We’ve all heard the saying, “Good things come to those who wait.” Golf professional Lou Biago is one person who can testify to that.
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For nearly 25 years, Biago has been head professional at Lake Toxaway Country Club in the North Carolina mountains. Although surrounded by one of the most picturesque lakes in the Eastern United States, the golf course never quite measured up. The routing was pedestrian and so narrow in places, Biago joked, that golfers had to walk sideways down the fairways.
Those days are drawing to a close, however, as Lake Toxaway Country Club is in the midst of $6 million redesign. Greensboro architect Kris Spence has devised a master plan to transform the course into something special, something fitting of its surroundings.
Early reviews of the project are positive, and that’s rewarding to Biago. A consummate professional, he could have moved on to bigger and better golf courses over the years. Instead he stayed put, and the bigger and better golf course came to him.
“Seeing the improvements and getting excited about the course gives me a lot of satisfaction,” Biago says. “The club has grown over the years and with the new design, it’s going to be spectacular. We’re looking forward to having a course that is challenging, but also a much better course for golfers to play.”
While Biago grew up in Pennsylvania, the mountains of Western North Carolina always beckoned. He was recruited to play golf at UNC Asheville from a junior college in the mid 1970s and, after college, worked at Asheville Country Club for a few years.
By the early 1980s, Biago thought he’d found his career path. He spent summers at country clubs in the Northeast and winters at Lost Tree Club in southern Florida. Then, in the winter of 1982, he heard of opening back in Western North Carolina and drove up to interview with Reg Heinitsh, Jr. It was Reg’s father who resurrected Lake Toxaway in the early 1960s after a massive flood in 1916 destroyed the dam and left a dry lake bed for nearly 50 years.
Biago and Heinitsh immediately hit it off, and the affable Biago has been Lake Toxaway’s golf professional ever since.
“The facility wasn’t the best, but I just loved the area and enjoyed working for Reg,” Biago says. “He lets me run the operation. And I told him from Day One – I would run this operation like it was my own.
“Now we’re taking it a couple of octaves higher and we can’t wait to get this done. I’m so excited for our members to see how different it is going to be.”
Not only is Biago excited for the members, the members are excited for him. Everyone associated with Lake Toxaway Country Club respects the job Biago has done over the years.
“Lou is solely responsible for the golf department and makes my life very easy,” says club manager David Dew.
Biago is also playing a key role in the construction of the new design. He’s working hand in hand with Spence to ensure the project is a total success. Biago has served as a liaison between membership and the architect, and suggested subtle changes that Spence has incorporated.
Over the course of 25 years, one learns every nook and cranny of a piece of property.
“It’s been invaluable to have his expertise during this process,” Dew says.
As he walks across the work of art rising from the hills and valleys surrounding Lake Toxaway, Biago feels two different emotions. One is the contentment that comes from staying in the same place for all these years, and the second is the excitement that can only be brought about by change.
“It’s almost like a whole new career for me – like going somewhere else,” Biago says. “It is going to be invigorating to see Lake Toxaway Country Club have a new beginning.”