Bentgrass creeps south (Design case study)

In early March 2004, a few weeks prior to ground-breaking at The Club at Olde Stone in Alvaton, Ky., the design and construction principals of the project, who gathered in an Atlanta hotel conference room for a team meeting, soon became part of a roundtable about agronomics. Owner Jim Scott reiterated his determination to build the state’s best golf course, and all agreed what that meant: bentgrass wall-to-wall.
There was just one problem: The location was questionable. Olde Stone would take shape just outside Bowling Green on the southern edge of the transition zone.
“It’s really the lower end of the transition zone,” says Drew Rogers, a University of Kentucky alumnus and partner with Arthur Hills/Steve Forrest and Associates, which designed the course. “Anything south of Bowling Green, or Nashville, is warm-season turf country when it comes to fairways. All the fairway turfs we researched were warm season, and we considered them for Olde Stone.
“But we all decided to make a run at cool-season turf in the fairways because our client was so focused on being the best in the state, and the region for that matter. Bentgrass would deliver the firm, fast conditions we envisioned for the golf course, plus the quality we were after.”
Marketing and real-estate considerations also were important. Olde Stone features about 400 housing lots on the periphery of the golf course. Cool-season grasses retain their color longer throughout the year, and selling lots is easier when their surroundings are green, Rogers says.
L-93 was used on the fairways and tees, and an A-1/A-4 blend was used on the greens. But how was that going to work at 36 degrees longitude, hundreds of miles inland and a few hundred feet above sea level?

“I believe it was our contractor, Mike Oliphant, who offered up the notion of capping the entire place with sand,” Rogers says. “He said it would drain better, obviously, and give the bentgrass its best chance of surviving through July and August in southwest Kentucky. Sand is a great growing medium and would provide the firm and fast conditions we were looking for.”

Wyatt Warfel, golf course superintendent at Olde Stone, was an assistant superintendent at Olde Stone when the sand-capping idea was first broached.

“It was like a dream come true,” he says. “I mean, what superintendent doesn’t dream about that?”

Fast-forward 27 months. The Club at Olde Stone opened for play in June and has just experienced its first July and August in southwest Kentucky. Scott put his money where his mouth is – sand-capping all 18 fairways added about $1 million to the course’s construction costs. And from all accounts, it was money well spent.

“It has turned out to be a huge plus,” Warfel says. “It requires more maintenance in terms of hand-watering high, dry spots where I use more wetting agents to spot treat. But you don’t get the drainage problems, and that’s the key with bentgrass down here. The fairways were all built sort of like a green would be: completely shelled out with drainage placed into the subgrade.”

As with greens construction, it’s the subgrade preparation that tells all. This sort of subdrainage was installed throughout all 18 fairways, in all the low areas where the water goes once it passes through the sand.

“You’ve got to have drainage there, or it will muck up in a heartbeat,” Rogers says.

The sand-capping procedure was employed ostensibly to benefit the bentgrass, but it provided another indirect benefit.

“Most places get a lot of Poa annua during grow-in, but we have very little to zero Poa infestation,” Warfel says. “The Poa likes wet, shaded areas. With the sand draining so well, that prevents the Poa from adapting.”

Rogers has been bowled over by the results of the drainage.

“To this point, it’s been nothing short of amazing,” he says. “We’ve had no disease. No pythium on tees and fairways because they’re so well drained. Anytime you can get the moisture out of that plant through these hot spells, you’re better off. With bentgrass down here, it’s mandatory.”

Rogers hastened to point out that executing the sand-capping process wasn’t merely a matter of spending the million bucks and reaping the benefits. Warfel and his predecessor, Curtis James, conducted an expert grow-in, but managing the sand – the purview of Oliphant Golf Construction – was an enormous job in and of itself.

“It was the hauling and placing of the sand, the pushing it out and grading it properly that really taxed us,” Rogers says. “It added five or six weeks to the finishing process. From a construction standpoint, it wasn’t just the cost but the labor and time. Think about the beaches you’ve been to: It gives with every step.

The crew used a screened river sand (rounded granules) that was locally available. Rogers says the sand was pretty clean but also plenty shifty.

“Once we put it down, we had to apply a lot of water to stabilize it,” he says. “It was a lot more work, but the results speak for themselves. I don’t know that I’ve ever seen a course grow in to maturity so quickly and so healthy.”

Breaking the mold
The Club at Olde Stone is a study of the benefits of innovation and calculated risk-taking. The project’s principals easily could have chosen Bermudagrass or zoysiagrass for the fairways, but sand-capping all 18 fairways allowed the opportunity to bring bentgrass farther south that it’s ever been.

Ditto for the overall land-planning scheme. Scott could have opted for a traditional community layout, but instead chose a “new urbanist” model. The model called for the development of an actual village center amenitized with public space and light retail, stocked with an array of smaller housing units (cottages, duplexes, even lofts located upstairs from shops), and surrounded by residential neighborhoods where, in transect planning fashion, lot sizes tend to get larger the further they sit from said village.

Automobile use within the community is discouraged. In a larger context, that requires connectivity using light rail. In a golf community setting like The Club at Olde Stone, that means foot and bicycle paths.

The “new urbanist” model allowed more lots than a traditional scheme would have. To date, 69 of the 384 lots have been sold, and less than 100 of a targeted 350 golf memberships remain available.

“Jim Scott and his team are to be congratulated for really seizing the opportunity at Olde Stone,” Rogers says. “They knew they had a spectacular piece of land and, for someone else, maybe it would have been enough to build a first-rate golf course and some nice housing. But this place breaks the mold.”

Dramatic terrain
As an architect, Rogers was particularly enamored with the opportunity to create a truly core golf course (There’s one road crossing and housing can be seen only on the periphery of a few holes.) on a piece of land that features variety. A hefty budget – about $13 million was spent on course construction – didn’t hurt matters. Indeed, in another nod to the climate and the varied microclimates on site, each green at Olde Stone is equipped with Sub-Air units – three permanent and 15 portable.

“I guess what I like most about this golf course is the amount of variety we were able to achieve, thanks to the terrain,” Rogers says. “The topography is outstanding, and the holes are all unique because of it.”

Holes 2 through 7 are located in the floodplain of Drake’s Creek, where there isn’t much elevation change, but there’s lots of space. The holes higher on the property are generous but don’t feature as much space. The natural fall of the land makes them dramatic, Rogers says.

While a boon to Rogers, the dramatic variance in terrain is a challenge to Warfel, who refers to the frontside lowland holes as Hell’s Kitchen.

“It’s probably five degrees hotter down there, with less air movement,” he says. “Last summer was real dry. We had a serious challenge keeping it wet and fertilized enough.”

Nonetheless, Warfel says Rogers made his life a lot easier by being so organized.

“I know a lot of superintendents who’ve had trouble with architects changing their minds all the time during construction and grow-in,” he says. “Hills/Forrest had everything planned in advance. They weren’t coming back all the time wanting to change things. Drew was always there, but never demanding and always helpful.”

Following assistant superintendent stints at Merion in Ardmore, Pa., Saucon Valley in Bethlehem, Pa., and Cannon Ridge in Fredericksburg, Md., Warfel began his tenure at Olde Stone as top assistant to Curtis James. Last year, Warfel was offered his first head superintendent’s job at the University of Maryland Golf Course in College Park. He took it, but when James left this past spring, Scott called and offered Warfel the head job at Olde Stone.

“I didn’t even have to think about it,” Warfel says. “This place is something special.” GCN

Hal Phillips is a freelance writer based in new Gloucester, Maine. He can be reached at onintwo@maine.rr.com.

At a glance
The Club at Olde Stone in Alvaton, Ky.
Date construction began: March 2004
Date project finished: October 2005
Date course opened: June 1, 2006
Cost of project: $13 million (golf course only)
Course length: 7,372 yards
Golf course acreage: 230 acres
Grass on greens: A-1/A-4, 50-50 mixture
Grass on tees: L-93
Grass on fairways: L-93
Grass in rough: Kentucky bluegrass (blend), plus a variety of fescues (sheeps, fine) in outer rough
Architect: Arthur Hills/Steve Forrest and Associates; partner in charge, Drew Rogers
Builder: Oliphant Golf Construction
Golf course superintendent: Wyatt Warfel
Owner: Jim Scott