Balancing art and science

We are in an exciting period of the year for golf. Our own courses are at their best offering fast running conditions and shorts more in an abundance than waterproof trousers and everyone should be in a good frame of mind.

Coupled with that, we have the professionals showing us how it is done over the toughest tests the game has to offer. The Open Championship is about to be played over Royal Liverpool Golf Club, one of the very finest tests of golf to find anywhere. The fact that their last two Open Champions have been Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy is testament to the fact that the course identifies the best.

Standards of golf course maintenance are now at a level that anyone time travelling, from even as recently as the 1980s, could never imagine, and the ability to measure soil condition and plant health mean that issues which plagued the Head Greenkeepers of yesteryear are often cut off a the path. That doesn’t mean that the job has become easier. No way, with the tools to improve comes expectation of perfect conditions and golf with forever be an outdoor game with all the variables that that entails. The very best Course Managers are using all the tools available to them, but they also have a feel for their golf course and know, just know, what is best for it, so those with the best balance of art and science are the ones who produce the very best golf courses. So we are in an exciting period whether you are a golfer or a greenkeeper.