Golf Club Atlas

How the ball interacts with the ground is at the soul of good golf. The natural, random land conformations found on links are ideal but skilled artifice is needed for an inland course to enjoy the same playing attributes. In all the world, some of the most graceful man-made contours of the sort that are perfect for golf are found at Wolf Point, a Mike Nuzzo design in Texas. Appreciate the scope of contour in the photograph against the silhouette of Green Keeper Don Mahaffey.

Ran Morrissett, the author of the above quote, started Golf Club Atlas ~12 years ago as a place to share pictures and golf stories with his friends.  It has grown into much more.  He came to visit recently. Wolf Point is currently the welcome picture to his website.  I'll be sharing more in the future about our round and his thoughts on the course.  Cheers

Last week The Eden Green at The Old Course was one of the best in the world.

The Old Course at St. Andrews was established in 1552, and has enjoyed the recreational golfer since the early 1400's.  It is a public and publically owned golf course.  On Sundays it becomes a park for anyone to stroll the grounds - pets are welcome too!

Today a fellow player, Colin Donaldson, tweeted the above picture - he shot a 72 amongst the rubble.

The picture is of The Eden green (#11) and is roughly 10,000 square feet – not counting the adjoined 7^th green.

I’ve heard, and remember, the slope of the green is more than 4%, or it rises 1 foot for every 25 feet.

To get the slope down to "their" desired pinable level, or more fair?!?, it would have to be reduced to ~2%.

That means if the change in elevation from the front of the green to the back is 4 feet, the back would have to drop 2 feet.

To drop the back 2 feet, it would require almost the entire side to be disturbed.

That is what is happening in the above picture.

They chose a starting point for where the green would need to be cut to achieve the 2 ft drop in the back without looking like a shelf.

The area is large, it appears as if they are disturbing 2,500 sft.

The sod has been cut and removed and placed so it can be replaced and replanted when complete.

They are using a laser to help measure and ensure that the desired slopes are achieved.

It is a usually slow process.

I assume they would also need to adjust the irrigation line and lower the surrounding irrigation sprinklers.

Why does this matter?

Last week this was one of the coolest holes in the World, now it is a little less unique.

You can follow us on twitter for now and we’ll be posting more about this greatest of holes.

It is too late, but still informative: #Savetheoldcourse.

Happy Birthday Moji!

Last night Eddie Vedder and Glen Hansard played Jones Hall, the Houston Symphony Orchestra's home venue.  I thought it was a great show filled with variety, I like variety - here is a review of the previous night's show.  

Throughout the evening Eddie would tell stories before each segment of songs.  {Don't let his most recent album's name fool you, "Ukulele Songs" has some powerful music live.  His 2nd Ukulele (from the 1950s) of the night was so strong and vibrant, he was only able to set the volume to 2?}  

When Eddie got to the early Pearl Jam set, he described how long it has been - 20 years - that we have all lived with these songs.  When he wrote them he was in a much different, angrier, place.  He shared and acknowledged his experiences with the audience as if we lived them together, because we did.  Although it was some of those anger filled songs that brought everyone together, and now that life is much clearer, hopefully for everyone, we can still share the songs in a meaningful way. (Here is the Setlist.)

The things that we share can help make us closer.  Especially common interests over an extended period of time.  Even if we weren't together, they are a form of shared experiences.  Playing the game of golf would certainly fit this long term shared experience.  Many of the people I know that appreciate the game have done so for a long time.  This is obvious when playing.  

I wish the goal of reconnecting those that share a similar passion was higher up the priority list in the business world of golf.  It seems more and more that the business of golf's goal is to provide pristine conditions and an unparalled experience?  When in truth they can't compete with the joy of sharing and playing the game as a youngster with our super-extended family.  And that doesn't cost a thing, it comes free with every round.

So who is Moji?  I had forgotten about her too.  Three years ago I saw Glen Hansard perform during his Once tour.  It was brilliant.  And that night while coaching and coaxing the audience to sing with him, someone standing directly next to me, Moji, belted out a few notes.  Moji was so awesome Glen had to bring her up on stage: check out this youtube video from that night and a review of the magical night.

Fast forward to last night.  It turns out that Glen did not forget Moji.  She was back and even better.  She sang duets with both Glen and Eddie!  And was part of the "Hard Sun" trio during the final encore! Setlist

Moji can sure show us that greatness can come from almost anywhere if we stay open minded.

Texas Golfer Fall Issue Essay

Texas Golfer Magazine published my essay in its current fall issue.  I describe how the game should be more fun for everyone, especially women.  The short version is that I tee off from the most interesting location, and don't worry about my handicap.  Click the image to read or this link to the entire digitial issue.  Cheers and go vote!

Last Call for Affordable Golf Symposium

I've been asked to speak and share my experiences at the Symposium on Affordable Golf this fall.  Specifically I'll be describing how we built so much great golf at Wolf Point for an incredibly low price.  The symposium location is very cool: Pinehurst.  This is the third year that Richard Mandell has hosted this grass roots event.  Here is the website:  http://www.symposiumonaffordablegolf.com/.  
Please fill out their survey: http://bit.ly/golfsymposium.

Some highlights from the Agenda:

2012 Symposium On Affordable Golf Agenda Complete 
The third annual Symposium On Affordable Golf will once again be held at the Southern Pines Golf Club in Southern Pines, North Carolina on Monday and Tuesday, October 29th and 30th. This year, the Symposium will be one and a half days, followed by a golf outing on the Donald Ross-designed Southern Pines Golf Club Tuesday afternoon.

The Symposium On Affordable Golf raises awareness and understanding of the challenges of the golf industry through open discussion, exchange of ideas and highlighting successes that promote the health and sustainability of the game of golf. As in previous years, there is no fee for attendance. Also, as in past years, members of the PGA, the LPGA and the GCSAA will be eligible to receive continuing education credits. 

There will be three case studies detailing successful and affordable golf operations, each from different regions of the world. Other topics include "The Curious Case of the Taj-Mahalics," "Let's Start Romancing the Game Again Instead of Selling the Business," and "Where Sustainability and GolfSpeak Intersect."

The picture below is the last time Rich and I spoke together.  That is Pete Dye's son, Perry, to our left.

Wolf Point with PGA Championship fairways

Earlier this week we shared how Wolf Point Club has three times as much fairway as this week's PGA Championship course, The Ocean Course at Kiawah.  One would have to hit a bad shot to miss that much fairway at Wolf Point.  Often the average player may hit every fairway from the tee.  What they don't know is that one can hit the fairway, and it still may be a bad shot. When their location in the fairway doesn't allow a chance to aim at the day's hole location, or if one does try from the wrong angle it will wind up even worse if not perfect. 

The picture below is what Wolf Point would look like if the USGA or PGA got their hands on the setup of the course.  They both like narrow fairways that challenge the driving accuracy of the pros.  The striped areas are the fairways as designed and maintained.  The dark green fairways are how the course would look with 28 acres of fairway - the same as this week's PGA.  It may not be obvious, but the average player certainly wouldn't hit 1/2 as many fairways.

What we don't like about the USGA & PGA's methodology is that they have to change the existing golf course to suit their needs, even though big fairways do challenge the best players, as long as the greens are well designed.

Three times as much fairway as the PGA Championship

This week the PGA Championship is being contested at The Ocean Course at Kiawah.  It is a very good golf course and certainly challenging, especially with so many angled fairways.  The course has 28 acres of fairway, not always easy to hit, and in my opinion way too tight for the average player.

When I tell people about Wolf Point, I describe the course as fairway everywhere.  When I say we have over 84 acres of fairway, the average player has no idea what that means.  It means we have three times as much fairway as a "Championship" golf course.

How does that effect a game a Wolf Point?  It means you can keep playing, instead of fighting off alligators, in stead of looking for your ball.  It certainly doesn't mean it is easy.

I would like to know if any golf course in the world has more fairway than Wolf Point?  I doubt it.  

*Later this week I have an illustration of what our course would look like with 28 acres of fairway.

From the space race to a cattle ranch.

From the space race to a cattle ranch. The amazing story of a designer who is reshaping the rules. 

The title of this blog is the introduction to a published profile about my past and our current work.  One never knows what a reporter is writing when talking over the phone, but Shaun got pretty close.

"Wolf Point is a fast-running teaser that brings to mind the best that the great old links can conjure up."  

"But the silver lining in this raincloud is that Mike Nuzzo has been unearthed.  A designer who brings a progressive practicality to the table and does so with great success."  

Click this link to read it in its entirety.

High praise from our recent visitor

The following is a message from our recent visitor and includes a message he forwarded on to a past partner:

G’day Adam & Paul, many thanks to you both for stimulating me to make it down to Wolf Point. WOW! It is kind of cruel that Mike’s first work, can’t be seen by enough people to catapult his career, but hopefully our project will do that for him!

I visited the most fabulous golf course in the middle of nowhere 90 mins from Houston, to meet with and review the architect’s work. It is called Wolf Point. It’s a non-descript, very plain property, where a aerospace engineer named Mike Nuzzo threw in his career to pursue his passion for golf course architecture and has, in my opinion, massaged enough movement in the landscape and tilts around the greens, to create a rival to Riviera, Kingston Heath and the Old Course as lessons in golfing greatness on flat, small properties.  And it was built for less than our last project and made very effective use of a wandering ravine and some nice stands of Oaks to create a must-play.

It is a golfing masterpiece. The course is magnificently & reasonably maintained for its clientele -- genius!


Many thanks to you Mike for reinspiring me towards great golf architecture!


Below is our visitor hitting a green side recovery to the 9th hole.  Be careful to keep it on the green from that angle towards the hole.

Take your daughter to the golf course week.

The PGA of America and the National Golf Course Owners Association are encouraging everyone to introduce daughters, granddaughters and nieces to the game of golf during Take Your Daughter to the Course Week, July 9-15. More than 1,000 participating facilities across the country will offer free green fees to girls accompanied by a paying adult, with many facilities also offering free clinics for young ladies.


Great idea, but it is kind of like telling parents to validate to their kids.  Every golf course should encourage children, daughters, women, seniors regularly -- some more than others.  But in general, children aren't welcomed at most courses.  There is no appropriate course for me to take my daughters to play in Houston - a fun pitch -n- putt.  (I did blow up an un-fun one and built a cool golf center in its place: Swanson's).


Thankfully I do on occasion get to take them to a course we built on the coast. There is lots of room for them to play. It is great to see them have fun enjoying all different aspects of the experience.

Validation of Wolf Point's double green at 8 & 18

Recently I had a business round at Wolf Point.  We play the 8th as a warm up hole to get to the first tee.  The 8th and 18th share one large 14,000 sft putting surface.  In describing my hesitation to build a double green, he said "it would have been silly not to have done so".  There have been so many gimmicky, goofy, ugly and unplayable double greens built in the modern era.  


It turns out that our double green was going to prove it's authenticity today. Pictured below was the first time we played the green on our regulation round.  My guest is putting from the 18th green towards my ball near the 8th hole.  His shot drew a little too much and the swale exaggerated his miss.  I took the pic mid shot, he wound up inside my ball.  Nice pars.
(click the pictures for the bigger versions)

On the last hole of the day my approach ran a little long into the swale and my guest's ran quite a bit further, again the swale exaggerating his miss.  Below is his next to last putt of the day, from the 8th green to the 18th hole.  Proof that this green complex is no gimmick.  Both greens are in play from both holes.  Maybe next time we'll play to the opposite greens.

All fun and games at Wolf Point

There are very few forced carries at Wolf Point Club.  One of them, the creek at the 15th, can be cleared by a 10 year old girl, who has only been on a golf course twice!  I wish there were other places for us to play.  For now it doesn't get any better than this!

And a bonus video inspired by Happy Gilmore's protagonist!

Speaker on Affordable Golf

I've been asked to speak and share my experiences at the Symposium on Affordable Golf this fall.  Specifically I'll be describing how we built so much great golf at Wolf Point for an incredibly low price.  The symposium location is very cool: Pinehurst.  This is the third year that Richard Mandell has hosted this grass roots event.  Here is the website:  http://www.symposiumonaffordablegolf.com/.  
Please fill out their survey: http://bit.ly/golfsymposium.


Some highlights from the Agenda:

2012 Symposium On Affordable Golf Agenda Complete 
The third annual Symposium On Affordable Golf will once again be held at the Southern Pines Golf Club in Southern Pines, North Carolina on Monday and Tuesday, October 29th and 30th. This year, the Symposium will be one and a half days, followed by a golf outing on the Donald Ross-designed Southern Pines Golf Club Tuesday afternoon.

The Symposium On Affordable Golf raises awareness and understanding of the challenges of the golf industry through open discussion, exchange of ideas and highlighting successes that promote the health and sustainability of the game of golf. As in previous years, there is no fee for attendance. Also, as in past years, members of the PGA, the LPGA and the GCSAA will be eligible to receive continuing education credits. 


There will be three case studies detailing successful and affordable golf operations, each from different regions of the world. Other topics include "The Curious Case of the Taj-Mahalics," "Let's Start Romancing the Game Again Instead of Selling the Business," and "Where Sustainability and GolfSpeak Intersect."


The picture below is the last time Rich and I spoke together.  That is Pete Dye's son, Perry, to our left.

Golf Club Atlas Next 50

By design Wolf Point Club hasn't shown up on any magazine best lists, top world or anything similar.  A number of our friends are magazine panelists and have even enjoyed an escorted round with us.  But they have all been instructed to never submit any ratings of the course.  A few journalists have also played with us, the big magazine architecture editors have not.  I guess if they can't add it to their list Wolf Point is of little interest.


There is one list that Wolf Point did appear on a few years ago.  My friends Ran and Ben at GolfClubAtlas.com added our course to their Next Fifty list.  These are the courses they'd most like to see.  "We have not yet played the following but hope to profile them sooner rather than later."


Back in 2009 our work showed up at #8 with a promise to visit soon.  I just recently noticed that we jumped to #4.  (see below).  Even nicer was that the few that we passed haven't been crossed off their list, but just bumped lower.


Ran and Ben have been busy of late.  Here is hoping they get a chance to appreciate our work sooner rather than later.  I think they will find it unique for a number of reasons.


Cheers

Don Mahaffey Should Write a Book

Recently there was a post on Turfnet about the Teachings of Don.  Here are some of my favorite quotes:

Common sense practical golf course maintenance strategies that result in lower overall costs yet still improve playability.

If you are not familiar with Don Mahaffey, he is a golf renaissance man, gifted with superintendent skills, a strong knowledge of golf course architecture–both neo-classical and post-modern–the ability to operate as both project manager and grow-in superintendent, an irrigation genius, a guy who understands business and shaping with a dozer.  Don blends all these skills together to create a philosophy of practical golf course construction and maintenance.

And Don's previous blog posts that Randy references:

19 Suggestions for lower golf course maintenance costs in2012

Don Mahaffey's 7 tips for successful gang mowing

An interesting putting green

In designing a pair of practice putting greens for a public course, I drew a set of green surfaces that included interesting, yet subtle contour. I was asked to redraw the green contours to be simple sloped planes to match those on the course.


It is a valid request, but these putting greens are where the new player will first meet the golf course, or maybe any golf course.  I'd rather it be an interesting meeting.


Their request inspired me to compose this quote: 


One neat element of a creative putting green is you can always find a straight or flat putt on one, but the converse is not true. 
You can never find a creative putt on a flat green. 
 -- Mike Nuzzo


The following videos, while very cool, show how predictable a flat planar surface can be:

Features and topography before a first site visit

I am visiting a new client this week. The project is to rebuild a green complex later this year, and look at some tee options. The course is 60 years old and has several different styles throughout. 


Prior to my visit I was able to compile a Google aerial image and recreate all of the golf features - greens, tees, bunkers, ponds & fairway. This is probably the most accurate set of feature areas in the courses history. I can now easily calculate the square footage of each green, tee, bunker...


The superintendent also shared an available county topographic website, which I was also able to compile and chart. Above is the illustration I can bring to my first site visit to begin working on a specific problem and also start to work on a long term master improvement plan.


Every piece of information is now in one file and I will make any site visit notations or future design changes in this same file as well - everything will always stay associative.  Drainage, irrigation, earthwork, cart path or anything mapped via GPS.


As for the topo, the darker the brown the higher the elevation, the darker the grey, the lower. It is now easy to spot the valley along with the high and low spots throughout the course.


Research, facts and preparedness makes for a much easier site visit and better results.

Golf Course Economics by a factor of 28!

Sometimes we are asked how our methods are cost effective.  Our potential client may assume we cut corners or are over-estimating the benefits when we say we can complete a project for 30-50% less.  What would they think if we said we could perform a task for 4% of their planned budget.  They would certainly think we were nuts.


Here is the story.  A high end club has embarked on a bunker renovation.  They will be changing the bunker edge style and replacing the sand.  Why change the edge style?  To keep up with modern fashion I suppose, but it won't be long (5-10 years) before their changes are either out of fashion again, or the owners realize how much more these fancy new edges cost to maintain.  But I am not going to discuss maintenance costs, only capital costs today.


Listed below are the quantities and some estimates for this bunker project as compared to our imaginary one.  The Tonnage of sand is accurate.  One big difference the members of the high end club are anticipating is the color of the sand.  Their new sand will be white as snow.  This looks pretty and I can understand why some prefer this look.  Our sand is beige.  Their sand costs $100+ a ton, our sand costs $35 a ton.  Their sand gets transported across multiple state lines - gas is expensive.  Our sand is local.  The square footage number is calculated based on 4" of sand installed in a bunker.  400,000 square feet of bunker is absurd when the site isn't all sand to start.  This is where good design trumps over-design.  Their installation would include rebuilding all the new edges and has a cost similar to the material costs.  We would just replace the sand and clean up.


I've never told a client that replacing their bunker sand would cost 28 times more if you hire a different architect for the original design.  Maybe I should.  The picture above is one of our bunkers.


Lastly the industry says that bunkers should be rebuilt every 5-10 years.  We don't agree here either, but I sure hope no one tells the club that their bunkers will be bleach white forever.  They sure do try to keep 'em white however, by cleaning out every piece of debris in every bunker, every morning.  How much does that cost?  Did I mention how much sand they need to warehouse for regular maintenance and the facility they need to store the new sand?


The data:


High End Private Club Bunker Project
Tons Sand 7,000 
Price/Ton $100.00+ 
Distance (mi) 350 
Truck Loads 389 
Sand Price $700,000 
Cubic Yards 5,385 
Cubic Feet 145,385 
Square Feet 436,154 
Installation $700,000 
Project Cost = $1,400,000 


Wolf Point Club
Tons Sand 963 
Price/Ton $35.00 
Distance (mi) 20 
Truck Loads 53 
Sand Price $33,704 
Cubic Yards 741 
Cubic Feet 20,000 
Square Feet 60,000 
Installation $16,852 
Project Cost =  $50,556 


Cost Ratio = 28!!! times as expensive to replace the sand at the high end club as compared to Wolf Point.

Zen and the Art of Green Shaping & Finishing

Don Mahaffey has been working and consulting with a municipal course for 3 years. Starting this month they contracted Don rebuild 9 of their greens. We did some planning and came up with a number of good concepts that fit the site and will be more enjoyable for their players. 
For me, a most fun part is the fine shaping and finishing of the greens. It is a slow process, a lot like polishing a stone with lots of small circles.  The tool is a "mechanical bunker rake".  It  has a little blade in front to push around shovels of material and a rake in the back to smooth.
Above is a picture of the before and during. The green was tiny, too sloped for a hole and flat on top. When finished the 5th green will be more receptive to the average players shot and be far more interesting for putts and chips. We are using the materials on site and bringing in a little sand to perform the final finish in a week or so.
Another highlight is that Intern Rob has been working with Don for a couple years since helping to build the TPC San Antonio courses.  Last summer he and I had a nice project near Memphis.  Great music and even better ribs. 

Ron Whitten, Bandon Dunes and Don Mahaffey

Don Mahaffey (pictured above) and I have worked on a several projects and proposals since we created Wolf Point Club together. We have had a lot of chances to compare notes and discuss our ideas about golf and business. While our abilities are very different, our approaches are quite similar. 


Recently Ron Whitten wrote a blog post about Bandon Dunes with references to the Steve Job's biography. Don and Ron had somewhat different takes. Here is Don's: 


Jobs would have loved the idea of Bandon Dunes. My take is Jobs felt creating something beautiful at the intersection of creativity and technology was the key to good products. He did not focus just on one part of that, beauty was key, but the products had to be highly functional as well. Functionality was very important, but it had to be beautiful as well. After all that, it had to be simple. “Simple is the new sophistication” was his saying and he believed very much that it took great design to marry simplicity, beauty, and functionality together into something successful. Bandon Dunes has the Jobs’ pillars of success in spades. 


Bandon was created during an ugly period of excess in golf development. $10+ Million dollar courses with extravagant eye candy and multi-million dollar maintenance requirements was the norm to create a remarkable project. Keiser went against the grain and created something completely different. Jobs would have loved that. Jobs is quoted often in the bio as saying something along the lines of “the consumer doesn’t know what he wants until I give it to him” He didn’t believe in market studies or focus groups. He felt if he designed and built products that were simple, functional, and beautiful, then Apple would be successful. 


I have to believe Keiser felt similarly about his development of Bandon Dunes. For sure industry “experts” would have told him to build something more mainstream closer to population centers. But it seems Keiser felt if he built something great (simple, beautiful, functional) on a special piece of land, it might work.
 

Happy New Year: First round of 2012

We started off the year strong, playing every day, until the 2nd anyway.  Pictured above is an old friend playing the shortish par 4 16th at Wolf Point Club.  He lost his tee shot in the creek, not taking my advice and keeping the tee ball right of the flag. The fairway slopes will draw the ball towards the creek. He did win the match on 17 unfortunately. 


"Completely original, and more like Scotland than any course I've played in the US." were his comments after the round. 


It was the first time I remember playing in a wind that came from the north-east - a 21 mph wind. It made for some interesting differences: I didn't carry the creek on 4, I birdied 5, I drove the 10th with a 4 wood and Jeff hit the longest tee ball on 17 I've seen yet - even with that crazy swing. 


Happy New Year