BEHIND THE SCENES AT THE MASTERS

BY DAVID TAGGART

When you first set foot on Augusta National it is hard to shake the feeling that you aren’t watching it through the TV. When you have seen it so many times and know it so intimately, you can’t help think that Jim Nantz is going to start speaking from somewhere. Each morning I was tasked with cleaning the already pristine ‘Second Nine’ fairways (ANGC consider it uncouth to say Back Nine, preferring First and Second Nine). As the sun rose and we made our way down the 11th fairway, mist billowing off Rae’s Creek, it stops you in your tracks and you just stand and stare at it. Then a bird chirps, the sun breaks through the trees, gleaming off one of the brilliant white bunkers and you can’t help but smile, it just knows how to show off.

Distilling the attention to detail into one article is impossible, compounded by the fact that everything they do is a fiercely guarded secret, even to the army of grounds crew volunteers that work the event each year (There is over one hundred of them, many of whom have worked more than 15 Masters). None of us know what height they cut the grass, how many times they cut it or roll it, how fast the greens are rolling, how dry or firm the greens are or what chemicals they have applied to the grass. They are a very friendly, hospitable ‘Southern’ team but as soon as you probe too far, the shutter comes down and the conversation awkwardly ends. The amiable southern disposition belies a deep commitment to science and data. The Superintendent carried a ‘Heat’ map of each green every morning, detailing, to minute detail, the temperature and drought stress of each green. This isn’t uncommon elsewhere in the world but the level of precision is unprecedented, quite literally every inch is measured. Secondly, the pins are not set to the yard/foot/ or inch but by the millimetre. A committee of at least 15 walk every green in the morning, comprised of members, the world’s best superintendents and an army of over qualified staff to assess ‘exactly’ where the hole should be cut. I am assured that a centimetre here or a centimetre there can make all the difference. Normally I would scoff at this but having seen the movement in the greens and just how firm and fast they were playing, I have no doubt they were right. Pins are tested to the n’th degree before they are selected and then GPS’d, tape measured and cross referenced.

In the mornings I was part of the fairway cleanup team and in the afternoons I was stationed to the 12th Green with 2 other volunteers. Between groups we would scurry on to the greens, brush any sand splashes and hand pick the leaves and pine needles that had blown onto the green. It is certainly a special spot, tucked away from view with special access to a part of the course that very few people ever get to see. It is so quiet and you can hear every word the players say, some more colorful than others. Once tournament play starts you can follow the roars from around the course which was especially exciting as Rory built momentum on the final day and when Cam Smith birdied the 11th it elicited the loudest cheer of the week from the Amen Corner crowd.

Whilst seeing all of those classic images from the television coverage in person was surreal, what was even more special was getting to see views of the course and around the clubhouse you don’t see on TV. Two that stick in my mind are the view from the 5th Green/6th Tee. The elevation from here means you get a birds eye view of the 6th Green/7th Tee as well 16th Green and the amphitheatre that is forming around it. Incidentally the ‘skimming’ of balls across the lake during the practice rounds draws bigger cheers than most of the regular competitive golf. Deafening pantomime boos rain down for any player that threatens to not take part, it would be interesting to know whether this new tradition is equally as popular amongst the Green Jackets as it is the Patrons. The second memorable view and my favourite spot to watch golf was the 7th green. It is such a tough green for the players to navigate but until you stand there, you would never know just how close the holes are to each other. The 2nd Green, 3rd Tee, 8th and 17th fairway are so tightly packed and the trees are thin

enough that from this area you can see down to 16 Green and up to 18 Green. On Sunday as a player it would be so distracting as you can see and hear where the entire field are and how well they are playing. The back of house buildings amount to a small town. The media centre, complete with private tunnel access, is bigger than most hotels. Stories abound about plots of surrounding land that the club are steadily buying up. One plot has recently been converted to Beckermans Place which is their premier hospitality venue complete with 4 replica greens for the well oiled Patrons to practice on whilst they sip their glass of Crow’s Nest IPA, a new brand of hops brewed solely for the Masters and served out of taps modelled in the shape of the famous lodgings that the competing Amateurs stay in each year. Perhaps my biggest regret of the week was not hiding my Staff credentials and buying one for myself.

As much as I tried to resist, as momentum built towards Tiger playing, it was tough not to join the thousands of people following his every move. On Thursday I snuck behind the 2nd Tee to see him hit his drive. It is pretty compact now they have pushed the tee as far back as it can go and as he put his 3 wood back in his bag, we stood shoulder to shoulder contemplating whether he had in fact hit it too far right. Undoubtedly, fatigue and pain meant that he struggled on the weekend but he was among the most impressive players on the range throughout the week. Players would stop on the range to watch him hit balls, as much in awe as the rest of the Patrons. When they walked away they would all shake their head and smile in disbelief, incredulously talking to their caddie about how good he looked. He beat 8 of the worlds top 12 over the first 2 days on a golf course that Tyrell Hatton probably wasn’t as far off the mark for criticising as people might admit. It was brutally tough and you could sense that by Sunday after battling the weather and the sadistic setup, it wasn’t just Tiger that was mentally and physically exhausted and ready for the week to end.

Superintendent Brad Owen commented on the final day that if a meteor were to hit the golf course maintenance yard that week (meteors can be that precise at Augusta) then there would be a good chance the golf course maintenance industry would grind to a halt. A touch hyperbolic, but he had a point. The most highly regarded professors, construction specialists, chemical suppliers and irrigation manufacturers sat in a room that also contained the Superintendents from some of the best clubs in the country and around the world (Seminole, Hazeltine, Liberty National, Bethpage, Oak Hill and Muirfield Village to name a few). I was struck by the fact that lively debate amongst these individuals during rain delays will no doubt be shaping turf management decisions around the world in the coming years. One Phd student from the leading Turf School in the states was asked to present her findings because the room found it so interesting. It speaks to the understated ‘Southern’ culture at ANGC that they welcome such a wide diversity of opinion in their quest for ever higher levels of perfection, they listen, they don’t preach and they never seem stressed. It does help that they have every conceivable resource at their disposal. They have an enormous high tech maintenance yard that still did not have enough space to house all of their machinery. They do so much reconstruction each year (ANGC is only open 4 months of the year) that their contractor has a permanent and similarly sized and stocked workshop just adjacent to the maintenance compound. A landscape nursery, staffed by a team of approximately 20 is in the far corner of the property with enough stock to replant almost the entire golf course. In the two weeks leading up to the event they had to do just that. Unseasonably cold temperatures had decimated most of the famous azaleas and they were still replanting new stock right up until the Sunday when I arrived for the Drive, Chip and Putt.

Perfection is their brand and they are so committed to it. Everything, in every corner of the property is painted White or Green. Except for the security camera I found deep in the woods behind the 12th Green, I’ll let you know next year whether they’ve fixed it. They dictate the language their staff must use. ‘You’re welcome’ is a big no-no, it should instead be “It was my pleasure”. All the signs whether customer facing or back of house were pristine and typed out in the same font. Strict adherence to the brand perpetuates the mystique, in turn driving the business behemoth that is The Masters. Whatever crazy numbers you hear that they make in the pro shop each year, treble it and you’re probably halfway there. People go solely for the purpose of buying the merchandise, to many, the golf plays second fiddle. This was driven home when I was stood watching Bryson DeChambeau hit his approach into 13th Green when a huge man, clutching 4 bags full of shirts and sporting a tattoo that said ‘Guns & Hoses - South Columbia Fire Dept’, written around a burning skull, said to me “Excuse me buddy, which hole is this?”. I felt a certain sense of frustration that he’d won the ballot.

It is truly every bit as special as they make it out to be. Not only is it pristine but they also know how to put on a show. Everywhere you look you can see them doing things both on the golf course and around the clubhouse that if they were really honest are just for a bit of theatre. Who can blame them, when you are that good and you make it look so effortless you have to create ways to be better and for people to notice. It just adds to peoples fascination. Patrons would quite literally beg to join the army of volunteers filling divots on the fairways each evening or clean the dew in the mornings. Did there need to be 30 people doing it? No. But it looked cool.

My lasting memory was watching Tiger limp from the 17th Green to the 18th Tee, roared on by the fans and then thumping his drive with his last bit of energy down the narrow chute to the middle of the fairway. The applause followed him the entire hole, building to a crescendo as he reached the green. Everyone just felt so privileged to see him there. Besides not sampling one of their IPA’s my other regret was that I wasn’t able to take my father, it’s that sort of place. If you ever get the chance to go, drop everything and go but make sure you take someone with you if only so when you get back and can’t stop talking about it there will be one person that doesn’t find you insufferable.