everything about it, from the golf
Speaker 2: to the special golf architecture that's out there too, to
Speaker 2: the views, and just just in general that area.
Speaker 1: I'm convinced, like the Cypress thing is like you just
Speaker 1: can't have a bad day when you're out there.
Speaker 2: No, it doesn't matter how you play or anything. It's
Speaker 2: just a it's just a special place. Every everything about
Speaker 2: it is so special. Just walking around there is just amazing. Yeah.
Speaker 2: After that, Seminal to me is just everything about the
Speaker 2: experience there. The golf course is great. Everything about the
Speaker 2: experience there and just walking those grounds is amazing. The property,
Speaker 2: the property of the clubhouse, it's just it's just a
Speaker 2: great place.
Speaker 1: You picked three places with a lot of history. Yes,
Speaker 1: and then what are a few places that you are
Speaker 1: kind of dying to see that you haven't gotten to yet.
Speaker 2: A couple of places I'm dying to see. Boy, there's
Speaker 2: a lot. I really want to go to. The country Club.
Speaker 2: I'd really like to see see the country club.
Speaker 1: Out in Masskline Bookline.
Speaker 2: I just feel like that's a really special place with
Speaker 2: a lot of history that I that I that I
Speaker 2: like to go to. Another one that's uh that I've
Speaker 2: always always wanted to get to and just never been
Speaker 2: able to get there is Marion. I feel like that's
Speaker 2: that's another special place. Both both out on the East coast.
Speaker 2: Those are two great golf courses, and I think they
Speaker 2: have a lot of special history with them. I love
Speaker 2: looking into history and things that have happened at golf courses.
Speaker 2: That's just that's that's neat to me. Mm hmm.
Speaker 1: So last question is is Notre Dame gonna make the
Speaker 1: playoff this year?
Speaker 2: They're gonna make the playoff this year? I feel very kind.
Speaker 1: Are they gonna, you know, put together a decent performance
Speaker 1: in the playoffs?
Speaker 2: Though? Yes, I think I think they're I think they're
Speaker 2: learning as they're going. We've had some really had some
Speaker 2: really bad ones, and I think they're I think they're
Speaker 2: learning what they need to do to get into that playoff.
Speaker 2: And they have a really good recruiting set up this year.
Speaker 2: So yes, I think they're gonna be in the playoff
Speaker 2: and they will perform this week this year as well.
Speaker 1: You know a lot of people are calling for them
Speaker 1: to just be banned from it.
Speaker 2: I could see that from the outside looking at I
Speaker 2: could see how nobody would want them in the playoff
Speaker 2: because they do. They take a different road to get there,
Speaker 2: and there's a lot of people that want them, want
Speaker 2: them in a conference just to solidify that. And you know,
Speaker 2: if they were going to be in a conference, it
Speaker 2: would probably it would it would be the ACC because
Speaker 2: that's where they have their ties to.
Speaker 1: It should be in the Big ten.
Speaker 2: They should be in the Big ten based on location and.
Speaker 1: And and academic stand.
Speaker 2: And academic standards as well.
Speaker 1: The UH it would be they don't want to they
Speaker 1: don't want to run up against Ohio State.
Speaker 2: I guess that's that that could be the fact. But
Speaker 2: you know, right now we have Clempson in ACC, then
Speaker 2: we're not playing them every year because it's a modified schedule.
Speaker 2: But you know, it's hard for them from a standpoint
Speaker 2: to not play Navy and to not play some of
Speaker 2: the Boston College and uh Purdue Michigan, say, some of
Speaker 2: those some of those rivalries Michigan. It's hard for them
Speaker 2: not to play someone's driving. So they like the modified
Speaker 2: schedule where they play.
Speaker 1: Oh that's why they got to join the Big Ten.
Speaker 1: They don't lose those games.
Speaker 2: We're adding Wisconsin this year, so we have Wisconsin a
Speaker 2: home and home, Soldier Field and Green and lambeau Field,
Speaker 2: so that'll be, uh, that'll be interesting to play start
Speaker 2: playing them because in Ohio state, I think we start
Speaker 2: playing them in twenty twenty eight. So they're they're they're
Speaker 2: trying to bring a tougher schedule in trying to play
Speaker 2: some SEC C SEC teams and some Big ten and Accy.
Speaker 1: Might be in the SCC before you.
Speaker 2: That's what that's what it's looking like. So I think
Speaker 2: they have a good chance of getting there this year though,
Speaker 2: and they'll I think they'll perform this year.
Speaker 1: All right, Well, Nick, it's been a pleasure and UH
Speaker 1: look forward to uh seeing what what the Irish do
Speaker 1: and then seeing South Bend Age as it as it
Speaker 1: enters it's next iteration of its life.
Speaker 2: Here, appreciate it. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to another edition of the Friday Podcast.
Speaker 1: Today's episode was edited by Meg Atkins. As a quick reminder,
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