LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The greens are young, sometimes fragile and being trimmed to championship heights.
To keep them vibrant for the PGA Championship, the Valhalla Golf Club grounds crew has resorted to high-tech and archaic tactics.
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First, let’s start with what must be removed before tournament play begins Thursday. The PGA of America, which owns the 28-year-old course hosting its third PGA Championship, purchased 18 electrical fans last fall to place alongside the greens.
The fans are designed to keep air moving through the putting surfaces on muggy Kentucky afternoons. They require electrical outlets along all 18 greens, so it’s safe to call Valhalla a “wired” golf course. The infrastructure for the fans was installed in 2010, one year before the club switch to T-1 bentgrass putting surfaces. This year’s PGA is believed to be the first major championship contested on T-1 bentgrass greens.
“The fans have certainly been very instrumental in growing healthy turf here at Valhalla,” superintendent Roger Meier says. “The fans are probably our biggest tool in managing the putting surfaces in keeping them dry and keeping the air movement across the putting surfaces. It helps that plant cool down, especially in the evenings. It keeps the putting surfaces dry and firm, which is certainly critical. When we get into those hot, humid days of the good old transition zone weather, they are there to aid the putting surfaces and to keep the atmosphere around those greens a little bit cooler and a better growing environment.”
The Valhalla staff doesn’t always use all 18 fans at once. Some greens might require two fans on humid days. Some might not require a fan. Meier says six greens receive air from fans all 12 months. The fans are green, which blends with the turfgrass hue. Despite their massive size, they are quieter than a typical house fan.
One of Tuesday evening’s major maintenance tasks involves removing the fans. Monday was one of this summer’s most humid days, thus the decision to keep fans on the course for Tuesday’s practice rounds. A crane truck will lift the fans from their greenside spots, and they will be placed into storage until the tournament ends.
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A throwback maintenance practice also has assisted in keeping the greens slick for the world’s best players.
The greens are being rolled by hand, instead of machine, this week. The rollers are large drums filled with water – and they are heavy. Pushing and pulling them up greenside slopes is a two-person task.
“The hand rollers are really nice for the championship because we can really manipulate the weight of the rollers, especially with the greens and working with green speeds and trying to achieve the championship speed that we want,” Meier says. “We are able to manipulate those and control the weight in them and gain different speeds by manipulating the weight of those rollers.”
Valhalla received an assist from a notable course in a neighboring state to obtain the rollers. Paul Latshaw, of Muirfield Village Golf Club in Dublin, Ohio, delivered rollers to the course when the ones Valhalla ordered weren’t the proper size. Latshaw visited Meier last weekend to provide input on using the heavy devices.
“I picked that up from him and learned it from him,” Meier says. “Everybody knows Paul is one of the greats in the industry and one of the best.”
Muirfield Village, like Valhalla, was designed by Jack Nicklaus. Muirfield Village hosts the PGA Tour’s Memorial Tournament.
Meier, in his fourth year as Valhalla’s superintendent, says his course’s greens are primed for what awaits. His crew this week consists of 40 staff members and 70 maintenance volunteers from other courses. The greens are a big topic in the maintenance shed.
“They look great and they feel great,” Meier says. “They are getting firmer by the day, which is certainly our goal and we are picking up a little bit of speed as we go into championship week.”
Guy Cipriano is GCI’s assistant editor.