I am a sports junkie and spring is my favorite time of year. Which button on the TV remote do I press and what sport do I watch? Hockey, basketball, baseball, horse racing and most importantly right now – golf! No, not Johnny Miller and weekly “down-grain, cross-grain, double grain and towards the setting sun grain” of regular PGA Tour events or some rental car-sponsored “championship.” It is time for The Masters contested at Augusta National Golf Club. It is my official start to the golf season. I enjoy everything about Augusta National Golf Club and how the golf course is prepared to be an agronomic fantasy golf environment for their “tune-a-mint.”
As a golf course superintendent you may not like or appreciate what I am saying or what Augusta National Golf Club has done for our sport. Every year at this time I hear the industry bemoan the fact that our membership wants us to be like Augusta. This places unfair pressure on the superintendent to perform and create something from nothing just to please an uninformed group of members/players.
Superintendents, consultants and industry brain trusts — spare me! Please don’t place all your cares and woes of your golf course at the feet of those in Georgia and at CBS. If there is a member or player at your club who believes their course should look like Augusta National does this week they either need a frontal lobotomy or a bottle in front of them.
As a golf course superintendent you should thank Augusta National and their long list of superintendents for what they have done to help the quest to improve and enhance playing conditions. Of course, I don’t endorse maintaining daily playing conditions to the levels we will watch this week. It is not financially feasible, agronomically practical and certainly unplayable for all of us. However, why not at least see what we may learn from the successes of the agronomic staff at Augusta National and what they have contributed to the game. Let’s thank them for their efforts.
