playability

I’ve been playing golf since 1988, and working in greenkeeping since 1993. Depending on who’s reading this, and when, that either makes me an old timer, or it reveals how new and inexperienced I am 😉 😄.

I’ve measured more deviations in ball roll (bobble, chatter, and snaking) on golf course putting greens at the end of a day’s play, compared with measurements of ball roll deviation made prior to any play.

An anonymous golf course superintendent sent me this message: I’m blown away by the quality of these surfaces with an amount of nitrogen I would’ve thought was far too small.

The 50th KBC Augusta tournament was played from August 24 to 27 at Keya Golf Club in Fukuoka, Japan. This was my ninth KBC Augusta tournament, and during each of these tournaments I’ve shared photos, ideas, and measurements related to the course maintenance work.

One of the measurements I routinely make on putting greens is the surface hardness—or firmness—as measured by the sdi golf course firmness tester. What I provide to the golf course superintendent, at least during tournaments, is a summary chart like this one.

The 50th KBC Augusta golf tournament will be held at Keya Golf Club in Fukuoka next week. This is an especially interesting golf tournament because of the grass types used—korai (Zoysia matrella) on greens, fairways, and tees, with noshiba (Zoysia japonica) in the rough.

Here are three items that cover the topic of surface hardness, or the firmness of turfgrass surfaces, from all kinds of angles. Richard Forsyth is the director of courses at Royal Melbourne Golf Club.

I made a video about the bobble test with Queen. She knows about green speed, and she was familiar with the Holing Out Test using the Greenstester, but she didn’t know how to do the bobble test.

On November 2 & 3, I’ll be at the Portuguese Greenkeepers Conference in Porto. You can register for the conference at the APG website. Here are three quick notes. 1. The five exciting topics I’ll be discussing I’m going to lead a series of short seminars at the conference.

Andrew Thomson joined me from his home in rural southwestern Japan to discuss the variety of playing surfaces one can find around the world. And you won’t find many people as well-traveled, nor as familiar with the types of playing surfaces, as Andrew.