The Fairway is the Best Way
An Inside Look at the 2017 U.S. Open from LebanonTurf
Last week, the U.S. Open Golf Championship took place at Erin Hills Golf Course, the first U.S. Open ever in the state of Wisconsin. LebanonTurf was a proud contributor to the tournament maintenance team, and we got to see first-hand how they prepared the course for this once-in-a-lifetime experience. In the end, we found that LebanonTurf may have played an even bigger role than we thought.
Early Mornings and Late Evenings
The maintenance crew and volunteers arrived each day of tournament week at around 3:45am. They checked in, got their assignments for the day, and most of the 100+ crew members were out on the course by 4:30am. They mowed fairways and greens, raked bunkers, replaced divots, cut cups, and got the course ready for the first tee-times, which usually started at around 7am.
Then, later that evening, after the golf was done for the day, they did a lot of that maintenance again.
“We haven’t been getting much sleep,” said Erin Hills Director of Course Maintenance Zach Reineking. “Most people don’t realize that they’re here from 4am until the buses leave at 9:15pm. Some of us even stay longer to get all the equipment prepped and ready for the next day.”
It Takes a Village of Volunteers
The Erin Hills maintenance staff of 15-20 workers had been actively preparing for this tournament for more than a year, but when actual tournament week came, they needed more help. They enlisted turf professionals from all over the world to come help and get valuable experience.
To work at the tournament, the volunteers had to go through an application process, and most all of them are superintendents at their home courses. Some of them were from West Bend Country Club (right down the road) while another group came all the way from Australia.
LebanonTurf Takes Center Stage
Erin Hills features wide, undulating fairways, and thick tall fescue grass on either side. The big storyline for golfers was the need to keep the ball in the fairway, because if you didn’t, you were in trouble in the fescue.
For LebanonTurf, those fairways hit close to home. Reineking explained how LebanonTurf played a part in the U.S. Open:
“Right now we’re using the Country Club 27-0-5 on all our fairways. Just a great product. We see extended color. We don’t use much fertility on our fairways, but this is just a product where application in the spring gives us great coverage, great color. It’s been a home run for us for the last 4 or 5 years.”
We had a front row seat to see how much hard work went into putting on the U.S. Open for a worldwide audience, and we’re proud to play a small part in making it possible.
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