MD/DC/VA Golfers - Twelve Monkeys Mental Divergence

[dcmidnight]

> @TheCityGame said:

> When I graduated high school, I think 55% of my graduating class went to college.

 

Our class was right around 60% - and I went to a very good public high school in a small town. Same no stoplight/no fast food town my parents still live in. Once every few months I will lurk in a FB group with some of our high school alumni in it. The other day a guy I graduated with was debating two job offers from big box stores to be either a checker or work in the stock room. As a kid, he never wanted to leave town and never wanted to go to college. So now he's in his mid 40s, completely miserable and debating between two $15/hr jobs.

 

So - kids make their own way if they want to. IMO raising your kid right and to generally be a good person / positive contributor to society is way more important - clearly Sullys kid has no shot.

 

 

 

[TheCityGame]

ANYWAY -- enough tacos and wealth disparity for me.

 

Next year, one of our courses is getting shut down between August (2020) and the following June 1st (2021). After that, the other course will be shut down from August (2021) to June 1st (2022).

 

I learned yesterday that McDonald golf is doing the work.

 

https://www.mcdonaldgolfinc.com/

 

They've done work on tons of stuff around here. . .all the biggies. . .including Congressional. Renovation, design, drainage. I don't know what the master plan is for us, but according to the guy I talked to yesterday, these guys are good.

 

 

[SullGolf]

City, what if they improve the drainage but the course isn't as green and sopping wet? Have you considered what effect that will have on your membership? Sounds risky.

[gregh729]

Stay away from the McRibs. They are nasty

[dcmidnight]

City are they doing reconfiguring, changing fairway grasses, anything like that?

 

A full year is agressive, I imagine they could almost completely rebuild the course in that time.

[FAbb]

This was the rumor I heard from 2MT.

 

"Significant irrigation adds around the greens, all tee boxes redone, new cart paths"

 

Um, wut?

 

This does seem like the kind of guy that would sell you on a cart path and tee box reno...

 


 

[TheCityGame]

I have not seen a master plan.

 

For all I know, they could be moving bunkers, moving greens. 2More did say what Fabb said, but I don't know how much of that is what is being passed around the grapevine at the club, or if 2More has knowledge I don't. I think he talked to the greens committee guys, but until I see a master plan, I consider it all mainly rumors. Or if not rumors, it's information that has been filtered through a couple of people with their interpretations of what was said.

 

The guy I talked to yesterday sells big machinery and knows people at the redesign company personally, and he didn't really know what was going on. He thought everything was on the table.

 

 

[Gmen1204]

 

[Kent01putt]

McDonald is the same company doing SPCC. They are very good and most likely you are working with Joel for the redesign. They sub out the irrigation system but do all the re-grassing etc... Probably using Latitude 36 grass which is becoming more popular in this region.

[baddomes]

 

 

"What you really need is a full fleet of carts with bluetooth speakers, and better looking cart girls"

 

[misplacedtexan83]

> @Kent01putt said:

> McDonald is the same company doing SPCC. They are very good and most likely you are working with Joel for the redesign. They sub out the irrigation system but do all the re-grassing etc... Probably using Latitude 36 grass which is becoming more popular in this region.

 

I miss you...dad

 

You playing in the 7s

[FAbb]


 

[2moreTerps]

my information came straight from the head pro. and he said it was 100% confirmed. if the scope is different it would only be larger than what i presented.

 

Fabb laughs but our tee boxes are awful and a lot of people care about that. It really is something that makes turf valley seem lower quality than most other private clubs. If they're investing in the club and trying to appeal to private course clientele the tee boxes need to be improved. One of my buddies (same first name as hoop) who I'd put in the "very reasonable" cares about tee boxes. Buying new siding for a house isn't exciting but sometimes it needs to be done.

[baddomes]

Why are the tee boxes currently awful?

 

Man I would have a really hard time having a course closed for an entire year just so they can add sprinklers around the greens, repave cart paths, and put sod down on tee boxes that don't currently grow grass.

 

But if that's the scope of work, the McDonald sons look like they would be the experts in the area. Can't have your cart paths too bumpy. Don't want to spill your 54oz sweet tea.

 

 

[TheCityGame]

2More is right about tee boxes. More on that later.

 

My #1 priority. . .when it comes to playability. . .our surrounds are horrible. Aprons, rough around the greens, etc etc. I mean patches of bare dirt with little nests of grass around them. All over both courses. I don't know if it's disease, irrigation, bad mower practices, bad player behavior. I don't know. But they're horrible, like sometimes definitely costs you a stroke horrible.

 

This is a stock internet picture, but this is the idea. . .

 


 

Tee boxes. . .You know how the 17th tee box at Worthington is always kind of dead, the sod feels "loose" and overly sandy and divots never grow back. A TON of our tee boxes are like that, even the ones they've recently redone (on the cheap, without shutting the course down). It's not the kind of thing I care about, personally, but 2More is right about the how unappealing it is.

 

Also, we have tons of outings and the general opinion is that we're concerned about the outings business if we look trashy on the tee boxes.

 

 

 

[baddomes]

For tee boxes like 17 at Worthington, and #4 at Norbeck, they're just too surrounded by trees for anything to grow. Are they planning on ripping out a bunch of trees as well?

[TheCityGame]

> @baddomes said:

> For tee boxes like 17 at Worthington, and #4 at Norbeck, they're just too surrounded by trees for anything to grow. Are they planning on ripping out a bunch of trees as well?

 

It seems to happen on our course on tee boxes that aren't surrounded by trees. Like they were poorly built, or don't drain well, or whatever. Some of them just feel like trying to grow grass in sand. Not sandy soil. Sand. And, crab grass seems to take them over for whatever reason.

 

 

 

 

[Kent01putt]

Tex I am playing the 7's

[TheCityGame]

> @Kent01putt said:

> Tex I am playing the 7's

 

That's great news.

 

I don't have your sign up yet. If you tried and it didn't go through, let me know.

 

 

[TheCityGame]

I have Kent as paid, but not signed up.

 

I have a few other people paid but not signed up.

 

I have a few people signed up but not paid. I'll send emails out today.

[FAbb]

I sure hope the scope is larger.

 

Improved irrigation around the greens - great! That's something that can really separate courses, during years like this. Nobody loves playing when the green surrounds are burnt out and patchy AF.

 

All tee boxes redone - bleh. Are they as good as pricier clubs - probably not. Are they on par with clubs in the same part of the spectrum - I'd say yes. Basically, they're fine. This is total window dressing.

 

New cart paths - BARF. I've taken a cart at Turf once or twice, ever. I can't say I recall any traumatic experiences from the cart paths. Unless "new cart paths" means ripping out all the paths between the tee boxes and greens and grassing them, this sounds like an AWFUL place to allocate funds.

 

If they've actually done a master plan, and THAT ^^^ is the work that got prioritized, I'd be raising a real stink.

 

Here are some things I could get behind.

 

- Remove trees in strategic places, and thin out groves of tress, to improve airflow and sunlight. This improves the turf conditions in areas that are getting choked out. PLAYABILITY of the course improves. Bonus, it can also be a nice visual effect, for the window dressing loving crowd.

- Demolish, and rebuild the 17th green. That green is AWFUL. It's flat, boring, and unlike anything else on the golf course. There's an overly large "fairway" in front of the green. There's a bunker short-right that I've never seen anybody hit a ball into. The front-left bunker is also poorly placed, IMO. That hole just sticks out like a sore thumb.

- Address the bunkers. Fix bunkers that have drainage issues, if any exist. Excavate and bring in new sand as needed to try and ensure consistent playing conditions. Address any bunkers that are poorly placed, and potentially add bunkers in places where it'll add interest to the hole.

- If you have tee boxes that sunlight and airflow won't help, consider rebuilding them to drain better. DON'T just rebuild them all so you can have flat, pretty rectangles everywhere.

[TheCityGame]

Our bunkers are well built. We have some oddly placed ones.

 

They're not consistent, which is weird, but I actually kind of like it. You need to evaluate with your feet and eyes the way each bunker is playing.

 

The bunkers on 17 are fine. So is the tree. The green is dumpy, but that hole gets too much hate. It's a difficult shot for late in the round.

[HighBoomingDraws]

Fabb are you a TV member? I feel like you play there often enough where you gotta be breaking guest policy rules if you aren’t! Lol

[siegel159]

Just signed up and paid for the 7's. Did an initial sign up email ever go out?

 

Based off of these reviews, looks like I might not join Turf. I'll stick with EPP for now I guess

[TheCityGame]

> @HighBoomingDraws said:

> Fabb are you a TV member? I feel like you play there often enough where you gotta be breaking guest policy rules if you aren’t! Lol

 


 

[dcmidnight]

> @FAbb said:

> If you have tee boxes that sunlight and airflow won't help, consider rebuilding them to drain better. DON'T just rebuild them all so you can have flat, pretty rectangles everywhere.

 

I agree with everything Fabb wrote.

 

(please note this as well)

 

Not to beat up on bad tee boxes but MV has had them go bad for a number of reasons. On a couple holes, they were just too small when the course was built 50 years ago. The biggest issue with tee boxes that are on the smaller side is that it means the groundscrew cant spread out the markers from day to day as much as they want to let the grass regrow. So its super easy to start getting beat up/burned out sides of tee boxes. So when we rebuilt a bunch of the teeboxes to be bigger - it wasnt so much to have pretty rectangles. It was more to increase the amount of area they have to work with on a day to day basis.

 

Too many trees doesnt just mean the sun cant get in there but also the wind cant get in there to help dry things out. Huge problem and based on county regulations - unfortunately its not always an easy problem to fix.

 

A lot of our fund last year went to fixing half the bunkers. Unfortunately we only did have last offseason, half this offseason. But - apparently, and this sounds ludicrous - but there are a limited number of companies that can build the billy bunkers in the way they wanted and they werent available.

 

I start getting infuriated when they talk about spending money on expanding the clubhouse. Its just not something I give two rips about. Have a decent bar and a good menu - I dont care about having a second floor lounge. But - I get it.

 

[SullGolf]

As one of the rare people who has both signed up and paid for the 7s, do I win some sort of prize? Maybe a 30 minute advance warning on the twist?

[gsrjc]

> @TheCityGame said:

> I have Kent as paid, but not signed up.

>

> I have a few other people paid but not signed up.

>

> I have a few people signed up but not paid. I'll send emails out today.

 

I won’t be able to make it.

[davechen]

Junior and I are in. Didn't we just used to pay at the door?

 

#TeamShorts

#ShortsStrong

 

#HashtagsRBroken

[dcmidnight]

> @SullGolf said:

> As one of the rare people who has both signed up and paid for the 7s, do I win some sort of prize? Maybe a 30 minute advance warning on the twist?

 

Just how Sully wants to raise his kid. To be soft and need advanced notice of any random twist in your life.

 

Typical...

 

(I think its worth pointing out that if Sully and I played straight up right now he would ~~probably~~ beat me.)