Busy times on the prairie

Barry Anderson leads the maintenance of GreatLIFE Golf & Fitness Willow Run Golf Course on the far east side of Sioux Falls, South Dakota. The large, modern homes above the 13th, 14th and 17th holes didn’t exist when Anderson arrived as assistant superintendent in 2005.

Accessing the nearby Big Sioux River, the public course’s emergency water source, meant Anderson traversed dirt paths and cattle pastures. And he always needed to remember one task before returning to the course. “My boss would drive down there and shout, ‘Go shut the gate!’” Anderson says.

Anderson was promoted to superintendent in 2008. Cattle no longer roam the land between Willow Run and the Big Sioux River. Willow Run now draws water from two wells. The last time Anderson checked the river’s viability as an emergency water source, he says, “It was all streets and signs up there. I didn’t know how to get back down to the course again.”

The scenes Anderson encounters on the 38-year-old course mirror what he observes on the periphery. Like the neighborhood above it, and the city where it resides, Willow Run has gone from sleepy to bustling. The Sioux Falls metropolitan area surpassed 300,000 residents in 2023, a sharp and speedy increase from the 187,000 residents inhabiting the region at the turn of the century. Homes occupy former cattle pastures on every side of town. When the families living above Willow Run glance downward during daylight hours from April to November, they are almost guaranteed to see golfers on every hole.

Willow Run supported 48,167 rounds in 2023, according to GreatLIFE Golf & Fitness director of golf Jason Crisp. The number marks the highest single-year rounds played total among the six GreatLIFE courses in Sioux Falls and surrounding markets. “And we were a little bit slow out of the gate because we had snow in April,” Anderson says.

Pushing 50,000 annual rounds in a climate with heavy snow and prolonged below-freezing stretches seemed unimaginable in December 2013 when Tom Walsh Sr. announced plans to meld golf and fitness in Sioux Falls. Walsh, a revered Burger King franchisee, was motivated by the healthy mission concept implemented at the GreatLIFE-branded courses in Kansas.

Willow Run and Bakker Crossing were Walsh’s initial golf purchases. Separated by 12 miles, the courses featured pleasant layouts — Willow Run boasts surprising elevation changes for a prairie area code; Bakker Crossing has a links-style feel — and generated steady business, with annual rounds played in the mid-20,000s. Rounds played reached the high-20,000s during busy years.

GreatLIFE offered prospective members affordable, all-inclusive monthly golf and fitness memberships. Volume increased following the ownership change, and Willow Run and Bakker Crossing suddenly started attracting more than 40,000 annual rounds.

Remember, this growth occurred in a post-recession golf economy hampered by rounds decreases and course closures. “Barry and I got really close because we were thrown into the fire,” says GreatLIFE director of agronomy Brent Venenga, who spent 22 years as Bakker Crossing’s superintendent before moving into his current role in 2023.

Anderson and Venenga related to what peers experienced when play increased without a tapering period during the COVID-19 pandemic. The pair, after all, endured instantaneous play surges six years earlier. Asked how the pandemic affected Willow Run, Anderson says, “Basically the tee sheet filled up faster.”

How does a superintendent know their work life has suddenly changed? Or that a new model might work?

Anderson reverts to the tee sheet.

“We were busy before,” he says, “but you looked at the tee sheet and it was packed earlier in the morning and later, too.”

Whenever Anderson or a Willow Run co-worker turned a corner — a frequent occurrence because holes bend right or left — they encountered a golfer. Midday tasks such as fixing a sprinkler head or edging had to be handled earlier or later with heightened alertness. Adapting to a frantic pace that never slowed tested Anderson and his team.

“You figure out early that you’re either in or you’re out on this,” he says. “If it’s too busy and you can’t handle it, then we’ll find somebody else. You get back to developing everyone and they buy in.”

Anderson and Venenga remained happily employed and living in one of the Midwest’s trendiest metropolitan areas by finding ways to evolve and flourish. Sitting in a second-floor clubhouse conference room with Crisp and a visitor on a March afternoon, Anderson and Venenga reflected on the mindset required to handle an ownership change. The 70-minute conversation about their work pasts, presents and futures inspired, informed and included guidance to help peers navigate ownership and business changes.

Anderson: “Just be transparent and be yourself. Don’t try to be something you’re not when they come in because you’re not going to be able to uphold something anyway. Be authentic.”

Venenga: “When the transition was happening, it was, ‘Hey, I am who I am.’ You were the first one there and the last one to leave. I remember thinking the same thing … be who you are. If it didn’t work out, it was time to move on.”

GreatLIFE employees wear shirts with the Live. Play. Better. mantra on them. The wellness-themed mission statement: To enrich the lives of families and individuals through golf, fitness and healthy lifestyles.

Skepticism surrounding the concept of offering golf and fitness for low monthly membership rates eroded when Walsh started making improvements to the golf courses and clubhouses. Walsh immediately remodeled the Willow Run clubhouse, “knowing that probably in another year he was going to tear the whole thing down and blow it up,” Anderson says.

“And,” Anderson adds, “he did.”

A fitness center occupies the lower level of the clubhouse. Run on a treadmill. Walk 18. Lift. All at the same location. All potentially on the same day.

Course improvements followed the clubhouse remodel. A par 3 Anderson calls an “ugly” hole was replaced with a hole playing from elevated and neatly landscaped tee boxes to a green fronted by a pond with mounding behind the surface. A photograph of the par 3, the current 16th hole, occupies the scorecard cover.

In the second year of Willow Run’s GreatLIFE existence, an expanded practice area opened and a wayward space near the 18th hole was converted into a 3-hole practice/warmup course. Bakker Crossing created a 3-hole practice course a few years later. Every GreatLIFE course in Sioux Falls has added family tees. Willow Run received two big-ticket items, a new pump station and an irrigation system, in 2019 and 2022, respectively.

Membership increased as Walsh acquired and enhanced more golf courses and fitness centers. Many of the facilities Walsh purchased lacked the capital or capacity to invest in capital improvements in the early post-recession economy.

Consumers embraced the reinvestments. GreatLIFE ended its first year in Sioux Falls with 5,000 members, according to Crisp. Current membership exceeds 43,000.

Consumers also embraced affordable rates. An annual 2024 single unlimited walking golf and fitness membership offering access to all Sioux Falls-area GreatLIFE facilities is $84.99 per month. A single membership with unlimited cart is $147.49 per month. Central Valley Golf Club, Fox Run Golf Course, Rocky Run Golf Course and Worthington Golf & Fitness Club join Willow Run and Bakker Crossing as GreatLIFE-owned and -operated courses in and around Sioux Falls.

“The concept is very low membership rates, but it’s driven by volume,” says Crisp, who worked as the head pro at Bakker Run before moving into a corporate director of golf role last year. “When you have full golf courses, you have people buying food and beverage, and they are buying items at the pro shop.”

GreatLIFE courses are open to the public, although Crisp says member rounds account for 85 percent of play. Tee-time competition is fierce. Bakker Crossing hosted 387 rounds in one day last year, topping the previous high of 368 during Venenga’s and Crisp’s tenures at the facility.

Willow Run remains GreatLIFE’s busiest Sioux Falls-area course and will likely maintain that status for the foreseeable future. A fast start to 2024 puts Willow Run on a pace to exceed 50,000 rounds if favorable weather continues, according to Crisp.

The conference room where Anderson, Venenga and Crisp discussed their jobs, organization and backgrounds on the early March afternoon has windows on three sides. Temperatures reached the mid-40s and wind gusts approached 20 miles per hour, yet two dozen hearty South Dakotans dressed in multiple layers were playing the course.

Anderson and Venenga layered up after the conversation for a course tour. Approaching golfers, many of whom Anderson knew by face or name, redirected multiple fairway conversations to the rough. Remember, March golf means bonus golf in Sioux Falls.

Willow Run carried a pre-GreatLIFE reputation as a scramble-friendly course, and Anderson says the course hosted as many as five sizeable team events per week during the peak season. Scrambles and outings became less frequent as the philosophy shifted to providing tee times for GreatLIFE members.

Member-focused philosophies altered how Anderson and his team maneuvered. Instead of frequently preparing the course for 9 a.m. shotgun starts, the crew must be in position to accommodate peak-season tee times beginning at 6 a.m.

The hustle begins at 3:30 a.m. when a veteran fairway mower reports to the maintenance facility bordering the par-3 sixth hole on the northwest corner of the property. Using a Toro 6700 unit with seven reels that cuts 11 feet wide, the operator mows all 18 fairways in less than seven hours. A rough mower begins his day around 4 a.m. and the remainder of the crew reports one hour before the first tee time. On days with 6 a.m. tee times, the practice green is mowed as a cup cutter heads to the first green a little after 5 a.m. “If you’re here at that time, you just see lights going everywhere,” Anderson says.

Early beginnings. Filled tee sheets from sunrise to sunset. More homes under construction around the course. Stories are the only reminders of Willow Run’s sleepy days on the Sioux Falls outskirts.

“All of the sudden we are in the middle of town,” Anderson says.

Guy Cipriano is Golf Course Industry’s publisher and editor-in-chief.