Number 2

Earlier this year I was chosen to join a small group of superintendents from around the country at the other Pinehurst in North Carolina as a part of the first ever Golfdom Summit. Golfdom Magazine is one of the best industry publications we have as golf course managers. The Summit was an idea to bring industry leaders together to share ideas and learn about new technology in managing golf courses.

The trip was last week and it was quite an experience. Of course we had to play golf and the newly renovated No.2 was waiting for us. The summit began with 18 holes on the site of the 2014 US Open and US Women's Open.
The new look on No. 2 was impressive. Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw were hired to turn back the clock on the old Donald Ross design. Green lush grass around the property with numerous heights of cuts are a thing of the past. The new look includes two heights of grass; the greens and everything else. Bermudagrass covers the fairways and green surrounds. The course is no longer overseeded with ryegrass for the winter months. As you can see from the pictures, the bermudagrass is dormant.

The irrigation system was simplified to a single row system down the middle of the fairway and around the putting surfaces. This way you are rewarded for shots kept in the middle of fairways. Shots in the middle of the fairway are rewarded with healthier playing surfaces. The roughs were excavated out and turned into natural areas of sand, pine straw, wire grass and other native plants.

What about the greens? There were no contour differences in the greens since they provide the greatest defense to the course. The greens were re-grassed with bentgrass and were just as slick as you remembered from the previous tournaments. They are certainly intimidating and you have to stop and think about every putt.

I like the change for this site, especially with the history of the course. I would give Coore/Crenshaw, Bob Farren, the Director of Grounds at Pinehurst and his staff an "A" for their vision and accomplishments. However, I think everyone would agree that the course needs to mature some to increase in difficulty. It will be interesting to see how the professionals play in 2014.

I find playing other properties to see what other courses are doing extremely beneficial to my operations. I always come away with new ideas. Networking with superintendents and sharing ideas on course management was the most valuable experience of all. Some vendors were on hand as well to preach about newer technology and bounce ideas off the superintendents.