Gross: South Course Ahead Of Schedule


April 17, 2008

Pat Gross, the director of the Southwest Region for the USGA Green Section, is the staff agronomist in charge of the 2008U.S.Open Championship atTorreyPines. He is working closely with the maintenance staff to ensure the playing conditions meet the proper standards set forth by the USGA Championship Committee. USGA staff writerDavidShefterrecently chatted with Gross to see how preparations were coming.

How is the course shaping up from an agronomic viewpoint?

Gross

PatGross: Oh, it's fantastic. We had a few hiccups last year, and for various political reasons things that were a little slower to come together than everybody would have hoped. But the take-home message there is that Mark Woodward, [golf operations director] Jon Maddern and [South Course superintendent) Candice Combs and their staff did just a remarkable job.

Kikuyugrass is not a surface that golfers play on a lot but is the prevailing turf atTorreyPines. What makes it so unique?

Gross: It's a sub-tropical grass. It is similar to Bermuda [grass] in that it uses less water. It requires less fertilizer and it is just very well adapted to coastal climates.

Do you pretty much see it inCaliforniaor is it indigenous to other areas?

Gross: I see it in courses from up in the [San Francisco] Bay area down to San Diego along the coast and some inland parts of the L.A. (Los Angeles) area. It's very prominent in Mexico and it will extend down into Texas and a little bit in Arizona here and there.

What makes it such a tough playing surface?

Gross: It has that thick, above-ground stem and the wider leaf blade. It has a very, thick flushy stolon that will tend to grab the club if it's not mowed or managed properly. Just because the leaves are wider and the way it grows on the surface, you can tend to get some unpredictable bounce and roll from the golf ball. When it's very lush and actively growing . it will tend to be like Velcro under soft conditions.

Does kikuyugrass grow more rapidly in certain parts of the year?

Gross: It's a warm-season grass so it will go slightly off color from about November to February. But in the coastal locations like Torrey Pines it didn't go off-color at all during the winter. It was a mild winter, so that's one of the big advantages of it. It retains its color when Bermuda grass at the same time will go brown.

Do you need aggressive maintenance to ensure its consistency?

Gross: There are three basic things. Number one, mow it aggressively. Number two, put it on a strict diet. Just very limited nitrogen and some other micro-nutrients for color with iron and manganese. And number three, it's very standard practice to apply primo growth regulator to just keep it from growing too aggressively and tighten it up.

The rough heights at mostU.S.Opens have been in the neighborhood of 3 inches depending on the climate. Do you have to alter the height of the primary rough with kikuyugrass?

Gross: Typically a fairway cutting height of one-half inch. The primary rough for the Open is going to be at 2½ inches. That's the target right now. We may drop that a little bit more. Typical rough on kikuyugrass in southern California is 1½ inches. Beyond that 20-foot section of primary rough is going to be a combination of kikuyu and rye grass at 4 to 5 inches.

So there is some rye grass atTorreyPines?

Gross: Yes. In the rough. It's a combo of kikuyu[grass] and rye grass in the rough, but just straight kikuyugrass in the fairways.

How about playing from the fairway on kikuyugrass? I would imagine the ball sits up pretty nicely for the golfer.

Gross: The ball sits up fantastic. It really does. It's more of a stiff-bladed grass and it sits right up. Part of the reason is people aren't familiar with it. I know a lot of people east of the Mississippi freak out when it's not rye grass or bent grass.

Is it true the kikuyugrass won't be as prevalent in the apron areas around the greens?

Gross: They've kept the kikuyu out of the aprons and the tees. So the tees and aprons are hybrid bermudagrass. It's a sod and it was installed when the greens were resurfaced and rebuilt back in 2000. That was part of the Rees Jones renovation.

Torrey Pines uses reclaimed water to irrigate the golf courses, right?

Gross: California, Arizona, Nevada - all of the southwest on the lower Colorado [River] basin - is extremely squeezed for water. The three Open venues in California - Olympic [Club], Pebble [Beach] and Torrey Pines - all use recycled water.

Is this something we are going to see more and more utilized by courses in areas with water issues?

Gross: It's going to be necessary one way or another. Most golf courses would gladly accept it. The problem most places are having is the cost of building the reclamation facility and then installing the pipeline, which in some cases I have heard is $1 million a mile. For instance, bringing it to Los Angeles Country Club or Bel-Air [Country Club], they are not going to rip up Wilshire Boulevard at $1 million a mile to bring them water. There are all kinds of those peripheral deals going on. At Torrey Pines, it's the city of San Diego reclamation facility.

Has this been a highly successful project forTorreyPines andSan Diego?

Gross: Well, they can water. Then you can manage on the back side with the other things you need to do.

From an agronomic point of view, things sounds like they are right on schedule to have the course in ideal condition for the start of play on June 12.

Gross: They are ahead of schedule. What was remarkable to me is right after the Buick [Invitational] they had to build a practice tee and it's going across the ninth and 10th holes of the North Course. They constructed and sodded an enormous three-level tee in one week. And it is really good. They are jumping on it. These guys are firing on all cylinders right now.

The staff there has had a week-by-week maintenance plan in place for more than a year. So it's just monitoring that and making the necessary adjustments. Really what we're focusing on and what I am helping them with is making sure that they have adequate equipment and doing a maintenance check list to make sure nothing has fallen through the cracks, monitoring course conditions and making sure the things [USGA Senior Director of Rules and Competitions] Mike Davis wants to see are implemented, and the theme of our relationship is no surprises. I don't want to surprise them with any last-minute details and I don't want any surprises from them saying, 'Oops, we are not going to have that fairway mower-type of thing.'