Speaker 1: I miss the green, for example, I'm already upset.
Speaker 2: When I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset.
Speaker 2: And when I find my ball.
Speaker 3: In a brid egg Friday Egg, the dreaded Frida Egg, fridagg,
Speaker 3: Frida Egg, Frida Egg bride Egg.
Speaker 4: Lie, I'm about ready to run off of the course.
Speaker 5: Ladies and gentlemen, Welcome back to another edition of the
Speaker 5: Frida Egg Podcast. Today we're doing our first ever live podcast,
Speaker 5: and I'm lucky to be joined by a couple of
Speaker 5: the brightest and youngest stars in the turf industry from Chicago.
Speaker 5: We've got Brian Moore from the glen View Club, Brian
Speaker 5: Palmer from Shore Acres, Scott Pavalco from the Babbelink Club,
Speaker 5: and then I'm also joined by fellow golf nerd Jason Way. Guys,
Speaker 5: welcome on, Thank.
Speaker 6: You for having us, Thanks for having us.
Speaker 5: So to kick things off, I'd love to hear from
Speaker 5: each of you guys about how you guys got into
Speaker 5: turf and how you got into golf.
Speaker 7: More importantly, Yeah, I grew up around the game. My
Speaker 7: father was superintendent, so I'm pretty sure all three of
Speaker 7: us is the common theme right there. So just basically
Speaker 7: every summer from probably the age of eleven or so
Speaker 7: was spent on the golf course with my father. Helped
Speaker 7: out where I could caddied, and just really developed my
Speaker 7: love for the game through summers with him.
Speaker 1: He was at an old.
Speaker 7: Course in Elmsford, New York and Norwood Country Club, so
Speaker 7: there's some pretty historical significance of that club and architecturally too,
Speaker 7: I think Tailinghouse, rain Air, and then Banks took over
Speaker 7: once Rayner died, so it's a pretty cool property where
Speaker 7: you can see essentially, you know, tidbits of all three
Speaker 7: of them. So it's kind of where my love for
Speaker 7: golf and architecture stems from.
Speaker 5: Nice and then you were at the Loop.
Speaker 7: The Loop grew in the Loop in northern Michigan.
Speaker 5: And then came too.
Speaker 7: Yeah that's a little layover at Chicago Golf Club.
Speaker 1: So yeah, yeah, not at it all not bad.
Speaker 5: You got to see a lot of good architecture, how
Speaker 5: about you, Brian.
Speaker 8: I'm pretty pretty much like Brian over here. My dad
Speaker 8: was a superintendent, so I used to go to work
Speaker 8: with him on the weekends and I started working for
Speaker 8: him full time, I guess on the payroll when I
Speaker 8: was fifteen sixteen, and my grandfather played golf. He's the
Speaker 8: one that taught me how to play. And at some point,
Speaker 8: I guess I decided that I want to go do
Speaker 8: it for a living and end up going to college
Speaker 8: and just go to work at some clubs around the
Speaker 8: Northeast and having some fun. And I guess the other
Speaker 8: passion just kind of grew from more experience.
Speaker 2: Yeah, my story is somewhat similar, but a little bit different.
Speaker 2: My father was also superintendent at a little public course
Speaker 2: in just outside of Youngstown, Ohio. I grew up. I
Speaker 2: was born and raised in Ohio, and unlike these guys,
Speaker 2: when I was fifteen, I thought the idea of getting
Speaker 2: up for work at four am was ridiculous. So I
Speaker 2: did other things at that time, but I grew up
Speaker 2: around the game of golf. My grandfather retired from the
Speaker 2: steel mills in Youngstown the year before I was born,
Speaker 2: and I kind of grew up. He was kind of
Speaker 2: my best friend as a little kid. He would take
Speaker 2: me to the little Part three golf course and we
Speaker 2: would chip around, and that's kind of I can ever
Speaker 2: remember not being around golf. So fast forward to my twenties,
Speaker 2: I started working for my father at his course, and
Speaker 2: after about a season, I just knew it's what I
Speaker 2: wanted to do. At that point, I didn't really know
Speaker 2: what I wanted to do with my life, but after
Speaker 2: working for him, I fell in love with being outdoors
Speaker 2: every day. I love the game of golf, the problem solving.
Speaker 2: And then I went to o Highest University got my
Speaker 2: degree and I worked at Mierfield Village for eight years.
Speaker 2: I was fortunate to be hired there, and then luckily
Speaker 2: the Jeensic family took a chance on me. I was
Speaker 2: a young kid and they hired me to run cog
Speaker 2: Hill for three years, and then after that I went
Speaker 2: up to Babblink.
Speaker 5: So what's the best part about waking up at four
Speaker 5: am every day.
Speaker 7: For me living in the city, no traffic.
Speaker 8: I'm not quite sure. I really like to watch the
Speaker 8: other sunrise and I can't stand to wake up when
Speaker 8: the sun has already risen. I really kind of feel
Speaker 8: like I wasted a day at that point.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's that sort of that feeling of accomplishment. You know,
Speaker 2: it's fun to be up and five hours later you
Speaker 2: see people driving to work and you're like, yeah, you know,
Speaker 2: and working for four or five hours, you know, and
Speaker 2: wide awake. I like to joke that on my days off,
Speaker 2: I like to sleep in until five point thirty.
Speaker 5: So to kick things kind of off into the superintended talk,
Speaker 5: I think there's a disconnect with your regular golfer and
Speaker 5: what you guys do on a daily basis and for
Speaker 5: a living. So what's one thing that you wish every
Speaker 5: member at your club understood about your job?
Speaker 2: I think, you know, what's interesting about our job is
Speaker 2: that we strive to create a playing you know, a
Speaker 2: place for recreation that's the same every day. But by definition,
Speaker 2: it can't be the same every day because you have
Speaker 2: so many different variables. You know, we're dealing with living things,
Speaker 2: the weather, and so you know, the golfer is there
Speaker 2: for a brief four hour window, you know, hopefully less,
Speaker 2: hopefully three and a half, but sometimes four to five,
Speaker 2: and you know, we do our best to make sure
Speaker 2: everything's the same, but it's really not possible because of
Speaker 2: all the variables.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I think I'm with Scott there.
Speaker 8: It's so hard to have a consistent product every day
Speaker 8: given all the variables. But the one thing I wish
Speaker 8: that that, Yeah, the members of all the clubs and
Speaker 8: all the golfers in general. Really we're able to see
Speaker 8: how large of a team we have and how many
Speaker 8: things we're trying to accomplish in an eight to ten
Speaker 8: hour day, and how much work is actually done long
Speaker 8: before the sun rises, long before the first tea time at.
Speaker 6: Eight o'clock or whatever it is.
Speaker 8: I mean, there's there's a lot going into it. And
Speaker 8: I really wish that some more golfers, some more members
Speaker 8: would go out earlier, go ask the superintendent to go
Speaker 8: cut cups or go to Corset, just go for a walk.
Speaker 6: In the morning and see how much is actually happening.
Speaker 5: It's like they should have a mandatory, uh, you know,
Speaker 5: like you bring your kids to work day, it should
Speaker 5: be bring your member to work day.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 8: I've offered it up and I've had a couple of
Speaker 8: coming cut cups and it'd be great if more did it.
Speaker 6: It's fun.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I just think it's the amount of time it
Speaker 7: takes in the morning, kind of what Brian said. You
Speaker 7: know how large your crew is, and you know how
Speaker 7: much is actually going on in the day, and you
Speaker 7: know how much time you'd really like to have in
Speaker 7: the morning to get it set up, and you know,
Speaker 7: probably for all of us, it's you know, getting get
Speaker 7: it all done before play, stay in front, and the moment,
Speaker 7: the moment you get caught, it kind of just you know,
Speaker 7: throws a wrench and everything.
Speaker 5: So so the three of you guys recently took a
Speaker 5: trip to the British Islands. I'm interested, you know, when
Speaker 5: I go to golf course, I'm always looking at the
Speaker 5: architecture from a superintendent's lens. What do you guys look
Speaker 5: at and what are kind of some cool things that
Speaker 5: you took away from the trip.
Speaker 7: I think it's how little they do over there, you know,
Speaker 7: the perception of you know, the members over there and
Speaker 7: what they expect, not condition wise, but just how much
Speaker 7: they just let nature be over there. They don't try
Speaker 7: to control and minimal, minimal inputs. That's what I always knew,
Speaker 7: that's what they did, but to see it over there
Speaker 7: and you know, you know, they just don't fertilize fair ways.
Speaker 1: And for me, that's kind.
Speaker 7: Of what I'm trying to do this year, and just
Speaker 7: how little inputs they put into things. But I just
Speaker 7: think it's, you know the perception of the members from
Speaker 7: here to there, you know, what they expect at our
Speaker 7: clubs are entirely different, you know, so it's a tough
Speaker 7: balance to try to do little but make it look
Speaker 7: like you're doing a lot.
Speaker 3: So where do you think that we in our golf
Speaker 3: culture here went off the rails with that, because that's
Speaker 3: clearly not the way we are here about golf. And
Speaker 3: you know what can people like Andy and I who
Speaker 3: are out there trying to fight the good perception fight
Speaker 3: for you do to help get us a little bit,
Speaker 3: you know, more back in line with the spirit of
Speaker 3: the game.
Speaker 8: Well, I think that what's really interesting, even if it's
Speaker 8: I mean, we're very fortunate to go to some of
Speaker 8: the better clubs in the UK and Scotland and everything
Speaker 8: is so simple from the moment that you step out
Speaker 8: of your car. There isn't a ton of employees and
Speaker 8: everyone coming to greet you, and the clubhouses aren't huge
Speaker 8: and grand, and you can really walk on the best
Speaker 8: golf courses in the world just been walking up to
Speaker 8: the pro shop and the other courses are very simple.
Speaker 8: Obviously a lot of them have been around for a
Speaker 8: long time that in some cases they weren't shaped or
Speaker 8: you know, built, they were just kind of there and
Speaker 8: seeded or you know in mode, and yeah, I think
Speaker 8: that there's a strong a connection between the course and
Speaker 8: the town.
Speaker 6: You know, every.
Speaker 8: Course has a town or a village across the street,
Speaker 8: and they're not trying to hide it with any fences
Speaker 8: or anything like that, or green tarps or anything. It's
Speaker 8: just it's there. Embrace it. It's all ye know, kind
Speaker 8: of like we're doing at Canal Shores. It's all just
Speaker 8: part of the community.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think, to echo what you said, Brian, the
Speaker 2: biggest thing that I took away is that it's just
Speaker 2: simple and accessible and fun and golf is a part
Speaker 2: of the community, or at least that was my perception,
Speaker 2: you know, spending two weeks there. I'm not going to
Speaker 2: pretend like I'm an expert of what happens in England
Speaker 2: and Scotland. But you know, the other thing I would
Speaker 2: like to just say is when you go there and
Speaker 2: you see the links land, you get it. It just
Speaker 2: makes sense, like you can see why golf evolved there
Speaker 2: and see why they're able to have great golf with
Speaker 2: not high inputs. And you know, it's not to say
Speaker 2: that we all, you know, as superintendents, we strive to
Speaker 2: be minimal and you know, good with our budgets and
Speaker 2: produce firm conditions. But when you go there and you
Speaker 2: realize they're on sand, they can grow fescue, it doesn't
Speaker 2: grow very much. They don't have to mow it, they
Speaker 2: don't have to double cut things that you know, they
Speaker 2: literally dig into the side of a dune for sand
Speaker 2: to top dress. You know, these types of things. It
Speaker 2: just makes sense. You know. I will reflect on one thing,
Speaker 2: before we really saw a links golf course, or before
Speaker 2: we walked one, we pulled up to this castle, Bambrea
Speaker 2: Castle and Brian and are like, holy crap, look at
Speaker 2: this freaking castle. It's been here like five hundred years.
Speaker 2: And you turn around and you look toward the ocean
Speaker 2: and there's just all this dune's land that's not a
Speaker 2: golf course, but you just look at it and you're like,
Speaker 2: that should be a golf course. You know, great terrain,
Speaker 2: small level areas, features that look like bunkers that aren't bunkers.
Speaker 2: They're just there. And so that's my biggest take home.
Speaker 2: It just makes sense there. And we sort of impose
Speaker 2: our American will on the game, and in some cases
Speaker 2: I think we've made it a little bit less fun
Speaker 2: and a little bit less accessible unfortunately.
Speaker 3: So as you were tripping around over there, did you
Speaker 3: stay incognito or did you actually reach out to the
Speaker 3: greenkeepers the courses that you played and interact with them?
Speaker 1: Yeah, we kind of.
Speaker 7: My trip was early and they saw the golf late,
Speaker 7: so I wasn't with these guys. But for us, yeah,
Speaker 7: we reached out to the course managers.
Speaker 1: And at North Barrick and at St Andrews.
Speaker 7: They gave us a tour around the facility and walked
Speaker 7: the course with us.
Speaker 8: And then when I was with Scott, we're just incognito
Speaker 8: the whole time.
Speaker 5: What was the coolest thing you saw over there? Whether
Speaker 5: it be a hole, a you know, feature, or you know,
Speaker 5: just something you picked up, like, what was like one
Speaker 5: thing that will stick with you?
Speaker 8: Well, the one cool thing is all the walls and
Speaker 8: how they all on each course. There's a wall that'll
Speaker 8: come into play, whether it's you know, out of bounds
Speaker 8: or it's something that you have to go and hit
Speaker 8: over to access a green. Another part of the fairway.
Speaker 8: You know, it wasn't taken out, it was just there
Speaker 8: was a wall that was about a hundred years old.
Speaker 8: They just went and left it there and they go
Speaker 8: and go and use it. I think that was cool.
Speaker 8: And just a lot of small little bumps and things
Speaker 8: like that that can go and add so much to
Speaker 8: a hole. And it's a really simplistic approach.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think to echo what you said again, you know,
Speaker 2: all the stuff, A lot of the things like at
Speaker 2: North Barrack for instance, that make it so awesome is
Speaker 2: the fact that they didn't have you know, Cat three
Speaker 2: fifties and land levelers to completely smooth out the ground
Speaker 2: and to remove anything that wasn't actually the golf course.
Speaker 2: They just sort of incorporated what was there into the
Speaker 2: golf course. So there's walls and big humps and bumps
Speaker 2: that you would never expect. And you know, maybe with
Speaker 2: the exception of sort of this renaissance of old school design,
Speaker 2: you know, in the past fifteen twenty years or however
Speaker 2: long it's been going on in the United States, we
Speaker 2: see those as imperfections and we work really hard to
Speaker 2: make everything smooth and perfect and a single plane. And
Speaker 2: it's I realized after seeing the links Land golf courses
Speaker 2: that that's really what gives them character and that you know,
Speaker 2: it's just what makes it cool. The golf course is
Speaker 2: just on the land that was there.
Speaker 7: Yeah, And I just think, you know, with with the
Speaker 7: modern architecture currently, I mean, what's going on over there
Speaker 7: on those links land courses is kind of what they're
Speaker 7: trying to emulate with the subtleties and the imperfections within
Speaker 7: the fair ways, and you know, they just it just
Speaker 7: happened there. And you know all the courses being built now,
Speaker 7: you know that are primarily on sand is. You know
Speaker 7: they're trying to duplicate that in one way or another.
Speaker 1: It's pretty interesting.
Speaker 7: But those those green complexes at North Barrick just blew
Speaker 7: me away, Like I could play golf there every day
Speaker 7: and never get bored of it.
Speaker 5: That's what I hear from a lot of people. I
Speaker 5: need to get over there, Jason, have you Ben? So
Speaker 5: you guys have each taken significant undertaken it significant restoration
Speaker 5: work at each of your club's golden age courses. So
Speaker 5: Scott you're at a Allison course, Brian Palmer you're at
Speaker 5: a Rainer course, and Brian Moore you're at a Flynt course,
Speaker 5: some say Colt and Ross course. Many lots of speculation
Speaker 5: as to what the true lineage is there, what's been
Speaker 5: the most rewarding part of the work that you guys
Speaker 5: have done getting it back towards what it was close
Speaker 5: to opening day.
Speaker 2: Like I mean, for me, you know, I'll first say that,
Speaker 2: you know, I my career, it's it's only really recently
Speaker 2: and since this project that I've really gotten interested in
Speaker 2: golf architecture. I didn't grow up a architecture fanatic or anything.
Speaker 2: I just played the courses that were there and you know,
Speaker 2: didn't really think much of it. And what's really interesting
Speaker 2: to me is to appreciate the history, but then just
Speaker 2: how how much little details are so important. You know,
Speaker 2: grass lines. I'm sure we'll talk about grass lines at
Speaker 2: some point, but you know, just putting in the extra
Speaker 2: effort to get the grass lines right for us made
Speaker 2: a huge difference. And then really the to answer, to
Speaker 2: truly answer your question, what's most rewarding, it's just having
Speaker 2: people see the work, and not that it's all mine,
Speaker 2: you know, it's our crew and Urbina and the shapers,
Speaker 2: but and just to see their appreciation and for them
Speaker 2: to not know why necessarily it's so much better, but
Speaker 2: they see the new golf course or that, you know,
Speaker 2: the renovated golf course versus what it was, and they
Speaker 2: immediately find that it's more fun and they have more
Speaker 2: fun playing and you know, they enjoy it.
Speaker 5: So with you getting into architecture more recently, what have
Speaker 5: you done to kind of like learn about Golden Age
Speaker 5: architecture and how has it changed the way you do
Speaker 5: your job on a daily basis.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, quite honestly, I don't know that it
Speaker 2: necessarily changes the way I do my job on a
Speaker 2: daily basis, but it it It just I just try
Speaker 2: to think about things in a different way. And you
Speaker 2: know what I've done is I've you know, taking taken
Speaker 2: the opportunity to go on trips like to the UK,
Speaker 2: and I try to read you know, I'm not going
Speaker 2: to say that I've read every architecture book, but websites
Speaker 2: like Jason's and yours and Golf Club Atlasts and you know,
Speaker 2: I just try to take in information and see how
Speaker 2: it's applicable to what we do at Bobblink, you know,
Speaker 2: because I think, you know, one thing we always say,
Speaker 2: or I always say to our crew is we're either
Speaker 2: getting better we're getting worse. There's no staying the same.
Speaker 2: And you know, if we can use some of the information,
Speaker 2: you know, we have, like there's so much information available
Speaker 2: right now. You know, you don't have to go to
Speaker 2: the library and dig to find out things about Golden
Speaker 2: Age architects. It's it's everywhere. You just type it in
Speaker 2: Google and you know there's information everywhere, so it's really
Speaker 2: easy to learn things.
Speaker 8: Yeah, I think that for the other restoration at Short Acres,
Speaker 8: it was really just there wasn't one sort of as
Speaker 8: like as a singular sort of moment, or if it
Speaker 8: wasn't the bunkers or teas or anything like that. It's
Speaker 8: really just when the members were able to see it
Speaker 8: grown in and see how much it really resembles what
Speaker 8: it looked like in the oldest aerial in nineteen thirty seven,
Speaker 8: I think everyone just just kind of got it. It's the
Speaker 8: aha moment that it's changed and it's changed for the better.
Speaker 3: We Andy and I and people like us obviously love
Speaker 3: to go down rabbit holes of geekery. I'm kind of
Speaker 3: curious to know, I mean, just before and after shots
Speaker 3: of the work that's been done at your respective courses. Obviously,
Speaker 3: I would have to assume ninety nine people out of
Speaker 3: one hundred think it's significantly better.
Speaker 6: Do they care to know.
Speaker 3: Why or are they just happy to know, Wow, this
Speaker 3: is better than it was before. They What level of
Speaker 3: interest do they have in the thinking that goes into
Speaker 3: making decisions big and small.
Speaker 7: I think it varies. I mean, you've got some people
Speaker 7: that want to know why and other people that.
Speaker 1: Don't. Really they're just there to play golf. But yeah, I.
Speaker 7: Think you know, the people that maybe don't necessarily understand
Speaker 7: why you did something, when you have that opportunity to
Speaker 7: describe it to them and tell them why, you know,
Speaker 7: it's kind of like that aha moment. Okay, yeah, I
Speaker 7: get it, it makes sense.
Speaker 8: So yeah, I don't think that that there's a huge
Speaker 8: part of the membership of any club that that really
Speaker 8: we'll go and get into it like that, But there
Speaker 8: is that handful that you know, you know, they'll ask
Speaker 8: questions in quizya and being at short Akers, which is obviously,
Speaker 8: like you said, a Rainer, and having a lot of
Speaker 8: temple holes, and having a lot of members that will
Speaker 8: go play other places. It's when they go and they
Speaker 8: play another Rainer and come back and then they have questions,
Speaker 8: and I think that's that's the best. You know, It's
Speaker 8: when each year. We have interns and I take them
Speaker 8: to Chicago Golf Club or go to Blue Mount. I'm
Speaker 8: trying to teach them about template holes and all that
Speaker 8: sort of stuff, and they kind of look at me
Speaker 8: like I'm a crazy man, and then we go there
Speaker 8: and by like the second te they're like, Okay, I
Speaker 8: get it now. So I think that there's a little
Speaker 8: bit of that too.
Speaker 2: I would say buy and large. The typical golfer, typical
Speaker 2: member or golfer in general does not, and hopefully it's changing.
Speaker 2: But I don't think they really know or care that
Speaker 2: much about really what makes it. Architects are good. They
Speaker 2: just know that certain courses they play they have more fun,
Speaker 2: and certain courses they play and it's not as much fun.
Speaker 2: And so, you know, we have a very small percentage
Speaker 2: I would say at Bobblink that really have gone down
Speaker 2: a rabbit hole to learn about Alison or to learn
Speaker 2: why we did what we did. They just know that
Speaker 2: the conditions are much better. They have more fun when
Speaker 2: they're out there. You know, their guests that they bring
Speaker 2: are happier. You know, it's just they just want to
Speaker 2: go and play, and that's that's cool. I think that's
Speaker 2: it's our job to worry about that stuff, and if
Speaker 2: there are other people that are interested and that can
Speaker 2: want to learn about it, then we love talking about it.
Speaker 5: I agree. I think most people don't know how to
Speaker 5: describe why something. They liked a course more than another one,
Speaker 5: but they know it's better. And I always hate when
Speaker 5: somebody says, you know, I played this course and I
Speaker 5: say how was it and they say hard like the
Speaker 5: first thing that comes. So, you guys are all young,
Speaker 5: and since join, since becoming a part of your club
Speaker 5: and becoming the superintendent there, there's been a significant culture
Speaker 5: change around the club with how it's presented. And you know,
Speaker 5: what were the biggest keys to changing that culture Because
Speaker 5: obviously members always joined clubs because they like the golf course.
Speaker 5: So they spent a ton of money at some point
Speaker 5: liking the golf course. That was the way it was
Speaker 5: before you guys got there.
Speaker 7: I think for me it was pretty easy because right
Speaker 7: me coming in there, they there was a change that
Speaker 7: they wanted. So for me, you know, I was always
Speaker 7: amazed that. You know, you know, they say they want
Speaker 7: firm and fast and brown, but do they really so
Speaker 7: when you start to implement it, I was pretty shocked
Speaker 7: that they.
Speaker 1: Were all on board with it.
Speaker 7: So for me, it was pretty simple. It was, okay,
Speaker 7: let's just keep keep pushing, right, there's no one's complaining.
Speaker 7: Must be doing a good job. Let's just keep pushing. So,
Speaker 7: you know, it was it was changing over before I
Speaker 7: got there, So it was it was pretty easy for me.
Speaker 6: Up at Short Acres.
Speaker 8: I really think it was just the other members were
Speaker 8: interested in change, and they were interested in trying to
Speaker 8: go and restore the golf course and the way it
Speaker 8: used to play. And I'm quite thankful that they go
Speaker 8: and let me tinker and go and let me push
Speaker 8: it and just going go and mess around, and it's
Speaker 8: all for the enjoyment of the members and their guests,
Speaker 8: but to really just to make it play like it
Speaker 8: did one hundred years ago.
Speaker 2: If our membership is a little bit different in the
Speaker 2: in that and our project kind of came about for
Speaker 2: a different reason. You know, our project was not a
Speaker 2: architecturally driven project. First, it was we had significant agonomic issues,
Speaker 2: we had significant drainage issues. Basically it was an infrastructure project.
Speaker 2: And fortunately the board of directors at the time had
Speaker 2: the foresight to realize that this was a great opportunity
Speaker 2: to bring back some of the architectural features that have
Speaker 2: been lost or covered up. And so, you know what
Speaker 2: was the success You know, why was it successful, Bobblink.
Speaker 2: It's because of the board of the directors. They had
Speaker 2: a good pulse on the membership and you know, they
Speaker 2: were willing to stand up and say because it was
Speaker 2: so contrary to what had been done there for one
Speaker 2: hundred years. You know, they had kind of been proud
Speaker 2: of the fact that there were no major projects, there
Speaker 2: were no you know, closures for renovations. But unfortunately the
Speaker 2: infrastructure situation that degraded to the point where we needed
Speaker 2: to intervene in a serious way. And the leaders at
Speaker 2: the board you know, drove the project home. They helped
Speaker 2: focus groups to find out what people wanted, and hired
Speaker 2: a great architect and you know, I think we ended
Speaker 2: up with a pretty good product.
Speaker 5: Speaking of you know, working with architects, so Brian and Scott,
Speaker 5: you work with Jim or being Brian Palmer, you work
Speaker 5: with Tom Doak, how is what keys? And you know,
Speaker 5: with the relationship you guys have built over the last
Speaker 5: year a couple of years or some of them, what
Speaker 5: have been kind of like the things that you've learned
Speaker 5: the most from those relationships.
Speaker 2: Well, for me, I mean, the project was it really
Speaker 2: just opened my eyes to the world of golf architecture.
Speaker 2: You know. Jim Jim Orbin is a really uh he's
Speaker 2: a he's a great guy, and he was really easy
Speaker 2: to get along with, and I could tell from the
Speaker 2: beginning that there was a mutual respect. I think it's
Speaker 2: I think it's really important. I've described this to our
Speaker 2: members and to the guys on our staff, But in
Speaker 2: order to have a successful project, to me, there's like
Speaker 2: a triangle of interests, and on one end is like
Speaker 2: the agronomy and the superintendent pulling in one direction, and
Speaker 2: then on another corner is the membership and what they want,
Speaker 2: which isn't always right, you know, and they're pulling one way,
Speaker 2: and then you need a guy like Orbina or an
Speaker 2: architect to come in and pull that third direction. So
Speaker 2: the triangle sort of evens out and you have a
Speaker 2: balance of what we need agronomically to grow grasp what
Speaker 2: the members want for, you know, how they want to
Speaker 2: use the club, and the respect of the history and
Speaker 2: of the design that was there.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I think the one thing that I have.
Speaker 8: I guess that I've learned the most from from spending
Speaker 8: time with Tom and his associates is they've just got such.
Speaker 6: A keen eye they see everything.
Speaker 8: And I think that's just a neat question to ask
Speaker 8: when you spend time with any architect, when you walk
Speaker 8: down a fairways, just stop and say, okay, so what
Speaker 8: are you looking at right now? And they'll tell you.
Speaker 8: And I guarantee you probably wouldn't ever go and guess
Speaker 8: what they're thinking about. But you know, it's just what
Speaker 8: direction the water is going to be draining off the
Speaker 8: green and just all sorts of things like that. You know,
Speaker 8: it could be a bunker off in the distance on
Speaker 8: a different hole or whatever. And that's been really eye opening,
Speaker 8: quick educational, and it's got me looking at a golf
Speaker 8: course in a totally different manner.
Speaker 7: Yeah, just what they see is completely different than anybody else.
Speaker 7: It's yeah, it's crazy to that they're focusing on something that's,
Speaker 7: you know, two hundred yards away, but it's going to
Speaker 7: come into play on your approach out to this green.
Speaker 7: And you know, working with those guys building the loop,
Speaker 7: just seeing you know what they're focusing on and what
Speaker 7: they're seeing and to hit off of Scott too.
Speaker 1: I mean, you need to.
Speaker 7: Have that relationship with the architect.
Speaker 1: You're working with.
Speaker 7: You know, there's got to be a certain amount of
Speaker 7: trust there where you know, you need to trust them
Speaker 7: that they're going to do what's best, and also you
Speaker 7: know they need to trust you that you can you
Speaker 7: can implement and maintain what they're trying to do. So
Speaker 7: I was always I always just say to them, just
Speaker 7: do what you know, do what you want to do.
Speaker 7: I'll find a way to maintain it.
Speaker 1: So I know.
Speaker 7: Brian's kind of done that up at Short Acres with
Speaker 7: some of these bent grass collars and you know, at
Speaker 7: ninety degree angles, so I don't know how you get
Speaker 7: a mower on it, but scissors right, lots of ropes.
Speaker 3: Speaking of different perspectives, you mentioned the Scott. You mentioned
Speaker 3: the player corner of the triangle there, which I'm sure
Speaker 3: is interesting at times. All three of your clubs have
Speaker 3: a pretty wide range of handicaps from what I understand,
Speaker 3: how do you balance, you know, trying to provide a
Speaker 3: fun and challenging experience for people who are at such
Speaker 3: wildly different ends of the skill spectrum.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm firm and fast.
Speaker 7: Everyone's pretty much gonna love it for the most part.
Speaker 7: You know, to have the old guys, senior members come
Speaker 7: up to you and say they've never hit a drive
Speaker 7: this far. You know, no one's going to complain about
Speaker 7: hitting the ball further than they have before. I think
Speaker 7: when you get to the greens is where it gets
Speaker 7: more trickier, you know, knowing when you should and shouldn't
Speaker 7: push green speed. You know, for certain events, yeah it's
Speaker 7: great too to push, but you know, day in and
Speaker 7: day out, you know, midweek when you got the ladies' days,
Speaker 7: you know they don't want the greens. We're alling thirteen
Speaker 7: plus and putting off the green. So he's got a
Speaker 7: kind of balance and you know, for me, I just
Speaker 7: try to target who's who's playing and when to push
Speaker 7: and when not to push.
Speaker 8: For me, it's really it's a lot about the course
Speaker 8: set up, who's playing. I can see who's playing in
Speaker 8: the morning, and I can see there's eight groups playing,
Speaker 8: and there's four or five groups that I know that
Speaker 8: want to challenge. Then I'll go and you know, give
Speaker 8: them a challenge. But I think that the biggest thing
Speaker 8: is trying to be consistent. I know we spoke on
Speaker 8: it earlier about how hard it is to be consistent.
Speaker 8: But I just just try to keep the greens at
Speaker 8: the same speed all day every day, so that if
Speaker 8: you come out on a Tuesday, they'll probably be just
Speaker 8: as fast as they.
Speaker 6: That would be on a Saturday morning.
Speaker 8: And that makes it, I think easier for everyone just
Speaker 8: to get a gauge so you don't walk out in
Speaker 8: the green and say, oh, well it's lower than yesterday.
Speaker 6: Or whatever it was.
Speaker 8: But I think there's a lot to be to be
Speaker 8: set about course set up, and I think it's a
Speaker 8: lot of clubs.
Speaker 6: It isn't taken to us seriously.
Speaker 8: It's more of just a chore, and it's something that
Speaker 8: that I think a lot of thoughts should be I
Speaker 8: put into it when it's performed in the morning.
Speaker 2: I don't know that I have a whole lot to
Speaker 2: add to that, because these guys made some great points,
Speaker 2: but i'll just echo that. Well. One of the things
Speaker 2: that we did in our project is we added some
Speaker 2: tees to help with some of the aging members, you know,
Speaker 2: some forward tees and encouraging people to play the golf
Speaker 2: course a little bit shorter. And then you mix that
Speaker 2: with having typically firmer conditions when the weather allows, and
Speaker 2: some expanded bent grass around greens that allow for a
Speaker 2: variety of shots and so that you're not always you know,
Speaker 2: having to fluff a sixty degree wedge out of the rough,
Speaker 2: you know, to get it up on the green. And
Speaker 2: so just having variety and allowing different players to play
Speaker 2: different shots. You know. It's the funny thing about bank
Speaker 2: grass around greens is it's easier for the high handicapper
Speaker 2: and it's just as challenging for the low handicapper, you know,
Speaker 2: because the high handicapper can pull a hybrid out and
Speaker 2: bump it up the slope or you know, put the ball,
Speaker 2: whereas it makes the good golfer think, you know, about
Speaker 2: how they want to play shots.
Speaker 5: So just variety is big for us with short grass
Speaker 5: around the greens. I'm a big proponent of it. I
Speaker 5: think exactly what Scott said. It makes it easier for
Speaker 5: the high handicapper and actually probably a little bit more
Speaker 5: challenging for the low handicapper. But one of the issues
Speaker 5: is people when you change something like and you go
Speaker 5: to short grass, people don't it's different and they don't
Speaker 5: know how to play it. It's not as simple. Is
Speaker 5: there anything that you guys have done to kind of
Speaker 5: educate your membership on how to how it's changed and
Speaker 5: how it's you know, you can play it differently now.
Speaker 2: I mean, I can't take any credit for it. Our
Speaker 2: head pro Dan Waters did a great job with kind
Speaker 2: of getting ahead of that stuff. One of the things
Speaker 2: that we did with our renovations we don't have a
Speaker 2: step cut, we don't have any callers, so it goes
Speaker 2: green right to rough up against our greens, and so
Speaker 2: initially that was something that was difficult for people to
Speaker 2: understand why we did that. But he did a great
Speaker 2: job of, you know, giving a group lesson or putting
Speaker 2: a video together to explain how to hit a certain
Speaker 2: shot or these are the options you can play. So
Speaker 2: you know, that's collaboration with him is how we kind
Speaker 2: of got the members on board with it.
Speaker 8: I think with all the short grass, I don't know
Speaker 8: if there's been a lot of education. I just think
Speaker 8: that it's been something that a lot of golfers have
Speaker 8: had to go and relearn. I think it's a shot
Speaker 8: that they would hit maybe twenty five or forty or
Speaker 8: fifty years ago, or on a.
Speaker 6: Trip to Ireland or Scotland.
Speaker 8: I've had members come up and say, yeah, you know,
Speaker 8: it's supposed to be getting you know, pretty firm and
Speaker 8: dry out there, and I'm going to Ireland next week,
Speaker 8: so I'm gonna, you know, I'm gonna go hit some
Speaker 8: bump shots from you know, forty or fifty yards out.
Speaker 8: I'm gonna get the putter out and it's just playing
Speaker 8: all the shots that they used to play. That there's
Speaker 8: I guess getting more comfortable with nowadays.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I just use the putter more, just putt it.
Speaker 5: It's like they had that scratch video that you know,
Speaker 5: they they put out the PGA Tourist thing that was
Speaker 5: like they did like a remix version of you know,
Speaker 5: all these highlights and it was just putt It's it's
Speaker 5: so much easier for the regular player to, uh to
Speaker 5: do so. How often in the summer do you guys
Speaker 5: get around and see other, you know, people in this
Speaker 5: room's work And is there an instance where you took
Speaker 5: something that you saw across the street or down the
Speaker 5: street and implement it immediately into your operation.
Speaker 7: I think of the summer it's probably less. It's spring
Speaker 7: fall is when we probably venture out more. I know
Speaker 7: in the summer, I just don't want to leave. But yeah,
Speaker 7: you always try to look at just even like now
Speaker 7: for organizational like you know, walking around people's shops and
Speaker 7: what are they doing here? What are they doing there?
Speaker 7: Just trying to grab ideas. But yeah, I mean I
Speaker 7: think it's always it's always nice to go see Brian
Speaker 7: and see how firm as fairways are and you know,
Speaker 7: maybe push you a little bit.
Speaker 1: You know, well, I'm not going to water tonight.
Speaker 7: I got to try to catch up to him. So yeah,
Speaker 7: I think we're competitive in nature, so it's always nice
Speaker 7: to get out and go see people and either you know,
Speaker 7: gauge what you're doing against that or using this motivation.
Speaker 5: Do you ever get to say like, hey, you know
Speaker 5: so and so is doing this over there, so that's
Speaker 5: why I did this here?
Speaker 7: Do you ever use No, But we'll call each other
Speaker 7: and say, oh, you know, call up Scott Bordner and
Speaker 7: be like, hey, heard your pretty soft down there, heard
Speaker 7: your pretty green. You know, just try to rile each
Speaker 7: other up.
Speaker 5: You guys shouldn't make sure it's to say are you soft?
Speaker 5: You know you soft? Bro?
Speaker 8: Yeah, something that between myself and Brian Moore and Scott
Speaker 8: Board and we've got a pretty good little relationship going
Speaker 8: and we definitely like to to go and push the
Speaker 8: buttons if we can so. And I mean, it always
Speaker 8: helps out when you have interns and you can go
Speaker 8: and make those those field trips, or if you if
Speaker 8: you have a rain day and it's just nasty, you
Speaker 8: just go send the crew home and you know, just
Speaker 8: go take your assistance and interns to go for a
Speaker 8: walk somewhere. And I think you're always gonna go and
Speaker 8: learn something if it's the way that they're doing divots,
Speaker 8: if it's the way that I mean, there's just a
Speaker 8: million different ways to improve. But if you just go
Speaker 8: and find that one thing on a golf trip, you know,
Speaker 8: to go and make your operation that much better than
Speaker 8: it was a it was a worthy trip.
Speaker 2: I think it's really hard to get out in the summer.
Speaker 2: It can be, and it kind of at least the
Speaker 2: people that I work for and the way I kind
Speaker 2: of grew up in the business, like there's a vortex
Speaker 2: of like one hundred days in the summer where historically
Speaker 2: you're like married to your golf course and you don't leave.
Speaker 2: With that being said, I've really tried to make an
Speaker 2: effort to break out of that, and not only for
Speaker 2: myself but the people that work at Babbling, to try
Speaker 2: to like explain like it's okay, Like it's okay if
Speaker 2: we go somewhere else, or if you take a day off,
Speaker 2: or if we leave early because it rained, or you know,
Speaker 2: we I've just tried to do a better job of
Speaker 2: not feeling like you have to be at the golf
Speaker 2: course all the time. And I think it just going
Speaker 2: to see somebody else's golf course just kind of puts
Speaker 2: into perspective what you're doing and whether the golf course
Speaker 2: is better or worse, or you know, it's not necessarily that,
Speaker 2: it's just to see something else. You know, you look
Speaker 2: at the same thing over and over again for one
Speaker 2: hundred days, and it's like it gets worse in your mind,
Speaker 2: or you don't really you lose perspective, and then you
Speaker 2: go and see something else and it kind of brings
Speaker 2: everything back together and you realize, you know, we're all
Speaker 2: doing the same basic thing. We're all doing a good job.
Speaker 2: You know, it's just good to see other places. So
Speaker 2: I don't get out as much in the summer as
Speaker 2: I do in the spring, and fall, winter. But I've
Speaker 2: kind of made like a note in my mind, like
Speaker 2: do it get out, see a couple golf courses in
Speaker 2: the summer, just to put things back into perspective of
Speaker 2: where you actually are.
Speaker 7: And it's just so easy around here because there's so
Speaker 7: much good golf and great superintendents where you can I mean,
Speaker 7: for me, I can drive I don't know ten minutes
Speaker 7: and see three guys. So it's sometimes you just gotta
Speaker 7: get away too.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'll never forget being on a trip to Long
Speaker 3: Island with Brian Bossert from Brynmar and we we were
Speaker 3: at Piping Rock and we were walking off one of
Speaker 3: the tea's and there was a candy wrapper in the
Speaker 3: fescue and he picked it up and you could just
Speaker 3: tell like his relaxation level increased, so because he's like,
Speaker 3: so it wants everything to be perfect at his own club,
Speaker 3: and he's like, oh my god, if if if on
Speaker 3: Long Island they have candy wrappers on the ground, I
Speaker 3: guess I can relax a little bit. So speaking of
Speaker 3: getting out and about you know, playing versus just taking
Speaker 3: a walk. Is one better or the other than the other,
Speaker 3: or do you just get different things when you do
Speaker 3: a play versus a walk.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I think it's important to play your course. You know,
Speaker 7: it's hard to say you're gonna play every week but
Speaker 7: at least a couple of times a month because you
Speaker 7: just see something from the golfer shoes. But you know,
Speaker 7: when I'm going to see people, I don't. Yeah, you're
Speaker 7: just getting away sometimes the last thing you want to
Speaker 7: do is play. But just go walk and talk and
Speaker 7: what are you doing here?
Speaker 1: You know, this is my issue.
Speaker 7: I heard you're doing something similar, you know, like I
Speaker 7: don't have callers like Scott either, and so what are
Speaker 7: you doing? But it's always great to go play.
Speaker 8: Yeah, I really think it's important just to go and
Speaker 8: just to go out and walk. You know, if you're
Speaker 8: playing and your balls on the right hand side of
Speaker 8: the fairway and you want to go and see, you know,
Speaker 8: something that's open they had left hand side, it makes
Speaker 8: an awfully difficult to do. So just important just just
Speaker 8: to go and walk somebody else's courses, and just like
Speaker 8: Brian said, just to just to go and ask questions
Speaker 8: and bounce ideas. You know, there's some people in this
Speaker 8: room that I really trust. And if I'm going to
Speaker 8: make a change in something. Are gonna use something different
Speaker 8: or do something different than I mean, I'm always gonna
Speaker 8: go and ask a question first.
Speaker 6: I think that's important.
Speaker 2: I think for me it's both. But I think there
Speaker 2: are different versions of playing golf. For me, playing golf
Speaker 2: doesn't have to be start on hold one, play eighteen holes,
Speaker 2: grind it out, keep score, you know, keep track of
Speaker 2: all your shots. Like for me, playing golf can be
Speaker 2: just walking the golf course at the end of the day,
Speaker 2: excuse me, with a wedge and a putter and hitting
Speaker 2: a few shots, putting around, chipping. You know, I do
Speaker 2: that frequently all day and that to me, that's as
Speaker 2: important as anything else. It doesn't have to be eighteen holes,
Speaker 2: you know, regimented. You know, it's okay to just go
Speaker 2: play a hole or two or you know, and to
Speaker 2: echo Brian what Brian said, you know, just walking getting
Speaker 2: off the golf cart. Whether you're a golfer or a superintendent,
Speaker 2: it's it's the best thing. You just you appreciate things
Speaker 2: in a different way.
Speaker 7: You know.
Speaker 2: I walk the golf course every day that I can
Speaker 2: in the winter and a lot of days in the summer.
Speaker 2: You know, it's just a it's a good way to
Speaker 2: see the golf course for me.
Speaker 8: Yeah, I think it's important in the morning in the
Speaker 8: summer just to walk. So for at least at least
Speaker 8: one morning in the summer every week, just to walk
Speaker 8: and don't walk in order. There's a lot of things
Speaker 8: that I can see if you walk right down the
Speaker 8: middle of the fairway every time. So I'm all over
Speaker 8: the place. I mean, I'll lose my cart some days,
Speaker 8: and I'm just kind of out about wandering around. But
Speaker 8: I mean that's the only way that you're going to
Speaker 8: go and see things, and you know, if you're on foot.
Speaker 5: That's the way the architects do it too. I always
Speaker 5: find it funny, having walk some courses. How you go
Speaker 5: into a shop and if you're with an architect, the
Speaker 5: staff is always like, oh, we got to you can
Speaker 5: take a card and always walk. I see, the only
Speaker 5: way you can see everything because you you can take
Speaker 5: your time, and you know you're not driving to a
Speaker 5: certain destination, so you can take sidetracks and everything. We're
Speaker 5: gonna do like a scenario here, you know, So if
Speaker 5: all you guys were moved a new job tomorrow and
Speaker 5: you took over a course, that would had all the
Speaker 5: typical American golf problems. It's too overwatered, overtreed, shrunk greens.
Speaker 5: What would be kind of your first objectives?
Speaker 7: Put a plan in place, just map it out, you know,
Speaker 7: give give you know, if it's private, give the membership.
Speaker 7: You know, your roadmap for the for the first year, goals,
Speaker 7: how you're going to obtain the goals and go from there.
Speaker 8: Yeah, And I also think it depends on the architect.
Speaker 8: What kind of course. Is it a Golden Age course?
Speaker 8: Is it a new course. There's a lot that you
Speaker 8: have to think about, and there's gonna be a lot
Speaker 8: of education, and there's a good chance that it's probably
Speaker 8: if it is overtreated or overwatered or whatever, it's by
Speaker 8: being away for a long time. So to go and
Speaker 8: take your time, go and develop a plan. If you
Speaker 8: have an architect, try and develop a master plan and
Speaker 8: go that route. But a lot of education.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think typically, you know, we're maybe a unique
Speaker 2: group because we've been at courses that have worked with
Speaker 2: great architects and have an architectural pedigree. But if I
Speaker 2: take a new job, first thing I'm looking at as
Speaker 2: grass and it's pretty likely that the reason they hired
Speaker 2: me is because they're not happy with the turf, and
Speaker 2: so you know, having a background in architecture would allow
Speaker 2: me to think of things a little bit differently. But ultimately,
Speaker 2: you know, you originally hired typically to grow grass, and
Speaker 2: you know, you make a plan and hopefully you can
Speaker 2: make architectural improvements in house or however, you know, to
Speaker 2: to allow people to have more fun and enjoy the
Speaker 2: golf course.
Speaker 5: So what's the most unique and resourceful solution that you've
Speaker 5: come up with for a problem at your course.
Speaker 1: It's a good one. Yeah, you're not. I mean.
Speaker 7: I think we always try to look on you know,
Speaker 7: what can we reuse?
Speaker 1: Right, I know, just trying to like reuse.
Speaker 7: I did a couple of fairway expansions last spring and
Speaker 7: just you know, where can I reuse that that rough sod?
Speaker 7: So we covered up some some stump holes.
Speaker 6: Uh.
Speaker 8: And I think in my operation, it's really I think,
Speaker 8: like everybody else in this room, we're having a tough
Speaker 8: time with labor, and it's how can how can we
Speaker 8: go and change things and go and go and develop
Speaker 8: or keep the same conditions but with a lot less inputs,
Speaker 8: whether it's Triplex's which for.
Speaker 6: The longest time was.
Speaker 8: You know, it was against the rules to have a
Speaker 8: triplex and a green you know, they work just fine,
Speaker 8: and they cut just as good as a walk mower.
Speaker 8: And if we can go and go and get away
Speaker 8: with it, that's the third of the guys that we
Speaker 8: would have the walk mall just you know, different things
Speaker 8: like that, if we can go and get rid of
Speaker 8: the step cut and we can do that, and that's
Speaker 8: one last guy in the morning. I think the bunker
Speaker 8: maintenance and now has changed quite a bit. I don't
Speaker 8: know about about all you guys, but uh, you know
Speaker 8: now we're allowed to go and get away with only
Speaker 8: giving a full rake in the bunkers maybe twice a
Speaker 8: week and just go and touch them up rather than
Speaker 8: send him a full.
Speaker 6: Crew of six guys out every day.
Speaker 8: There's just a lot I think in the maintenance that
Speaker 8: that we do every day and don't even think about.
Speaker 6: It's kind of a hard question to ask.
Speaker 2: Yeah'm probably not going to directly answer your question because
Speaker 2: I can't think of anything. But I think there's very
Speaker 2: few like truly new ideas, and it's just sort of
Speaker 2: adapting things that you wouldn't necessarily have done in different ways,
Speaker 2: and that's not a very good answer. But one of
Speaker 2: the things that we always focus is focus on is
Speaker 2: trying to see what we're doing that it causes damage.
Speaker 2: I'm sure these guys would agree that. You know, a
Speaker 2: lot of times things don't look good on a golf course,
Speaker 2: or you have areas that wear out turf, and you're like,
Speaker 2: you know what is going on, and then you actually
Speaker 2: observe what's happening with your staff or the routines that
Speaker 2: you get into, and you're destroying your own turf because
Speaker 2: guys are making turns in the same spots or you know,
Speaker 2: you're doing things the same way. So it's just this
Speaker 2: is not answering your question, but it's something else that
Speaker 2: you know, we just trying to realize that we can
Speaker 2: sometimes be our own worse enemy. Less is more at times.
Speaker 6: Yeah, there's no doubt.
Speaker 8: I mean I think that we've probably all want killed
Speaker 8: more grass than a disease, golf or anything.
Speaker 7: Yeah, sometimes it makes perfect sense in your mind and
Speaker 7: then you do it and you're like, I don't know, hey, Funnerberg.
Speaker 1: What do you think of this? Ure?
Speaker 2: By nature? We always want to try to do something
Speaker 2: to fix things. Yes, less more yes, sometimes the best
Speaker 2: thing to do is nothing.
Speaker 7: Do you really need a roll today?
Speaker 2: Probably not?
Speaker 5: Yeah, So November first, you guys have touched on it
Speaker 5: a little bit. But you know, one of our members
Speaker 5: of our audience urged me that we had to talk
Speaker 5: about water usage. Is that something that you found less
Speaker 5: is more is good with water?
Speaker 2: It depends on the circumstance, you know, it's just everything circumstantial. So,
Speaker 2: you know, bobblink, you know, we strive for firm, fast conditions. However,
Speaker 2: seven twy percent of our golf rounds are with golf carts.
Speaker 2: It's just what it's the way the members operate. So,
Speaker 2: you know, whereas we would like to never water our
Speaker 2: fairways because we could get away with it, we have
Speaker 2: a lot of golf carts running overhere those areas. So
Speaker 2: we have to find a balance between what's appropriate for
Speaker 2: play and what is going to keep grass alive. And
Speaker 2: so typically it's it's always better to be too dry
Speaker 2: than too wet.
Speaker 1: But I always add more.
Speaker 2: You can always add more.
Speaker 1: Hard to take it away.
Speaker 2: It's very hard to take it away if we're you know,
Speaker 2: we're in a place that floods. You know more, too
Speaker 2: much water is always worse than not enough, so probably
Speaker 2: less is more most most cases.
Speaker 7: Yeah, and just knowing when right. You gotta know when
Speaker 7: to push doesn't matter. You know what Brian Palmer's doing.
Speaker 7: You want to push, but you like, no, that's a
Speaker 7: bad idea. You know, I'm gonna be a little soft
Speaker 7: today and you know, spend the heads to night. But yeah,
Speaker 7: it's just knowing when when and when not to, probably.
Speaker 1: More importantly when not to.
Speaker 7: Yeah, sometimes you gotta put your ego aside and do
Speaker 7: what's best for the plant.
Speaker 5: What's your biggest pet?
Speaker 7: Peeves, Oh, it's a lot, there's a lot. I hate
Speaker 7: when people slam the golf stick on the green. It's like,
Speaker 7: come on right, spend over. I just hate it. It's
Speaker 7: just like, let me put it here and then drop it.
Speaker 7: Oh my gosh, it just drives me crazy.
Speaker 2: I do that sometimes. Yeah, I'm an offender.
Speaker 1: Yeah, just bend over.
Speaker 7: And you know there's always that one guy you see
Speaker 7: walks over the edge and puts it down.
Speaker 1: You're like, that guy gets it, you know.
Speaker 8: I think now again, like most people in this whole
Speaker 8: room would would agree with with all these new spikes.
Speaker 8: It's just if we could all have some nice old
Speaker 8: old school metal spikes again, and just go and keep
Speaker 8: your feet quiet, don't be moving, no twisting, don't drag
Speaker 8: your feet. I mean, just gon't think about the people
Speaker 8: that are playing behind you, because you know you have
Speaker 8: two people that are dragging their heels all over the places.
Speaker 8: It's just kind of destroyed for the rest of the day.
Speaker 6: And I don't like when.
Speaker 8: I mean, it isn't always a caddy, but it'll be
Speaker 8: a member as well when the flag stick is in
Speaker 8: the cup and they'll go and and take like the
Speaker 8: flag and go and bend at a forty five degree angle,
Speaker 8: and then for the whole rest of the day the
Speaker 8: flags kind of rock and just kind of sway in
Speaker 8: the breeze at an angle because the whole whole cup's ruined.
Speaker 5: I agree.
Speaker 2: You know we're going to get into overrated, underrated.
Speaker 5: But golf shoes way overrated.
Speaker 6: Gosh, yeah, I agree.
Speaker 2: I could go down the rabbit hole of like grumpy
Speaker 2: super gripes. But all I will say is that when
Speaker 2: I grew up growing up learning how to play golf,
Speaker 2: my grandfather and my father would always tell me it
Speaker 2: was like the first rule, you always leave the golf
Speaker 2: course in better condition than when you step foot on it.
Speaker 2: And now my dad was superintendent. I don't know if
Speaker 2: other people learned golf that way, but I was always taught.
Speaker 2: You know, you fix your ball mark and one other
Speaker 2: at least you always repair a divot if it's unrepaired.
Speaker 2: And so for me, you know, the biggest complaint is that,
Speaker 2: and we should just do this in life generally, is
Speaker 2: try to leave things better than the way we found them.
Speaker 2: I just wish more people sort of had that attitude
Speaker 2: with golf courses. I see it every golf course you
Speaker 2: go to, you know, unfixed ball marks, un rake bunkers, divots,
Speaker 2: it's the same stuff, you know, taking a post down
Speaker 2: to hit a shot and don't put it back up,
Speaker 2: that kind of stuff. It's just common courtesy.
Speaker 3: I'm a do sweeping offender, and we talked about morning
Speaker 3: routine earlier, unapologetic do sweeping offender. So on a scale
Speaker 3: of one to ten, with ten being like super nova
Speaker 3: level of annoyed, how annoyed is Dan Lucas at Kingsley
Speaker 3: Club with me for going out and starting about five
Speaker 3: minutes before the official start time every time I play,
Speaker 3: and running up on his guys who are trying to
Speaker 3: mow greens and fairways.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm sure.
Speaker 7: The operators are probably more frustrated than anything. It's not
Speaker 7: you that's necessarily the problem, but I think it's you know,
Speaker 7: our staff.
Speaker 1: We teach to be courteous and to get out.
Speaker 7: Of the way, and you know, the first people offerre
Speaker 7: they're always like, well, I don't care if they're in
Speaker 7: my way, but yeah, they're gonna pull off to the side,
Speaker 7: And it's just that compounding, you know, effect on everything
Speaker 7: else that you know, five minutes here, a minute there where.
Speaker 7: Next thing you know, you're making the turn and you're,
Speaker 7: you know, a half hour behind. And now the people
Speaker 7: that do care are the ones that are you know,
Speaker 7: you're waiting on.
Speaker 1: And once you wait.
Speaker 6: You're done.
Speaker 7: You might as well just start rolling the green and
Speaker 7: get the do off and head home because it's hard
Speaker 7: to catch up. Yeah.
Speaker 8: I mean, if it's a person that's gonna go out
Speaker 8: and do it every day, then the crew is gonna
Speaker 8: know who it is and know that you don't care
Speaker 8: if you keep mowing, so just keep going. You know,
Speaker 8: you're not a person if there's a lot of doing
Speaker 8: the green, you're not gonna go and line it up.
Speaker 8: You probably gonna have your bag in your back and
Speaker 8: go put it and then if it's close, you're gonna
Speaker 8: pick it up.
Speaker 5: Right.
Speaker 6: So this isn't too big of a deal.
Speaker 8: But you know, if it's a forceom that wants everything
Speaker 8: to be taken care of prior to them, it can
Speaker 8: make it pretty tricky. But we always need to find
Speaker 8: a way. Scott talked about the problem solving and it's
Speaker 8: a pretty cool aspect of our job, and yeah, we'll
Speaker 8: figure it out.
Speaker 2: It's it's the it's the expectations of the deuce sweeper.
Speaker 2: You know, if it's somebody that's gonna take their time
Speaker 2: and realize that you know, like like Brian said that
Speaker 2: if we don't get the golf course prepared, you might
Speaker 2: not care, but the guys behind you probably do care
Speaker 2: if the golf course isn't perfect when they get there.
Speaker 2: And so so, you know, if we lose that one
Speaker 2: opportunity of the day to work unimpeded, then it does
Speaker 2: sort of set everything else back. So a lot of times,
Speaker 2: if we have an early group that you know, wants
Speaker 2: to tee off early or you know, play really quick,
Speaker 2: we send them out in front of our maintenance and
Speaker 2: then have them loop back around. And it's sort of
Speaker 2: that way. It doesn't impede our routine because we you know,
Speaker 2: our schedules. I mean, it seems very simple and it
Speaker 2: really it's not rocket science, but we put a lot
Speaker 2: of effort into figuring out who's going to do what
Speaker 2: and how certain pieces are going to fit together to
Speaker 2: be able to get things mode raked, watered, rolled, of course,
Speaker 2: set up done, you know, all in an order that
Speaker 2: makes sense so that when guys finish those jobs, they
Speaker 2: can move on to their next task. And you know,
Speaker 2: if you haven't. We always deal with unexpected things equipment
Speaker 2: breaks down or whatnot. But you know, having a forty
Speaker 2: five minute delay or fifteen minute delay on one thing
Speaker 2: can set something else back, you know, twofold. So it's
Speaker 2: it's really just all the planning, but it's what makes
Speaker 2: it fun. It's like a chess match. You know, you're
Speaker 2: at the pawn and we're the king.
Speaker 6: Question.
Speaker 4: It kind of goes with the annoyances As a superintendent.
Speaker 4: One of my biggest pet peeves is watching other superintendents peves.
Speaker 2: On social media because at the.
Speaker 4: End of the day, that's what they're painous to do,
Speaker 4: and we've seen it over the years, and I know
Speaker 4: that's pretty well. I'm sure social media is gonna come up.
Speaker 4: But what you guys think about.
Speaker 7: Your communication and social media?
Speaker 4: I'm sure you've seen that in your community out there,
Speaker 4: there's definitely.
Speaker 2: There.
Speaker 4: But do you guys feel about what should be out there?
Speaker 7: What's too much shou Yeah, I just don't put anything
Speaker 7: out there.
Speaker 1: I think.
Speaker 7: You know Twitter, right, I think it can be extremely useful,
Speaker 7: but also I think it could be pretty negative at times.
Speaker 7: And yeah, you just got to be really careful with that.
Speaker 7: I don't I just stay away from it. It's uh,
Speaker 7: if you're not doing it, you can't you know, offend
Speaker 7: anybody or but yeah, it's it's tricky. I don't think
Speaker 7: either of us really do too much on it. But
Speaker 7: I think it could be useful, you know, course conditions
Speaker 7: this and that.
Speaker 1: But yeah, yeah, it's.
Speaker 5: Like I think I've said enough. It's like when I
Speaker 5: always get frustrated when journalists or like you know, influencers
Speaker 5: on social media take to like their travel problems. It's like,
Speaker 5: I don't follow you for your travel problems.
Speaker 2: I hate that. Yeah, I think knowes what happened.
Speaker 5: More positive you know point out the.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think you know, I'm moderately engaged on social media.
Speaker 2: I think it's an interesting platform. There's a lot of
Speaker 2: people that give in put interesting information on social media,
Speaker 2: but I'm not I do not engage in conversation or
Speaker 2: state opinions or it's just it's it's unfortunate because you know,
Speaker 2: when you meet someone face to face and you have
Speaker 2: a conversation, uh, there's very rarely. You know, there are
Speaker 2: certain people and there are certain you know, incidents, but
Speaker 2: people are generally nice to each other. And when you're
Speaker 2: behind a device, you know that filter. And it's not
Speaker 2: saying that everybody needs to be filtered all the time,
Speaker 2: but people just feel like they can say whatever they
Speaker 2: want and you don't realize that anyone can see it.
Speaker 2: And it's just a it's a slippery slope. It's a
Speaker 2: slippery slope. I think it's it's a big mistake to
Speaker 2: state opinions because you never know it could come back
Speaker 2: and the next job you apply for, the guy looks
Speaker 2: at your Twitter and it feels completely opposite of you
Speaker 2: politically or you know, especially politics. You know, that's like
Speaker 2: the last thing you want to put on social media.
Speaker 2: Because you might need to be hired again someday and
Speaker 2: they could come back to bite you. It's silly, but
Speaker 2: that's the world we live in. I think.
Speaker 5: If Phil perfect, the question, the question is what is
Speaker 5: your perfect day on a golf course look like? From
Speaker 5: a superintendent?
Speaker 1: Superintendent?
Speaker 7: So, first off the bat right, everyone shows up, no breakdowns.
Speaker 7: It's probably maybe starts off morning fifty to fifty five,
Speaker 7: slight breeze from the north, maybe a little bit of clouds,
Speaker 7: and then it opens up, gets.
Speaker 1: To about seventy two.
Speaker 7: You know, take take the sweater off.
Speaker 1: And that's about it.
Speaker 7: Hang the hose up for the day. Maybe drive around,
Speaker 7: say hi, make sure everything's good. It's probably my dream day.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I think I'm pretty close to Brian there.
Speaker 8: As long as everyone's on time, nothing breaks down, you know,
Speaker 8: obviously the conditions are what you want. It to be
Speaker 8: pretty dry, hopefully have a clear day. You don't go
Speaker 8: and find anything unexpected out there. You know, there isn't
Speaker 8: a dead deer in a fairway, or does skunk here.
Speaker 6: Something like that.
Speaker 8: That's always kind of fun to deal with. But yeah,
Speaker 8: just a nice day with no obstructions and no unexpected
Speaker 8: events would be nice.
Speaker 1: Maybe good lunch too.
Speaker 7: It's a nice lunch, would really tie it all together.
Speaker 6: That's some pretzels.
Speaker 1: Pretzel.
Speaker 2: It starts with a good cup of coffee, fifty five degrees,
Speaker 2: gets up to about seventy, no clouds, and then being
Speaker 2: a mile and a half from Lake Michigan, the air
Speaker 2: conditioner turns on, gets to about seventy five and then
Speaker 2: next thing you know, it's sixty seven clear day.
Speaker 1: Throw the sweater back on.
Speaker 2: Yeah, put the sweater back on. Now, you know there
Speaker 2: is Every day is a good day if you're on
Speaker 2: a golf course. In my opinion. I agree, even the
Speaker 2: worst day on a golf course is better than the
Speaker 2: best day stuck in an office in my opinion. So
Speaker 2: you know, I like my job, the good and the bad,
Speaker 2: the weather. You know, it's also fun sometimes when it's
Speaker 2: pouring down rain and you're out there walking around with
Speaker 2: a rain suit on, and you come in and people
Speaker 2: look at you like you're absolutely insane, and you're like,
Speaker 2: this is awesome. You know, I'm out in the rain,
Speaker 2: and you know you're stuck in traffic somewhere. So I
Speaker 2: like it all. I like the turf part and the
Speaker 2: architecture part and the my staff part, the political stuff
Speaker 2: with the membership is probably the least fun part of it.
Speaker 2: At times, I've got a great membership, but you know,
Speaker 2: those are the things that make the job difficult. It
Speaker 2: was just grass and our staff, it'd be a piece
Speaker 2: of cake.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So do you have to fight to get does
Speaker 3: the office have a gravitational pull for you in your
Speaker 3: day or do you have to fight to get out
Speaker 3: there on the course and stay out on the course.
Speaker 7: Or no, No, it's the opposite. It's like you got
Speaker 7: to find it makes the time to be.
Speaker 1: In the office.
Speaker 7: That's my least favorite part, dealing with paperwork and yeah,
Speaker 7: outside all.
Speaker 1: The time.
Speaker 6: With Brian. I don't know.
Speaker 8: If I do spend time in the office, it's after
Speaker 8: course set up, so maybe like an hour or two
Speaker 8: prior to lunch, and then all afternoon out on the
Speaker 8: course and all evening.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Probably, much to the dismay of our accountant. The
Speaker 2: bills tend to stack up on the desk because that's
Speaker 2: the last thing you want to do with it inside
Speaker 2: On a nice day or even or if it's a
Speaker 2: bad day, you don't want to sit in the office either.
Speaker 2: You want to either be gone or be out doing
Speaker 2: something so playing in the flood. Not yeah exactly, but
Speaker 2: the galoshes on.
Speaker 5: What's the like nerdiest golf rabbit hole you find yourself
Speaker 5: going down a.
Speaker 2: Lot, uh historicerials dot com or Google maps or I
Speaker 2: just love like, like especially if you can find like
Speaker 2: different eras of photos, just like watching how golf courses evolve.
Speaker 2: And uh, it's I mean, that's when I get sucked
Speaker 2: in the office if I start looking at aerial photos,
Speaker 2: because hours will pass and I'll be like a little geez,
Speaker 2: I gotta get home.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I'm with Scott.
Speaker 8: There's there's so much online you're talking about, all the information.
Speaker 8: You can watch courses of all of them. You can
Speaker 8: go in see your property and hopefully you know, you
Speaker 8: end up like coming across an old image of your
Speaker 8: place or something like that they haven't seen before. But
Speaker 8: all the information, all the old black and whites. It's fantastic.
Speaker 7: Yeah, same you just yeah, we're shoot at six o'clock.
Speaker 6: I gotta go.
Speaker 5: Where's the weirdest place that you found something really cool
Speaker 5: at your club?
Speaker 7: Ah? Well, I don't know if I want to talk
Speaker 7: about it, but I've found some weird stuff borderline gruesome,
Speaker 7: but yeah, I don't think I want to share it.
Speaker 7: I kind of was one of those things you wish
Speaker 7: you get on, say.
Speaker 2: It's getting dark, it is getting dark.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 7: It's always good to get up in the attic and basement.
Speaker 7: And one of the first things I did was just
Speaker 7: clean the shop. And the amount of old periodicals you
Speaker 7: find and the stuff that you're kind of grateful that
Speaker 7: somebody decided to keep old magazines from like the twenties
Speaker 7: and thirties.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 8: Yeah, it's always pretty interesting just to go cleaning and
Speaker 8: just to look. I mean, obviously you're gonna expect to
Speaker 8: go and go and find some old old maps and
Speaker 8: a map drawer, but you know it's the one on
Speaker 8: the bottom or the one that's rolled up in the
Speaker 8: back forty somewhere that you go.
Speaker 6: You know, it's almost like you strake gold. That's fun.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, pretty much the same. We did find some
Speaker 2: cool stuff when we rebuilt the golf course. We found
Speaker 2: some arrowheads and some horse old horseshoes and like a
Speaker 2: railroad spike, and you know, you just kind of wonder, like,
Speaker 2: how did that stuff get there? Why is it here?
Speaker 2: You know, Bob iLINK was a horse farm at one time.
Speaker 2: It just kind of makes you think, like, man, some
Speaker 2: of these trees have been here that long. You know
Speaker 2: that if there's only the trees had eyes, you know,
Speaker 2: tell me what had happened here two hundred years ago.
Speaker 3: What role does photography, either historic or current play, and
Speaker 3: how you're able to do your job.
Speaker 7: I think from a documentation standpoint, it's great, you know,
Speaker 7: with Scott just doing that big project, if you can
Speaker 7: get an actual picture of you know, what you put
Speaker 7: in drainage wise, or you know, the use of drones
Speaker 7: now where you can you know, use it to log information,
Speaker 7: you know, power lines and stuff like that, so you
Speaker 7: can go and find it at.
Speaker 1: A later date.
Speaker 7: And then obviously for you know, all future work you're
Speaker 7: looking to do to have that historical documentation. And it's
Speaker 7: a big difference between you know, having the you know,
Speaker 7: two thousand foot overview versus you know shots of you know,
Speaker 7: your approachot into the green where you could.
Speaker 1: Get that third dimension look to it. I think it's
Speaker 1: it's all important.
Speaker 7: It's really just you know, what are you trying to do?
Speaker 7: Are you going to make changes for the future, and
Speaker 7: you want to do it too, How it was you know,
Speaker 7: original architect intent. Then yeah, I mean how else you
Speaker 7: can to do it? There's nobody around you know who
Speaker 7: built short acres and can tell you, well, I remember
Speaker 7: putting that tree there.
Speaker 8: Yeah, it's all about documentation. I mean, if it's a
Speaker 8: couple of trees, you're gonna take out. If it's a project,
Speaker 8: like you said, so that the future superintendent or whoever
Speaker 8: that person is now going to know that there's a
Speaker 8: pipe here, there's power here, because that's probably the worst
Speaker 8: part of the job, is to go and dig a
Speaker 8: hole and go and go and find something, or go
Speaker 8: and hit something that you shouldn't hit.
Speaker 6: I think everyone in this room could have tested that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's I think it's super important. I think one
Speaker 2: of the things I talked to the guys that work
Speaker 2: for me about is taking meaningful pictures. I mean, the
Speaker 2: smartphone is probably the best and worst invention you know,
Speaker 2: in history, But for like, I basically use photos as
Speaker 2: a journal. Like I just take as many photos as
Speaker 2: I possibly can can, all the time. And then you know,
Speaker 2: with technology, Google Photos uploads everything and I can look
Speaker 2: at it on my computer. I can go to the
Speaker 2: date it's GEO tagged, so I can search Highland Park
Speaker 2: and it'll show me all the photo you know. It's
Speaker 2: just it's so great, and it's such an easy way
Speaker 2: to to catalog things and to you know, just keep
Speaker 2: track of what you're doing. And you know, it's it's
Speaker 2: really hard to remember what the golf course looked like
Speaker 2: two weeks after we airified in twenty sixteen or whatever,
Speaker 2: but I've taken photos of it so I can go
Speaker 2: back and say, you know, well, actually the greens look
Speaker 2: the same two weeks this year as they did two
Speaker 2: years ago, you know, because perception is, you know, you
Speaker 2: just our memories aren't that good. We're not built that way.
Speaker 2: So photos are great. I mean, the more photos are better.
Speaker 1: Yeah, probably too many for me at least.
Speaker 2: Yeah, same here, but yeah, you know I need you
Speaker 2: don't have to buy film anymore, so it's great.
Speaker 7: The more hours, you know.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I've got like two hard drives filled up with photos.
Speaker 5: I look through them whenever I get depressed about where
Speaker 5: the PGA tour is playing. So we're gonna do some
Speaker 5: rapid fire question, well maybe just one rapid fire question
Speaker 5: and then get to overrated underrated, so you know, you
Speaker 5: can say one word about whether they're overrated, underrated, or
Speaker 5: you can expand on your answer. So up first, what's
Speaker 5: better for taking pictures? Sunrise or sunset?
Speaker 7: Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 1: I think sunset. I mean, nothing beats a good sunrise.
Speaker 1: You get the color. But I always feel like.
Speaker 7: Shadows in the evening are a little bit more uh
Speaker 7: sexy to my eye.
Speaker 8: I'm a sunset person, just like you said, the shadows.
Speaker 8: There's some really neat things that you don't see any
Speaker 8: other time.
Speaker 6: Of the day.
Speaker 2: Depends on the angle. It's all about angles. Sometimes some
Speaker 2: goods are some holes are good at sunrise, some are
Speaker 2: good at sunset. See, I'm a sun ride.
Speaker 5: There's something about the morning light when it gets to
Speaker 5: a certain part how the golf course, like sun lights
Speaker 5: up that I'm into.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I feel like you got a little more time
Speaker 7: in the evening as well.
Speaker 1: I think if you if you miss it, yeah, you've
Speaker 1: got it in the morning. Year that's it.
Speaker 5: There's like twenty minutes in the morning, yeah, where.
Speaker 7: You got maybe thirty five or forty in the air evening.
Speaker 5: All right. Overrated, underrated ball washers, overrated.
Speaker 9: Overrated, overrated, underrated coffee, highly underrated.
Speaker 6: But underrated underrated.
Speaker 5: Is there a do you guys each have like a
Speaker 5: a designated coffee maker in the shop.
Speaker 7: Yeah, yeah, we've got two, one for myself and then
Speaker 7: the rest of the staff. They don't like it as
Speaker 7: strong as I do, so we had to buy another
Speaker 7: one at least upot a day.
Speaker 2: That explains a lot.
Speaker 5: Do you ever get too caffeinated.
Speaker 1: Shaken?
Speaker 6: Yeah? I do, and then as soon as I do,
Speaker 6: my assistance can tell.
Speaker 7: He said way too much today, just pacing.
Speaker 5: Uh overrated, underrated green speeds.
Speaker 8: Hmmm, I think they're overrated, but uh, you know, for
Speaker 8: guys like us at private clubs, we have to keep
Speaker 8: up with with the expectations, if you know, if that's
Speaker 8: what you know, the members are all our bosses, so
Speaker 8: if that's what they want, then that's what we have
Speaker 8: to give them.
Speaker 7: I can go underrated because I think there's an importance
Speaker 7: with green speed.
Speaker 1: And and how how.
Speaker 7: It plays, you know. I think more often than not,
Speaker 7: if you're you make up too fast, you're gonna you're
Speaker 7: gonna take away the fun for a lot of people.
Speaker 1: So I think it's important. I'm gonna go underrated. I
Speaker 1: think it's key to.
Speaker 7: Determine, you know, what's what's the limit at.
Speaker 1: Your course and then kind of stick within that range.
Speaker 2: I think I think it's probably underrated, and not meaning
Speaker 2: that faster is better, but to what Brian just touched
Speaker 2: on that the right speed, but I think I'm gonna cheat.
Speaker 2: But I think what's underrated is the speed of your
Speaker 2: approaches and fair ways.
Speaker 7: Yeah, and right ball roll If you're rolling fourteen but
Speaker 7: you're bouncing everywhere, yeah, I'd rather be rolling.
Speaker 1: Eight and smooth.
Speaker 5: What's the thing that you work, like, the aspect of
Speaker 5: your maintenance that you work the hardest on that gets
Speaker 5: the least appreciation.
Speaker 7: Probably not by choice, but bunkers, My gosh, it's a
Speaker 7: ridiculous amount of labor we spend on bunkers. It's probably it,
Speaker 7: I don't know, it's probably all the little stuff we
Speaker 7: do too, the grooming, you know, the it's the stuff
Speaker 7: that we're doing in spring to gear us up for
Speaker 7: you know, the midsummer to have it playing great that
Speaker 7: probably you know, goes unnoticed.
Speaker 1: Maybe I'm wrong.
Speaker 2: It's it's the stuff that every golfer hates. It's the aerification,
Speaker 2: the verder cutting, the top dressing, the it's it's that
Speaker 2: stuff that uh you know, we only do because we
Speaker 2: want the golf course to be better for the members.
Speaker 2: But unfortunately we need that time to intervene and the
Speaker 2: golf course doesn't play as well. So for sure, that's
Speaker 2: that's the worst thing, because none of us want to
Speaker 2: have a crappy golf course, you know, so we just
Speaker 2: try to make the best decisions, and unfortunately that stuff
Speaker 2: is largely unappreciated and hated by the golfers.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I agree one hundred percent.
Speaker 8: I mean, when a golfer isn't happy because the golf
Speaker 8: course has just been verified, don't think for one split
Speaker 8: second that myself and my staff is is really excited
Speaker 8: about a lot of holes in the greens. But it's
Speaker 8: something that we have to do to go and provide
Speaker 8: the you know, the conditions that are desired. So so
Speaker 8: we do it and we try to heal as quickly
Speaker 8: as possible.
Speaker 3: On the subject of bunkers, if you could waive a
Speaker 3: magic wand and change expectations for bunker maintenance away from
Speaker 3: kind of the PGA tour standard that I think we're
Speaker 3: prey to in this country to something that's reasonable, how
Speaker 3: would you describe that, How would you really like to
Speaker 3: maintain your bunkers.
Speaker 6: If it was just up to you, if you were king.
Speaker 1: I just wouldn't like to make data. Just let them be.
Speaker 1: I think if I don't know, it's I think what Brian.
Speaker 7: Does up at chore Acres is pretty good. Unfortunately, with
Speaker 7: my circumstance, I can't put a trap rake machine in
Speaker 7: our bunkers, but we.
Speaker 1: Try to.
Speaker 7: Do less of a full rake and more spot rake
Speaker 7: in It's just it's just time consuming. But I think
Speaker 7: it's you know, the golfer, you know, you need to
Speaker 7: be aware of who's playing behind you, and you know,
Speaker 7: pick the rake up, and you know, don't just you know,
Speaker 7: rake it right. You know, you should walk out of
Speaker 7: a bunker and feel comfortable knowing that if you hit
Speaker 7: your ball in there, you'd be Olka playing it.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I think that.
Speaker 8: Just to give them a great rake every Tuesday morning, uh,
Speaker 8: and then just go and go and do it again
Speaker 8: on the the following Tuesday morning, just so everything's at
Speaker 8: the same spot.
Speaker 6: But if everyone is doing the job, whether.
Speaker 8: It's the golfer, a caddie, whoever's playing, to go and
Speaker 8: clean up after themselves. Like Scott said, make sure that
Speaker 8: the course is in a lot better shape than when
Speaker 8: you went and set foot in the first tee.
Speaker 6: But I don't have to do as much.
Speaker 8: But yeah, those are the expectations we have here in
Speaker 8: the States, I think, get back to the UK. I
Speaker 8: mean the only place that we saw bunkers fully raked
Speaker 8: was Monday morning at Saint Andrew's at the Old Course.
Speaker 8: I mean everything else was you know, go use your
Speaker 8: foot whatever, just just going clean up after yourself.
Speaker 2: I think it's it's a tough question to answer for me,
Speaker 2: because you know, I've worked at the PGA tour sites
Speaker 2: and I've done that, and reflecting back to the Links
Speaker 2: golf courses, you know, it makes sense there that the
Speaker 2: bunkers aren't raked every day because it's just what fits,
Speaker 2: you know. But at Bobblink, we've created, we have a
Speaker 2: totally one hundred percent created environment, and we have sand
Speaker 2: on top of soil that literally does not drain at all.
Speaker 2: And so for me to say that I would like
Speaker 2: to just not maintain them, it doesn't really make sense
Speaker 2: because it wouldn't be I don't I think we would
Speaker 2: lose some of the architectural integrity because we've it's they're
Speaker 2: totally created you know what I mean, and so I'm
Speaker 2: you know, we're fortunate. We rebuild all our bunkers. They're
Speaker 2: really easy to maintain, we have good drainage, we trap
Speaker 2: rake them. It's it takes. We have one hundred and
Speaker 2: fifty thousand square feet of bunker, so they're huge. It's
Speaker 2: actually easier to just do a full rake than it
Speaker 2: would be to walk in and try to touch up footprints.
Speaker 2: So two guys full rake them in three hours in
Speaker 2: the morning and we're good to go. So I'm pretty
Speaker 2: lucky in that regard.
Speaker 5: All right, last question, if Tommy Rayner took over as
Speaker 5: consulting architect of your club and said you need to
Speaker 5: either install double wide cart paths throughout the property or
Speaker 5: ten water fountains, which would you choose.
Speaker 7: Probably go with the fountains, like a nice fountain.
Speaker 2: I'm all about maintenance access, so I'll go with the
Speaker 2: car pass we can actually use those, and.
Speaker 8: I guess I'll go fountains as long as you're in
Speaker 8: Lake Michigan. Yeah, go put them in the lake and
Speaker 8: that's fine.
Speaker 5: All right, Thanks so much for you guys time. Thanks
Speaker 5: Phil and Oak Park Country Club for hosting this and
Speaker 5: uh Jason and Keith from Heralds from setting this up
Speaker 5: and hope everybody enjoyed it.
Speaker 9: Thank you you've.
Speaker 7: Been listening to the Fried Egg podcast.
Speaker 2: We do the digging for you.