More Cape Region league winners and a new book on golf architecture
October 8, 2004
Mike Connor, assistant pro at The Rookery Golf Course in Milton, enjoys sharing good news–and at The Cape Gazette, we aim to please.
Connor sent me a note about The Rookery’s successful conclusion to the third straight season for its Tuesday Night League.
The League begins play in May and usually runs through late August. With weather replays, the season sometimes stretches into September. Each team has two players and plays nine holes per match.
Two leagues are set up with two divisions of between 6 to 8 teams. This year there were 7 teams per division, for a total of 56 contestants.
Connor described the season series as follows: “The League starts each Tuesday at 5:30 p.m. with a shotgun start. The teams play a head-to-head match against other teams in their league. The format is better ball of the two-man team.”
The “regular season” takes 13 weeks to play, followed by a playoff system that would make the NHL proud.
As Connor wrote, “The 4 division winners receive a bye from the first week. I also took 4 teams from each league (a total of 8 more teams) that are the wildcard teams which play head-to-head in the first week of the playoffs. The winner of the playoffs meets the division winner in the next week. The playoffs continue until the playoff winner in each league meets for the overall winner. The runner-up for each league plays for 3rd & 4th place.”
This year’s winning first place team was David Carey and Scott Foresman. Second place honors went to Bill Horn and Kenny Watts. Chris McGill and Brad Rouse won third place, and Joe Romano and Bob Ruppel earned a fourth place finish.
Congratulations to one and all.
If you would like to see your club’s competition results published in this column, just email the information to the address noted below. We’re happy to share the joy.
The Works of Art
Last year I attended a meeting with Bill Fasy and other officials of Delaware Park, the upstate horse racing/slots center. In addition to the many horse pictures on the walls, several foursome photos from past tournaments showed that golf also holds a special place in Fasy’s heart. A few questions confirmed this impression, and he and I then had a great conversation.
Fasy was excited about their newest project, the White Clay Creek Country Club, which meanders through the Park acreage. He was especially impressed with Arthur Hills, the Ohio golf course architect responsible for the design.
I recalled that conversation when I read The Works of Art: Golf Course Designs by Arthur Hills (Donning Company Publishers).
In this autobiography/portfolio, Hills explains his approach to golf course design and customer relations. The reaction Hills created in Bill Fasy was not unique.
Hills is no prima donna, deigning to grace his clients with his presence. Instead, he gives the impression of being a quietly effective cheerleader for his designs, aimed at providing a challenging yet pleasantly memorable experience for the golfers playing his courses.
Hills gives example after example of how he and his associates met each aspect of their assignments, accompanied by great photographs of the resulting handiwork. This may look like just another coffee table book, but it’s far more than that. For students of either business success or golf course architecture, it offers a real glimpse into the hows and whys of one of the country’s premier practitioners.
The book also includes pithy commentary from Hills about the state of the sport. For example, he’s in favor of limiting the distance that golf balls can go, and not just because those limits could preserve the shot values of some classic courses. As he notes, the extra costs in building larger golf courses translates into higher fees, which reduces the number of golfers inclined to pay for the privilege. That kind of long-term thinking is not always in evidence in the golf industry, or in other business areas for that matter.
The Works of Art is a great gift for fans of golf course architecture.