A time for reflection, reimagining
+ Championship season hits high gear with Opens, NCAAs; long reads to settle in with; Coore & Crenshaw are at it again.
THE STARTER
🏌️ Grayson Murray’s suicide has left the golf world stricken with incredible sadness. Could you please check on someone you haven’t seen in a while or someone who is having a difficult time?
🏌️ Akshay Bhatia wrote “G$” on his left wrist, which stands for “G-Money,” his nickname for Murray, prior to the RBC Canadian Open. “Oh, God, I didn’t think it would be this hard,” Bhatia wrote on Instagram. He’s not alone, is he?
🏌️ The charges filed against Scottie Scheffler by Louisville police at the PGA Championship were dropped by the county attorney. Did this matter need to reach that point?
🏌️ Lexi Thompson announced that this will be the final year she plays a full schedule on the LPGA Tour. Is there a better ambassador for women’s golf than Thompson?
🏌️ Nelly Korda torpedoed her U.S. Women’s Open title chances with a 10 on the par-3 12th hole in the first round. Do you realize how difficult it is to make 10 on a par-3?
🏌️ PGA Tour player Michael Kim said on X that he thinks Korda should get a sponsor’s exemption to a Tour event. Well, as long as she doesn’t take Kim’s spot, right?
🏌️ Adam Scott will need to get through final qualifying for the U.S. Open on Monday to get into his 92nd consecutive major championship. Does he deserve a special exemption from the USGA?
🏌️ Virginia sophomore Ben James was hit with a one-stroke penalty for slow play at the NCAA Championships. “We weren’t trying to slow up play,” he said. “We were just trying to play our best golf.” What does one have to do with the other? Can’t you play your best golf without being slow?
🏌️ The security worker who tackled Adam Hadwin — who was celebrating Nick Taylor’s historic win last year at the RBC Canadian Open — broke his silence. He was interviewed by Canada’s TSN, only identified as “Mr. X.” “It was a soft takedown,” Mr. X said with a laugh. “His feet never left the ground." Did Hadwin think it was soft?
:: Mike Purkey
FEATURES
BOOKMARKED
Good reads that are mainly about golf, but not always.
📖 The precarious future of Big Sur’s Highway 1
How climate change is threatening one of the country’s most famous roadways.
:: Emily Witt | The New Yorker | 05.17.2024
📖 Bill Walton was my rival, my brother, and my close friend
He had wanted to be more like me on the court and I wanted to be more like him off the court.
:: Kareem Abdul-Jabbar | 05.31.2024
They are their own greatest influence, making music of their own creation: fast and slow, driving and serene, loud and soft.
:: Michael Lydon | Rolling Stone | 08.23.1969
An unthinkable tragedy makes suicide prevention an essential focus — even in golf.
:: Sam Weinman | Golf Digest | 05.29.2024
SUBSTACKED
📖 A little region with big, huge wines
Priorat is the perfect red wine for summer.
:: Jose Andres | Longer tables with Jose Andres | 05.27.2024
TFC PODCAST NETWORK
🎙️ Learn by doing ... and just keep moving forward
Five Iron Golf co-founder and CEO Jared Solomon joins host Colin Weston to discuss how the company emerged from the back room of a clothing store.
:: The ModGolf Podcast
BUSINESS
WEEK IN REVIEW
1️⃣8️⃣ The industry’s names, news and notables that are making the headlines. | Read
ICYMI
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SURVEY
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LIFESTYLE
19TH HOLE
Each episode of the “Course of Life” podcast closes with the guest sharing a favorite 19th hole experience.
Keith Stewart, PGA Professional and founder of ReadTheLine.com: “I like to judge a good cheeseburger and fries at the course, and a DCL to drink. That's code for delicious Coors Light!"
:: Alex Lauzon | Co-host of “Course of Life” podcast
HOME FRONT
Treesdale Golf and Country Club | Gibsonia, Pennsylvania
Stats: 4.47-acre lot | 7 beds | 7.5 baths.
Price: $2,750,000.
About: An elegant estate with a sophisticated interior, resting on nearly 5 secluded acres backing to North Park. Highlights include an ornate staircase, custom millwork, Ludowici tile roof, and a resort-like black bottom pool. The freshly painted interior boasts marble and hardwood floors, four fireplaces, an elegant formal dining, office and living room. The lower level offers a stone fireplace, heated floors, custom pub, built-in booths, a bedroom, full bath with a steam shower, and fitness room. The Cuvee-designed kitchen features a center island, quartz counters, a Wolf gas range,steam oven, wood-burning pizza oven, Subzero fridge and ice maker. The hearth room opens to a sunroom with heated terra cotta floors and walls of windows. The upper level offers primary suite with a fireplace, dual walk-in closets, bath with heated marble floors, soaking tub and walk-in shower, five additional bedrooms, and a nanny/in-law suite.
For more listings, go to GolfLifeNavigators.com.
ARCHITECTURE
DESIGN NOTES
Coore & Crenshaw reimagines The International’s Pines
Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw are approaching the finish line of the firm’s makeover of The International’s Pines course in Bolton, Massachusetts.
Located 40 miles west of Boston, The International’s reimagined Pines will be the first new 18-hole course to open in Massachusetts in more than a decade.
Over the past two years, Coore & Crenshaw have created a new course that takes greater advantage of the land’s varied topography, unique landforms and mature vegetation. Not a single hole corridor or green site remains from the prior version of the Pines, which was best known for decades as America’s longest golf course. This emphasis on length has been replaced by Coore & Crenshaw’s signature preference for golf courses that look natural, are strategic and can be enjoyed by all levels of play.
“Bill, Ben, shapers Ryan Farrow and Zach Varty, and the rest of the Coore & Crenshaw team have worked their magic, taking an exceptional site and crafting what we strongly believe will be considered one of the country’s best new golf courses,” said Paul Celano, director of golf at The International. “Their deep admiration for courses built during the early 20th century, the so-called ‘Golden Age of Architecture,’ is an ideal match for our vision of a golf-first experience at The International that preserves and honors the club’s 120-year history.”
The Pines is only the second course Coore & Crenshaw have designed and built in New England. The first is the consensus Top 100 Old Sandwich Golf Club in Plymouth, Massachusetts, which opened in 2005.
Further evidencing the club’s appreciation for golf’s golden era, the Pines will be one of the region’s few courses to feature fescue grass on tees, fairways and in the rough. Fescue grass courses are typically found in Scotland and Ireland, places where the game was first played. These turf conditions, when combined with Coore & Crenshaw’s elevated course architecture, will allow for greater shot diversity and foster an ever-evolving, engaging golf experience on holes framed by sandy waste areas, wispy fescue and stately pitch pines.
Sodding and grow-in of the fescue playing surfaces will continue in the coming months. Other final project tasks include installing new bunker sand, edging perimeters of bunkers, trimming and clearing trees, establishing fairway/rough lines, seeding the practice putting green, and initial mowing of tees, fairways and bentgrass greens.
Built originally in 1899 as Runaway Brook, a nine-hole public course, that layout was abandoned in 1955, when Geoffrey Cornish fashioned an entirely new track, with the help of top New England players Francis Ouimet and Paul Harney. The new spread instantly became the longest course in the U.S. — 8,040 yards — and featured steeply pitched greens and deep bunkers. International Telephone and Telegraph purchased the property in 1961 for use as a private club and corporate retreat. It changed the club’s name to The International Golf Club in 1967.
In 1972, Robert Trent Jones was summoned to soften the greens and bunkers, but he also added more length, stretching the course to 8,325 yards and a par of 73. This calling card began to lose its luster this century, however, as golfers became less focused on course difficulty as a measuring stick for quality. Instead, they have signaled a preference for courses that are strategic, walkable and enjoyable to play for all skill levels.
“The Pines will check all of these important boxes,” Celano said. “With our recently renovated Oaks course, we now combine 36 holes of exceptional golf with a welcoming club environment and culture rooted in a deep respect for the game and its treasured traditions.”
The International’s Pines course is expected to open for member preview play in the fall of 2024.
RELATED: Design Notes archive
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