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Miller lands
LPGA agronomist post
It didn’t take long for John Miller, CGCS, to brush up his rèsumè upon hearing that GCSAA and the LPGA Tour were partnering to hire a full-time agronomist for the women’s professional golf tour.
“I knew it was something I was definitely interested in,” says Miller. “I’ve had a fever for tournament golf for a long time and really enjoy being a part of tournament golf. When I saw the release, I was immediately excited about the possibilities and how I might be able to fit in.”
Now, he’ll get the chance to find out. The superintendent at the Golf Club at Yankee Trace in Centerville, Ohio, for the past 14 years has been hired by GCSAA to become the first full-time agronomist for the LPGA Tour.
A 24-year member of GCSAA, Miller prepared Yankee Trace for four professional golf events when the facility played host to the Nationwide Tour’s Dayton Open from 1999 to 2003. In his new role, Miller will assist LPGA tournament operations staff in developing consistent course conditions, primarily in the areas of greens speed, fairway widths and the height of cut for roughs and fairways, and serve as a liaison between the LPGA and the host facility’s golf course management team.
Miller is a member of the GCSAA staff, but will work closely with the LPGA’s staff and superintendents at LPGA tournament sites.
“First, I obviously want to help promote GCSAA and get the name of the association out there,” Miller says about his initial goals for the new position. “The association has done a wonderful job of promoting itself and the profession of the golf course superintendent. I’m going to be in a position where I can take that promotion to another level, and I’m excited to do that.
“Then, I really want to help the superintendents at the host sites get what they need to do the best job possible. I want to be a resource for them and assist them in a way that makes the course better, not just for the week of the tournament, but for the whole year.
“From an LPGA perspective, I really want to listen to what the players have to say, find out what things are important to them … and relay those things to the superintendent. I want to be that bridge between the LPGA, the players and the host facility.”
GCSAA CEO Steve Mona, CAE, thinks both GCSAA and the LPGA will benefit from this partnership. “It is a mutually beneficial arrangement that will ultimately showcase the value of GCSAA members to the game and elevate the platform on which LPGA professionals compete,” he says.
LPGA Commissioner Carolyn F. Bivens says, “We are excited to welcome John to the LPGA team. The LPGA and GCSAA have partnered to select a talented, experienced agronomist. With this appointment, we ensure the venues on which the LPGA stars compete are in the best condition for the players, week in and week out. John also will play an integral role in selecting all future LPGA tournament venues. We sincerely thank the GCSAA for their partnership in selecting John.”
Miller earned a bachelor’s degree in agronomy from Ohio State University in 1983. Prior to arriving at Yankee Trace, he served as superintendent at Indian Springs Golf Course in Mechanicsburg, Ohio, and London (Ohio) Country Club. Miller currently serves on GCSAA’s Standards/Bylaws Committee and previously served two years as vice chairman of the Education Committee and as a member of the Certification Committee.
Miller is a member and past president of the Miami Valley GCSA and has served on the education planning committee for the Ohio Turfgrass Foundation. He also is a past president of Play Golf Ohio.
Benjamin T. Anders of Weaverville, N.C., is the winner of the 2007 Joseph S. Garske Collegiate Grant by Par Aide. Established in honor of Garske, who founded Par Aide, the $2,500 grant assists the children of GCSAA members in the funding of their education. The grant, which is funded by The Environmental Institute for Golf, is renewable for a second year with proof of enrollment and a grade point average of 2.0 or higher. Anders will enroll at the University of North Carolina this fall. He plans to major in business with an emphasis in dentistry.
Winds of change at Olympic
The Olympic Club in San Francisco, the oldest athletic club in the United States (est. 1860), has nurtured many national and world championships in many sports, including four of golf’s U.S. Opens.
The club, which includes 45 golf holes, returns to the game’s major spotlight this month when it hosts the U.S. Amateur on its 83-year-old Lake and Ocean venues. The event also is significant in that it will showcase a different look at America’s 23rd-ranked Lake Course, which is slated for its fifth U.S. Open in five years.
“The USGA knows we’re going to be hosting the Open, so they’re going to be looking at how the players react to the changes we’ve made (for the Amateur) on the golf course and how the scoring goes. From there they can gauge if we need to do anything differently,” says Pat Finlen, CGCS and director of golf course maintenance operations at Olympic.
Finlen and his staff — including course superintendents Brian Koffler (Lake) and Zach Ohsann (Ocean) — have done a lot to this point. The fairways at both layouts are recontoured, and bunkers have been deepened with new sand and new surrounds that include tall fescue. The Lake Course has been lengthened to almost 6,900 yards. Two notable changes are the result of extending the driving range 35 yards, backed by 40-foot mounds, which forced both the 14th and 15th greens on the Ocean Course to be moved and the 15th lengthened overall.
Since Finlen arrived in 2002, ongoing fairway topdressing and tree management programs were instituted. At the Lake Course, especially, it will be firmer and faster; wind will be a new issue, with many holes now more open to air movement.
This year’s Amateur is the third (1958, 1981) at Olympic. It begins a grueling nine-day run Aug. 18 with two practice-round days on both courses, two days of stroke play on both venues and five days of match play on the Lake Course.
“The first four days are the crunch days with more than 300 golfers,” Finlen says. “Some will play two rounds a day on the practice days, so it’s virtually solid golf from 7:30 in the morning until dark.”
The schedule is a staff-stretcher. Finlen can draw on 51 members from the Olympic crews, but he’s also counting on as many as 40 volunteers come tournament time.
The key, the 23-year GCSAA member notes, will be the efforts of the course superintendents. He hired both as assistants with impressive credentials — Koffler, a six-year GCSAA member, had worked at Cypress Point and Pebble Beach, and Ohsann, a five-year member of the association, had a stint at Augusta National — and both worked their way up the ladder. They’ve been especially valuable since Finlen, a GCSAA director, often must tend to association business.
“With my board service and everything, Brian and Zach and their assistants have done a tremendous job with all they’ve had to do,” Finlen says.
Deere retools One Source
Now that John Deere’s acquisition of Lesco is officially completed, the company has rolled out how the deal will benefit its innovative John Deere Golf & Turf One Source program.
While the former Lesco business is officially housed in John Deere Landscapes, Gregg Breningmeyer, director of marketing and sales for One Source, says the acquisition will influence the latter program.
Adjustments, as he calls them, will take effect at the start of the company’s new fiscal year, Nov. 1. They include:
• Lesco agronomic products, along with some current One Source partner products, will be available through One Source.
• One Source distributors will carry both equipment and irrigation components and provide financing options for those products.
• Former golf and turf field Lesco employees will complement the agronomic arm of One Source, with a focus on seed, fertilizer and
chemicals.
• Stores on Wheels will continue to provide exclusive golf services.
• Customers also will be able to purchase golf and turf agronomic products through John Deere Landscapes branches (former Lesco service centers).
• While Lesco’s headquarters operations are being moved to John Deere Landscapes in Alpharetta, Ga., an office will remain in Cleveland.
Steve Mona, CAE, CEO of GCSAA, was recently re-elected secretary/treasurer of the National Golf Foundation’s board of directors. Other officers include Jim Conner, president of FootJoy, chairman; Jim Thompson, president and CEO of Golfsmith, vice chairman; and Mark King, president and CEO of TaylorMade-Adidas Golf, immediate past chairman. Other board members are George Fellows, Callaway Golf; Jerry Hinckley, Textron Financial; James Kahn, Golf Digest Companies; David Manougian, The Golf Channel; and Gary Schaal, Cannon Ridge Golf Club.
Veteran super readies for challenge
Ken Lapp has been working on golf courses going on six decades. He’s left the age when most retire in his dust. And he’s not about to stop and smell the flowers just yet.
“It’s been a great trip so far,” says the Class A superintendent and longtime golf course maintenance director at Cog Hill Golf & Country Club in Lemont, Ill., with “so far” resonating like he can’t wait to see what’s over the next rise.
So far, Lapp’s ride has taken him to the heights of his profession. The last three decades-plus of his 52-year career have been at Cog Hill, where he’s prepped for 16 Western Opens, a U.S. Amateur, a couple of men’s public links championships and a women’s public links. On tap next month at Cog Hill’s venerable Dubsdread Course is the BMW Championship, the final qualifier in the PGA Tour’s FedEx Cup series before the Tour Championship, Sept. 13-16.
The day after the BMW’s final round brings Lapp to the brink of that next rise. He will embark on something he hasn’t done since he became a teenage superintendent in 1955 — a total renovation of the 43-year-old Dubsdread, which will reopen in the spring of 2009.
GCM caught up with the 44-year GCSAA member in late June to talk about where his trip has taken him, where he’s going next and why he keeps going.
GCM: Your longevity is unique enough, but you’ve also had just two bosses in all that time — your dad, Amos (at Andrews GC in West Chicago), and the Jemsek family (Fresh Meadows GC in Hillside and Cog Hill).
Ken Lapp: I was fortunate to become a superintendent at age 19 at Fresh Meadows, and the only reason for that was working for my father and Joe Jemsek. Joe gave me a break. He also knew my dad was going to be looking over my shoulder.
GCM: For half of your 35 years at Cog Hill, you’ve prepared for either aPGA Tour or national USGA event. Yet you don’t seem any worse for the wear.
KL: Fortunately, we’ve had good weather nearly all those years. Also, I’ve got a tremendous crew — some of the guys have been here since 1979, ’82, ’84. Without them I don’t think it would’ve run as smooth as it has. Plus, we have four courses here and multiple crews and multiple equipment — I can throw 75 guys on that golf course if I have to for a tournament. The PGA Tour is also great to work with. Everything has always been negotiable. I think that eliminates a lot of the pressure.
GCM: Isn’t the BMW a different ball game — late in the season on a public golf course that does about 35,000 rounds?
KL: It’s going to be different, especially the time of year. We’re used to a tournament in July. In September, there are the effects from the summer weather and summer-long play. It all depends on the weather.
GCM: It must be exciting to look forward to your first full-scale renovation after all this time and to work with (architect) Rees Jones to boot.
KL: It’s got my adrenaline flowing already. For 35 years, I’ve seen the golf course one way. I’m anxious to see it when they make the changes. It’ll be like rebirth.
GCM: You’re 71 years old. Why haven’t you retired by now?
KL: Well, No. 1, I enjoy what I do. Golf is my life, in a way. No. 2, the relations with the people I work for ... I fall back on that quite a bit. I’m a very lucky man; I have generally a free hand. Nobody is looking over my shoulder. I enjoy it and they seem to still want me. And I’ve got my health. Maybe when one of those changes, I might think about retiring.
— Terry Ostmeyer, GCM senior staff writer
Bayer CropScience has filed a lawsuit against NuFarm Americas Inc. and Vogel Seed & Fertilizer, also known as Spring Valley, for infringement of Bayer’s patented use of the pesticide imidacloprid on fertilizer, which it invented and has been selling under the brand name Merit Plus Turf Fertilizer for the past 10 years. The suit seeks to halt joint actions by NuFarm and Spring Valley to formulate and sell imidacloprid
on fertilizer
Mother Nature forces pre-tournament scramble
When Brad Minnick, CGCS at Lawrence (Kan.) Country Club, woke up on the morning of June 2 he likely couldn’t have imagined what was in store for him that day.
Heavy rains roared through Lawrence and, on top of several previous days of precipitation, caused an irrigation system failure that loosened the soil on the course’s sixth hole and caused serious damage to the green.
A thrust block, which is put at the end of a dead-end line, came loose after the rains and moved enough that it allowed a 2-inch pipe to fail, Minnick said. When that pipe failed, about 560 gallons a minute poured out onto the green about 5 feet away and “just absolutely wreaked havoc.”
“Where the pipe failed, it gouged a hole in the green and caused an area about 4 feet by 8 feet to collapse and then took some of that material and washed it across the green and then took the rest of it and forced it under the sod of the remaining green, pushing that sod up,” Minnick explains.
A mere three weeks before the club’s annual member-guest tournament, Minnick knew he had to act fast to come up with a solid solution. The bubbled-up sod had to be entirely cut off. Minnick and his crew took out all the debris from underneath the sod and put it back together.
While the green recovered, the hole was changed from a par 4 to a par 3 with the flag positioned out on the fairway to serve as a makeshift temporary green. Since then, the hole has been changed back to its original par-4 status, but the flag and cup are still on the approach area away from the green.
In order to get it back in playable condition for the member-guest, Minnick and his crew topdressed and rolled the green, using lots of fertilizer and sand. Minnick reopened the green for the June 20-23 event, but said it was ugly.
“We opened it just for the tournament, then closed it back down,” he said, adding that the initial trauma and work that had been done to restore it caused a few areas to perish, which had to be reseeded.
Minnick is confident he won’t have to undergo this scenario in the future. “It won’t happen again,” he said. “We have a very good staff. I think all we’ve done has been great.”
— Darcy DeVictor, GCM associate editor
Toro’s Happe named to EIFG advisory council
Michael Happe, managing director of The Toro Co.’s commercial equipment business, is the newest addition to the advisory council of GCSAA’s philanthropic organization, The Environmental Institute for Golf.
Happe is the latest in a line of Toro executives to serve The Institute. Mike Hoffman, Toro chairman and CEO, served on The Institute’s (then known as the GCSAA Foundation) board of trustees from 1997 to 2000, and Ken Melrose, retired chairman and CEO of the company, is currently a member of the advisory council. Toro was the first to be recognized at the Victory Club level with cumulative giving that exceeded $1 million.
Passing noted
Hector T. Clark, one of GCSAA’s oldest living members, died June 14 in San Diego. He was 92.
Clark was a protégé in the 1930s of legendary superintendent Leo Feser at Woodhill Country Club in Wayzata, Minn., where his father, Norman McKenzie Clark, was the golf pro. One of Hector’s most noted achievements in his younger years was caddying for Bobby Jones during the year he won golf’s Grand Slam.
Clark was one of the profession’s first college-educated superintendents, graduating from the two-year agronomy program at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst. He moved to San Diego to become superintendent at Balboa Municipal Golf Course and for many years was at La Jolla Country Club. He also was a top amateur player in the area. He was a founder of the San Diego GCSA and was its first president in 1962. Later, he built golf courses in the area and was superintendent at Costa Mesa Municipal before retiring in 1986.
Clark was the father of Sandy Clark, CGCS at Barona Creek Golf Club near San Diego, and grandfather of Douglas Clark, superintendent at Desert Mountain Club in Phoenix. Other survivors include his wife of almost 62 years, Ginny; two other sons, Tim and Chris; two brothers, Norman and Douglas; eight grandchildren and four great grandchildren.
Memorial donations can be made to the Blind Community Center of San Diego, 1805 Upas St., San Diego, CA, 92103-5298, or The Environmental Institute for Golf, 1421 Research Park Dr., Lawrence, KS, 66049-3859.
Correction
A chart on Page 92 of the July issue of GCM incorrectly identified the manufacturer of the fungicide Insignia. Insignia is a product of BASF. GCM regrets the error.
The Club Managers Association of America has purchased Club Management magazine and also has entered into a publishing agreement with Naylor Publications. The first issue of the bimonthly official publication of the CMAA under the new operating agreement will be September/October.
Moraghan out in USGA shakeup
Surprise and, in some cases, surprisingly little to say were the reactions from a handful of superintendents who have worked more than most with Tim Moraghan, the USGA’s director of championship agronomy, when word surfaced in late June that Moraghan’s position had been eliminated and he was leaving the USGA.
Moraghan, a former superintendent himself, had been with the USGA for more than 20 years, much of that time as the key person responsible for the long- and short-term planning of course setup for major USGA championships.
As of early July, neither Moraghan nor the USGA had commented on the changes, except for a brief staff memo from USGA executive director David Fay on June 28 announcing the departure of Moraghan and indicating that the association’s Green Section regional agronomists would supervise championship agronomy for the U.S. Open, Women’s Open and Senior Open, tasks those agronomists already handle for most amateur-only championships.
Obviously, the news left some superintendents taken aback, but also with their usual resolve to move on.
“I won’t comment until after the event,” said Michael Lee, CGCS, the manager of golf course maintenance at Whistling Straits in Kohler, Wis., just a week before the U.S. Senior Open was to begin on the Straits Course. “It’s just too new. We’ve just got too much going on. We’re focused on having a great championship.”
One superintendent who got an early warning on Moraghan’s dismissal while helping out at the Women’s Open June 28-July 1 at North Carolina’s Pine Needles is one who has worked as closely with Moraghan as any — Paul Jett, CGCS at Pinehurst No. 2. Jett prepped for U.S. Opens in 1999 and 2005, has the U.S. Amateur on tap next summer and another Open looming in 2014.
“I hate to see anyone lose a job over job elimination. I’m sure it’s tough on Tim and surely not the way he would have wished to have left the USGA,” Jett said, adding that the day after the news broke he met with the top agronomists from the Green Section’s Southeast Region, Pat O’Brien and Chris Hartwiger.
“We look forward to working with them for the Amateur and the next Open here, just as we had looked forward to working with Tim,” Jett said.
Another superintendent who worked with Moraghan for two Opens, and at two very contrasting venues as well — Pebble Beach in 2000 and Winged Foot last year — is Eric Greytok, now superintendent at Remington Ranch, a new development near Bend, Ore. He didn’t know about the dismissal and was shocked when contacted by GCM.
“I hadn’t heard about it. I’m kind of caught off guard. Wow!” Greytok said without further comment.
Mark Kuhns, CGCS and GCSAA secretary/treasurer, is director of grounds at Baltusrol Golf Club in Springfield, N.J., where Moraghan is a member. The two go way back, notably when Kuhns was at Oakmont Country Club and prepped for the 1994 U.S. Open.
“I met Tim in 1987. He’s been a good friend to many superintendents over those years and a true ally of the industry,” Kuhns said. “He’s certainly helped many of our members elevate their careers. He was instrumental in my getting interviewed in the media tent at the 1994 Open — I don’t know if that was ever done before. I know Tim will always be a part of the golf industry and I wish him the best. Our friendship is lifelong.”
In the news...
Playing partners
A story in the Albuquerque Journal about a husband-wife superintendent-golf pro duo who work together at Sandia Golf Club in Albuquerque, N.M., featuring Todd Huslig, GCSAA Superintendent Member.
Superintendent deals with tree-replacement issue
An article in the Jamestown (R.I.) Press reports about GCSAA member Joe Mistowski, CGCS at Jamestown Golf Course, going before the town’s Tree Preservation and Protection Committee to request that red cedar trees replace some of the pine trees lost because of turpentine beetles. The trees were lost on a part of the golf course bordering a busy street where errant golf shots once blocked by the pines are now hitting passing cars and raising the course’s liability insurance.
Host city won’t share in U.S. Open payday
The discrepancy in revenue the USGA stands to make from the 2008 U.S. Open at Torrey Pines’ South Course in San Diego compared to that shared with the city is explored by the San Diego Union-Tribune. GCSAA Past President (2004) Mark Woodward, CGCS, San Diego golf manager, is featured.
Cutting to the chase
A feature in the Glenwood Springs (Colo.) Post Independent tells about how a stop by the pro shop after a round of golf more than 20 years ago led Jim Richmond, GCSAA Class A superintendent at Glenwood Springs Golf Course, to where he is today.
North Carolina State University has named its noted entomologist, Rick Brandenburg, Ph.D., a prestigious William Neal Reynolds Professor in the university’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. Brandenburg conducts research and Extension programs that focus on insect pest management in turf and peanuts and is co-director of the North Carolina Center for Turfgrass Environmental Research and Education.
Survey: Multi-course owners in a buying mood
The nation’s largest golf course ownership groups have their eyes on expanding in the coming year, according to a survey of attendees at the National Golf Course Owners Assocation’s 2007 Multi-Course Owners Leadership Retreat, held in Monterey, Calif., in late June.
Forty-four percent of attendees indicated their companies planned to increase their golf course holdings in the next 12 months, which was up from 29 percent a year ago. Seventeen percent said they planned to sell courses in the coming year, while 25 percent indicated their companies planned both buying and selling.
The companies represented at the retreat own or operate seven or more golf courses in the U.S. and worldwide.
Other results of the survey revealed that:
• Forty-three percent of respondents cited a “highly engaging and well-trained staff” as the most effective tool in motivating golfers to choose one facility over another.
• Forty percent believed adding new golfers and increasing participation rates among existing golfers was a shared responsibility of golf courses at the local level with support from national governing bodies.
• Seventy-three percent intend to increase their marketing efforts to women in the next year.
GCSAA was represented at the event by CEO Steve Mona, CAE; Managing Director, Member Programs Hannes Combest; and Director of Research Clark Throssell, Ph.D.
Letter to the editor
Editor’s note: For more on GCSAA’s certification program and the experiences of a recently certified superintendent, see this month’s Inside Your Career column.
During my 30 years-plus as a member of GCSAA, I have always been an advocate for our profession and GCSAA’s education and certification programs. My mentor, Stan Metsker, CGCS, was a 2007 recipient of the GCSAA Distinguished Service Award, which was due in large part to his contributions in the establishment of certification as a major GCSAA program.
In the late 1960s, Stan felt superintendents were not receiving the recognition or the salary commensurate with the education and responsibilities required of the position. He felt a valid certification program was an essential component in the evolution of the profession.
As a rookie superintendent in 1973, I saw becoming a certified superintendent as a personal goal and one I aspired to. I was first certified in 1979. I still remember studying for and taking the six-part exam. I also remember the sense of accomplishment when notified that I had passed.
My involvement in certification continued when I was asked to serve on the Certification Committee in 1981-82. This committee developed the first long-range certification plan, which, in my opinion, serves as the foundation for the plan in place today. When implemented in 1984, this plan, in part, called for course attesting, a code of standards and minimum education requirements phased in over 20 years. Many may not be aware that by the year 2003, the plan called for a four-year college degree or a stringent combination of GCSAA seminars and formal education in order to apply for certification.
As I look at the certification program today, I see many of the elements envisioned over 20 years ago. The plan has obviously been modified through the years to reflect changes in the profession and to keep the certification program current and relevant. The emphasis on verification of competencies is a very important component of the new program, particularly in the areas of business, communication and leadership.
Some members may ask, is the new program more difficult than the old program? Perhaps it is, but the new program is right on target with planning that took place over 20 years ago.
This brings me to John Magnuson, CGCS at Murphy Creek Golf Course, one of seven courses in the Aurora, Colo., Golf Division. John, an employee of Aurora Golf for more than 25 years, is also one of the first superintendents certified in the “new” program. He began his career as a high school student on the driving range and has gone through the ranks as a maintenance worker, equipment manager, superintendent and now certified superintendent. Coincidently, John and Murphy Creek will host the U.S. Amateur Public Links Championship in July of 2008.
During the past year, I have watched John navigate the revised certification program. My perception is the program is relevant, demanding and rewarding and brings the designation “CGCS” to an even higher level. In my opinion, the current program is terrific and one that should be embraced by our membership. I know John could not be more excited or proud about achieving certified status. I also know that Stan Metsker is very pleased with where certification is today and, for that matter, so am I.
Dennis Lyon, CGCS
Manager of Golf, City of Aurora, Colo.
GCSAA Past President (1989)
Twenty-six percent of the graduating student members in GCSAA’s 2007 spring survey said the area in which they felt the least prepared was financial management. Sixty-nine percent, meanwhile, said they believed they were well-prepared in equipment and maintenance and 66 percent cited safety in the workplace.
Peter Bevacqua, USGA’s managing director of U.S. Open Championships since 2003, was recently named the association’s first-ever chief business officer and will lead its revenue-producing activities.
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