ClubCorp Charity Classic

ClubCorp Charity Classic at Quail a Hollow was a huge success. The Weiskopf course continues to improve and the greens were fast. Ray Hartman, Weiskopf superintendent, helped me paint a 60' by 60' grid in #18 fairway. There were 100 squares (6'x6') that were sold for Pete's pin shot. He took 3 shots and money was paid out for those squares.

Ray Hartman next to field striper

Lake Health Grid

The first winning shot

Driving range rotation

The cart barn driving range tee is set up on the grass Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Monday through Thursday the hotel end of the driving range is setup on the grass. This gives members the option to always hit off of grass instead of mats when the weather permits. This also allows us to rotate the range to get the divots to grow in quicker and provide a perfect surface to hit off of. 

#3 Devlin Tees and touch ups

The crew from ForeFront came back to reshape the tees on #3 and resodded them. We had them take the old sod and fix all the trench lines and valve areas that were left bare this spring. Sprinkler heads were leveled and drain lines were tied back together. All the areas that were affected this spring have now been fixed.

#3 Blue tee pointed towards middle of fairway and new bentgrass sod laid with bluegrass surrounds

Old tee sod used to fill any old drain lines and bare spots in the fairways.  We will remove the stakes and ropes once it is tacked down.

Devlin tee size

Over the years some of the Devlin tees have been greatly reduced in size. In the picture below on #14 you can see how narrow it has become. It is level on each side and is bentgrass so we have begun to lower the height on the edges to make the tee bigger. We are able to get 3-5 feet bigger on each side. There are many other tees like this that we will start to enlarge. By next spring the tees on Devlin will have more teeing space which in turn gives everyone better grass to hit off of. 

Moisture Meters

A lot of people have asked me what the device is that I have been using to check the greens. The Spectrum Technologies TDR 300 measures the volumetric water content(VWC) in the soil. It is the exact meter used by the USGA at their championships and also on the PGA Tour. This allows us to dry out the greens as much as possible without stressing out the turf. We check each green between 20 and 30 spots to see where water needs to be applied.  We only apply water where it needs it with a hose. Overhead sprinklers are only used on greens when the whole surface needs water which this time of year is very infrequent. If you see me or the guys  using them feel free to stop and we will show you how it works.

Moisture Meter

14.4% Moisture Content at this spot.  Average on the green after 33 readings is 14.5%

Pictures from Aerification of Devlin

The approach on #6 aerated

Lance sweeping cores off of #13 green

Process continues with blowing and fully cleaning plugs

After the greens were top dressed, but not yet dragged and rolled

Fairway aerator in action

Prepping for Aerification

Friday we aerated the hotel putting green. This allowed us to do a practice run on all our settings for the greens aerification on Tuesday. This includes aerator spacing, speed, sand volume, which topdressor will be best and most efficient at filling the holes and many other factors. We also could see how   aggressive we could be on the dragging of sand to fill the holes as well without damaging the turf. I feel good going into my first aeration at Quail that we have prepared to provide the shortest amount of recovery time possible on the Devlin course.

Lance aerating the Hotel Practice Green