Every year I get the privilege of interviewing the incoming president of the Golf Course Superintendents Association of America. And boy have those conversations gotten interesting as the last few years have rolled by! As always Golf Course Trades does a great job making it look good – thanks team! You can read the entire interview here. And don’t forget...
PINEHURST, NC – It was nine years ago when Dan Maples and his family took me out for a Saturday night on the town in a limo during U.S. Open week. During dinner the whole town stopped by the table to shake his hand and chat. Dan just smiled warmly, thanked them kindly by name, and asked about their families and what they were doing. Everybody loved him, and he...
It has to be great to be Steve Smyers. He gets to devote his entire life to golf. His wife is a former touring pro. His son is a first team All-American and a reigning Division II national champion. He has done golf design work at some of country’s most popular public golf courses, (like Southern Dunes), as well as some of the most esteemed private sanctuaries...
JF: How disappointed are you that you didn’t get the 2016 Olympics Course gig down in Rio? RTJ 2: I’m not disappointed – I’m supportive of golf being successful in its re-emergence in the Olympics. However, the sand is running out of the hourglass, and everyone will have to get started soon if they want the proposed new golf course to be a...
[Author’s Note: We’ll be at Casa de Campo for the reboot of the GolFantasy vacations franchise. In prep, here’s Pete Dye breaking down the courses like a fraction for us, along with some observations about modern equipment Alice makes a cameo appearance as well, stealing every scene she enters!] Jay Flemma: Tell us a little about building Teeth of...
NEW YORK, NY – I’m here with Jay Flemma – Jaybar! – who is working on releasing ten old Seapods shows on Archive under the old “Jay’s Plays” series he used to do back in the mid-’90s. We always loved those recordings, and now these new Archive shows should be terrific because everyone will have access to them. 1st SET...
So my preview for this year’s PGA Championship will not only be another hilarious laugh-a-minute romp with Kiawah Island course architect Pete Dye, but will also be in the PGA Championship program! Here’s a taste: JF: We hear some interesting things happened while you were building Kiawah Island? PD: Oh I got plenty of stories! Everything happened to us...
We caught up with Bill Love, the architect responsible for getting Olympic Club ready for this year’s U.S. Open. Jay Flemma: We’ve heard that the opening stretch of holes at Olympic Club will be the toughest start to a U.S. Open in recent memory, but that there might be some birdies coming home. What look to be the toughest holes at Olympic Club and what...
Try to time your arrival at Chambers Bay so as to be there for sunrise, the light is magnificent. As the sky slowly brightens from black to deep purple to blue, they’ll appear before you: eighteen precious jewels, each prim as a cameo, yet as cunningly and carefully designed as the many intricate facets of the gemstone. Yes, everything you’ve heard about...
[Author’s Note: This interview was over 17 pages long. Here are some fun and interesting excerpts. You’ll have to buy the book for the rest:)] Dan Hixson – Zen and the Art of the Do It Yourself Golf Design Career MC Lars is actually wrong (for once!) Post-punk laptop rap isn’t the new DIY: golf course design is, at least if you’re Dan...
While I get a few more interviews and course reviews finshed, here’s some great insighta o Chambers Bay from Robert Trent Jones, Jr., who by this time next week = may pull a come from nehind victory in the Rio primary:) (I.E. The Olympics election…err…selection…) JF: Now those hummocks look like berms that Seth Raynor did at flat courses like...
Can you tell golf course architect Kelly Blake Moran is a Texan? He may not wear a ten gallon hat, but boy is he proud of the Lone Star State. Call him Amarillo Slim in a windshirt. “And I’ll tell you another thing!” he roars disapprovingly. “Those Oklahoma teams that won those national championships a few years ago? I’ll give you one...
Jay Flemma: Tell us about the origins of the courses at Royal Melbourne. When were they designed and by whom? Geoff Ogilvy: It was in the late ’20s, early ’30s. Most of the courses that existed were built in the city. But then there was a movement out to the sand belt where there was this incredible terrain, native trees, and great sandy soil. It was...
As always, Ran Morrissett has an insightful and probative interview with an outstanding golf course architect. This month, Ran sits down with Texas’s Jeff Brauer: Dallas Stars fan, bon vivant, and the trailblazing golf course architect that gave us Giant’s Ridge in Minnesota and Cowboys Golf Club in Dallas. From the interview: “7. You have a natural...
The plane taxied to the terminal zone, cut its engines, and cooled its wings while I hi-tailed it out the door and into ground transport for the ride to Whistling Straits.
While I walk the course and cull a few quotes from players, here’s my Pete Dye interview from PGA.com.