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: