Christmas Already?!

Of course its not, it was 2 months ago...but around the office you would have thought otherwise. Its been years since a lot of us here in the office have changed golf equipment...the fact is none of us really get to play as much golf as you might think. The old adage, "If you want to play golf, don't get into the golf business.", is true in a lot of respects, but we do get our time to shine out on the links every once in a while. Until now I've been able to use the excuse of, "The only reason I played so badly is the clubs. I mean they were made back in the early 80's", for which we all know is a completely invalid excuse. The fact is its most of the time always going to be the Indian, not the arrow, but in golf, I think having a new arrow every once in a while pays off. It feels as if golf club manufacturers have been secretly conversing with cell phone providers. Let's make the newest greatest thing on the market, and in four months lets replace it with an even better product....and then lets change that products color and call it a "pro series". To keep up with technology is something that not even the Jones' can do, but oh do they keep all of our eyes anxiously awaiting "the next best thing".

So I guess 2009 has officially been our year of change here in the office in regards to golf equipment, our feeble attempt to keep up with the Jones'. I would almost say it has taken a domino effect. One person gets this club, and that causes the other guy to think, "Man I want that!". Then someone else gets a set of this or that, and that sparks an excitement in someone else ...you know the drill. It would be a safe bet to say that this is typical behavior around most offices around the world, especially those in and around the game of golf.

So I know your asking, "What did you all get?". I'll lay it out in the said domino effect that took place! Maybe in the future weeks and months we can all write some reviews on how the new sticks are working out for us.

Matt gets his new Victory Reds!

Steve Mac get his new Tour Preferred Irons!



David then gets his new Callaway X Forged Irons



along with his new FT9 Driver


Steve Mac then decides on the Burner TP's



Nate and myself then catch a little of the "Man I want that!" bug that I discussed earlier. For some its easy to suppress this feeling, but I would venture to say for 99% of all warm blooded males... its a battle that's not worth fighting. Simply put its a case of, "Gimme, Gimme, Gimme".

Nate decides on the Mizuno MP67's


along with the new Titleist 909 D3 driver




And Finally.....

I chose the TaylorMade TP MB Smokes





and the new Cobra S9-1 Pro S







So there's a glimpse into our February X-mas! Needless to say we are all ready for Mr. Spring to finally warm us up so we can confidently stroll out to the course. Now I'm not saying records are going to be set...all I'm saying is there is a group of young Indians, ready to unleash a few new arrows!

Folds of Honor Foundation/ Patriot Golf Day

Last Tuesday the Tennessee PGA and allied associations located at Golf House Tennessee hosted a press conference to promote the Folds of Honor Foundation as well as Patriot Golf Day. PGA Member, Dan Rooney was on hand to explain how his foundation, which helps families of wounded or deceased veterans, was established. He gave a heart-warming story of the night that changed his life forever, and that sparked him to create Patriot Golf Day. Mr. Rooney served several tours oversees where he was an F-16 pilot.

(Above - SSG Ken Weichert, Dan Rooney PGA, Lt. Col. Thomas Kunk)

Mr. Ed Pulido, a soldier wounded while touring oversees, then presented a short presentation to everyone about the Folds of Honor Foundation. He gave us his very emotional story about his tour of duty, his injury, his path to recovery, and more importantly of his determination to succeed. After hearing his story it became very apparent of what each and every soldier is sacraficing to continue to keep our freedom, and how much they need our support not just for their time in the war but when they return home as well.

Mr. Ed Pulido

In concert with Mr. Rooney and Mr. Pulido, Executive Director of the Tennessee Section PGA, Jeff Abbot spoke on how the Tennessee Golf Foundation is assisting families of our military through the Screaming Eagle Pro-Am and other activities. Abbot was presented with a flag flown in Rooney’s F-16 cockpit over Iraq during his missions.

Ed Pulido, Dan Rooney, Jeff Abbot, Matt Vanderpool, Dick Horton

Week of 2/9 - 2/13

Last week found Nate, Ryan, and myself traveling East to Knoxville. Tuesday morning was started with a site visit at Toqua Golf Course, host site of the 2009 TGA Four Ball/Senior Four Ball. During the site visit we met with the club owner, club pro, head superintendent, and GM of Food& Beverage. We discussed details such as practice round and tournament days, tournament registration, course set-up and marking, cart availability, player lunch, etc. Typically our site visits run 30 minutes to an hour, and allow us to go over the basic details of the tournament before registration begins for the players.

Tuesday afternoon found us at yet another site visit with TN National Golf Club, host of the 2009 Senior Amateur. After our meeting we were kindly invited to hit links for what would be our first round of the year. YIKES! The weather was great, except for the high gusts of wind, but we had a great time and all in all were all pleasantly surprised at how well we played seeing as how none of us had swung a club in several months.

Wednesday started off with another site visit, this time at Holston Hills CC, site of the 2009 Mid Amateur. Jay Garrison, our Tournament Chairmen, accompanied us to this site visit where we again discussed details of this years event. After our meeting we headed to Beaver Brook CC to do a course rating. Luckily, the weather was some-what warm, a drastic difference from the weather we have encountered thus far on this years course rating trips.

Some quick info for those of you who don't know what exactly goes on during a course rating:

USGA Course Rating - USGA Course Rating is defined as the evaluation of the playing difficulty of a course for scratch golfers under normal course and weather conditions. It is expressed as strokes taken to one decimal place, and is based on yardage and other obstacles to the extent that they affect the scoring difficulty of the scratch golfer.

Bogey Rating - USGA Bogey Rating is the average of the better half of a bogey golfer's scores under normal course and weather conditions. It is expressed as strokes taken to one decimal place, and is baed on yardage and other obstacles to the extent that they affect the scoring difficulty of the scratch golfer.

USGA Slope Rating - Slope Rating is the USGA's mark that indicates the measurement of the relative playing difficulty of a course for players who are not scratch golfer, compared to the USGA Course Rating. It is computed from the difference between the Bogey Rating and the USGA Course Rating. Slope Rating is expressed as a whole number from 55 to 155.

The Rating Process

When rating a golf course, the rating ream (usually consisting of three to five team members) evaluates the difficulty of a golf course under normal playing conditions. The golf course is evaluated for a scratch golfer and a bogey golfer. The rating process requires a study of each hole, including detailed data obtained at all landing areas for both of the golfers. The shot lengths are used by the rating team to determine where the landing areas are for each player. When rating, the team considers ten obstacles, along with the effective playing length of the course. Both length corrections and obstacle values are considered at each hole. Following this evaluation, the values given to the obstacles are plugged into an equation, which formulates the USGA Course Rating and Slope Rating for each set of tees.

The 10 Obstacles that we evaluate are: Topography, Fairway, Green Target, Rough & Recoverability, Bunkers, Out of Bounds/Extreme Rough, Water Hazards, Trees, Green Surface, and Psychological.
Effective Playing Length Corrections are determined by the following: Roll, Elevation, & Dogleg/Forced Lay-Up

A typical course rating will take between 3-5 hours depending on the amount of tees and obstacle values that have to be rated.

The USGA recommends that a golf course be re-rated every 7-10 years.

We finished rating Beaver Brook just as the storms were rolling in. (The wind had been so brutal that several trees had fallen on the course during our rating.) The storms passed that night and Thursday morning we ventured down to rate Green Meadow Country Club. The weather was great, just a little chilly, and the course rating went extremely well. After some quick lunch we headed back to Franklin. Friday morning the three of us headed south to Columbia, TN. There we visited Stoneybrook GC, which had just recently gone through some major course renovations, and needed to be re-rated.

The week was very productive and it only confirms that the golf season is quickly approaching. While it takes a few weeks to get back in the swing of things after winter break we are finding ourselves diving in head first now!

2009 Tournament Season quickly approaching

It just about time to bust out the clubs, dust off the shoes, and tee it up once again. Spring is just around the corner and for the TGA that means simply, "Tournament Season". We are currently in the process of finalizing all of our tournament dates and sites before registration opens on March 1. I would venture to say we are about 90% complete with the tournament schedule, with just a few last events to nail down. Good things are in the works for this year, and I am excited to see the game of golf grow in Tennessee.

Along with tournament scheduling I have been focusing a great deal of my attention to course ratings. This year it looks like we have approximately 30 courses that will need to be rated and I have already begun my process of getting some of these done before the rush of tournament season begins. It is my goal this year to finally get us ahead of schedule and continue to work on getting us on a 7 yr. re-rate schedule. (USGA recommends a re-rate every 7-10 yrs.)

Next week I will be traveling to Knoxville to conduct several Championship Site Visits. I will be meeting with Toqua Golf Course, TN National, and Holston Hills about several of this year's TGA Championships. While in the Knoxville area we will also be rating Beaver Brook and Green Meadow.

For more information on all of the TGA Championships and Events please go to our website www.golfhousetennessee.com

2009 PGA Merchandise Show

I recently returned from the 2009 PGA Merchandise Show which was again held in Orlando, FL, however that is where the similarities between this year and previous years end. As you can imagine this year's show was much different due to the struggling economy. Most of the larger golf companies were still there and Titliest even returned this year after skipping the last few years. The one noticable change was there were not as many "startup" companies there that were trying to market and sell the next new innovative golf item.

Along with fewer companies came fewer attendees. One local sales representative told me that all of the window shoppers stayed home this year and only the real buyers were at the Show. I was one of the few window shoppers that did go to the Show. I went to try and scout out new and interesting favors for our championships and just to see what all is going on in the golf industry. What new products are coming out and what is the buzz surrounding these new products. One thing I noticed that is likely to change is a longer product life cycle or a reduction in the amount of new products a company unveils in a year. Other than that, it looked like business as usual.

All in all, it was a good trip and very informative. For more information on the 2009 PGA Merchandise Show log onto http://www.pgamerchandiseshow.com/.