THE GOLF CLUB
MANAGER ISSUE 17 | AUGUST 2018
THE OFFICIAL JOURNAL OF THE GOLF CLUB MANAGERS’ ASSOCIATION
SPECIAL FOCUS: ARCHITECTURAL DESIGNS AND UPDATES
EDUCATION
BUNKER REVAMPS
GET THIS KEY UPGRADE RIGHT AND ON BUDGET INDUSTRY
THE GOLFING MISSIONARY
TEACHING JUNIORS ACROSS THE NORTH OF SCOTLAND INTERVIEW
IN THE CHAIR
P H I L G R I C E O N H I S D E T E R M I N AT I O N TO U S E H I S N E W POST TO LOWER THE GCMA’S AGE PROFILE
ED U C AT E | I N FO RM | I N S P I RE ‘
CONTENTS ISSUE 17 | AUGUST 2018
GCMA
CAREERS
04
24
Chief executive Bob Williams
How GCMA recruitment can help your club
INDUSTRY
EDUCATION
12
The golfing missionary growing the game
32
Talking architecture with Ross McMurray
14
All the latest news from the golf industry
38
How to get the best out of a bunker project
INTERVIEWS
REGIONAL
16
60
Meet the Manager: Stranraer’s Jim Burns
64
Dougie Cleeton on Bruntsfield Links’ revamp
We speak to new GCMA chairman Phil Grice
16
64
38
THE OFFICIAL JOURNAL OF THE GOLF CLUB MANAGERS’ ASSOCIATION GCMA Bristol & Clifton Golf Club, Beggar Bush Lane, Failand, Bristol, BS8 3TH Tel: 01275 391153 | hq@gcma.org.uk CHIEF EXECUTIVE Bob Williams - bob@gcma.org.uk COMMUNICATIONS MANAGER Mike Hyde - mike@gcma.org.uk GOLF MANAGEMENT RESEARCHER Jim Cunning - jim@gcma.org.uk EDUCATION COORDINATOR Niki Hunter - niki@gcma.org.uk MEMBERSHIP SECRETARY Ann Jones - ann@gcma.org.uk EDUCATION AND MAGAZINE ADMINISTRATOR Debbie Mereweather - debbie@gcma.org.uk FINANCE ADMINISTRATOR Shirley Edmondson - shirley@gcma.org.uk BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT MANAGER Tash Johnson - tash@gcma.org.uk COMMUNICATIONS EXECUTIVE Marie Taylor - marie@gcma.org.uk PRESIDENT JR (John) Jones 2018/19 CAPTAIN Cameron Dawson BOARD OF DIRECTORS Gary Steele, Phil Grice, Eddie Bullock, Amy Yeates, Andrew Rankin THE GOLF CLUB MANAGER IS PUBLISHED BY: SPORTS PUBLICATIONS LTD 2 Arena Park, Tarn Lane, Scarcroft, West Yorkshire, LS17 9BF, UK Tel: 0113 289 3979 | info@sportspub.co.uk PUBLISHER Tom Irwin - t.irwin@sportspub.co.uk EDITORIAL DIRECTOR Dan Murphy - d.murphy@sportspub.co.uk OPS DIRECTOR Will Shucksmith - w.shucksmith@sportspub.co.uk EDITOR Steve Carroll - s.carroll@sportspub.co.uk CHIEF DESIGNER Andrew Kenworthy - a.kenworthy@sportspub.co.uk DESIGNERS Vicky Jones - v.jones@sportspub.co.uk Emmi Parry - e.parry@sportspub.co.uk Every effort has been made to ensure accuracy, but the publishers cannot accept responsibility for omissions and errors. All material in this publication is strictly copyright and all rights are reserved.The views expressed in The Golf Club Manager do not necessarily represent the views of the company or the editor. Every care is taken in compiling the contents but the publishers assume no responsibility for any damage, loss or injury arising from participation in any offer, competition or advertising contained within The Golf Club Manager. THE GOLF CLUB
MANAGER ISSUE 17 | AUGUST 2018
THE OFFICIAL JOURNAL OF THE GOLF CLUB MANAGERS’ ASSOCIATION
SPECIAL FOCUS: ARCHITECTURAL DESIGNS AND UPDATES
EDUCATION
BUNKER REVAMPS
GET THIS KEY UPGRADE RIGHT AND ON BUDGET INDUSTRY
THE GOLFING MISSIONARY
TEACHING JUNIORS ACROSS THE NORTH OF SCOTLAND INTERVIEW
IN THE CHAIR
P H I L G R I C E O N H I S D E T E R M I N AT I O N TO U S E H I S N E W POST TO LOWER THE GCMA’S AGE PROFILE
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001 GCMA August 18 Cover.indd 3
31/07/2018 14:36
ON THE COVER: GCMA chairman, and Royal Norwich general manager, Phll Grice
WELCOME
ISSUE 17 | AUGUST 2018
A
ugust has generally become one of my quieter months and a period when I can catch up and start to plan for the second part of the year. The regional meetings will start in September and, this year, we will need to plan for the Board changes that will materialise at the AGM next spring. This year, though, we are coming to grips with our own restructure at head office. Following the strategic review it was agreed there was a need to carry out a full appraisal of the working arrangements at HQ. We have now developed the role of membership services coordinator and will be looking to make an appointment in the very near future. However, we have also parted company with Ann, Debbie and Tash – I would like to take this opportunity to sincerely thank them for all their efforts, support and contribution to the GCMA over the years and wish them well for the future. Looking back at July I have to mention one of the most exciting Opens for many a year, and I was able to attend the practice days and the first day of competition. I have to say that, from my point of view, Carnoustie and the surrounding arrangements were excellent. As we all know the logistics that go with such an event can make or break the experience – for me they certainly created a memorable one. Well done to The R&A. I am already looking forward to Portrush.
Talking of events, the GCMA conference planning group are well into the process of selecting a venue for the 2019 conference. We have taken on board the feedback from the Mercedes Benz event and will endeavour to provide a conference experience that will inspire as well as inform. We should be making an announcement within the next month or two. Finally, I cannot end my welcome without sympathising with you and your greenkeepers on the course condition problems that many of you are experiencing up and down the country. I sincerely wish you well and, hopefully, some decent rainfall. Bob Williams – chief executive
“The GCMA conference planning team are well into the process of selecting a venue for the 2019 conference“
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What you
NEED TO KNOW Relevant news, opinion and expert insight from around the industry. Plus what’s happening around the UK in the world of the GCMA
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The month in
PICTURES
1
GCMA president JR Jones played an important role at The Open, as the on-air rules expert for the Golf Channel and NBC’s coverage of the 147th championship at Carnoustie last month.
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Jones was on hand throughout the week to explain the subtleties of rules decisions to a US audience and, as you can see, he enjoyed a spectacular view of the 18th hole as Francesco Molinari claimed the Claret Jug.
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2
A sunbaked Monifieth Links was the host venue for the annual Sports Publications partners day on the eve of The Open. As well as a chance to raise the profile of the association
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among the industry, the day also offered the chance to enjoy an authentic, fiery links experience, with challenges not dissimilar to those being faced by the professionals just up the road at Carnoustie.
3
Stoke by Nayland was the venue as we squared up against our French counterparts in the annual ‘Le Big Match’. To find out the results, and see if we managed to add another win to the series, check out From the Regions on page 62.
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This GCMA club is famous for…
GREAT YARMOUTH This East Anglia course, run by general manager Tim Starbuck, is where one of golf’s most famous terms originated...
G
reat Yarmouth & Caister is a club that could feature in this column several times over. It is the oldest in Norfolk – founded way back in 1882. The course also winds its way at several points through the nearby racecourse. You’ll hit shots over the rails onto greens. Indeed, at the 1st, you crisscross the barriers before you get onto the putting surface. But what Great Yarmouth & Caister is really renowned for is being the home of bogey golf. Ever played in a bogey competition? It’s great fun, although something of a headscratcher if you’re not used to it. It harks back to the days when all serious golf was fought out over matchplay. What a bogey competition does is take that central element – winning and losing holes – and mould it into a strokeplay competition. You are rewarded based on how you do against the course, rather than an individual player. So what’s this got to do with Great Yarmouth & Caister? In 1890, way before golf became ‘par for the course’, a member at Coventry had the idea of playing
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a match under a handicap against the number of shots a scratch golfer would rack up in a perfect game, says the club’s website. This became known as the ground score. The idea was proposed to Dr Thomas Browne, who founded Yarmouth, at the club’s autumn gathering and was then introduced. Yarmouth’s website continues: “These competitions were played throughout the winter, at the same time a music hall song ‘Hush! Here comes the Bogey man’ was gaining in popularity.”
When one competition participant said to Browne ‘This player of yours is a regular Bogey man’, the bogey score was born. It was the staple term to describe golf’s scoring system, until par was born, and today we know it as a score of one over on any given hole. What is it that makes your club special? Every club has something that makes it unique, that sets it apart from everywhere else. Why not let us know what it is? Email s.carroll@sportspub.co.uk
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Meet the golfing missionary taking the sport
TO THE MASSES
R
obbie Stewart must have a really reliable car – and a very understanding wife. Most nights you will find Buckpool’s director of golf hitting the road, taking teaching to a series of clubs in the North East of Scotland. Stewart is from the area, having spent his childhood summers endlessly repeating Lossiemouth’s 9-hole loop with his friends, and was motivated to give something back after a successful career in golf. So through his business – The Moray Golf Academy – he started visiting six clubs, as well as Buckpool, and began coaching the junior sections. Youngsters at Hopeman, Cullen, Spey Bay, Rothes, Dufftown and Keith all benefit from group sessions, with Stewart either
leading or assisting Scottish Golf’s team of volunteer coaches. “Cullen would be the furthest away and they would all be within an hour’s drive of Buckpool,” he said.“All these towns and villages have all got their own course and they’ll all have 150 to 250 members each. They’re not huge clubs but they tend to be the centre of the towns.”
“I would like the kids to get the same enjoyment out of the game I had. That’s where I get my satisfaction. That’s why I get up in the morning”
As the juniors progress, he then provides one-to-one and pairs’ coaching. Introducing new players to the game, though, is only part of Stewart’s role. “The big problem is keeping them in it. That’s been my focus. As they get older, you do fewer group sessions and more individual. I do a lot of pairs’ coaching where two pals will come together for half an hour or an hour – rather than get into a group of eight for an hour. “They get a lot more benefit from that and it allows me to take them out onto the course and coach them there, rather than just standing in a driving range or in a simulator. The coaching is very much based on getting the kids onto the golf course and enjoying that, rather than just pure instruction.” The benefits of that approach
Young players in action at one of Robbie Stewart’s coaching sessions
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If you are looking for ways to increase participation, take a look at the Roving Pro Robbie Stewart. The Buckpool director of golf, as Steve Carroll found out, is a one-man juggernaut for growing the game…
has been far wider than merely seeing a group of willing youngsters getting some great coaching. Participating clubs have not only been able to keep much needed junior talent within the ranks, but have inadvertently added another potential membership stream. Stewart explained:“It was always the mums dropping off for the coaching so we booked in a Get into Golf ladies’ class. “We first did this at Buckpool about four or five years ago and that programme has really grown at each of these clubs. “It’s been great for increasing membership. It’s usually a minimum of between 50% and 70% of the ladies starting the sixhour programme who will join as members of the golf club. That has been a great success. Each of the
clubs have probably got 10 extra lady members over the last couple of years, just purely as a result of the group coaching we have been doing.” With a minimum of a dozen juniors at each session, and as many as 42 at Buckpool when a new programme began last year, Stewart is providing a constant stream of new faces. “I do a different club each after school. My schedule might be Buckpool on a Monday, Cullen on a Tuesday, Spey Bay on a Wednesday, Hopeman on a Thursday. It’s a different club each night. Typically, a 10-week course goes with the school term and I’ll start again in August. “I’ll do a session from Easter to summer, and slightly shorter from end of summer to the start of the October holidays. With a
couple of clubs last year, we had a great winter session as well. The kids would come as a group to Buckpool and the instruction would be indoors on the simulator and indoor putting.” Stewart sets aside Fridays to ensure he still plays but, otherwise, he is reaching out across the Moray area. But why do it? He laughed:“I’ve been lucky to have a really happy and long career in the game of golf, purely because I loved the game as a kid. “I would like the kids to get the same enjoyment out of the game I had. That’s where I get my satisfaction. That’s why I get up in the morning. You are teaching them about life at a micro level. It’s about behaviour, attitude, integrity and a love of the outdoors. “If they learn these skills through golf then fantastic.” Who is Robbie Stewart? Scottish PGA trainee of the year in 1982, Robbie Stewart spent eight years as the pro at Largs before joining Cruden Bay as head pro in 1992. He stayed at the world top 100 venue for 20 years, spending the last two as director of golf before teaming up with Paul Lawrie at his new golf centre in 2012. Four years ago, Stewart set up the Moray Golf Academy, based at Buckpool, and doubles up at the Buckie venue as director of golf.
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In the
LOOP 1. Having trouble with chafer grubs and leatherjackets? This might help... What’s happened: An emergency authorisation has been granted for the use of Acelepryn, an insecticide, on greens and tees to control chafer grubs and leatherjackets. What does it mean? It’s very good news for those clubs that have plagued by the bugs, which can cause huge damage to courses. The progressive banning of pesticides throughout the turf and wider agriculture industry had left course managers and greenkeepers with few effective ways of controlling the problem, which is made worse when badgers, birds and other predators tear up turf in search of a meal. Independent advisors recently suggested the cost to golf clubs, from chafer grub damage alone, was up to £85 million a year – a figure that calculated not only the repair expenses but also the lost income in green fees as visitors stayed away and members sought new pastures. This authorisation, which was
The news you need to know from the last month in the golf industry…
applied for by the Bingley-based turf experts STRI, will allow Acelepryn to be used where there is an acknowledged instance of economic damage and where it is advised that the product is used. Dr Ruth Mann, the STRI’s head of research, said:“Since the withdrawal of effective insecticides, economic damage from chafer grubs and leatherjackets has been of major concern to many of us. “Obtaining this emergency authorisations of Acelepryn enables us to manage the most
damaging effects of these soil pests as part of an integrated turf management programme.” Stocks of the insecticide are limited in the UK and are being provided to qualifying clubs on a first come, first serve basis. 2. New appointments at Scottish Golf What happened: New Scottish Golf chief executive Andrew McKinlay announced a trio of appointments as he starts his task of trying to move the under siege
@GCMAUK Fantastic day supporting the Chilterns region @GCMAUK yesterday at the magnificent @ BurnhamBgolf #lovegolf @CSIDarrenWood
14 | GCMA.ORG.UK
Our very own, Phil Grice, has been appointed as Chairman of the Golf Club Managers Association @GCMAUK @RoyalNorwichGC
Fun, casual, friendly, relaxed... imagine that. And any industry event you can wear shorts to gets my nod...top marks @englandgolf! @MikeHyde
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We want to hear from you! Send your correspondence, on any subject, to letters@gcma.org.uk
organisation forward. What does it mean? Clare Queen, who has been filling in on an interim basis, has been confirmed as performance director, while Gillian Patton takes on the role of performance manager on a permanent basis. Karin Sharp, who was formerly corporate services director, has been promoted to chief operating officer. “I am delighted to be able to confirm these posts and have been struck by the dedication and expertise shown by all three in my short time as chief executive,” he said. 3. Here come the hosepipe bans... What happened: United Utilities, which serve seven million people in the North West of England, are set to enforce a hosepipe ban from August 5. What does it mean? Low reservoir levels and the continuing hot weather was behind the announcement of a temporary use ban, as they are officially known. While at the time of writing no other major companies had
followed suit, the lingering dry spell – already believed to be the longest heatwave for more than 40 years – might change that. Many club managers have been in touch with the helpdesk to ask how these will affect them and, currently, there is no cause for alarm as they do not apply to commercial premises such as golf courses. Where clubs could be affected is if water supplies continue to deplete, get really low, and the water companies apply for a Drought Order. That legislation allows them to ban the use of mains water for use – but other sources, owned by the Environment Agency such as boreholes, are still not affected by that ban. The water companies don’t foresee any Drought Orders coming into force in 2018.
Welcome to our newest GCMA members Joy Pickard, manager at Mid Herts in Chiltern & Home Counties region Terry Adam, honorary secretary at Chilwell Manor in East Midlands region Rebecca Suffolk, assistant at Scraptoft in East Midlands region Sean Boyle, manager at Chesterfield in East Midlands region Craig Brown, manager at Kidderminster in Midland region Kim Rawlinson, assistant at Trentham Golf in Midland region Emma Yarham, secretary at Dereham in Norfolk region Graeme Whitfield, secretary at Kendal in North West region Mel Brooke, secretary at Penwortham in North West region Steve Rose, assistant at Carnoustie Caledonia in Scotland region Devon Greenslade, manager at Downes Crediton, in South West region Geoff Wise, secretary at Pyecombe in Southern region Callum Tulloch, manager at Ashley Wood in Wessex region Peter Jepson, secretary at Ferrybridge in Yorkshire region
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service, deliver a better product @ GCMAUK @CMAEurope @ThePGA @Foremostgolf @AFletchCoaching
The following people have also joined the GCMA as affiliate members: Mel Bashford,Tom Everett and Emma Pope.
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GCMA | INDUSTRY | CAREERS | EDUCATION | REGIONAL
The interview...
PHIL GRICE
“We all have to be able to adapt to a changing market and the evolving needs of the members”
16 | GCMA.ORG.UK
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Royal Norwich’s general manager is shepherding through a historic move to a new site. He’s also just become the GCMA’s new chairman. He talks to Steve Carroll about juggling jobs and the challenges of moving house…
C
ongratulations on becoming GCMA chairman. It must be a huge honour for you. How do you feel now you’ve taken up the
post? I’m still quite taken aback and I am stunned. It’s an honour to be on the board. For them to have put me forward as chairman, with peers like Eddie Bullock, is brilliant and quite surreal. Can you explain to us what your role will be as chairman? It’s obviously to chair meetings and to ensure the direction and the preparation of the meetings is professional, strategic and will deliver actions. It’s also to work with the chief executive on the strategy to deliver some of those actions decided by the board. I am incredibly aware that we are a members’ organisation, not unlike Royal Norwich. We’ve gone from being essentially a national committee to a board of directors with regional managers and a team at head office. It is still not a perfect scenario, but it’s a work in progress to get us working together. It’s a very interesting time for the GCMA with the strategic review being implemented. You’ve come in at quite a crucial time for the association? Absolutely. Mike Hoare (former chairman) has done a brilliant job and helped move the organisation from its past to where it is now. He
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has been an integral part of it for a number of years. Now, we have a timely opportunity to make sure that, internally, we are fit for purpose and those around us are fit to take us forward. We are under no illusions. Golf is performing a 360-degree review on how it’s perceived and how it’s played. We’ve done that review and how we implement that strategic review means there is some tough work to do to get everyone to buy into being respectful of our past
“There is some tough work to do to get everyone to buy into being respectful of our past and progressive in the future” and progressive in the future. Are we representative of not only of today’s membership but, potentially, tomorrow’s? Sometimes we will have to face some difficult decisions and we’ve got to be very professional about how we go about this next period. It’s a crucial time for Royal Norwich as well, as you accelerate the move towards the new site at Weston Park. How do you feel you will be able to balance the two roles? I’m comfortable with the work
and what’s expected of me. If this position had come up around 12 months ago, I don’t know that I would have moved forward with it. But the role as chairman will probably take less time than I was devoting to the GCMA in my previous position as marketing and communications director. I believe it will take more strategic input over time, but it’s something I am familiar with – it’s a very similar role to what we’ve evolved at Royal Norwich. Clearly your relationship with the chief executive is going to be crucial if your role is to be a success. Are you looking forward to extending that with Bob Williams? It’s critical we are straight with each other and set some tangible strategic objectives for the association. We need to make sure everyone is on the same page and he needs to know what we’re expecting of him. From the regional managers down, we all need to be clear on what – as an organisation – we are trying to achieve and the kind of growth we are looking for. Take, for example, the age profile. How do we get that down? There are a lot of good people in golf who are of a younger age and we need to ensure we are relevant to them as well. Bob knows that and, along with the new board members Amy Yeates and Andrew Rankin, I believe I am going to offer
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GCMA | INDUSTRY | CAREERS | EDUCATION | REGIONAL
something new. I really think that, collectively, the board have got to share in supporting Bob, and the regional managers and head office have got a big part to play too. We all have to be able to adapt to a changing market and the evolving needs of the members. From the top down, and the bottom up, we’ve got to start looking to work together to make sure we are all working to the same ends. Turning to Royal Norwich, you became general manager seven years ago. Did you know the move to Weston Park was on the horizon? It was always part of my initial discussions with them. There was a job to do to run the club and a job to do to stave off the membership decline, which had been gradual over a decade. We did that in the short term but the relocation project was always in the background. It became quite apparent, when I got under the
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skin of what was happening, that the only way to secure the club’s long-term future was to seriously look into that project. How big of a challenge was that? I was naïve about it, if I’m honest. A members’ club is a wieldy beast to direct. A proprietary club is a speedboat and a members’ club is an oil tanker. Turning it around and changing direction is not a simple task. You realise that the governance of making decisions is not as straightforward as you think. There are a lot of people that have an opinion that has to be listened to. They gave me a lot more rope and leeway than they had given anyone before. But my comment to them was ‘would Delia Smith go to the Barclay End, at the end of a season, and ask 22 volunteers to run Norwich Football Club?’ As much as they love the club and are passionate about it, have they got the people skills, the golf specific industry knowledge, the wherewithal within leisure, the
marketing experience and the understanding of the industry outside of what they want? When did it become apparent that governance would have to change for the relocation project to be a success? Quickly. Within six months I’d realised the stark reality that it wasn’t a proprietary club. The speed at which decisions were being made and the amount of times a suggestion might have been rebuffed, or concepts and ideas were rebuffed, was hard to conceive. Sometimes you knew a decision was the best thing for the club but, because it had not been done that way before and you had to convince a group of people to vote in favour of change, it was difficult. The people that appointed me were incredibly supportive, they were all on the general committee at the time, and that made life easier. Outside of that, when you were going to the club to ask for change, the support is always diminished.
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You were dealing with a very emotive issue for a lot of members who might have been at the club for decades. I imagine when that was unveiled there was a little bit of hostility? None of it has been smooth. People can almost say what they want in a members’ club. There is a perception there is diplomatic immunity because, when they pass through the gates of the club, they are an equal member. With a lot of clubs, the membership might not always be the youngest. Statistics show that members clubs are that bit older. Maybe passions run higher and the perception of the truth, as it is, is a little bit greyer – ‘it’s always been fine, we’ve always come through it, it won’t come to that’ was often the response. On top of that, while the piece of land we were buying at Weston Park was phenomenal, the golf course that was on there was not
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built to the highest quality. It was an evolved course from 9 into 18. As much as we had to deal with it here, we had to go down to Weston Park and present forums to their members and try to convince them that us coming and taking over was going to be a good thing for them. They had a proprietor, who was selling. What the members wanted was someone to buy it and carry on the club as it was. They didn’t want any change. For us, that piece of land only had value if we could build something that future proofed the golf club – with fantastic greens, fairways, with a number of teeing points, with fantastic irrigation – and build something akin to where the market is actually going, while providing something that isn’t in East Anglia. Norfolk has got some lovely links courses and they are quirky, old fashioned and, as a golf geek, they are fantastic. But they won’t
accommodate the youngsters coming through and the families. What we’ve got is a unique opportunity to create a new benchmark. If the club weren’t moving to Weston Park, what would the future have looked like? If they hadn’t ran aground, they would have had to make some drastic changes, which would have been regressive steps, and all it would have done was staved off the day when they did close. The lack of reinvestment, the lack of acceptance over where the market was going over a long period, and the decrease in membership and the profile of the membership was all against us. The ability to bring in new customers was very challenging. We had been at the top end in our marketplace but were cut adrift because those below had become so much more progressive and had much more to offer. The club couldn’t have survived
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too much longer in the current form. So the decision was made to alter the governance. How did you all go about that? We had an evidence-based approach. I sat on 10 interconnected committees during relocation – from change to people and integration and marketing. I was moving from group to group and was the conduit on all of them. We went from Castle Stuart, in Scotland, to Goodwood and visited every premier golf outlet – from The Wisley right through the country. We went to learn and we brought back the evidence and the models they were using. We looked at the best parts and tried to create some synergies as to how we could take that forward. We magpied the best of what was out there. We held forums with our members, where we discussed what we were doing and why, and we then had to get a mandate
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from the members to allow us to cross the line. It had to be voted on by the members. The lightbulb moment for me with the members came when we showed them the Vision 2020 future of golf presentation by the European Golf Course Owners Association. It talked about getting families into golf, about the future, and was factual, visual and it was someone else speaking. I was very aware that my voice would become associated with driving change. I had a fantastic treasurer and two or three other people around me that worked equally as hard and they guided us through the icebergs of a private members’ club and how we would make sure everyone’s questions were answered. We brought in the likes of Bob Williams, Eddie Bullock, John Weir – people who were industry experts – to the committee meetings and forums, so they could see it wasn’t a pipedream and that all the decisions we were making
Who is Phil Grice? Phil Grice’s career in golf began as an assistant at Haste Hill, in London, before moving on to Kingswood, in Surrey, as the head teaching professional. He became director of golf at Sprowston Manor, in Norwich, at the age of 22 before spending 10 years as centre director at Lexden Wood. Grice built the business from a 9-hole pay and play into a 27-hole complex, driving range and teaching academy with 1,000 members. He joined Royal Norwich in 2011 as general manager and was appointed to the newly formed GCMA board of directors in 2014 with responsibility for marketing and communications. He took over as chairman from the long-serving Mike Hoare in June.
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were based on experts saying ‘this is where the wider golf industry is going’.That, in essence, won the members and committees over for the relocation concept. You moved from a large committee structure to a board of nine directors. Explain how the new set up works… We have five member directors, who are skills based. They are really behind it and understand how the board structure works. We then have two non-executive positions that are taken up by industry experts. We’ve got a golf industry expert and a golf food and beverage expert. I am general manager but I’m also a director and then there is Peter Todd, our head of estates. He too is a director. We’ve got an incredibly strong board of members and for the wider membership to recognise that we should have four non-members on that board is a huge change for them. How has that worked in practice? Any article changes within the rules still go before the whole membership. Daily operational decisions don’t. They have employed professionals, as they see it, to run the club and they allow the professionals to do that. It’s a proper hybrid between a proprietary club, where you are fully responsible for every decision, and a members’ club, where often you have all of the responsibility but no control. It’s unique, modern and it’s fair. None of us are here to do a bad job. Sometimes we’ve had some tough debates behind closed doors. When we come out we are all pointing in the same direction. We have a bi-monthly board
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meeting. There are generally 12 to 15 things on the agenda. Papers are all submitted seven days in advance. There’s a report on everyday matters, the relocation, change management and so on. Whenever there is change, there will be people who disagree... Through the time we were negotiating with Persimmon and looking to sell the land for the move, we probably lost 150 to 160 members – they didn’t go quietly. They were incredibly difficult times. I don’t blame anyone for going. They had perhaps been here 10, 15 or 20 years and it was all going to change. Maybe they couldn’t understand the full rationale and maybe they didn’t want to. Perhaps we didn’t explain it properly. But that was a difficult time and the political talk in the clubhouse, all the time, was horrific. Some members left because they were sick of people talking about relocation. I’d stave off a rumour every day. It was difficult to try and alleviate the members’ fears of what could happen and ‘what if this and
what if that’. We had to convince the members that they were the custodians, which they were. They had a choice. Did they want to be the ones holding the baby when the boat ran aground or did they want to be the custodians who took the club to the new venue and a sustainable future? As we speak, the grass is coming through at Weston Park… It’s incredible the difference the colour green makes to everything. The grass went down and the seed popped after seven days and we had grass between 18 and 21 days. The rate at which the grass is coming through, from fertilising the soils and getting the right water on it, means we have suddenly got fairways that – only four weeks in – are unbelievably lush. We now have greens that are being hand cut on a regular basis and it has transformed people’s view of the site being ready in time. We are probably on target to have the whole site handed back to us by the end of this month or very early September. The site is going green in front of our eyes.
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A right Royal move
FOR NORWICH
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hat a difference little shoots of green poking through the surface can make. Where once there was mud, now there is a golf course – or the semblance of one, anyway. It’s the moment everyone connected with Royal Norwich’s relocation realised that it really was happening. Construction workers have been on site at the club’s soon-to-be new home at Weston Longville for a year but – despite an architect’s vision and the shapes carved out by a bulldozer – it still took imagination to see those long drives and approaches to shapeless greens. Now as the construction company MJ Abbott prepares to hand the growing course back to the club, and a year of bedding in ensues, the day the first shot is hit at the £10 million project is starting to get tantalisingly close. Royal Norwich had been at their Hellesdon site for 125 years but the club was beset with problems. Envisaged by Jeremiah James Colman – he of the mustard fame – as an out of town retreat, it had been hemmed in by the everexpanding city. Trying to cross the main road that split the course in two meant taking your life into your hands. And burdened by a clubhouse that was quaint but unsuited to the rather crucial activity of getting money into tills, club chiefs felt
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It’s one of the largest UK golf club projects seen since the recession – a total relocation to a new course. Steve Carroll talked to those involved in Royal Norwich’s move to Weston Longville
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Phil Grice, Ross McMurray and Peter Todd study the plans
there were only two choices – move or watch the historic outfit slide into obscurity. So they sold the course, which had the hand of James Braid laid upon it in the 1920s, and used the money paid by house builders Persimmon to envisage a 24-hole complex 10 miles down the road at the former Weston Park Golf Club. Half a dozen sites had been under consideration but there was only ever one that truly fitted the bill. Even so, making the decision to pack the bags was tough. “It’s a wrench to leave,” admitted Royal Norwich general manager Phil Grice.“I’ve been a PGA member for nearly 30 years now and I am a golf geek. “So losing somewhere like this, and being part of the reason it’s happened, doesn’t always sit well with me, if I’m honest, but you have got to stay focused on the future.” That future is being shaped with
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the help of European Golf Design’s Ross McMurray. The architect behind the Twenty Ten Course at Celtic Manor, his brief was to create a playable, yet still challenging, layout that would appeal to the club’s target audience. “People here want it to be fun, to play in a nice setting, be challenged a little bit but without coming away thinking it had been too tough,” he said.“It has challenges, though, linked to the fact that some of the site is new and open grazing land with very few trees. “Trying to design a golf course where some of it is routed through mature parkland, some of it is woodland and some of it is open grazing land, and tying the whole thing together is quite tricky. “Some of the holes in the more open land, such as the 12th, had to have a lot of excavation to make them work. It’s trying to get the balance between shaping
something and doing what you need with it but not having a completely different feel to everywhere else. It’s tricky.” His final design was flexible, with five sets of tees on every hole and a course that ranges from 5,300 yards to 7,200. Some of the greens are undulating but these spaces are not over the top, averaging around 550 square metres. What the Weston Longville course is, though, is strategic. It’s perfectly playable for the higher handicapper
”People here want it to be fun, to play in a nice setting, be challenged, but without coming away thinking it had been too tough” ED U C AT E | I N FO RM | I N S P I RE
ROYAL NORWICH Royal Norwich was formed in November 1893 and the Duke of York, who later became King George V, agreed to become the patron. Within six months of being founded, there were more than 300 members and James Braid redesigned the course in 1923 – providing eight new greens and extending the length to 6,399 yards. That layout at Hellesdon is the one still largely played today as the club celebrate their 125th anniversary. But, from September 2019, Royal Norwich will move to a new £10 million development at Weston Longville. The site, based at the former Weston Park GC, is being transformed with the help of European Golf Design architect Ross McMurray and construction firm MJ Abbott.
– the golfer willing to sacrifice a shot here and there to make the overall score more agreeable. The better you are, the more difficult the challenge becomes. The right areas of fairway must be hit to ensure the correct angle in for the second shot. It pays dividends to find certain green sections if an awkward putt is to be avoided. As well as getting McMurray on board, key to the project was the addition of Peter Todd as head of estates. Todd came from The London Club, where Grice had been impressed with his work ethic and attention to detail. “I’d never seen anything like it. It was an incredible pyramid of youngsters, through to qualified staff and head greenkeepers that were underneath him,” he said. “You could clearly see he was the conductor to the orchestra. All these guys were playing these
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An aerial view of construction work at the Weston Park site
different instruments fantastically. “I’d never been in a greenkeeping facility that was so clean. It was like a restaurant. “The members on our committee fell in love with him because they loved his attention to detail. They could see the building of the course and the delivery was in incredibly safe hands.” The relationship between the agronomist and the architect was crucial – and the two quickly developed a mutual respect. He explained:“I have said to Ross things like ‘the prevailing wind will drop those leaves into those bunkers. Can we make them grass hollows and not sand bunkers?’ and he has said ‘Yes, let’s do that’. “He’s pragmatic. He respects what you think and I respect his architect’s vision.” Grice was similarly enthralled. “If you could see what this site was originally, and some of the
bland areas he has turned around, he carries all of those images in his head. “He has had this vision for a piece of land that’s already got a mark on it and I can’t see how he does it. He goes round the site saying ‘that tree is staying, that tree is going’. How do you even do that?” What McMurray and Todd strove to do was produce a course that will live within its means. A massive on-site reservoir will keep down water costs, while the course should also be relatively cost-effective to maintain. “We all know golf follows the economy and goes in boom and bust periods,”Todd added. “What you want these days is a challenging golf course that doesn’t cost a fortune to maintain. “Otherwise, you’ve saddled your business with an uphill task straight away.” Todd might be most proud of the
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new maintenance building – a near £1 million two-storey facility that must rank as one of the finest in the country. The aim is to establish it as a turfcare centre of excellence and it has already attracted the attention of large companies wanting to use it for corporate training. If that building sells the club off the course, then the 17th will be the hole that does the job on it. The showpiece par 3, with a long carry over the only water hazard on the layout is part of a daunting – but thrilling – finish that will keep scorecards hanging in the balance until the very end. Grice said:“During a competition or a society day, what a stunning view that will be. As you drive into the club, you will see the 17th lake and look right down it. “It will be the hole that people remember. You’ve got a great score going and you are going to be scared when you come to the
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”We could sell our memberships to a huge retired community and that won’t do us any good going forward” 17th.” But the new Royal Norwich is also about more than just a golf course. The clubhouse, a combination of the historic former stable blocks that formed the old Weston Park building and a new glass-fronted construction, will have its own microbrewery. That’s not all. An open plan pro shop, conferencing facilities for 250 people and indoor simulators allowing golfers to be both custom fit and play their favourite tracks are just part of
the offering designed to keep members and visitors at the club once they’ve played the course. And Royal Norwich hope it will be a younger golfer that is coming through the doors. “The job is to try and fill the membership categories,” Grice concluded.“We’re working to a model and 10 per cent of the club will be juniors and 15 per cent will be between 18 and 30. “We want a continuity of ages through the club. We could sell our memberships to a huge retired community and that won’t do us any good going forward. It won’t help the cultural aspect of the club. “You need those age categories spreading as best you can for the health of the business.” So the countdown is on. The whole move has been about acknowledging their heritage but embracing the future, says Grice. He’ll be hoping the balance at Weston Park proves spot on.
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In conversation with…
ROSS MCMURRAY
The outstanding Twenty Ten course at Celtic Manor was designed by Ross McMurray
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The European Golf Design architect, the man behind the Ryder Cup course at Celtic Manor in 2010, shares his principles and thoughts with Steve Carroll
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hat makes a good golf course? It needs to be strategically strong. I am less influenced by aspects such as the setting. If you look at the top ranked courses in the world, in Europe, or the UK, many of them will be in some sort of spectacular setting. They are very often ocean or seaside courses with magnificent views. That’s great and I absolutely understand why that’s the case. They are lovely places to play golf. But one of my favourite courses is Royal Lytham & St Annes. It’s really strong but, visually, no one is ever going to say it’s the most attractive golf course in the world. But it’s still a great golf course and I think it suffers in the rankings because of its setting. I get a bit frustrated sometimes that modern golf courses don’t quite get the attention and rankings they deserve. I’m convinced that modern golf courses can be as good – or better – than anything that has gone before. But, as a general rule, they don’t get ranked as highly. Maybe that’s because the sites aren’t so good and there is too much emphasis on aesthetics and setting. But I think there are an awful lot of top new courses out there that probably deserve to be ranked higher. How important is a strong start
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GCMA | INDUSTRY | CAREERS | EDUCATION | REGIONAL and finish in the work you do? We always read about classic courses that had a gentle introduction... I don’t think there is a right or wrong. Again, you need that variety. If every golf course had a nice easy start it would get pretty boring, but generally, you want to create a first hole that isn’t going to be one of the toughest on the golf course. The first hole on Royal Norwich’s new course will
that’s what works best on the site and, whatever you do, a hole of that length is not going to make for the easiest start. You need to be aware of that and think carefully about how the hole should be designed in terms of the challenge you are setting the golfer at the beginning of the round. Is there pressure to create a standout first hole when you are creating a new design?
delay. It’s important that golf course architects, managers and greenstaff all work together to ensure that the operational needs are met. Sometimes you can be hamstrung by the terrain you are working with or other aspects of the site. You do the best you can. It’s not always easy to create the ideal but we should also recognise that some of the most memorable opening holes don’t follow the ideal anyway.
be a nice, medium length par 4 that plays between 280 and 370 yards. The fairway is generously wide and there is nothing much to trouble you in terms of hazards, but it’s still a great strategic hole which rewards a well-positioned drive because of a fantastic copper beech tree at the corner of the dogleg. It worked out really well. It was the best hole that could be designed in that area and that was the length that fitted the space. Occasionally you might have to start with a 460-yard par 4 because
I’ve never felt that at all. The first hole needs to set the scene for what is coming, give a sense of the course’s character and identity but without being overly demanding. In terms of operation it’s certainly helpful if golfers can get away easily and not have to reload too many times. Golf club owners and managers are more aware than ever of the amount of time it takes to play a round of golf and the impact of that on revenues and they want groups to move along the first hole without too much
Do you bring a general set of design principles to each course? You always bring design principles but you need to adapt them to make sure the golf course you produce actually fits the landscape with which you are provided. There are a huge number of impacts, which may not always be obvious to begin with. Very often you will produce a design and think ‘that’s great’ but then, as you learn more about the site and its
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opportunities and constraints you realise things aren’t going to work as you initially thought. For instance, at Norwich, there’s a tree preservation order on the whole site which makes it very difficult to remove trees without detailed consultation. Maybe there’s archaeology on the site, which nobody knows about at the start, and subsequently you can’t build in that area. That happened at Celtic Manor.
I had to make major changes, after the golf course construction had started, because the archaeologists were finding all sorts of Roman artefacts and graves on the site. There were substantial changes to the last three holes to fit around what they discovered. There are always things that throw a curve ball at you. You might start with the ideal but, often, things change and you have to adapt. Using Celtic Manor as the
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example, how difficult was it to adapt because, presumably, your design across the 18 was very balanced. When you have to alter that, how difficult is it to keep that balance? It can be very difficult. It might only be one hole that you’ve changed but that might impact on every other hole on the golf course. For instance, if you had a par 3 and had to change it to a par 4, you are probably going to want
to find a par 3 somewhere else to replace it. To get a par 3 in might mean the hole before has to become a par 5, which means the par 5 before that will need to change because you don’t want back-to-back par 5s. It’s a bit like knocking over a line of dominoes, it just has this knock on effect all the way down the line. At Celtic Manor, we changed the design of the last three holes. We were originally finishing on a par 4 but I had to make the 17th – which was a par 4 – into a par 3 to
avoid some Roman graves. The only other thing I could do was stretch the 18th tee back and make that into a par 5. That considerably increased the amount of excavation work we had to do but, arguably, I look and think it actually came out better. It is a nice finish, with a good long par-4 16th, a par-3 17th and a par-5 18th. It’s funny how these things happen. It wasn’t how it was originally planned and probably wasn’t the most efficient way to fit the holes into the landscape, but we were forced to make the change and I was delighted with the result. What are those design principles you would take into a project? It varies. The most important thing you need to do, right at the start, is get a clear brief from the client. We need to understand what they want to build and how is it going to be operated. Quite often, the client’s first thought is that they want ‘a championship golf course’ but is that really what is required? Ideally, detailed feasibility reports and business plans will guide the client as to their needs and the kind of golfer to whom they are trying to appeal. Who are they attracting? What’s the market? What is the potential membership structure? Are there going to be a lot of women and juniors? Royal Norwich is a case in point. There are probably going to be quite a lot of senior golfers and the club also want to encourage more ladies and juniors to play as well. You immediately know you have to provide a way for people who aren’t going to hit the ball particularly far to play the golf course. You’re probably looking at a course of around 5,000 yards at its shortest but Norwich also
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want to play high-quality amateur tournaments there – and possibly professional events. The distances the better players are hitting the ball nowadays means you are certainly thinking about increasing the length to over 7,000 yards. That’s what we have done. We’ve got a golf course that plays between 5,200 and 7,200 yards. The challenges for a high handicap and elite golfer are very different. How do you cater for that many people? It’s a tricky balance and it comes with experience. Obviously having lots of tees helps. Beyond that, you have got to think about how the average player is going to get round the course. What I have done at Norwich is try to make the landing areas generally pretty wide. You can get the ball out there but then the hazards are strategically placed in positions where a better player is going to say ‘I’ve got to think about what I am doing here’. The 6th hole is very interesting and one of my favourite holes on the course. The landing area is probably 70 yards wide. But if you want to hit the right part of the fairway it brings two bunkers on the right into play for the better player. There are miles of fairway on the left. I’m saying to the average player ‘hit it out there and don’t worry about those bunkers’. The next shot, you will play it up and you might not reach the green – you might be just short – and then you can chip it on. The better player is going to think ‘what’s the best line?’ It’s down the right as it gives them the best approach into the green. The green is quite tricky, sits at an angle, and is covered by a bunker on the left and a deep depression and another bunker on the right.
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There are some very tricky pin positions. They are going to have to really think about the position on the drive to make sure they can get to the pin position on the green from the right angle. It’s a hole where it’s easy to make 5. But making is a 4 is going to be quite tricky because you’ve got to hit two decent shots to get onto the green in a decent place where you are not going to three putt. That’s a lot to think about for one hole and yet you’re going through that process for all 18… That’s the fun part. That hole has worked out particularly well but not every hole is going to be perfect. Actually, you don’t want every hole to work out the same because it’s all about variety. You don’t want every hole to have a 70-yard wide landing area. Some are going to be narrow. One of the other things at Norwich is, because of the preservation order, trees will come into play on that golf course. I’ve tried to use them to make the better players shape shots. I think that’s one thing that’s actually going out of the game. It’s nice to angle fairways so a player has to hit a little fade or draw. There is a tree on the right side of the 7th hole and, unless you hit high, you are going to want to hit a cut around it. If you don’t hit that cut, you are going to go into the trees on the left. One of the things we are trying to do as architects is increase the importance of shaping shots. I don’t know what the answer is about the distance players are hitting the ball. I think it is much less of a problem at the general club golf level and being able to hit the ball further does make the game more enjoyable for most of us. But it does seem bizarre to me that I am suddenly hitting a 5-iron
180 yards. I’ve always hit a 5-iron 150 yards but now I can hit my driver getting up to 270. For decades I always thought I’d hit it well if my drive went 240 yards. Modern equipment makes a big difference and on a personal level you won’t find me complaining, but I do worry professionally about the impact of players hitting shots so far. But it does mean the test designed for the average golfer is different? That’s one of the big problems. There’s a tremendous amount of renovation work and remodelling going on and architects are looking at repositioning hazards. It’s always been the case, though. The same arguments happened 100 years ago and 50 years ago. I do think there’s a problem now when you see some of the older courses struggling to find space to lengthen and combat the distance issue. I do worry about whether
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they are going to be able to have tournaments at some of these traditional golf courses. That’s a shame but I’ve always been a fan of the fact that pros and amateurs generally play with the same equipment and the ball is the same. That’s one of the great attractions of the game – anybody can play anybody else with a handicap. If the pros start using different equipment because they are worried about the distances they are hitting it, is that right? Yet holes like the Postage Stamp at Royal Troon caused carnage during The Open. Is it about getting more creative? You have to find new answers. Traditionally the answer has been ‘narrow up the fairways and make it more penal when you miss them’ but where’s the fun in that? That takes a huge amount of strategy out of the game. I have concerns about the way the golf courses are rated. I think a
lot of clubs have received a slope rating and think they need to narrow up their fairways. Well, no. The course was probably never originally designed to have 20-yard wide fairways. It was designed to give you the opportunity to be rewarded if you position your drive on the correct side of the fairway to give you the best approach into the green. If you narrow the fairway, you’re just rewarding the guy that can hit it down the middle and not making it fun for anybody else. I suspect we’ll go on talking about these things but I do worry, with the length that people are hitting the ball, whether it is sustainable. Courses will get longer, the amount of space required will get larger, there will be more safety problems and courses will require more maintained grass and irrigation, all at a time when we’re trying to reduce maintenance costs, make courses more sustainable, speed up the game and make it more enjoyable.
“The most important thing you need to do, right at the start, is get a clear brief from the client. We need to understand what they want to build”
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It’s a problem which is going to get worse until something is eventually done about it. Of all your projects, which are you most proud? Very often it’s the last golf course you did. I am really proud to have designed a golf course for the Ryder Cup. How many golf course architects get to do that? I loved working at Celtic Manor. I go back there a lot and the people are great. That would be a major highlight. I really enjoyed the Marquess course at Woburn. I was very lucky to have worked on a site like that and, again, we still have a close relationship with the people there. Perhaps the course I hope people will get a chance to see most is one I finished in St Petersburg last year called Mill Creek. It was a huge project, built on sand and I was delighted with the way that turned out. It’s got a real linksy feel and lots of variety and playing options.
Ross McMurray Ross McMurray started playing golf at 10 and his grandfather was secretary at Elie. He studied landscape design at Heriot-Watt University, in Edinburgh, and joined golf course architecture firm Cotton, Pennink and Partners in 1988. He would then join IMG Design in 1990, which became European Golf Design two years later. McMurray was responsible for the Twenty Ten Course at Celtic Manor and was lead designer on The Marquess course at Woburn. He is currently president of the European Institute of Golf Course Architects.
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What goes into a successful
BUNKER REVAMP?
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y course manager wants to renovate our bunkers. What should I be looking at? Our advice would be to gather as much information as possible. When we speak to clients for the first time, we ask a lot of questions before moving forward to discuss renovation options. In the first stages it is critical a
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clear picture is built of the situation with existing bunkers. The objective is to assess needs, learn where the problems lie and make the correct recommendations. From our perspective, it is difficult to execute a successful renovation without building a clear picture and having the client acknowledge the existing problems. We discuss what their maintenance issues are and where
they invest the vast majority of time and expenditure with their bunkers. We ask what the membership feedback is regarding playability, whether the club has an architect on board, whether certain bunkers are now redundant and out of play or whether they are too penal. There is a very specific list of questions we use to yield the type of information we need. The picture we build is slightly
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The most frequent alterations to a course are the bunkers. Rhydian Lewis, director of construction experts Durabunker, reveals what you need to consider if your club is planning renovations… different every time – no two courses are the same – but a methodology to reach the right decisions and achieve the desired end goal is almost identical. Digging a little deeper, and being more specific, also creates a picture of current performance and a road map to a successful renovation project. An example of key information to glean from your course manager might be whether the bunkers
suffer from washout (sand sliding down bunker faces, leaving a wet slurry in the bunker bases), sand contamination, flooding, edge erosion, stone migration, instability and so on. After gathering the relevant information, we would then go on to recommend products that we feel would benefit the renovation and also ideas on bunker design – whether the club have an in-house designer or whether they come to
us for design services. What are the challenges of a bunker renovation in terms of design? We’ve designed with high-end companies such as Nicklaus Design and Greg Norman Design. We’ve learned a lot of lessons over the last eight to 10 years – enabling us to offer our own design service to clients. Course managers sometimes
The new bunkers on the 10th at TPC Colorado
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Durabunker director Rhydian Lewis, centre, at Banyan Cay, in Florida
have their own vision of what they would like to achieve and input can also come from various other voices within a golf club: committee members, chairman of greens, club professionals and other sources. Although our approach to design is always collaborative, setting clear and agreed design objectives is fundamental to achieving a positive end result. We always try to encourage the development of a bunker ‘masterplan’. This is not always easy as club managers, and even course managers, are not always aware of the variety of bunker designs that exist or what can be achieved through the sensible use of different products on the market. We often recommend an initial trial phase is implemented, where just a few bunkers are renovated, giving everyone the opportunity to assess both design style and products used. In effect, this produces a template for a larger project. There is a lot of in-house design and we’ve seen good examples
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“Although our approach to design is always collaborative, setting clear and agreed design objectives is fundamental” and plenty of very bad designs. There are a lot of aspects to consider. Many course managers are understandably focused on reducing maintenance, but reducing maintenance and coupling that with good design to produce bunkers that are pleasing to the eye and eminently playable is not always straightforward. To give just one example, we would ask the question ‘what is the maximum gradient of sand face that you would envisage?’ Sometimes we get a blank look, other times a vague answer and some rationale. It’s rare to hear relevant vocabulary such as ‘the
angle of repose of sand’. That is the steepest angle of descent, relative to the horizontal plane, to which a material can be piled without slumping. At this angle, the material on the slope face is on the verge of sliding. Once a flow of water is added to the mix, sand that is just about holding on will lose its battle against gravity and will not stay on bunker faces. This causes huge maintenance issues and time investment, not to mention appalling playing conditions for members. So, if a client wants sand flashed faces, we would ask ‘what sort of gradient are you thinking?’ They might say 50 degrees but we might say ‘what we would recommend is 30 degree or less so you are below the angle of repose of that sand’. With a good liner, it is usually possible to hold sand on slopes of approximately 35 degrees. But it doesn’t matter what liner is used if bunkers are designed with 50 degree sand faces. It is a law of physics that you are going to get
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slurry in wet conditions and sand is going to slide. So one design objective would be to agree a maximum gradient on any bunker face and not build beyond that. We are continuously learning but we do have a large back catalogue of projects, and with experience comes knowledge. The challenge of good design is multi-faceted but knowledge is certainly power when it comes to a successful renovation. If the course manager and inhouse team can bring all those elements together while still maintaining a golf course, they should be commended and utilised. Investing in good design, though, usually yields significant benefits. An architect is the obvious route but there are companies, ourselves included, who specialise in all things bunker and this focused
approach is something that should be considered as an option. This part of your business is very scientific – like architecture… The bunker design part of the business is one that is growing and we are having significant success – clients recognising our back history is something that is of value to any renovation project. There are recognised architects who are very good and obviously have a wealth of experience. We have been fortunate to work with some of the world’s leading course architects, and we have learned a huge amount from them. We are focused almost entirely on bunkers – bunker styles, bunker drainage, bunker liners, bunker edges, bunker surrounds – and it’s a relatively niche market in terms of architecture.
The truth is that some architects we’ve worked with have been very aware of maintenance issues, and we have been in awe of their work, while others have built bunkers that might look fantastic but the maintenance burden left behind has course managers tearing their hair out. Bunkers are not easy to maintain if they are not constructed correctly… Preparation and the design are key. If the design is wrong, you have got a problem right from the outset. You can try to put product on it to help, and it may to an extent, but if the design is fundamentally flawed you’re pushing the proverbial peanut up a hill – even with the best products in the world. The second point is to couple
CASE STUDY
SITTINGBOURNE & MILTON REGIS General manager Steve Bootes believes the bunker renovations at his course have significantly improved his club’s offering… Durabunker listened to our ideas. They built a picture of the problems we were facing with our bunkers and got a real feel for where we were at in the process.They didn’t try to sell us product – they were more interested in creating a solution that, along with design objectives, aligned with our style of golf course, solved our maintenance and playability problems
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and met our budgetary requirements. Although they ultimately provided us with both bunker liner and bunker edging products, they recommended we reduce the size of our bunkers quite considerably, built shallow revetted edges to offer clean definition and address our edge erosion issues, and coupled this with a liner that has performed through extremely testing conditions. At no stage did we feel they were imposing ideas on us that we felt uncomfortable with. It has certainly been a collaborative project, and
continues to be so. We were taken with the idea of one company providing design, construction, installation of product and adding to that a training element that is helping to add value to the project. It has resulted in bunkers that are now in play 24/7 even when the rest of the course is flooded. It significantly improves the product we are selling and makes my life as a club manager that bit easier now that I can be 100% confident that our bunkers will be an asset rather than an eyesore.
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DURABUNKER
good design with the use of complimentary products, not only to safeguard the design but to ensure minimum maintenance is required, making bunkers playable even in the most challenging conditions. Thirdly, the execution is also extremely important. With sand washout, if the design template states a 30 degree maximum and certain areas of bunker faces are at 40, because the shaper has been a little careless and the team have not quality checked the work, then the time spent investing in good design will have been wasted. How do you coach clubs on what type of bunker is best for them? The key thing is honesty. We would love to go in and sell large amounts of product – the higher the bunker wall is the more bunker edge product we sell. The larger
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Durabunker Ltd are specialists in the design, construction and maintenance of synthetic ‘sod wall’ or ‘revetted’ bunker edges. Executing any type and size of bunker project, they have built up a wealth of experience and expertise in the field of bunker design and construction. Durabunker offer free initial consultations to all UK clubs and have a number of international distributors on hand to support worldwide projects. For more information, visit durabunker.com the area of sand, the more liner product we shift. But that’s not the right way to go about it. From a business and design point of view, we want bunkers to look right and sit into the golf course well. We want to reduce maintenance time and we want golf courses to make critical savings, gaining hidden value such as diverting staff time that traditionally was spent on maintaining bunkers to managing playing services. So with our core product
Durabunker Shallow Edge Design by (RE)Golf at Hermitage
Durabunker, which is a bunker edging product, we do probably an equal amount of shallow edge bunker work with parkland courses as we do deeper faced bunkers on links courses. If we feel a six-inch edge coupled with a liner, with a rolling sand line, is what would fit best, then that’s what we would promote to the client – rather than a four foot wall. At Sittingbourne & Milton Regis, we reduced the area of sand by approximately 40% on some bunkers – representing significant cost and labour savings. Bunkers there were disproportionate to the size of greens and the amount of sand was overpowering the green area. We discussed with the club the idea of creating more classical style bunkers with crisp, clean edges rather than large sprawling masses of sand. It has worked well and the club is delighted with the results.
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CASE STUDY
LITTLEHAMPTON General manager Stuart McConachie was excited at being able to re-introduce classic linksstyle revetted bunkering to his layout‌
I loved the idea of our team working alongside Durabunker – learning the process and being guided by a company that had a significant back catalogue of bunker renovation projects and were happy to share their knowledge and skill with us.
It has been a fantastic experience for our staff.They are excited by the project, they have developed skills and knowledge that will benefit the golf club as a whole and it has enabled us to control costs by choosing just how much input the Durabunker team have. We suffered a few severe rain events over the spring. Our bunkers flooded and suffered terrible washout and sand contamination. The bunkers we built with Durabunker, which included both liner and synthetic bunker faces,
suffered no damage. They were as dry as a bone, the sand did not move an inch and the walls suffered no damage. The difference between old and new was mind blowing. We feel the investment in the bunker renovation has been very worthwhile. We are already seeing the benefits, with members talking about our bunkers in a positive light. The only issue is managing expectations and explaining we cannot complete the renovation overnight.
Before and after images of bunkers at Littlehampton after Durabunker were engaged for a renovation project.What particularly impressed the club was the way the company shared their knowledge and expertise when delivering the new hazards
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From Reservoir
TO ROTOR
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e all know about the importance of course renovations but isn’t keeping on top of existing irrigation systems just as important? Many golf club irrigation systems installed back in the ‘80s, in the golf boom in the ‘90s and early 2000s are coming to the end of their working lives. Clubs may be facing the prospect of total system renovation because, after 30 years, what they have now simply isn’t reliable enough to deliver the playing experience that golfers demand. And given this year’s been the hottest and driest summer since 1976, it’s time to think differently about irrigation, drive irrigation efficiencies and use less water. Is a good irrigation system fundamental to the effective running of a golf course? Three of the largest capital investments a club makes are the course, club house and maintenance sheds. Equally important is capital invested in irrigation system infrastructure which lasts 30 to 40 years too. What are the problems an old, failing irrigation system brings for a golf course and course manager? Golf architects, general managers, course managers and greenkeeping staff want the best course possible. No one’s more passionate about
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the course than the turf manager running it. It’s personal. It’s all about cost, budget and the bottom line. Having a firm grasp on costs, including the labour cost of repairs, maintenance and increased manual watering, the course manager knows exactly how much is spent on irrigation and can make more informed decisions. In my experience, this isn’t always the case. The details are lost when everything’s included in clubhouse utility bills. Something as simple as having a separate electricity meter on the pump house could give accurate running costs. I reckon 99% of clubs could tell you precisely how many pints were spilled in the bar yesterday yet 85% probably couldn’t tell you how much they spent irrigating last night. Work out if spilt beer or overwatering will have the greatest effect on the bottom line! Systems break down for two main reasons. The first is ageing hydraulics; pump and pipe networks. Old PVC pipe networks are failing. We’ve moved on a long way in terms of pipework technology and polyethylene (HDPE) pipe, used by gas networks, is more robust, reliable and lasts longer. The second is failing electrics. Cable, joint and decoders have advanced too with modern integrated control technology. Buried underground and working, they’re easy to forget and they shouldn’t be, because at some point, they will fail. If there’s negative feedback or complaints from golfers, this could
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Alastair Higgs, golf district manager UK & Ireland at Rain Bird Europe, tells Steve Carroll about the importance of good irrigation Rain Bird’s Alastair Higgs
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Sprinklers at Royal Aberdeen
be flagging up the performance limitations of the current system. So are you saying a modern, efficient system can save a club a lot of money? The bigger the system, the more you can fine-tune irrigation, water less and save money both directly and indirectly by maximising all other inputs. A thorough cost of ownership appraisal works out upfront spend and cost of ownership over time – likely investment and likely return. A practical example might to be looking at moving from single row fairway to double row fairway irrigation.That work needs to be done on a case-by-case basis, looking at every option. Everyone understands installing more technical processes means more components to start with but, over 30 years, the club reaps benefits, cost-wise and because the course will play as the architect originally intended. A lot of older irrigation systems need replacing or will do so soon.
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You’re saying ‘get to grips with it?’ Deciding how long to wait before addressing renovation is difficult. Noone usually waits for their car to break down completely before buying a new one. At some point, you start weighing up whether it’s more cost effective to continue to service and maintain your old car or buy new. Every club manager should start by answering five key questions: 1. What does it cost to run our system on a daily basis? 2. How much does irrigation cost our club each year? 3. What’s spent on preventative Who is Alastair Higgs? A keen golfer, Alastair started his career as a greenkeeper with Crown Golf in 2004, becoming head greenkeeper at Donnington Valley Golf Club in 2008, and was then appointed as course manager at Windlesham Golf Club in 2012. He joined Rain Bird in September 2016 and is golf district manager for UK & Ireland.
maintenance and upgrades? 4. How do we measure water usage and electricity for course irrigation? 5.What’s our approach to irrigation risk management and disaster planning? When it comes to risk management and disaster plans, addressing potential risks is critical. You might have a reservoir source that allows wall to wall watering but what happens if that source gets contaminated in June? You could switch to mains feed, but can the club then afford to water at the same rate? From personal experience, it’s worth tackling those difficult questions and getting a plan in place. You’ve outlined some of the challenges.What are the benefits of having a modern system in place? The benefit is being able to keep the course, reliably, in a target ‘zone’, whether that’s from an agronomic or playing perspective.Without that, costs rise and the course can’t be set up and kept at the best possible standard.The turf manager plays safe. A modern system gets you nearer to
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Rain Bird Rain Bird provides complete irrigation solutions to golf courses across the globe and has one of the strongest portfolios of trusted, quality, leading-edge products including pump stations, rotors, field controllers, map-based and mobile central control systems, decoders, swing joints, filtration systems, valves and irrigation accessories. The latest irrigation and control system technologies combine computer-aided design with GPS geo-referenced images and stateof-the-art ET-based scheduling and are designed to be easy to install and use. For more information, visit www.rainbird.eu/golf
Rain Bird’s irrigation systems at work
what I call ‘the cliff edge’, so customers get the best golfing experience and the club gains a P&L benefit. How do you work with clubs to make it straightforward for club managers apprehensive about going through the process? Our priority is understanding the issues and challenges at the earliest stage possible. First and foremost, we support the club to maximise what it has, assess how customers and the business are affected and look at any likely investment - whether that’s addons or a whole new system, if there’s a strong enough business case. Next comes purchasing equipment, solutions, training or advice. The two most important aspects are water source and a nozzle that delivers water evenly. All the stuff in between is about getting water to individual nozzles reliably, easily, as and when required. If the water source and nozzle are not correct then this will have the biggest adverse effect on system performance. We work closely with leading
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consulting partners across the globe, bringing in specialist support and technical expertise at exactly the right level, depending on what’s required. The way a course is designed, grass cultivars and water storage, for example, have a major impact on water requirements. There’s no point in having a magnificent irrigation system without water storage. The service you’re offering then is from genesis to execution? From reservoir to rotor is how we put it. Rain Bird invented the very first horizontal action impact drive sprinkler in 1935, which revolutionised the food production industry and ushered in a new era of irrigation. Irrigation is our sole focus – it’s what we do. We manufacture innovative products and solutions engineered to deliver best practice, and we provide irrigation expertise. How can clubs add new technologies onto existing systems to drive efficiency? What’s unique to Rain Bird is that
our latest software runs with all our systems dating right back to the 1980s. The original computer, if you wheeled it in, could run the latest hardware. Rain Bird offer timeless compatibility. Every single product is future proofed and backwards compatible. When you put a Rain Bird system into the ground it’s the start of a 30-year partnership. Every new product development, every technical advance, every time something gets more efficient or is easier to use, it’s available for Rain Bird customers. When you come into the Rain Bird family as a valued partner, you can be confident you are buying the opportunity to maintain your position against all your competition for years to come. It’s quite special to be involved with a global company that delivers that long-term commitment to partnership. What’s critical is working out the impact course irrigation has on your customer’s experience and the club’s profits. As I often say, as irrigation specialists, we’re not only in the golf business, we’re in the customer experience business.
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Helping your club run from
THE GROUND UP
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Understanding how resources are used, and how to control them, is hugely important in running a successful club. Ian Ratcliffe, managing director of Ground2Control, reveals how integrated systems can be the answer…
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anaging a golf club is hardly a seamless process. There are all those different departments, all with their own challenges and responsibilities. There are different laws and regulations that uniquely affect all those sectors as well. Who needs health and safety training? Who still has holidays to take? Who is working too much overtime? Who has been off sick? Communication is vital but without a clear plan of action, and efficient processes to make it all come together, it can be time consuming. Ground2Control provides an online integrated system covering GIS surveys, resource and safety management and Ian Ratcliffe, managing director, explains how joining the dots is much more efficient – and can save your club money. What is Ground2Control? Ground2Control is basically in three parts. We cover the whole spectrum of resource and safety management. We start with GIS information. That is the aerial survey of a course or a property. It’s giving clubs information about the asset they are managing. That’s through using very high resolution drones which produce topographical surveys. Those surveys can be used to
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measure areas – tees, greens, fairways and bunkers – so you can accurately measure quantities of chemical applications. But because the topographical surveys are three dimensional as well, they can then be used for irrigation and architects can use them for changes to the course. Ground2Control is a cloud-based
Users can create their own departments – the clubhouse can be a separate department to golf operations, and the bar manager can have their own log in as can the catering manager and so on. They just see information that’s relevant to them, whereas the general manager can then see all of it and put it all together.
system and is accessed through a browser. Anyone in a club, who has permission to use the system, can access the information. It’s not a drawing, stuck in a drawer, that’s out of the way. That information can build over time – so you are creating layer upon layer. That informs other aspects of the system. Secondly, resource management covers people – task management, chemical use, machinery and maintenance and financial management. Thirdly, safety covers every aspect of H&S for the entire club – and not just golf operations.
Looking at health and safety, how does Ground2Control assist golf club managers? What we have tried to do, which is different to traditional health and safety consultancy, is provide a tool where a general manager or course manager can choose an assessment or operating procedure they need and there’s guidance and sample controls that help them to understand all the risks and burdens, how to control them, and the importance of doing that. It’s very much a checks and balances system. You start off with a risk assessment, which just identifies what you have then got to do. If it’s a piece of equipment - let’s say you are doing a risk assessment for a chainsaw - you can select it and complete a risk assessment for it. That risk assessment will then say you need an operating procedure. It will provide all the information of risks and burdens relating to a chainsaw that you need to address. Then, for each of those burdens and hazards, it will give you
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guidance and it will explain the importance of addressing particular hazards. Then you put your controls in. ‘How do I control this particular risk?’ It sounds a rather large piece of kit? Potentially it is, because it covers everything. It will cover risk assessments, procedural, safe operating, safe systems of work, COSHH, manual handling, work at height – and it will also give you tools such as controlling legionella and exposure, noise and vibration of machinery, accidents and near misses. Does it simplify what would otherwise be time intensive work for club managers? Traditionally you have a health and safety file and you get someone in
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for an audit and you’ve got to use their knowledge and experience to fill it in. It then ends up in a folder. Most people then say ‘the folder is in the office and it’s there to be referred to’. But they are not implementing those practices to make their every day working life safer. It’s just a tickbox. Very often then, you don’t know where the gaps are. So if an incident happens it is suddenly ‘reach for the folder to see if we are covered’ and ‘oops, we are not’. There was a classic example. A greenkeeper injured himself lighting a bonfire. He effectively set himself on fire. He was an experienced greenkeeper, using a fuel to light a bonfire, and it backfired and burned him. The club didn’t have a safe operating procedure for lighting bonfires. The underwriter and the club had no defence. Although he
should have known not to do it, he did it and there was an incident, and he got injured. There was no history of going through a procedure for lighting a bonfire. ‘Well, it’s common sense, isn’t it?’ That’s not a defence. The person in question got a payout and the club was liable. If there was a safe operating procedure for lighting bonfires, the club and the underwriter would then be covered. It is being able to highlight and identify where those gaps are in the policy and then fill them easily and understandably. With our system, you can create a safe operating system for lighting bonfires. You can then attach all the employees that are likely to ever be involved in lighting a bonfire. That way, you can see if that safe operating procedure has been assigned to those employees.
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”It’s not a drawing, stuck in a drawer, that’s out of the way. It can build over time - creating layer upon layer of information”
The cost implications of not getting this right can be massive, can’t they? Another example, and this is where GIS information becomes useful, is the use of driving cones off tees. If you can overlay a 30 degree driving cone 250 yards off the tee, you can then see whether there are tees on adjoining holes or greens that come within that risk area. If they do, it’s just a simple sign on the tee to say ‘there is a hidden tee on the left side, if you hit the ball left shout fore’. It’s a simple thing to do. There was an historic case where a person got hit, lost an eye, and the golf club ended up being liable for £400,000. It’s a famous case. That could have been easily avoided if they had put a sign on the tee. That’s where the aerial footage comes into its own. It identifies all those problem areas.
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So you don’t need to be afraid of H&S because everything can be contained and inputted easily in your product. It is empowering various heads of department to undertake the work they are doing to make sure their department is covered. It’s a circular thing – to identify things are missing, allocate those tasks to the people responsible and then a board or committee can have read only access to the system to see an overview. Have we got everything in place? What actions are required? It creates actions for everything that needs to be addressed.
For more information, visit ground2control.com
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The layout that’s a Prince
AMONG COURSES The redesigned Himalayas course at Prince’s has been labelled a triumph. Steve Carroll talked to the people who made it happen…
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Architect Martin Ebert hits the first shot on the new Himalayas nine at Prince’s
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“You have to describe Prince’s as perfect links terrain. It’s beautiful sandy soil, with fantastic links undulations produced by the natural wind. It’s a great tract of land”
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t was 7.01am when the first competitive shot was hit, a drive struck in a squall. The gusts were hitting 45mph, flagsticks clung grimly to the holes, the rain menaced, and the ball threatened to come backwards. Yet there was a queue on the tee. And all the men were still going off the whites. When they had waited so long to play Prince’s new Himalayas course, not even Mother Nature was going to stop the members in their tracks. They’d watched with curious eyes as architect Martin Ebert took their favourite nine and almost redrew it entirely over the better part of a year. The Shore and the Dunes are the loops that always brought the Sandwich club acclaim, but it was the Himalayas that was the closest to the hearts of those who played
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at Prince’s most frequently. It takes courage to meddle with emotions, and history, with the course having stood as a monument to 1950s design principles. But the McGuirk family, who’ve owned the club for two generations, pushed forward. Not that they are saying this is a redesign, rather a re-imagination. Well, someone clearly had some big dreams. If you are going to show ambition, then hiring the team that turned Turnberry’s 9th into one of the world’s most spectacular par 3s, or could envisage the two new holes at Royal Portrush that will stun spectators at next year’s Open, was a masterstroke. “You have to describe Prince’s as perfect links terrain,” said Ebert of his first impressions of the stretch of turf that has been the club’s
home for more than a century. It’s land that’s withstood not only the most severe examinations by the weather but the bombs and barbed wire of two world wars. “It’s beautiful sandy soil, with fantastic links undulations produced by the natural wind. It’s a great tract of land, and plenty of room for it characterised by these parallel ridges to the ocean.” Even if the members didn’t feel the same way, the Himalayas was the awkward child of the trio of layouts. If visitors didn’t ignore it, it was reluctantly embraced. And as far as the McGuirk family were concerned, it didn’t hit the championship standard of its other siblings. You couldn’t argue that now. “When we first talked to Martin about it, we’d had a number of the top 100 people come down and they said ‘it’s a really strong
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27 holes but you haven’t got any signature holes’,” explained general manager Rob McGuirk. “It was ‘every par 4 is a similar length, there’s no risk and reward and you don’t have any holes facing the sea’. When Martin came, we said ‘these are the observations we have had over the last 10 years’ can we integrate these things into the Himalayas? He filled the brief.” As is his firm’s wont, Ebert delved into the archives with staff architect Mike Howard, unearthing old photos and scattered aerial shots – any scrap that could give them a hint of how the course developed. But a simple restoration, however, was not in their minds. Only the first hole remains recognisably the same as the original design. “There was the opportunity to get tees up onto higher ground, up onto these ridges – to create
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different angles for the tee shots and also to give beautiful views of the sea,” added Ebert. “There was a really big decision for Rob and his father to make – from two options. One was to keep the holes exactly as they were and the other was to introduce a par 3 at the far end of the course.” That hole, the 5th, is the one that’s rightly attracting all the attention. Ebert took a relatively flat expense of land and transformed it into an eye-catching par 3 – replete with wetlands and the view of the water the McGuirk’s craved. “One of the big characteristics was to try and get this green to blend in with the others on the course. That was a real challenge,” said Ebert.“The green was probably raised up by about a metre and a half from the lowest point and the tees were three or
four metres. We really wanted to get that view of the ocean as a backdrop and give the golfers a special experience – standing on that tee and feeling as though they’ve got that bit of elevation. “It’s a huge area for a relatively short par 3. “Rob’s brief was to make a shorter hole, not go with a 180 or 200yard hole. That was an interesting debate. “The Postage Stamp was mentioned but what people don’t realise is that the Postage Stamp is only open during the summer. “We really needed to produce a green big enough for all the golf that is played on a busy course. ‘What we ended up doing was creating a larger green but one with so many different flag positions on it, and if you miss in the bunker on the left or down the bank you will be in trouble.
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“Because of the size of the green, if you don’t hit the right part then three putts are probably more likely than two. It’s a special hole ready for us to go out and enjoy.” Installing the 5th meant losing the 2nd as it was. So Ebert got creative, combining the second tee with the old third green and producing a 600-yard plus par 5 that sweeps around the wetlands to a large and gently sloping putting surface. Of all the work that took place, this was the design that stood out most to McGuirk. “Five was always going to be good, because it’s brand new,” he explained. “We said ‘you can do whatever you want here. We just want it to be special’. “Someone like Martin is always going to make it really good. But with two, we couldn’t really see it
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throughout any of the growing in and were saying ‘are we really sure about this?’ There were 200 trees down behind the green, which we took down, and then it started to take shape. “Even three weeks before opening, we had no grass down on that middle bit of fairway and we overseeded with rye just to get it going. That hole played brilliantly downwind. I think into the wind it might be slightly different.” McGuirk drew on some of the classic American courses – Streamsong, Whistling Straits and National Links of America – when outlining his intentions to Ebert. But even he admitted he was a little surprised by the hugely positive reaction from visitors and members alike when the altered course finally came into play. “It was better than I thought it would be. When you walk it, you
don’t see it. To play it and see where the ball is landing, it visually stood out to me – particularly the second hole round the corner. “I haven’t had one complaint from the members through the whole process. They’ve liked going down there because they have seen the changes.” Now they are seeing more, with Ebert already at work on aspects of the Shore and Dunes course and developing a new masterplan to integrate those more with the Himalayas. Prince’s finest hour came in 1932, when Gene Sarazen won the Open there. In the middle of a golden triangle of courses, with Royal St George’s and Royal Cinque Ports close neighbours, they’ll be hoping those old glories are about to become more than mere memories. The re-imagined Himalayas is the perfect start.
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PRINCE’S HIMALAYAS NINE THE MAJOR CHANGES
1 3 8
ST The wide fairway has been re-introduced and a small central pot bunker put in to give players something to think about off the tee.
RD The old fourth has been extended with new back tees, bunkers down the left and an extended wetland on the right.
TH A much shorter hole now, the longer hitter needs to decide whether to try and blast at the green or play it as a two-shotter.
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5
TH A new hole – a short par 3 with a view of the ocean, a large contoured green with run off areas and extensive wetlands.
2 6 9
ND The old hole is replaced by using the second tee and the third green to create a slight dogleg par 5. A sand area was restored.
TH The green was extended up to the left and the hole was re-bunkered.
TH The old Sarazen bunker close to the green remains a feature of a finishing hole that’s a challenge into the wind.
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Meet the
MANAGER
Sponsor of the 2017 GCMA Manager of the Year award
With Jim Burns, secretary at Stranraer, in Dumfries & Galloway
Stranraer
H
ow did you get into golf club management? I was a county golfer for a number of years and, towards the end of that career, wanted to put something back in so I got involved with my local area on the executive and became championship secretary and, subsequently, secretary. I’d always had a hankering to get into
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golf club management and my predecessor at Stranraer retired in 2007. I applied for the role and was fortunate to get it. I’ve been a member here since 1968. My role has evolved. I originally started as starter/ secretary and, in 2011, I took on the treasurer’s role as well. What do you like most about your role? I enjoy the face-to-face customer
contact, building relationships and interacting with members. In this role, people are here to enjoy their leisure time and it’s incumbent on us to make sure that journey is enjoyable. That’s one of the great rewards – hearing their tale, their trials and tribulations. Being able to help them on that journey is one of the good things about this industry. Of course, there are challenges
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as well... The demographics in our location are a big challenge these days. We are becoming more isolated because peoples’ horizons are getting bigger. In days gone by, going to Stranraer was a nice break. Now people will jump on a plane for a two-hour flight – and that’s probably easier than a two-hour journey from Glasgow or Manchester. Tourism is the main industry here and, in the last 20 years, there has been quite a reduction in the number of people employed locally. These are factors we can’t control – unless someone brings more industry to the area. What’s the best piece of advice you have been given? Try to be your own man and be as honest as you can. What opportunities exist for the GCMA in Scotland? The initial understanding of the GCMA was that the secretary would go and have a good day out and play golf. The CMAE came in here with the concept that they wanted to educate managers and secretaries. That was seen as being in conflict in GCMA but there are many good attributes to both and the fact they are now working together more closely is going to help in these more challenging times. Golf, in Scotland particularly, is at a threshold. How do you see the state of golf at the moment?
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From a membership point of view it is precarious. I had someone come here from Leicester at Easter. He’s not a member of a golf club and decided to drive to the west of Scotland as it had good weather. He played here and two other courses. He said to me that he was coming back in the summer and had his
“In the last 20 years, there has been quite a reduction in the number of people employed locally”
Jim Burns
summer planned – Scotscraig, Cruden Bay, Reay, Prestwick and East Kilbride. He said he’d rather do that with his £700 than be tied to one golf club. That’s where the challenge is. It is adding that value to get that member’s discretionary income on
a regular basis. If the modern golfer wants to play lots of different courses, then traditional membership is going to suffer, isn’t it? That’s the difficulty golf clubs have – trying to retain the membership base but still grow the game. What is your proudest moment in golf? Being President of SGL was the pinnacle. I was elected as the first for the new amalgamated Scottish Golf Limited and privileged to undertake the role, which lasted 18 months. I visited many clubs across the country along with attending various amateur championships and was very lucky to attend the Masters, The US Open, our own Open and the Curtis Cup. It was essentially an ambassadorial role. I was the sounding board for many a club official with a question or two. Listening to the members’ issues and experiences allowed them to have a link with the governing body. I don’t have the answers. I don’t come from a big club with thousands of members but to see that we were not alone on this troubled journey that we are all on is heartening but also concerning. It was a year and a half and it was a super time.
Get In Touch To contact Stranraer, visit stranraergolfclub.net
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From the
REGIONS EAST MIDLANDS Wrap up of AGM and Spring Meeting Norwood Park and Belton Park After the Winter Meeting was cancelled, Norwood Park stepped in to hold the AGM and 18 members attended. Ron Beckett was elected captain and Paul Thornton was elected as vice-captain. It turned out to be an excellent meeting with lots of discussion and networking among the turnout. The end of April saw the Spring Meeting staged at Belton Park, where national captain Cameron Dawson was in attendance, along with 35 members. BC Technologies’ Matthew Armsby brought members up to date with GDPR and gave a great presentation on the need to address cyber technology. PlayMoreGolf’s Jake Rhodes detailed the success of his company and participating clubs are having by using their flexible membership systems. Other speakers included Steve Robinson, of Rijo42, Smart Energy Solutions’ Phil Townend along with Tammy Hewins, representing intelligentgolf. The Fairway Credit qualifier, and the Brader Trophy, were staged in the afternoon on the Brownlow course. It was Holme Hall’s Andrew Watson and Worksop’s Alan Mansbridge who will go forward to represent the region at the
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Fairway Credit Finals, which will be staged at The Berkshire, in September. Bill Dunn, of Radcliffe on Trent, won the Brader Trophy. The summer sees attention turn to the annual matches against Yorkshire, Midlands and East Anglia regions. The Autumn Meeting will take place at Kirby Muxloe, on Wednesday, September 12, and a further Business Seminar will be held at Newark GC on Tuesday, November 6. BIGGA’s ecological consultant Sophie Vukelic will be among the speakers and everyone is welcome to attend. INTERNATIONAL MATCH GCMA vs France Wednesday, June 13 and Thursday, June 14 Stoke by Nayland
Regional Managers Full details at gcma.org.uk/ regions Chiltern & Home Counties
David Cook East Anglia
Gary Smith East Midlands
Rod Savage London & Home Counties
Maureen Brooker Midland
Rob Wormstone Norfolk
John Barnard North West
Neil Annandale Northern
Terry Minett The annual match against the ADGF took place in reflective mood following the death of leading instigator Donald Gregoire. The first day saw the GCMA come out on top 5.5-2.5 on the Gainsborough course and the singles were staged on the Constable course the next morning in somewhat colder and windier conditions. The team responded well to the encouragement of South East regional captain Steve Armstrong and won the singles 9.5-6.5 to take the overall match 15-9. The GCMA now lead the overall series 9-4 and the French will be desperate to reduce the deficit.
Northern Ireland
Jim Cullen Scotland
Bernard Flockhart South East
John Edgington South West
Karen Drake Southern
Paul Gaylor Wales
Mike Rees Wessex
Alex Taylor Yorkshire
Cameron Dawson
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At the heart of the UK’s best golf clubs 9 of the top 10 courses in the UK and Ireland are managed by GCMA members
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My success story...
DOUGIE CLEETON
Sponsors of My Success Story
The first phase in a £1 million project at Bruntsfield Links Golfing Society is complete and there is more to come. Chief executive Dougie Cleeton reveals all about the ambitious development…
I
t is the place where club golf first began. The Bruntsfield Links Golfing Society, the fourth oldest club in the world, can trace their roots way back to 1761. The sport has been played on the site of Bruntsfield Links, in Edinburgh, for much longer. Their Barnton course is just as much of an institution, bearing the stamp of Willie Park Jnr, Dr Alister MacKenzie, James Braid and Fred Hawtree. A finer set of architects you couldn’t hope to find. Bruntsfield had been an Open qualifying venue until 2011 but had seen no changes since the early 1970s. So the club embarked on an ambitious redevelopment to modernise the layout to meet the demands of the modern game – and called in Mackenzie & Ebert’s Tom Mackenzie. “He presented quite radical course changes to the Society, which included renovating all bunkering, introducing eight new holes using the existing holes and developing a former practice ground,” said Bruntsfield chief executive Dougie Cleeton. “This included the introduction of a significant pond that would
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come into play and a complete change to the layout of the course, as well as controversially changing the signature 10th hole, but creating a far better hole with quite outstanding views.” The membership approved proposals for changes to take place in three phases and over three years, as well as bringing in Cleeton – the former managing secretary at Blairgowrie – to run the Society and project manage the £1.2 million renovation. The aim was simple: transform Bruntsfield Links Golfing Society into one of the best inland courses in the UK. Over the course of last year, 1st Golf Construction – appointed following a tender process – renovated the bunkers on holes one to four and 11 to 17, as well as building two new holes.
“It remains very fair, aesthetically outstanding, and is elevated to one of the very best parkland courses in the UK”
A new par-3 16th and a demanding par-4 17th were constructed and a pond was also introduced on the former practice ground to separate the 16th tee and the green. That phase of the project is now in complete and the whole makeover is now on track to be open to the members next year. It wasn’t entirely without challenge. Bruntsfield’s clay soil base was problematic for drainage, particularly for the reconstructed bunkers, and the Society opted to use Capillary Concrete liners. That allowed drains to be created and will also protect the new hazards from burrowing animals while also providing greater consistency in the way they perform. Cleeton added:“The project
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An aerial view of the construction works at Bruntsfield Links Golfing Society
started in June 2017 and through one of the wettest summers on record, 1st Golf Construction completed ahead of schedule and under budget. “New signature holes were created – the 2nd from an elevated tee looks down upon a fantastic vista while the 16th represents the ultimate par 3 over water to a green that slopes towards the pond. “The membership of the Society were so impressed with the first phase that they almost unanimously agreed that the course works should be completed in year two, one year ahead of schedule.” Mackenzie’s new plans include a putting green placed in front of the clubhouse, on land currently occupied by the 1st tee. The new surface will be more
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than four times the size of the existing one. “The final phase will also see further dramatic changes with the par-4 9th becoming a par 5,” Cleeton continued. “The once signature 10th will be even more dramatic as a ‘postage stamp’ par 3 that will be played to a green where the view from the tee is an unspoiled vista of the River Forth and beyond. “The new 12th hole will become a demanding par 5 dogleg and dangerously bunkered. “The 1st tee will move onto the current 18th green, which subsequently gets flipped over onto the once 10th fairway. “Another 40-plus bunkers will be reshaped and lined with Capillary Concrete.” In total, there will be eight new holes, more than 80 bunkers
reshaped and lined and three greens relaid, along with the transformation of the practice ground. Cleeton, Mackenzie and 1st Golf Construction’s Marcus Terry worked closely throughout the process, focused on delivering the best course possible, and the renovations will be completed in October and ready for play in April 2019. “The overriding observation about the changes is that while it looks like the course is more challenging, it remains very fair, aesthetically outstanding, and is elevated to one of the very best parkland courses in the UK.” We want to hear all about the success stories at your club. Get in touch by emailing s.carroll@sportspub.co.uk
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June 2018
STATISTICS UK&I 26,959
Hole-in-ones made in qualifying events during June
Total competitions recorded
GENTS:
LADIES:
16,356 10,603
461
115 Unclaimed BOSS hole-in-one watches. They can be claimed with the code at h1club.co.uk
928,324 total rounds of golf recorded
LOWEST EXACT HANDICAP
Gents
Ladies
-5.4 -5.3 29,433 total HowDidiDo Order of Merit sign ups for 2018
7,877
eagles or better
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400,291 birdies
3,464,667
Stats provided by HowdidIdo.com
pars
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@RainBirdGolf
Rain Bird has been a huge help for dialing in our system. They made it a much easier transition during the restoration. Stephen Rabideau, CGCS | Director of Golf Courses, Winged Foot Golf Club
Winged Foot Golf Club brought incredible precision to their irrigation. To prepare for a major championship, this prestigious club recently completed a historic restoration. By partnering with Rain Bird, they also received hands-on help implementing new intelligent irrigation practices. From dialing-in nozzle settings in their Central Control to setting up a Rain Watch™ system that responds to microclimates, a dedicated commitment from Rain Bird made it easier for the club to protect their water source and defend their turf. See more renovation stories at rainbird.com/RenovationPartner.