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Bringing the UK Golf Club Model to the U.S. · Designing Golf

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: When American golfers go to Great Britain and Ireland, they
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: often think, why can't it be this way back home? Specifically,
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: why can't we have more private golf clubs that accept
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: public play, Real clubs with strong local memberships that also
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: welcome visitors on a daily basis. There are a number
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: of reasons that this kind of golf club is rare
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: in the US, some tax related, some having to do
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: with history and culture. But the good news is that
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: it is possible to create a golf club in the
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: US that roughly replicates the UK model, and right now
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: in Michigan, a group of people is trying to do
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: just that. The architect behind this project is my guest today,
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: Mike Derees. Mike is a decorated golf architect and a
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: partner with the firm Clayton, Devrees and Pont. His solo
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: designs include Kingsley Club, Gray Walls and Diamond Springs, all
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: in his home state of Michigan, as well as Cape
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: Wickham in Tasmania. And in this episode, I'm talking with
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: Mike about the effort to bring the UK club model
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: to the US by turning Dunham Hills Golf Club into
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: proving Ground golf Club. I'm Garrett Morrison and this is
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: designing golf. So, Mike, mainly what I wanted to speak
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: with you about today is a project that you're involved
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: in in Michigan. This project is in its very early stages.
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: It involves reimagining Dunham Hill's golf club in the town
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: of Heartland, Michigan, reimagining that facility as proving ground golf club, which,
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: if the project happens, would be a very different kind
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: of club. So could you give me the backstory of
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: all this? Take me, start me at the beginning and
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: take me through kind of what has gotten you to
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: this point in in this venture.
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: Sure. So, Ben Cowen, young man, you know a forty issue.
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: I'll just say young man, I'm old. So but he's been, uh,
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: he's been in the golf business in the past. He's
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: a he's a father of two young daughters and is
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: you know, he's been enamored with golf for a long
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: time and it has always thought, hey, why can't we
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: why can't we have a place that's you know, can
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: have a private club aspect to it as well as
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: provide you know, open tea times for the public. And
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: so it's that UK model Australian model where it's accessible
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: to other people that want to get there in play,
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: but the focus is really on sort of taking care
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: of the members or as as Ben wants to call him, patrons.
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: So they're sort of patroning the the golf club and
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: you know, they look after it. They provide you know,
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: sort of the base support and then new members either
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: come and go. But also you bring in the opportunity
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: to have outside play at certain times of the day
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: and that's controlled and stuff. So you have a really
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: nice environment, just like you would in the UK where
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: you have a great course. You have this camaraderie that
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: you would have with your buddies that you know, you
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: play with and stuff. But it's a welcoming place to
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: bring people in from the outside. So and he's had
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: this idea for a while and we've we've looked at
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: other sites and things like that in the past. I
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: got to know Band met him or ten fifteen years ago,
• 3:43
  Speaker 2: a long time ago, and he was involved with the
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: Walking Golfer Society. Not that he's anti KRT. He just
• 3:54
  Speaker 2: you know, there's people out there that want to walk
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: and you know that's a way that you experience the
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: game also, and I'm a big proponent of that. Also,
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: you get a different sense of a golf course when
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: you're on two feet and there's four people walking down
• 4:08
  Speaker 2: the fairway and you know and this, you know, we
• 4:11
  Speaker 2: both hit it to the right side of the hole,
• 4:13
  Speaker 2: and we kind of walk together and talk, and the
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: next hole, you know, we're on the left side with
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: somebody else or whatever, and you get a sense of
• 4:21
  Speaker 2: sort of the social aspect of the game. I think
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: that's that's an element that we don't really talk about sometimes,
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: that that's a little bit lost in sort of the
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: shuffle of all the excitement of golf and things. And
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: so Ben's idea was really to bring this in and
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: so he identified Dunham Hills, which is about fifty sixty
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: years old. This has been a course in southeast Michigan,
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: which is anybody that knows the roads, if you're you know,
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: if you're in Detroit, the very southeast portion. Ann Arbor's
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: a little west of that, in little south of that
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: US twenty three runs through goes north south essentially out
• 5:04
  Speaker 2: of ann Arbor and out of Detroit. I ninety six
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: goes towards Lansing. Those intersect at the town of Brighton
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: just north of ann Arbor a little bit, and then
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: a little bit north of that, M fifty nine goes
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: over to Pontiac, and so that's sort of there's east
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: of M. Twenty three are some rural communities, but still
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: then some city centers and smaller, smaller towns and stuff
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: like that that are sort of outskirts suburbia for Detroit.
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: Some people manage to commute down to the city, but
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: you're not really very far and you're and the golf
• 5:43
  Speaker 2: course is only about ten minutes from that intersection, which
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: is a major thoroughfare for anybody that's coming up to
• 5:49
  Speaker 2: Michigan from southern Michigan from ann Arbor or say Ohio
• 5:55
  Speaker 2: coming up and going going further north to Northern Mission
• 6:00
  Speaker 2: for summer vacation or the cottage or something like that.
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: So it's a really interesting location in that it's it's
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: within this town or village of Heartland, and the golf
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: team has been playing the high school golf team's been
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: playing there, the women's and the men's for oh, you know,
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: at least fifty years probably, and the two coaches are
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: involved with ben as you know as part owners and
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: involved in you know, building this sort of contingent that
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: is really involved in wanting to transform the golf course
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: into something a bit more because it really hasn't had.
• 6:39
  Speaker 2: It has old irrigation and an old maintenance building, and
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: there's a clubhouse that they built about twenty twenty five
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: years ago and they're doing some upgrades to that. But it's, uh,
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  Speaker 2: you know, it's a it's a really good piece of property,
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: has a lot of mature oaks on it, some wetlands.
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: It's bordered on a couple of different side by basically
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: farm land. There's some development it kind of filtered off
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: to the side of one of the holes, but it's
• 7:08
  Speaker 2: really you know, it has a kind of country setting
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: to it, and and and the ground is it's really excellent.
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: You know, it's good soils. The routing is not not bad.
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: But we're going to make some alterations to that ultimately.
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: But the ideas is they're up and running now, operating
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: as they did in the past as a public golf course,
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: and we're doing some things like some tree management and
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: things like that now that we know we're gonna need
• 7:41
  Speaker 2: to do in the future. And you know, just help
• 7:43
  Speaker 2: the golf course get the turf grass up to snuff,
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: and then they'll they'll go on a on a money
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: raised to do the full thing, which would be you know,
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: full new irrigation. There's some a few whole changes that
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: we're doing routing and stuff like that, and we'll rebuild
• 8:02
  Speaker 2: greens and teas and and you know, get some some changes.
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: But we'll be using most of the corridors that are
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: on the golf course currently, so a lot of things
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: will feel similar, but it will play differently and the
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: routing will be a little bit adjusted to you know,
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: four five holes are really a little bit different in alignment.
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: Or there's a par five the twelfth, the current twelfth
• 8:29
  Speaker 2: that's going to get broken up into a short four
• 8:32
  Speaker 2: and a par three, and that's going to help to
• 8:34
  Speaker 2: sort of weave things together a little bit.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: So I want to get into the club model story
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: a little bit later, but first maybe a few more
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: details on the architectural project here. First of all, what
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: needs to happen in order for this this redesign project
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: to go through.
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: Money. It's always about money, It's.
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: Always that's a it's a it's a common answer to
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: these questions.
• 9:03
  Speaker 2: Got a couple of bucks. So yeah, you know that's
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: always that's always a factor. So you know, it's a
• 9:12
  Speaker 2: it's affordable golf, and the idea is that it should
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: still continue to be affordable golf, but you know it's
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: still you're you're putting an irrigation. Irrigation now is a
• 9:23
  Speaker 2: very expensive proposition.
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: Yeah, since Covid irrigation contractors irrigation materials have just gone
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: through the roof and that's a major story in golf
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: course construction that not a lot of people know about,
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: but it's having a huge effect on what people can do.
• 9:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah, major budgets, all that sort of stuff. So the
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: thing is is that's an incredible amount of disruption. We
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: also want to change a few whole alignments and stuff
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: like that. So that involves either in some situations, you know,
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: cutting some trees here or doing earthwork there, so really
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: sculpting a brand new green not on the same green
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: area where you know where the soil might be halfway decent,
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: but then consistency with trying to trying to build the
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: same thing. So we'll import green's mix and things like that.
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: All that comes with the cost, but long term, that's
• 10:18
  Speaker 2: going to make it much more viable for for the basically,
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: you know, the long term life of the of the
• 10:24
  Speaker 2: golf course. There's an old maintenance building that really need
• 10:30
  Speaker 2: they need a new maintenance building. And so we've identified
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: a location where we can build a new maintenance barn
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: and that's not going to affect the golf course is
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: going to be better and the current the current maintenance
• 10:44
  Speaker 2: bireing can can be taken out because we can realign
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: the entrance to the club, which would be a better,
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: more appropriate entrance to the club and will help the
• 10:53
  Speaker 2: practice area also. So some of those types of things
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: are they're just needed improvements and those come at a costs.
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: So I think we can do irrigation. You know, this
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: is not the desert where it's one hundred and ten
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: degrees and you know you have to you know, if
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: you don't, if you don't have water going on it,
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: it's going to die. It's just going to be dirt.
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: This is this is a moderate temperate climate. But you
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: still need to have irrigation. So I think there's ways
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: that we can do that effectively and economically, and that's
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: going to be you know important. So I think if
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: that if we can do that I think that's going
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: to be really really helpful. And then it's it's essentially
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: kind of an existing site, but we're really building a
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: new golf course. Think of it that way. So, because
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: there's certain areas that are going to get disturbed, even
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: though the turf is improving and getting better where it
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: is now, we're going to be overseating that or stripping
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: that and then putting down new seed that's going to
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: be so we'll have new varieties of that grass, ascue, bluegrass,
• 12:02
  Speaker 2: et cetera that will be better, you know, better drought tolerance,
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: pess aside, you know, those types of things, using less
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: of all of those types of things. So it'll be
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: economically friendly to manage and maintain. And we already have
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: a you know, we've already figured out a budget for that,
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: and that's a very conscious sort of aspect of the project.
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: So what are you proposing to do with the redesign?
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: What is the intention of that work, whether it's rerouting
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: some holes or reshaping greens and hazards. What are you
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: going for with the redesign of the course. How do
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: you hope to improve it?
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: Do you? I mean, just in with with regards to
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: the overall character of the golf course or character.
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: Of the golf course. Yeah, architecture design.
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: Sure, sure. So there's there's really good undulation on the property,
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: So some of it very rolling, some of it lightly rolling.
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: The key to all of that, I think, and some
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: of the keys to the changes that we're making are
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: trying to make better use of that and transition between
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: those areas. So we're trying to get the flow of
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: the property to better match that in the cadence of
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: the players. And to me, that's where those key elements
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: of how do you transition from one hole to the
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: next and do that? You know, if you've got a
• 13:34
  Speaker 2: big hill and you're you know, you have this beautiful
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: hole that goes down the hill, well, ultimately you're probably
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: going to be back to the top of that hill.
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: So so you don't want to go down and then
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: go straight back up. That's sort of a waste of energy.
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: You want to try and be able to use that
• 13:50
  Speaker 2: and yeah, you want to get to a peak, but
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: you want to sort of absorb that and stay there
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: for a little bit and then you want to transition
• 13:57
  Speaker 2: to another area or another level. And this is a
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: we have a sort of a high ridge in the
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: middle and it peels off on both sides and to
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: the north, so there's a fair amount of elevation there
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: and how we get about doing that involves a little
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: bit of dirt work to be able to do that,
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: to make there's a couple of extreme sort of situations
• 14:19
  Speaker 2: in the routing now where we can do a little
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: bit of earth moving, We can do that effectively, but
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: it's in a smaller concentrated area, and we can make
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: that transition work better. And that may not have been
• 14:34
  Speaker 2: a focus of there's you know, sixty years ago, or
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: they didn't have the equipment to do that, or there
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: wasn't the vision for that. Maybe, so we're trying to
• 14:46
  Speaker 2: do that type of stuff, and I think that's the
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: thing that's I'm going to make the difference. The greens
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: will greens will have character to them. Most people know
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: that I like like a little bit of in my
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: greenes and interest, so that's you know, that'll be part
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: of it. And not that their greens are horrible, but
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: there are some of them that are very playing and
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: they need some help. And so we're going to want
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: to have that sort of be consistent and broad across
• 15:16
  Speaker 2: the in the in the consistency and quality of the
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: of the maintenance across that. So that's that's part of
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: it of redoing those types of things.
• 15:32
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  Speaker 1: All right, let's get back to the episode. You're a
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: very hands on architect. You like shaping, you like being
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: on equipment and shaping bunkers and greens features. How do
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: you think about the style or the esthetic appearance of
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: those features on projects? Do you come in with an
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: idea of I want to do something with these that
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: has a look or do you just go there and
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: respond to what's in the landscape purely?
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: Well, first of all, it's what I call reactionary architecture,
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: so we're reacting to what that's giving us versus having
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: a static Nothing against SETH Rayner or CB McDonald if
• 17:33
  Speaker 2: they had a very stringent, organized way that they did
• 17:36
  Speaker 2: think right.
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: Or Langford to Moreaw or you know, there's a number
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: of architects who kind of have a style.
• 17:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and they were very rigid about that so and
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: that there's nothing wrong with that, and they built great stuff.
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: But I guess I think the thing that's really interesting
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: about golf is our palettes constantly changing. So we're those
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: unique features. How can we pull those things out to
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: give us something that's unique and special there that we
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: don't have someplace else. So for the most part, yes,
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: I'm trying to react to what's there. But I think
• 18:14
  Speaker 2: you come in with an idea or a concept that
• 18:17
  Speaker 2: could be, you know, we're going to do big, flashy bunkers,
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: or in this case, we're doing you know, about fifty
• 18:24
  Speaker 2: bunkers probably.
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: Which is relatively minimal compared to a lot of projects
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: these days.
• 18:31
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but I'm thinking this the scale of this in
• 18:35
  Speaker 2: it where there's a number of shared fairways and things. Also,
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: the scale of some of these bunkers is going to
• 18:41
  Speaker 2: be larger than normal, I think, than I would normally build.
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: Like a lot of times you build, you build clusters.
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: Just because the scale of the whole shared whole corridors
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: is going to be big. So you need bunkers to
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: compete with that.
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: I think so. Yeah, And I think so in some
• 18:58
  Speaker 2: cases there's there's going to be, you know, some larger
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: bunkers than say I would normally be apt to build.
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: I see.
• 19:07
  Speaker 2: And so the number of the sheer number isn't isn't
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: the point? The point is how do they fit in?
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: And how do they do that? And I've drawn in
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: a number that have little islands and buttons in them
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: and stuff, and that's a you know, that's sort of
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: a throwback to what Mackenzie and Maxwell did at the
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: University of Michigan and in Crystal Downs where I grew
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: up and stuff. And there have been times when I
• 19:33
  Speaker 2: have built little islands and bunkers and things like that,
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: but I think there's an opportunity to make this feel
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: really old school with some of that, and then kind
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: of having where there's two greens sort of flanking each
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: other and there's a large hazard in between with little
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: islands in it and stuff. That effect is going to
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: be really really strong. So part of that's a visual thing.
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: It's like, hey, they're setting up these holes. Both climb
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: sort of, you know, uphill a little bit, so you're
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: going to get a little bit of a that's there's
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: trees behind them in the background, but you're going to
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: get a bit of a skyline feel of of those
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: and this massive crater kind of between them. So I
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: think there's things like that that we're trying to do.
• 20:18
  Speaker 2: But then as I'm building it, that stuff also evolves
• 20:23
  Speaker 2: and we find other stuff or we run into something
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: that we don't that we didn't expect, and then you
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: have to change and figure that out. And that's always
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: something funky with old with old golf course properties at
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: Bloomfield Hills not very far from Dunham Hills when we're
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: it's an old colt course and there was a there
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: was a huge basically cistern that was six or seven
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: feet wide. It was like an old boiler nine feet deep.
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: And some farmer a long time ago, because nobody and
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: the golf course knew this there and we were cutting
• 21:01
  Speaker 2: some sod off and they ran into this metal lid
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: and all of a sudden, you know that, we open
• 21:06
  Speaker 2: up this lid and there's there's water coming into this
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: and a pipe leaving out that you know, drained down
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: to the end of the fairway and connected into the
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: main drainage of the deal. So some some very practical person, Hey,
• 21:20
  Speaker 2: we've got this old boiler unit. Let's throw this in
• 21:23
  Speaker 2: there and make a big it's basically a huge catch basin,
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: and it's just it's all internal underground, and people are like,
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: what are you gonna do with that? I'm like, it's working.
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: I'm not doing I wouldn't do it that way now,
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: but hey, look at it's perfect.
• 21:36
  Speaker 2: It seems to be doing that. That guy was smart man,
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: So yeah, no, it's so you run. I mean, I've
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: never seen anything like that. And there's a guy that
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: was a maintenance guy there. He's I didn't see him,
• 21:50
  Speaker 2: but he'd been there back like fifty sixty years ago.
• 21:54
  Speaker 2: He didn't even know that it was in the ground.
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: So it's really old. And you know, who knows what
• 21:59
  Speaker 2: we're going to find und Dunham Hills. It might be
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: something weird, but hopefully nothing too crazy.
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: So yeah, that's the thing with golf courses that have
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: been there for a while. Sometimes you find stuff good
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: or bad that you're not expecting. You know, the courses
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: has been there for a while. That's interesting what you're
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: saying about going in with a kind of general idea
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: of some new stuff that you want to do. These
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: shared corridors and maybe some bigger bunkers with those little
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: Perry Maxwell islands in them. He did like those, he did,
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: he did some of those at Prairie Dunes, He did
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: some of them at Southern Hills. Actually that the kind
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: of have come back, not all of them have come back.
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: And and so it's you know, is that how influence
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: sometimes works with you. Do you think of particular architects
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: and think Hey, I want to kind of pluck this
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: and see if I can do something with that on
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: this project.
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it's an evolution. I guess I'm never
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: not very often like specifically trying to like focus in.
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: I think maybe owners have clients have more of that, like, Hey,
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: I want to have a thirteenth O Augusta, or I.
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: Like Fisher's Island. Look, can you give me something like that?
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: So do I who doesn't?
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: So?
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: Yeah?
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: I think you know, a lot of times they're sort
• 23:18
  Speaker 2: of looking for that type of stuff. Ben hasn't given
• 23:22
  Speaker 2: me any sort of directive that way. You know, he's
• 23:26
  Speaker 2: kind of letting that do. And he's i mean, he's
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: very interested. He's an architecture junkie. So I'm sure like
• 23:32
  Speaker 2: once we get going, he's gonna be like, hey, what
• 23:34
  Speaker 2: about this? What about that? And that's all. That's all
• 23:38
  Speaker 2: fine and dandy. It's just it's trying to like bring
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: everything together and have it be cohesive. And sometimes you
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: go in with an idea or a whole and it
• 23:50
  Speaker 2: just doesn't fit somehow. It doesn't necessarily mean it's bad
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: or terrible, it just doesn't work out quite right, and
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: so you have to you have to adjust and you
• 24:01
  Speaker 2: have to figure out a way to make things work.
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: And that's not the that's that's a difficult thing to
• 24:11
  Speaker 2: do because once you're really like, wow, that's wow, this
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: is this is awesome, this would be so great. Well,
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: if it doesn't work with the other three or four
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: holes on either side of it, how do you get
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: those How do you get those to all come together?
• 24:24
  Speaker 2: How do you get those to merge and to be
• 24:27
  Speaker 2: really functional? Because you know, if you have one great
• 24:31
  Speaker 2: hole on a golf course and you have seventeen marginal ones,
• 24:33
  Speaker 2: it's not a very good course, even if it's the
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: most spectacular hole in the world.
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: So got to make the puzzle pieces fit together. And
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: whatever looks like a stylistic flourish is sometimes just a
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: response to what's going on in other holes or good
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: needs that arise on a particular one as you're building it.
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: But you know, a little bit further from that too,
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: I think is you know, we're influenced by all of
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: those guys, you know, whether it's Mackenzie col you know McDonald,
• 25:01
  Speaker 2: donald Ross, Tillian Hans, you're right down the line, Flynn,
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: those those things, or like the old links courses and
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: the stuff that they have. All of that cumulatively helps
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: you build things or do things, And I think that
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: is it doesn't have to be that direct. Just the
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: influx of all of that type of stuff is really
• 25:27
  Speaker 2: what is making a difference.
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: Having kind of a rolodex of ideas that you've seen
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: elsewhere and maybe one pops up as you're constructing the course. Yeah,
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: I've heard Brian Schneider and Blake Conan talk about that
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: a lot when they're when they're looking at a particular game. Oh,
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: this reminds me of some obscure course that I that
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: I saw, you know, way up in the north of Scotland,
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: and and it's uh yeah. Having that kind of memory
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: is both impressive and it seems useful. So the club model,
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: the kind of business model story here with proving ground
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: and what you're doing and transforming Dunham Hills is really
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: interesting that the idea is to replicate a kind of
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: UK club model, And from your description of it, it
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: sounds like this this involves a kind of balance of
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: public play accessibility but also a membership culture combining those two.
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: What do I have that right? First of all, is
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: there a better way to describe what the UK club
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: model is for our audience, and if you could talk
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: a little bit about what the benefits of this are.
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: You know, you're I think you're describing it properly. And
• 26:44
  Speaker 2: I think the thing is that the UK member clubs,
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: even the more exclusive ones, they might have limited time,
• 26:56
  Speaker 2: very limited times where it's accessible where you can be
• 26:59
  Speaker 2: introduced by your club pro maybe you're traveling over there,
• 27:04
  Speaker 2: et cetera. Or you know, you have you know, charter
• 27:08
  Speaker 2: groups and you know, golf tour groups and things like
• 27:10
  Speaker 2: that that that you know, find access and ways to
• 27:14
  Speaker 2: do this sort of stuff. So there's ways to do that,
• 27:17
  Speaker 2: you know, maybe at a premium though, And I think
• 27:23
  Speaker 2: what that affords is it helps it helps those clubs
• 27:28
  Speaker 2: on their bottom line, so there it maybe keeps their
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: dues down a bit because they're having sort of a
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: premium guess that comes in and usually those people end
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: up being fairly serious because you know, they're they're paying
• 27:45
  Speaker 2: more money and they're you know, they're respectful of it,
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: they're excited about it. So the idea with with dunnan
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: Hill's new proving ground would be that as we build
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: this membership and we get to you know, one hundred
• 28:02
  Speaker 2: and two hundred, three hundred members or whatever, we get
• 28:06
  Speaker 2: the opportunity to have less space available because maybe there's
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: more demand by the membership. So certainly when there's only
• 28:19
  Speaker 2: one hundred members, there's many other t slots available for
• 28:23
  Speaker 2: public play now that may still be restricted in certain
• 28:26
  Speaker 2: times of the day, et cetera. So you know, if
• 28:28
  Speaker 2: you're traveling through the area and you like, hey, i'd
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: really this is a I've heard a lot about this
• 28:33
  Speaker 2: new golf course, let's go try and play it. And
• 28:35
  Speaker 2: you call up and hey, I want to you know,
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: I want to tee off at nine thirty. Well, our
• 28:40
  Speaker 2: tee offs are going to be at eleven o'clock that day,
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: because you know, our member play is that morning up
• 28:48
  Speaker 2: to eleven o'clock or something. So that can all be
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: that can change or be shifted around a bit, I
• 28:54
  Speaker 2: think depending on how many members they have and how
• 28:58
  Speaker 2: they want to sort of control that environment. So it
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: gives those members that kind of ability to have, you know,
• 29:06
  Speaker 2: I feel like they're unencumbered. They're playing at a steady rate.
• 29:10
  Speaker 2: You know, they know the golf course bing bing bing bing,
• 29:12
  Speaker 2: you know, they play, they play more rapidly, and they
• 29:16
  Speaker 2: don't feel pressure from Billy. Bob and his guy's drinking
• 29:20
  Speaker 2: a bunch of beer, so nothing that's drinking beer, you know, yeah, exactly.
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: Seems like a cool guy, Billy.
• 29:29
  Speaker 2: But have you seen that the Landman series. He's he's
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: amazing in that. He does a great job, Billy Weuthorne
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: fantastic exactly.
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a proud name.
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: It is. Absolutely, he's a credible actor. So I think
• 29:45
  Speaker 2: really it's to try and provide a sort of a
• 29:48
  Speaker 2: balance between that and say, you know, this becomes you know,
• 29:53
  Speaker 2: wildly popular and they you know, there's a massive list
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: of people getting in. You know, it may evolve into
• 30:00
  Speaker 2: something else where it's going to be more restrictive. But
• 30:03
  Speaker 2: I think the whole goal is is that they would
• 30:07
  Speaker 2: Ben would like to have this be something where the
• 30:09
  Speaker 2: public is available to get play a cool golf course
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: that's walkable, it'spawn they'll still have golf carts and things
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: like that. But then it's also and like I said,
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: the women's coach and the men's coach at at the
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: Heartland High School, those those two coaches are involved in this.
• 30:27
  Speaker 2: They've been playing there for years. They're still going to
• 30:30
  Speaker 2: do that. They're still supporting say youth golf and and
• 30:34
  Speaker 2: you know, bringing in the regional you know, golf championship
• 30:40
  Speaker 2: or whatever for you know, whatever this division is. So
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: there's that activity of being involved in the community and
• 30:46
  Speaker 2: doing that type of stuff. I think is it's if
• 30:50
  Speaker 2: people want to talk about growing the game, that's how
• 30:52
  Speaker 2: you do it. That's that's really you know positive.
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: You know, in the US, clubs like this we often
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: refer to with the cut all term semi private, which is,
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: you know, as a term it doesn't really really make sense,
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: but it does set set apart these courses that function
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: as clubs with memberships and dues and initiation fees maybe even,
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: but at the same time allow consistent, fairly easy public
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: access where you can make a tea time. These models,
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: these semi private models are structured in different ways, and
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: I'm not sure I understand the nuances of every single
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: different type of structure. But at Pasa Tiempo, for instance,
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: that's a little different in my understanding, because the membership's
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: kind of function as shares and you can you can
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: sort of sell them, and there's that element to the club.
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: But then you also have have club cultures at places
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: like Wildhorse Golf Club in Gothenburg, Nebraska, where that feels
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: and really functions like a public course, an affordable public
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: course most of the time. But there is a healthy
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: club membership and affordable membership that is drawn upon by
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: many of the locals in that area. So I guess
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: there are varieties of these clubs, but still relatively rare.
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: You know, you go to the UK and just about
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: every single club is It's rare to find a club
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: that doesn't really allow outside play and doesn't use that
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: outside play to fund its operations. So I wonder, what
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: do you have a theory of why these models are
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: so rare in the US?
• 32:38
  Speaker 2: I don't. I think there's a The US I mean
• 32:43
  Speaker 2: has a different view of golf too. You know, from
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: a conditioning standpoint, everybody watches the Masters in April and like, hey, Frank,
• 32:55
  Speaker 2: we got to go cut those bunker edges and make
• 32:58
  Speaker 2: them look like a laser went through there and you know,
• 33:00
  Speaker 2: slice them down, and like, you know, the Masters is awesome.
• 33:06
  Speaker 2: You know, I love the Masters since I was a
• 33:08
  Speaker 2: kid watching with my grandfather. That's one of the reasons
• 33:11
  Speaker 2: that you know, I got excited about golf. I mean,
• 33:13
  Speaker 2: it was the beginning of the golf season here in
• 33:15
  Speaker 2: the North, So that was super fun. But that's appropriate there,
• 33:21
  Speaker 2: it's not necessarily applicable to all the other places. And
• 33:24
  Speaker 2: so I think there's a difference in sort of the
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: perception of golf in the US that, oh, there's a
• 33:36
  Speaker 2: munique golf course that anybody can go play and it's
• 33:40
  Speaker 2: not in good condition, it takes forever to play and
• 33:44
  Speaker 2: drinking beer and you know, but if you go to
• 33:48
  Speaker 2: the country club, it's cultured and has this and there's
• 33:52
  Speaker 2: a big variety in those in the US too. There
• 33:56
  Speaker 2: are places that are much more low key, and there
• 33:58
  Speaker 2: are places that are just and you have that in
• 34:01
  Speaker 2: the UK also, But I think I think the opportunity
• 34:07
  Speaker 2: to to do these sorts of things leads to something
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: that's more. You know, golf, like we were talking about before,
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: is a very social game, and so there are places
• 34:20
  Speaker 2: that you go into that do allow outside play, and
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: you tend to find that they're they're like, hey, Garrett, welcome,
• 34:30
  Speaker 2: Oh where are you from? You know, what do you
• 34:34
  Speaker 2: like to play? You know what what brought you here
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: or something? You know, You're you're sort of engaged, and
• 34:38
  Speaker 2: a lot of times you go to the UK and
• 34:42
  Speaker 2: like you get a caddy and the caddy is the
• 34:45
  Speaker 2: you know, the captain of the club or the president
• 34:47
  Speaker 2: of the club, and he's just like he's a farmer
• 34:50
  Speaker 2: or something, but you know, he's not farming anything that day,
• 34:55
  Speaker 2: so he just wants to make a few extra bucks.
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: And he also sort of serves as your guide, which
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: is which is really interesting and it leads to this
• 35:04
  Speaker 2: sort of thing of of sharing and and that golf
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: courses in Scotland and Ireland and England are sort of
• 35:11
  Speaker 2: a fabric of the community. They're not just wholly owned
• 35:15
  Speaker 2: by those those members. And I think maybe that's maybe
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: a difference between the America, you know, the Americas and stuff,
• 35:25
  Speaker 2: where it's sort of like, well, we're the owners of
• 35:28
  Speaker 2: this club. You know, it's private. Private means you know,
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: stay off, et cetera. I don't know that that could
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: be part of it, but you know, those are good
• 35:37
  Speaker 2: examples that you gave. There's Belvedere here in northern Michigan
• 35:41
  Speaker 2: and charlot Wai, which is a great example, Tasket golf
• 35:45
  Speaker 2: course and they have you know, they have a fair
• 35:49
  Speaker 2: amount of slots available and depending on the time of year,
• 35:53
  Speaker 2: but it's control too. So like if there are certain
• 35:56
  Speaker 2: days where you know that whole morning is blocked off
• 35:59
  Speaker 2: because is that's a that's the normal member play for
• 36:03
  Speaker 2: Men's Day or Women's Day or whatever. And Gray Walls
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: in Marquette Golf Club they've got thirty six holes, but
• 36:11
  Speaker 2: Gray Walls of course that I built for him twenty
• 36:13
  Speaker 2: five years ago. That's that has public play. But they
• 36:19
  Speaker 2: have six hundred and fifty or seven hundred members and
• 36:23
  Speaker 2: they're busy and both golf courses all the time. And
• 36:26
  Speaker 2: the original golf course was Langford and Moreau nine holes
• 36:29
  Speaker 2: of that. David Gill added another nine to it in
• 36:32
  Speaker 2: the sixties. So there it's a place that is you know,
• 36:36
  Speaker 2: they're welcoming people and bringing people in and there's a
• 36:39
  Speaker 2: there's a huge different variety in and that's also the
• 36:43
  Speaker 2: up is a different place. I mean, it's it's it's
• 36:46
  Speaker 2: it's not that far away. Everyone thinks it's totally remote,
• 36:49
  Speaker 2: but you know, there's a lot of access to get
• 36:54
  Speaker 2: in there.
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: This is the old Upper Peninsula of Michigan.
• 36:56
  Speaker 2: For correct for people people that don't know where.
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: Where Martet Golf Club is now, I assume that most
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: of those hundreds of members. At least a portion of
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: that membership lives elsewhere right.
• 37:09
  Speaker 2: Now, most of them are local, most of them are there.
• 37:12
  Speaker 2: So yeah, so Marquette's a good sized town, okay, sort
• 37:16
  Speaker 2: of the hub of the Upper Peninsula.
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah, now I haven't been there that This is on
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: my bucket list to go see Marquette and Gray Walls.
• 37:23
  Speaker 2: It's a glaring o mission.
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: I mean, obviously I have many I have many of
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: those omissions in my my resume.
• 37:31
  Speaker 2: We all do. But it's the town's probably twenty to
• 37:36
  Speaker 2: twenty five thousand people. But then there's a surrounding area
• 37:39
  Speaker 2: to that too, in Northern Michigan. University is there, there's
• 37:41
  Speaker 2: the major hospital for you know, a good section of
• 37:47
  Speaker 2: the of the of the Upper Peninsula there. So you've
• 37:51
  Speaker 2: got doctors, lawyers, you know, you know, college professors, you've
• 37:55
  Speaker 2: got students, you have guys that work in the mind.
• 37:58
  Speaker 2: You've got you know, insurance and skies, you've got all,
• 38:01
  Speaker 2: you know, sort of this well rounded breadth of people
• 38:05
  Speaker 2: that are that are there, and they love being outdoors
• 38:09
  Speaker 2: up there, and so they take advantage when it's and
• 38:11
  Speaker 2: it's gorgeous in the summer. They there if it's if
• 38:15
  Speaker 2: it's laid out there. They're playing golf pretty this time
• 38:20
  Speaker 2: of year. They're putting golf carts away at quarter to
• 38:23
  Speaker 2: eleven at night. I mean they're they're playing right to dark,
• 38:27
  Speaker 2: and it's Eastern time zone, far north and west, so
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: it stays light really really late this time of year.
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: It's pretty interesting that Michigan has quite a few, i mean,
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: relative relative to other states other areas, has quite a
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: few examples of of courses that have managed to balance
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: club culture with public access. And it seems like many
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: of these places are in some vacation spots. Right. If
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: they go closer to Detroit, the suburbs of a Detroit,
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: they're awful lot of private clubs that are more exclusive.
• 39:02
  Speaker 1: But you get farther north in Michigan and you start
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: encountering some of these places where yes, there's a club,
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: but you can also figure out how to play the
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: course fairly easily. And so there's something interesting there in
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: the culture of Michigan golf that allows that to happen.
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: I'm not exactly sure what it is, but I'd love
• 39:24
  Speaker 1: to figure out in general what it will take for
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: more courses to adopt this model. This is something I
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: think a lot of American golfers hunger for is not
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: only a club to join that doesn't feel like an
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: ultra exclusive or expensive club, but also in a array
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: of golf courses that while they have their club thing,
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: will also accept some outside play. And so I just
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: wonder what it'll take for that to happen in American golf.
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: I think there are some tax issues related to a
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: nonprofit status in the US that I don't entirely understand. Yeah,
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: I just I'm just trying to figure out how, how
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: how more of these places can exist.
• 40:08
  Speaker 2: I think, Well, I think part of the issue is
• 40:12
  Speaker 2: or the or the result of that is there that
• 40:16
  Speaker 2: there are a lot of clubs that are in a
• 40:17
  Speaker 2: resort area and so they're smaller, you know, a little
• 40:23
  Speaker 2: more laid back towns. The membership might be really seasonal.
• 40:27
  Speaker 2: They might be people that are only there, you know,
• 40:29
  Speaker 2: part of the year, snowbirds that go south or whatever.
• 40:32
  Speaker 2: And then you know there's the Midwest, nice people are
• 40:37
  Speaker 2: just sort of they're a little bit more. Yeah, I've
• 40:41
  Speaker 2: experienced the same thing happens in Wisconsin or Minnesota, which
• 40:44
  Speaker 2: are big golfing states also, and they tend to have
• 40:47
  Speaker 2: that that same sort of cyclical you know, they got
• 40:51
  Speaker 2: serious winter and then you know, the summer comes, it's
• 40:55
  Speaker 2: beautiful and people are coming back. And so I think
• 40:57
  Speaker 2: that might be part of it. That doesn't explain why,
• 41:02
  Speaker 2: you know, it can't be someplace else, because there's there's
• 41:05
  Speaker 2: plenty of other friendly places in the country, but that
• 41:08
  Speaker 2: I think that's maybe part of it. There are people
• 41:10
  Speaker 2: that say, you know, they haven't been around, and you know,
• 41:15
  Speaker 2: they've moved here. We have some new neighbors that that
• 41:18
  Speaker 2: just you know, are coming in the Sheen couple and
• 41:20
  Speaker 2: they're like and they've been in Chicago for a number
• 41:23
  Speaker 2: of years and stuff. And you know, Chicago is pretty nice,
• 41:27
  Speaker 2: but it's a big city, so there's a lot of
• 41:30
  Speaker 2: energy going on and people are you know, they're tense
• 41:32
  Speaker 2: or trying to get their traffic's bad or whatever.
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: You don't always know your neighbor exactly. But I've lived
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: in an apartment build in apartment buildings in Chicago and
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: not really done my neighbors.
• 41:43
  Speaker 2: So but I think that you know, they're like, everybody's
• 41:46
  Speaker 2: so nice. They're like, yeah, you know, you go down
• 41:49
  Speaker 2: the street and everyone says hi, and that sort of stuff.
• 41:52
  Speaker 2: And that I think that gets with that sort of
• 41:55
  Speaker 2: smaller community. You know, where you're where you where, You've
• 42:00
  Speaker 2: got sort of a connection to people where you see him.
• 42:06
  Speaker 2: You see him at the school or the church or
• 42:08
  Speaker 2: the drug store or whatever, because it's where everybody. You know,
• 42:12
  Speaker 2: everybody has to go there or you know, use that
• 42:14
  Speaker 2: facility or something. So I think that's maybe part of it.
• 42:25
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• 42:29
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• 42:34
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• 44:30
  Speaker 1: All right, let's get back to the episode. Another element
• 44:40
  Speaker 1: of this story, the Proving Ground story slash Dunham Hills story,
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: is about building golf that can be accessible, building on
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: a responsible budget, building something that can be maintained efficiently.
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: You have done this a lot in your career. I think,
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: actually you're the new build projects that you've done, a
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: lot of them have been publicly accessible affordable golf courses,
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: especially in the state of Michigan. You did Kingsley Club,
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: which is a private course, and we did actually a
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: recent video with you that people should check out. I
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: thought that turned out really well and your contributions to
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: it were great. But in addition to Kingsley Club, you
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: have helped design Diamond Springs, the Mines, other courses in
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: Michigan that were meant from the beginning to be affordable courses.
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: I wonder what you think are some of the keys
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: to designing for affordable golf but still producing something really
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: interesting and satisfying artistically.
• 45:49
  Speaker 2: Well, certainly what you begin with as always a big factor.
• 45:54
  Speaker 2: So when you think about what your soil type is like,
• 45:59
  Speaker 2: how is that that's going to affect a lot of
• 46:01
  Speaker 2: what you have to do to make things work. If
• 46:04
  Speaker 2: you've got solid clay and flat ground, you got to
• 46:08
  Speaker 2: move a lot of dirt. That costs money just because
• 46:11
  Speaker 2: it's equipment time, it's fuel, it's a labor all of
• 46:14
  Speaker 2: that sort of stuff and moving dirt, it just costs money.
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: So is you got you got to make a drain
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: on flat clay sites. You got to figure out how
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: to make a drain, and you need to move to
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: make that happen.
• 46:27
  Speaker 2: You got to get You gotta get water to the
• 46:28
  Speaker 2: plant that's irrigation. You got to get water away from
• 46:31
  Speaker 2: the plant that's draining. So those are the first two
• 46:33
  Speaker 2: critical things you know that you have to do. And
• 46:36
  Speaker 2: so if you got if it's flat, hardpan, clay or whatever,
• 46:40
  Speaker 2: you're going to have to do a lot of different
• 46:42
  Speaker 2: stuff that's underground that no one really sees besides oh
• 46:47
  Speaker 2: this is a perfect dan hole or you know, you
• 46:49
  Speaker 2: know all the stuff, the strategy and the stylistic stuff
• 46:52
  Speaker 2: you want to talk about, you've got to make it
• 46:54
  Speaker 2: actually function and work. So uh So, in Michigan, because
• 46:59
  Speaker 2: of the glaciers, we've had a lot of areas where
• 47:03
  Speaker 2: there's good, rolling, diverse terrain because the glaciers moved all
• 47:07
  Speaker 2: this stuff pulverized the sand and the stone down into
• 47:10
  Speaker 2: like a very well drained, nice sandy loam, sand gravel,
• 47:17
  Speaker 2: types of things that are very effective at moving stuff
• 47:20
  Speaker 2: through the ground. But there's still enough fertility. You just
• 47:24
  Speaker 2: go by any old farmstead and in the Midwest and
• 47:27
  Speaker 2: you know there's a lot of plant growth there. So
• 47:29
  Speaker 2: there's still a lot of good growing medium in that
• 47:33
  Speaker 2: and so we're starting with good we're starting with good product.
• 47:37
  Speaker 2: On all of those courses that you talked about, pilgrims
• 47:40
  Speaker 2: run the same thing. You think about gray walls. Now,
• 47:45
  Speaker 2: there's a lot of rock there, that's why it's called
• 47:47
  Speaker 2: gray walls, but there's also pure sand on that site.
• 47:51
  Speaker 2: And even when there was a big rock out cropping,
• 47:55
  Speaker 2: we could go over fifty feet and stick the dipper
• 47:57
  Speaker 2: down and like we're just pulling pure sand end up. Now.
• 48:01
  Speaker 2: I don't know why that is or how that worked there,
• 48:03
  Speaker 2: but you know, that was one of the fortunate things
• 48:06
  Speaker 2: about the site was we were able to utilize materials
• 48:10
  Speaker 2: on site. We didn't have to import materials there, so
• 48:15
  Speaker 2: that leads to a cost you know, less earth moving.
• 48:18
  Speaker 2: Now you've got fine shaping and things like that where
• 48:21
  Speaker 2: you're doing details, so bunkers, greens, tea work or fixing,
• 48:27
  Speaker 2: moving a little a little bit of dirt to make
• 48:30
  Speaker 2: this whole other, bigger area more functional. That's very economically effective.
• 48:37
  Speaker 2: So you can move a little bit of dirt in
• 48:40
  Speaker 2: one area and make three or four holes work instead
• 48:43
  Speaker 2: of having to shape three or four holes continuously. That's good.
• 48:48
  Speaker 2: That's that's the essence of a good routing, you know,
• 48:51
  Speaker 2: being able to find those types of things and make
• 48:54
  Speaker 2: them function.
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: That's interesting. You're talking about basically not not going hole
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: by hole and shaping each hole into what you want
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: it to be, but looking at the routing and looking
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: at some of those gathering points or concentrations of activity
• 49:10
  Speaker 1: and shaping that whole thing. You know, moving as you say,
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: a little bit of earth to make all three or
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: four of those holes work in one area.
• 49:20
  Speaker 2: Absolutely absolutely, So that's a that's a concentration or efficiency
• 49:25
  Speaker 2: of sort of efforts, time and money you know, involved
• 49:30
  Speaker 2: in that to make that work.
• 49:32
  Speaker 1: Do you take a different approach to shaping bunkers that
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: a course that intends to be affordable than you would
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: at another course, or or do you not?
• 49:41
  Speaker 2: I don't, we don't shy away from doing anything. If
• 49:44
  Speaker 2: it's appropriate for the golf hole, it makes the golf better.
• 49:48
  Speaker 2: I think that's important. And if that involves a little
• 49:51
  Speaker 2: bit of detail that goes into that we want. We're
• 49:54
  Speaker 2: very conscious of always building something that's it can be
• 49:58
  Speaker 2: done with a larger machine, or how do you how
• 50:01
  Speaker 2: do you get this done or that? And and part
• 50:04
  Speaker 2: of that is having the superintendent or the future superintendent
• 50:08
  Speaker 2: and the growing guy like on site early in the process,
• 50:12
  Speaker 2: because I will ask them questions or they'll come up
• 50:17
  Speaker 2: with stuff and say, hey, I don't know about maintaining that.
• 50:21
  Speaker 2: I'm like, well, what are you using? You know? Oh,
• 50:24
  Speaker 2: well we're going to use a triplex there? Okay? Is
• 50:26
  Speaker 2: it all wheel drivers? It too? Will drive is you know?
• 50:29
  Speaker 2: So we'll work through the process because there are people
• 50:34
  Speaker 2: that will be like, well I can't do that, well
• 50:36
  Speaker 2: why is that? And maybe they haven't ever been exposed
• 50:39
  Speaker 2: to it. There's a lot of extreme things and that
• 50:42
  Speaker 2: that gets in again the experience at Crystal Downs there,
• 50:44
  Speaker 2: you know, I had a direct drive thing and the
• 50:47
  Speaker 2: tenth te falls off and it's it's railroad ties holding
• 50:50
  Speaker 2: it up, Like doesn't seem real safe, right, Okay, So
• 50:57
  Speaker 2: how are you how are you managing that? Or there
• 51:00
  Speaker 2: are ways to manage things, but how you do it
• 51:04
  Speaker 2: or how you approach that makes a big difference. And
• 51:08
  Speaker 2: if you there's guys that you have that that are
• 51:12
  Speaker 2: going to say, yeah, okay, I can do that. I
• 51:14
  Speaker 2: got to figure out a way to do it, or
• 51:18
  Speaker 2: I don't know about that, Okay, what do you think
• 51:20
  Speaker 2: about this? And maybe we alter some stuff. So like
• 51:24
  Speaker 2: when we were building Kingsley, the seventeenth hole was the
• 51:28
  Speaker 2: big drop off after the landing area and if you
• 51:31
  Speaker 2: if you really bomb a drive, you go down the
• 51:33
  Speaker 2: hill and you got to mid iron into the green
• 51:36
  Speaker 2: or something or short iron for some of the guys,
• 51:40
  Speaker 2: but if you're back on the hill, it's a three
• 51:41
  Speaker 2: wood or something to try and get home in two.
• 51:45
  Speaker 2: And So there was this big valley and it was
• 51:48
  Speaker 2: all full forested trees there, and there was a there
• 51:52
  Speaker 2: was a gas line that ran through this, so there
• 51:53
  Speaker 2: was a road. There was this track going through there,
• 51:55
  Speaker 2: and I took Dan there. Dan Lucas who built the
• 51:59
  Speaker 2: golf course and grew in it was the super there
• 52:01
  Speaker 2: for almost twenty five years. I took him there and
• 52:05
  Speaker 2: I said, can you mow this? Meaning this this big
• 52:07
  Speaker 2: hill that we could see kind of under these full
• 52:09
  Speaker 2: grown trees, and he says, you mean his fair way
• 52:13
  Speaker 2: and I said yeah. He goes, yeah, because I got
• 52:16
  Speaker 2: three wheel drive and for all the other crazy stuff
• 52:19
  Speaker 2: you're building, so.
• 52:21
  Speaker 1: This will be no problem might as well, so.
• 52:24
  Speaker 2: You know, hey, but Dan had that sort of thing
• 52:27
  Speaker 2: of like, okay, he was always trying to, you know,
• 52:30
  Speaker 2: problem solve, how do we do this or that? And
• 52:32
  Speaker 2: there were things that he would say, hey, like that's
• 52:36
  Speaker 2: really hard for me to do, and I say, well,
• 52:38
  Speaker 2: how hard, you know. And there were things that you
• 52:41
  Speaker 2: know that we maybe tussled over here or there, but
• 52:44
  Speaker 2: for the most part, you know, we're trying to we're
• 52:47
  Speaker 2: trying to solve that and make that and it's a
• 52:49
  Speaker 2: very efficient golf course to maintain actually, even though it's
• 52:52
  Speaker 2: a big area, you know, with the fescio grass and
• 52:56
  Speaker 2: all that, and so you know, there's some compromise is
• 53:00
  Speaker 2: that you have to have there, like the second green,
• 53:02
  Speaker 2: there's very small margins for getting the triplex around there
• 53:05
  Speaker 2: and trying to cut stuff. But I was like that
• 53:09
  Speaker 2: was really important and we needed that space for play
• 53:12
  Speaker 2: space and stuff too, and those margins of error it's
• 53:15
  Speaker 2: a short part three, but we wanted it to be
• 53:18
  Speaker 2: this demanding shot and people make decisions. You know, if
• 53:21
  Speaker 2: you go to the back of the green, it's fat.
• 53:22
  Speaker 2: If you go to the front of the green, it's
• 53:24
  Speaker 2: really narrow, and you know, there's sharp drop offs to
• 53:28
  Speaker 2: bunkers or rough and Dan's like, yeah, that's a real
• 53:32
  Speaker 2: paint in the butt to maintain, and I'm like, yep,
• 53:37
  Speaker 2: but that detail really makes a difference in that case.
• 53:42
  Speaker 2: So that labor that that's extra labor there to do that.
• 53:47
  Speaker 2: You know, we could have made it blander and easier
• 53:49
  Speaker 2: and stuff like that. It still would have been a
• 53:53
  Speaker 2: really good hole, but it wouldn't have had that little
• 53:56
  Speaker 2: extra you know. That's that next that's that extra five
• 53:59
  Speaker 2: per set, you know, those those little detailed things that
• 54:02
  Speaker 2: you have to put into it. And then just recognizing that, hey,
• 54:04
  Speaker 2: we've got to do a little bit more on that
• 54:08
  Speaker 2: with the guys, and they have to understand that that
• 54:10
  Speaker 2: we've hey we've got to do that here, but over
• 54:13
  Speaker 2: here that's fine. We've got room all around it. Like
• 54:16
  Speaker 2: you think about the third green, you know, it's you
• 54:19
  Speaker 2: can you can you could land a plane on that
• 54:23
  Speaker 2: green because there's all this room around it, so it's
• 54:25
  Speaker 2: not you know, that's a that's a different source of thing.
• 54:29
  Speaker 2: So there's a balance there. But at the very front
• 54:31
  Speaker 2: of that there's two there's two small bunkers, one really
• 54:34
  Speaker 2: one in the corner, and that's pretty tight, but there's
• 54:37
  Speaker 2: room around it to do stuff. So I think that's
• 54:41
  Speaker 2: important to work with those guys and to get their
• 54:44
  Speaker 2: input and there. And sometimes those guys are like, well,
• 54:48
  Speaker 2: I'm I'm not a designer to only ask me. I'm like, no,
• 54:51
  Speaker 2: that's not the point. The point is is how are
• 54:53
  Speaker 2: you going to do this? And will you embrace what
• 54:58
  Speaker 2: we're trying to do and understand what we're trying to
• 55:00
  Speaker 2: do so that you can maintain that long term. You know,
• 55:04
  Speaker 2: I don't want it to be like I leave and
• 55:06
  Speaker 2: they just do whatever they want to do, and right,
• 55:09
  Speaker 2: it happens so much.
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: Right if you if you don't make that connection with
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: that superintendent.
• 55:15
  Speaker 2: It's a it's a it's a real team effort. And
• 55:19
  Speaker 2: that's funny because at seven Mile Beach, the superintendent there
• 55:24
  Speaker 2: Anthony too Good two Wee is his nickname. He's he's
• 55:29
  Speaker 2: a really good golfer and his family lineage are great golfers.
• 55:34
  Speaker 2: His dad was one of the best Australian amateurs of
• 55:38
  Speaker 2: all time, and his his great grandfather and great uncle
• 55:42
  Speaker 2: played in the British Open, you know in the eighteen
• 55:45
  Speaker 2: nineties and the nineteen hundreds, I mean finished like fifth
• 55:48
  Speaker 2: and they were like, so, yes, some real great lineage.
• 55:51
  Speaker 2: And he's and you know, I asked him a question
• 55:53
  Speaker 2: there early in the project. He's like, I'm not an architect,
• 55:56
  Speaker 2: you know, don't And I'm like, and he's a really
• 56:00
  Speaker 2: good player, so you know, he understands golf, but he
• 56:03
  Speaker 2: was just sort of focusing on other stuff and I
• 56:05
  Speaker 2: was like, no, I need to know kind of how
• 56:06
  Speaker 2: you want to do this or you know, so we
• 56:08
  Speaker 2: can you know, so we can find a way to
• 56:11
  Speaker 2: do that. And you know, that's it's a team effort.
• 56:16
  Speaker 2: We all got to work together.
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: Yeah. So I guess the key is there, the communication
• 56:22
  Speaker 1: between the architect and the person who's going to maintain
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: the architecture is where the efficiency comes from. And it's
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: where the good architecture comes from ultimately, because otherwise it's
• 56:34
  Speaker 1: not going to get preserved. And we see that at
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: a lot of courses.
• 56:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and you can, you know, Grasslandes evolve and they move,
• 56:43
  Speaker 2: and and that happens anywhere. It happens at the highest
• 56:48
  Speaker 2: levels of clubs. Because you've got a different guy mowing greens,
• 56:52
  Speaker 2: you know, on different days, and they mowing a little
• 56:56
  Speaker 2: bit different pattern and they just trying not to scalp
• 57:00
  Speaker 2: the just it's waffer thin, but they're just they're just
• 57:03
  Speaker 2: trying not to scalp. And all of a sudden, you know,
• 57:05
  Speaker 2: if it's a sixteenth of an inch, in two weeks,
• 57:07
  Speaker 2: you've almost moved an inch. And you don't really perceive that,
• 57:11
  Speaker 2: you don't see that. But you know, over time that
• 57:16
  Speaker 2: green margin can move one two three feet. You know,
• 57:21
  Speaker 2: in over a decade it can move five ten feet.
• 57:26
  Speaker 2: I mean, just because if someone's not paying attention to it.
• 57:30
  Speaker 2: So I think, you know, great golf doesn't have to
• 57:36
  Speaker 2: be expensive golf. And so thinking about the bunkers, and
• 57:43
  Speaker 2: you know, how do we build bunkers, you know, back
• 57:45
  Speaker 2: to your initial question, how do we build bunkers? Do
• 57:48
  Speaker 2: we do that differently or whatever? Well, the bunker is
• 57:51
  Speaker 2: a hazard, and so that bunker needs to do its job.
• 57:55
  Speaker 2: In my opinion, it has to. It has to make
• 57:58
  Speaker 2: you think and penalize you for your error, and that's
• 58:04
  Speaker 2: usually an error in judgment, not necessarily an error in
• 58:08
  Speaker 2: the swing. If you don't commit to something and say, hey,
• 58:11
  Speaker 2: that's that I can't hit out of that bunker or
• 58:14
  Speaker 2: I have to hit a wedge or something, and you know,
• 58:17
  Speaker 2: then you shouldn't be playing that close to it unless
• 58:19
  Speaker 2: you're really good and you know that you can take
• 58:21
  Speaker 2: advantage or something by doing that attacking that. So then
• 58:25
  Speaker 2: you play over here, and well, that doesn't leave me
• 58:28
  Speaker 2: the best next shot, you know, so then you that
• 58:31
  Speaker 2: you're trying to find the compromise the next time, and
• 58:33
  Speaker 2: that's what's really engaging the golfer and making them think
• 58:37
  Speaker 2: about it. And to me, that one really good hazard
• 58:41
  Speaker 2: that maybe requires a certain amount of detail or is
• 58:45
  Speaker 2: is something you have to maintain around like by hand
• 58:48
  Speaker 2: that oh, we can't just run a sidewinder around that
• 58:53
  Speaker 2: because it's too severe or too extreme, like that's okay.
• 58:58
  Speaker 2: I think that's where we want to compromise and say, hey,
• 59:01
  Speaker 2: we needed to put a little bit more into that
• 59:03
  Speaker 2: because that element is really critical to the feel of
• 59:06
  Speaker 2: the golf course or the strategy, but it doesn't really
• 59:09
  Speaker 2: take that much time, and that that's sort of worth it.
• 59:15
  Speaker 2: To me, that's more that's more worthwhile than walk mowing
• 59:20
  Speaker 2: teas because it has a nice, you know, small narrow
• 59:24
  Speaker 2: stripe and like, I don't really care about that, you
• 59:27
  Speaker 2: know that that okay, we're putting it. We're putting a
• 59:30
  Speaker 2: peg in the ground anyway, most of us are. So
• 59:33
  Speaker 2: I'm not trying to I'm not trying to like be
• 59:37
  Speaker 2: little teased that they're they're very important.
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you don't need them to be pristine, perfect.
• 59:43
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but the tea's are the first thing that a
• 59:45
  Speaker 2: golfer sees, and that's their first impression of the golf
• 59:49
  Speaker 2: course when they step on the first tee usually, and
• 59:52
  Speaker 2: if it's a really bad tea, or it's not tied
• 59:54
  Speaker 2: in well, or it's beat up because it's too small,
• 59:59
  Speaker 2: there's a negative connotation to that.
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 2: And that's interesting because my dad he picked up golf
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 2: later in life. He was a tennis player and he
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 2: and he ended up you know, loving golf, but he
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 2: really struggled with it because he started when he was
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 2: like fifty and and we we were we went out
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 2: to play some you know, just like okay, but just
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 2: sort of average you know, public golf course and stuff,
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 2: and and he was like, oh, the teaser just terrible. Here.
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 2: I'm like, you're putting a peg in the ground, Dad,
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 2: what differences to make? I was sort of like, I
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 2: was just like, don't worry about it. You know, you're
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 2: not hitting the grass and this level enough. And he's like, well,
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 2: it's kind of like it just doesn't look it doesn't
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 2: look clean. That's kind of his thing, you know. And yeah,
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 2: and so that, you know, that was the way that
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 2: I didn't really think about it, and he was, you know,
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 2: he was obviously going to be real straight with me.
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 2: He wasn't gonna beat around the bush. Hey, what do
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 2: you think about this? And blah blah blahlah. He was like,
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 2: this is awful, but fix this. What's not my job here?
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah, So, well, look at that little piece of the
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 1: bunker we preserve.
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 2: Be happy with that, exactly, exactly.
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 1: Yeah, choose your battles. All right, Well, Mike, I think
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: that's a good place to wrap up. Good luck with
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 1: the proving ground project, potentially another great course in Michigan,
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: So looking forward to seeing how that turns out. And
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 1: thanks so much for coming on the podcast. Pleasure to
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 1: talk to you. This episode of Designing Golf was produced
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 1: by Will Balsam. If you'd like to support Designing Golf
• 1:01:42
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• 1:01:45
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• 1:01:48
  Speaker 1: dot com slash membership to see what it's all about.
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 1: We're building a great community of avid golfers in there,
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 1: and we'd really like you to join it. Thank you
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 1: for listening, and we'll be back again soon with another episode.