Gallery: A Ross to Bear

By Jon Rizzi

Designer of more than 400 courses across 45 states, Donald Ross was American golf ’s first superstar, his name a designer label. “Golf has never failed me,” he famously said, and for more than 90 years, the 18 holes he authored at The Broadmoor have never failed to challenge and delight every level of golfer.

This spring, thanks to almost $2 million in restorations, the West course will reveal even more of Ross’s genius. Like the East, which underwent a similar restoration before hosting the 2008 U.S. Senior Open, the West combines “lower” holes designed by Ross and “upper” holes (across Cheyenne Mountain Boulevard) designed in 1964 by Robert Trent Jones.

In 2008, the success of the East project prompted PGA Director of Golf Russ Miller and Director of Golf Course Maintenance Fred Dickman—both of whom grew up playing Ross courses in, respectively, Asheboro, N.C. and Highland Park, Ill.—to repeat the feat on the West. They enlisted the same architect, Ross apostle Ron Forse, who cut his teeth on the Ross layout at New Jersey’s Mountain Ridge Country Club. Using Ross’s original drawings and aerial shots from the 1930s enabled them to recreate many of the elements that “had been brutally compromised and neutered over the years,” according to Forse.

So he, Miller and Dickman went about deepening and re-sloping the bunkers, rebuilding greens, widening fairways, adding mounding and cross-bunkering (“98 percent of which had been removed”) and giving golfers better sightlines on the undulating terrain of the upper course.

Despite the topographic differences, the lower and upper holes flow seamlessly; on the “Jones” holes, Ross-style bunkers flank Jones-style greens.

Additionally, they rerouted some cart paths to create a more “authentic” feel. “We did this in four phases,” Dickman explains, “starting in October or November and finishing in March every year since ’08.” The course never closed for golf.

Dickman, a scholar of traditional course architecture, couldn’t be more pleased with the result. Forse admires the Broadmoor team’s courage to push for the renovation during a soft economy: “The heritage of the golf course is more important than their own comfort. And the results speak for themselves.” broadmoor.com

Blank’s Checks

On January 9, the PGA TOUR Superstore in Greenwood Village announced $10,000 in grants to chapters of The First Tee in Denver and Green Valley Ranch. The First Tee, which impacts the lives of young people by promoting character development and life-enhancing values through golf, reaches more than 2,500 juniors in Metro Denver alone. The donation came from The Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation, whose eponymous chairman heads up Golf&Tennis Pro Shop, which owns and operates PGA TOUR Superstore. (Blank also co-founded The Home Depot and owns the NFL’s Atlanta Falcons.) thefirstteeofdenver.org; coloradoopen.com.

THEY HAVE THE HONORS

Few golf organizations give back more to the community than the Colorado Section PGA, and at January’s National PGA Awards in Orlando, the Larkspur-based organization received the 2011 National PGA Herb Graffis Award for Extraordinary Contributions in Growth of The Game of Golf.

In just the past four years, the Colorado PGA Foundation has given more than $300,000 in college scholarships, growth-of-the-game grants, and donations to numerous charities.

“What we do is not just about golf,” said Colorado PGA Section Executive Director and PGA Professional Eddie Ainsworth. “It is about making a positive impact in the lives of others through golf.” The most salient example of this is the Colorado Section PGA Golf in Schools Program, run in concert with the Allied Golf Associations of Colorado under the banner of the Colorado Open Golf Foundation.

In just its first year of existence, the program, which brings the game to local schools at absolutely no cost to the schools or students, has reached 8,187 children through 42 different schools, 34 different PGA professionals and 22 different golf facilities.

“We like to think that there is no longer a box to think outside of anymore,” Colorado PGA Section President Tim Lollar told the audience upon accepting the award. “We try to use all of the facilities in our Section to brainstorm new ideas. If one program doesn’t work, we try something else. And even if something works, we try to come up with something even better for the next time around.” coloradopga.com/playgolfcolorado; 303-996-1590.

 

Caddie Corner

In a business where carts and GPS systems provide reliable and accepted methods of generating revenue, instituting a caddie academy seems, well, nobly anachronistic. Not so, says the Colorado Golf Association, which this February announced the creation of the Eisenhower Caddie Academy at CommonGround Golf
Course in Aurora.

Once the primary mechanism used to familiarize children with the game, caddying also introduced kids to the values of hard work, social skills, perseverance and much more. The CGA’s 2012 goal is to attract 30 caddies (ages 14-18) for the Academy. These Level 1 caddies will work exclusively at CommonGround during a two-year training/probationary period, ultimately leading to the Level 2 who will be made available as independent contractors to surrounding country clubs to supplement their caddie programs.

The Eisenhower Academy Fund will pay the base caddie fee for Level 1 caddies ($25) as a way to thank the golfers for their help in training and to give the kids the work they need to learn the art of caddying. Participating golfers must complete a caddie evaluation
form and may provide an optional tip.

The academy begins selecting caddies in March. The 10-week program commences after Memorial Day and brooks no deviations (no big family vacations until August). It insists on an absolute minimum of three rounds per week (30 for the summer). Mainly targeting candidates entering their freshman year of high school, the academy will require applicants to complete an application and demonstrate a willingness to do hard work.  Caddies will report to a caddie master.

The impetus for the academy stems from CommonGround’s mission to serve as a community asset and to improve lives through golf. As its tagline articulates, it’s “a place for all and all the game teaches.”

By funding the academy without any additional cost to the golfer, the Eisenhower Caddie Academy distinguishes itself from all other caddie programs. “Cost has been the fundamental barrier preventing caddie programs from existing at affordable public golf courses,” says CGA Executive Director Ed Mate. “We have eliminated that barrier. To our knowledge, there is no other caddie program funded in this manner, and this is why we believe it will be successful.” cogolf.org; 303-974-2109