I Can't Find the Words

Wednesday we finished the sod work around the bunker on #11 and #16 green.  The last shipment of sod will be here on Tuesday and we should be able to have everything finished that afternoon.  Right now it is the opinion of myself and the contractor that we wait a full three weeks before installing the sand so as to be sure the liner is fully rooted.  That means they will not be finished before U.S. Open field day.

Unfortunately, these beautiful bunkers your seeing here is the last work of John Harbottle III.  Thursday he passed away suddenly and all of us here at Tacoma C&GC are in a state of disbelief regarding this tragedy.  Right now I cannot find the words to describe how I feel about this loss.  I loved every minute I got to spend with him working on the golf course and also just being his friend.  My thoughts and prayers go out to the Harbottle family. Below you see John enjoying a day on the golf course.  This is how I will always remember him.  He was a constant student of the game. He loved to play golf, but I think he most enjoyed studying golf and golf courses.  Almost every day he played, I'd find some reason to grab him and ask him "what do you think about this" or "what if we did this".  Of course he was always willing to share his opinion and expertise.  I am going to miss him so much.

Bunkers and Teeways Look'n Good

The first load of sod came in this past Tuesday and I think that afternoon we almost hit 80 degrees.  Not ideal conditions for laying sod.  Not only did the heat put a lot of fatigue on the guys, it also put a lot of stress on the sod and I really thought I was going to loose some of it.  The crew knew this stuff had to get off the pallets and many of them put in 12 hours that day to get the job done.  I honestly have the best crew ever.  They did get the job done, we got the water on it, and I'm happy to say we didn't loose any sod.  The first thing finished was sodding of the bunker floor.  Once the sod on the floor is established and rooted in, it will be sprayed out and the bunker sand will be installed.  The sod decomposes under the sand and becomes an impermeable layer which protects the bunker sand from being contaminated by rocks or native soil within the bunker floor.  There are many fabrics or other materials being used in the industry to line the floors of bunkers.  Simply put, at 28 cents/sq ft. (delivered), nothing comes close to the affordability of sod. 

Here is the same bunker today.  You can see we have cut the sod off the drain lines so there will be rapid infiltration over the drain pipe.

Above is the bunker to the right of #6 green.  It really turned out beautiful.  Although the grass on the floor looks similar to the grass on the bunker lip, it isn't the same at all.  The grass on the floor is straight perennial ryegrass.  The grass on the robust lips is fine fescue and it will be kept at a higher mowing height than the surrounding turf which will add a dynamic, classical, rugged look.

Here is a close up of the robust bunker lip which architect John Harbottle III refers to as a "bull-nose" style. I simply love this look and I'll give props again to John and the guys from Ridgetop Inc. for their excellent craftsmanship.  Next Tuesday the remainder of the sod will be laid and then its just waiting till there is good enough rooting to kill the stuff and put the sand in.  I'm guessing that they will be done for U.S. Open Field Day on June 9th.  These bunkers are going to be so cool.

On a side note, our fairway mowing height is back down to 0.340 or 340/1000 of an inch.  Now you can again enjoy that extra roll and a lie that allows you to spin it enough to hold the greens.

 Lastly, the teeways are definitely starting to take shape.  This one on #8 is probably one of the biggest since there is a lot of distance between each set of tees on this monster hole.  Next week we will drop the mowing height down and they should be even more defined.  I am so excited about the teeways.  I love the look, but on top of that, it will for sure be a time saver.  Even now in the establishment phase we are enjoying that no longer do we need to mow dew strips and rough between tees.  Our efficiency is already improved.  Next week we will take them down to 500/1000 or 1/2" and then we will stop mowing the tee decks with the walkers.  That will save at least 16 man hours a week.  Stay tuned for next weeks pictures. The drop to 1/2" will be very noticeable.

The Plan Underway

A week ago today we started the bunker remodel per the new Master Plan.  We probably wouldn't have started if we knew the weather was going to continue to be be wet but the forecast looked good so we decided to get started on a few bunkers.  There was no way to know that the weather was going to turn into one of the best stretches I have ever seen in May.  Things couldn't be going better.  It's going to be 80 degrees this weekend and nice through next week so everything looks good for getting this first set of bunkers done.  Above you see the Ridgetop Inc. guys making the final touches on the shaping of the bunker to the right of #6.

Below is how it looks today and it's hard to imagine anyone not getting excited about this.  Harbottle is not holding back on the strength of this bunker design.  These things are like none other I've seen.

Here's how the bunker on the left side of #6 green is looking.

Interesting is as we started to excavate closer to the green, we started to see layers of sand.  Here is a close up the bunker face showing sand layers.d

Just like growth rings on a tree, there are distinct layers of sand that depict golf seasons.  In other words, each layer is a season of sand being top-dressed, and or blown out of the bunker by golf shots and leaf blowers.  I counted about 60 layers which dates back to when architect Vernon Macan did some bunker revisions on the course.  There is at least a foot of elevation that occurred in this spot since the last major renovation or maybe even since the original green elevation was established.  Currently I am unaware of the date this green was built.    The 1923 diagram of the course shows this green at least 100 feet east of its current location and the 1941 aerial shows it where it currently is today.  So all we really know is this putting surface is at least 75 years old and to my knowledge it has never been rebuilt.  The new bunker left of the green is now moved away from the oak tree and closer to the green, so the tree won't actually be in the bunker anymore. Anyway, the construction phase is going great and as expected, we are learning as we go.  Part of the learning is knowing that we are going to have challenges.  One of those is that the wood stave water pipeline installed in 1923 is giving us fits on #16.

This section of wood stave will be buried when we're finished but it is right where we have made a cut in the earth so we almost pulled it out.  It can stay now that we've established a finish grade that is a few inches above it.  The picture above also shows the gravel nature of our soil.  For this reason, some of the new bunkers edges are being shaped out of imported soil.  The gravel and rock does not pack well and bunker edges made of this material are crumbly.  Even with the imported soil, it is important to know that some of these new bunker edges will not support your weight until grassed in so please do not step on the new bunker edges.  Ball retrievers have been placed out there for you to use for retrieving your ball out of the bunkers that are under construction.  Please use them.

Everyone is talking about the bunker remodel but it seems like there is at least as much talk about the teeways.  Today it looks like everyone is really getting the idea behind the teeways.  The good weather has given us the chance to get out and mow them down so it's pretty obvious what's going on. Above is a pic of  the teeway on #7 and below is a couple of pics of the teeway on #15.

I love the way it is looking. This first step is a mowing height of 3/4" or 750/1000.  Now that we are getting them established, my hope is to have them mowed at 1/2" by June 1st.  If we can do that I think they will look really good this season.  Kevin and Jason have been working really hard scalping these things down.  There is a lot of blowing involved as you can imagine.  Here is a video of Kevin scalping in a teeway.

The Plan - Getting Started

The Master Plan was adopted less than a month ago and the Green Committee has wasted no time getting started.  The excitement around the rebirth of the classical look for the golf course has launched us into a spring project to rebuild a handful of bunkers.

Here's the scene today on the 11th hole as we tear into the fairway bunker.  Kip Kalbrenner from Ridgetop Inc. has been awarded  the job of shaping the bunkers.  He has worked with John Harbottle III on several projects so they understand each other and make a great team.  Kip will be building the bunkers and my staff will be doing all the sod work.  Together we should be able to produce a great product.  This first phase will only be a handful of bunkers and about 5 days of construction.

This aerial shows the cluster of bunkers we are rebuilding this spring.  We are working on areas, not just those bunkers we wish to have done first.  We want to work on bunkers that are in proximity to each other. This shortens the time of the whole project since materials and machines aren't being transported over large distances.  Although we are in construction phase for only a few days, these bunkers won't be finished till about June 1st.  We are using sod as the liner which prevents mixing of bunker sand with native soil so it will take a few weeks for the sod to root down which is imperative if the liner is to function properly.  The rebuilding of the bunkers is very exciting but let's not forget the other great aspects of the plan.  Here you see we have removed the grass around #14 in order to install the extended collars or runoffs.

 I love this picture because it shows so much activity.  Tim is running the new vertidrain on #15, Raul is back there mowing 15 tee surround, and 4 guys are working on sod, and the greensmower just finished mowing the green.  Today, this project is done and it turned out awesome. We also extended the collar on the back of the 4th green.  The fairway or collar type sod that we used to install the extended collars came from the front of several fairways as part of the teeway installation.  Here you see Kevin scalping in the teeway on #4.

Also in this picture you can see where fairway type sod was removed to create the extended collars.  On Tuesday, a truck load of rough sod will be delivered, and all the areas where we harvested fairway type sod will be resodded with rough sod and it should look like we never really did anything except scalp in  the teeways.  This is definitely an exciting time on the golf course as there is a lot going on.  Come out and see it in person.