Fixing the 5th

Remember that power pole near the championship tee on #5?  Well now you see it and now you don't.

With the pole now moved out of the way, we are proceeding with the Master Plan project to rebuild and lengthen the teeing ground on #5. The two aerial images below shows how that teeing ground looks now, and how it will look after.

There will also be some changes in the fairway. Below are a couple of aerial images which show the before and after look of the fairway area.

When this hole was changed to a dogleg back in the early 70's, the fir trees were about 50 feet shorter than they are now.  Obviously the aggressive line over the left edge of the fairway was part of the original intent so this project will restore that fun risk-reward opportunity.  So yes we are fixing the 5th hole and it's going to once again be one of the best short par 4's anywhere. This project will begin in the middle of January 2019.  For a full detailed description of the project, please watch this video.

What's Up??

What have we been up to during this dreary winter?  Well, normally during the winter, we get some cold, frosty days when we can take care of some housekeeping but this year we are wet and warm.   Coming off 2014, the 5th wettest year ever recorded, 2015 is starting out as a contender for wettest ever. Today as the rain came tumbling down, we decided to work on some housekeeping stuff since it looks like our cold frosty days are numbered and before you know it, we will be in the middle of the growing season.

 Yardage plaques are getting painted.

Benches are getting painted and bunker rakes are getting some attention.

You see here a bunker rake handle that has been re-oiled and one that just came off the course.  The unfinished handle has a dark area at the end.  This is where a rubber grip was covering the handle and prevented it from getting bleached out by the sun.  We will no longer have rubber grips on the bunker rake handles.  They will just be simple and classy like the one on the right.  The rubber grips on the handles were really unnecessary and were just another thing that needed replacing periodically. Our handles are real hardwood so they don't splinter and they look good with just a simple finish.

We are almost finished painting the tee markers.

You may not know that we are in charge of the island at Forest Glen Lane.  This week we upgraded the irrigation system in that area.  The old antiquated system had two zones and 5 sprinkler heads.  The new system we just installed has 3 zones and 14 sprinkler heads.   There is no electrical power here but nowadays that doesn't matter as battery operated sprinkler clocks have gotten really amazing in the last decade. This area will be so much better this summer, and we will waste a lot less water since we have better coverage and control.

 On the course you'll notice some new markers in the fairways.  These markers designate the locations of the new Harbottle short course or family tees.  Basically these tee locations add two short courses for the enjoyment of anyone who wants to play from them.  The family tee concept was created to make the game more fun for those just starting to learn but really anyone can play from them.  John Harbottle III was such a supporter of getting young people involved in golf that we have named the two new routes in his name.  There is a separate score card for the new short courses and you can find that in the pro shop once we have all the markers installed.  They have official ratings so don't forget to post your score. There is a blue level one course that is about 3000 yards, and a gold level two course that is about 4000 yards.  If your looking at these markers and wondering why they are where they are, you might be interested to know that we didn't just put them in random areas.  The markers are also valve box covers.

Because our irrigation system runs off a 1953 mainline, we have many valves located right in the middle of the fairway. The 1953 system was a "center row" system; meaning there was simply a row of sprinkler heads down the middle of every fairway.  In fact that system was a "hand" system.  There was only plug-ins for sprinklers and a night waterman would move sprinklers from plug-in to plug-in.   FYI...John Harbottle III was once a night waterman at Tacoma. It's kind of cool to imagine him as a young lad out here in the middle of the night plugging sprinklers into these exact locations.  I've heard that John was very good at this.  It is well known that many a night waterman would spend a great deal of time drinking beer and forget about the sprinklers.  This resulted in over watered soft areas and underwatered dry areas.  That was not John.  Apparently he took the task very seriously and during his tenure as night waterman, the course was exceptionally firm, fast, consistent, and just the right amount of green color.  Would you expect anything less from John?  Anyway I could go on and on but those plug-ins became valves in 1989 and our system today still runs on sprinklers that come off pipe from those valves.  In order to minimize the amount of things in the middle of the fairway that we have to trim around and maintain, we figured whenever possible we would just use one of these valve locations as a place to put the family tee marker.  Everyone should give the Harbottle course a try.  Remember, golf is supposed to be fun and you might be surprised how challenging it is playing a short course when a whole new set of hazards comes in to play.

More Drainage

The rain gauge doesn't lie.  Although it seems like we've had the best fall weather, the rain gauge says we are 3/4" over average in the last 14 days.  Given that, it's no surprise that many of the winter wet areas have resurfaced on several fairways.  The last several days have been dry so we're quickly trying address some of these spots before the rain returns.  Essentially, to correct the poor drainage in these areas, we're just removing the soil to a depth of about a foot and then replacing the bad soil with straight sand.  Somewhere in each of these areas we dig deep enough to hit that gold colored, sandy layer.   Anytime we get into that layer, we know the area will drain indefinitely.  Below is a before, and after picture of the projects on 4 approach and in front of five approach.

DRAIN ON 5 BEFORE SOD

DRAIN ON 5 AFTER SOD

DRAIN ON 4 BEFORE SOD

DRAIN ON 4 AFTER SOD

Below is a picture of 9 approach where we're working today.  Anyone familiar with the golf course knows how wet it can get in this area during the winter months.  We're also taking the opportunity to widen the opening to the ninth green since we are doing a lot of sod work here.  The right edge of the fairway cut will move closer to the bunker short of the green allowing well struck shots to release to the green and not get held up in the rough.

As you can see these projects are getting completed with new sod that blends in very well with the existing turf.  That's because we're using sod from the beginning of 12 fairway which is very old fine textured Poa annua turf like the rest of the course.  With the recent construction of the forward tees, it is clear that we do not need to mow the fairways as close to the teeing ground as we have in the past.  In fact the beginning of 12 fairway will look a lot better with a little more separation between the teeing ground and the beginning of the fairway.

"Tee it Forward"

An interesting initiative has been proposed by both the PGA of America and the U.S.G.A. (United States Golf Association).  It’s called “Tee it Forward”, and it is a proposed movement that is in perfect alignment with our Green Committee recommendations in regard to playing from an appropriate set of tees.  For several years now I’ve written on this topic and I don’t wish to “beat a dead horse”, but this new approach is a little different so it’s worth mentioning.  In the past, the USGA has published the guidelines whereas golfers need to break 90 in order to step back to a longer set of tees, or that simply  they must play in under 4 hours.  They’re argument is that the game is much more fun if your taking less strokes and taking less time.  I personally couldn’t agree more.  Unfortunately, people are still not moving up so the new “Tee it Forward” initiative is now underway and it runs this month from the 5^th – 17^th.  For that time period you are encouraged to play from a set of tees that is aligned with your ability and it’s determined by your average driving distance.  They’ve created a chart that correlates driving distance and course yardage.  If you know your driving distance, you can look at this chart and see what length of course you should be playing to maximize your enjoyment of the game.  I’ll cut to the chase and tell you that according to this chart, your average driving distance should be 220 yards to play from our white tees, and 250 yards to play from our blue tees.  You can easily check your driving distance by deducting the yardage of your shot into the green following your tee shot, from the overall yardage of the hole.  The Green Committee embraces this initiative and encourages all of you to check your average driving distance to see if your playing from an appropriate set of tees.  If you find that you should move up, give it a try this month from the 5^th – 17^th.  Click here for more details about the "Tee it Forward" initiative and the complete chart which correlates driving distance with recommended 18-Hole yardages.