13 minute read
SOUTHERN TEXAS PGA
In 2020, Carlos Sainz Jr, Director of Instruction at Houston Oaks Country Club & Family Sports Retreat, claimed the season as a five-time champion, four of which were Section Majors. Sainz’s decorated year earned him the title of 2020 Omega Player of the Year for his outstanding performance on the course. But we left the year of 2020, the year of Carlos Sainz Jr. behind to enter the year of 2021, a fresh start, and a new year for another to claim the Section Major season.
The first Section Major of the year was postponed as the summer months witnessed an endless rain, drenching the golf courses and rendering them unplayable. By June, the rain had cleared, and the Southern Texas PGA kicked off their first Section Major of 2021 at Comanche Trace in Kerrville, Texas.
The Stroke Play Championship led to a playoff after Ben Kern, PGA Head Professional at Georgetown Country Club and Lonny Alexander, PGA Teaching Professional at Onion Creek Club tied for the lead with a two-day total of 137 (-7).
Alexander jumped out to an early lead in Round Two when he shot a 31 (-5) on the front nine. However, Kern battled back on the back nine by making backto-back birdies on 14 and 15 to take a one stroke lead before Alexander made a birdie on 16 to tie the lead.
On the third playoff hole, Kern hit a 9-iron to 6 feet and proceeded to make par to secure the victory and earn the first Major title of 2021 and his first Major title with the STPGA. “I am really excited to win my first major title with the STPGA,” said Kern who has been in the STPGA since 2018. “I have had six second place finishes and it feels great to win.” At the second Major, three-time Rolex Player of the Year, Ben Willman, PGA Teaching Professional at Axis Golf Academy won his fourth Tradition Championship title at Golf Club of Houston (Tournament Course) in July. “It feels like the first time,” said Willman. “It’s been a while since I won so it feels good to win again.” Starting off his first round with a chip in for eagle on hole one, Willman carded an 18-hole total of 67 (-5), just one stroke behind leader JJ Wood, PGA Director of Instruction at Golf
Ben Kern, PGA Champion at the Southern Texas PGA Professional Championship.
Performance Group. Three back-to-back birdies on the back nine during Round two gave him a three-stroke lead to win the championship with a final score of 8-under-par 136.
However, at the third Section Major, Ben Kern reclaimed his position on top after shooting 68-64 for a two-day total of 132 (-12), leaving the rest of the field in the dust with a six-stroke lead. “So many times, you play a round of golf and you think ‘I putted great, but I didn’t do this great or that great,” said Kern. “Today I hit the ball great, I hit every fairway, putted great, and I was just in sync all day.” Those nine birdies in his second round at the Clubs of Kingwood (Deerwood) earned him the TPx Communications Championship title and his second Major win of 2021.
At the Memorial Championship, Ben
Willman fought to put his name on a second Major title in 2021 after tying Ben Kern for the lead on hole 15 at Memorial Park Golf Course with just three holes left to play for the win. Heading into the final round, Kern lead the field by three strokes, with an impressive bogey free round one of 8-under-par. Willman and Robert Scott, PGA Teaching Professional at Royal Oaks Country Club, followed closely behind tied for second at 5-under-par. With three holes left to play in the final round, Kern and Willman were Lonny Alexander, PGA Teaching Professional at Onion Creek Club at the 2021 Stroke Play Championship. tied through 15, but Kern managed back-to-back birdies on 16 and 17 to reclaim the lead and win his third major in 2021. Now with a decorated year of three out of four Section Major wins, and his name at the top of the points list, the Southern Texas PGA Professional Championship carried a greater weight to its title as Kern headed to the fifth and final Major of the year. The Section Championship proved to be a challenge for many with the largest
Ben Willman, PGA Teaching Professional at Axis Golf Academy at the Tradition Championship.
purse of the year on the line, a guaranteed spot in the 2022 PGA Professional Championship, a PGA TOUR exemption, and a place for your name on the most esteemed trophy in the Section.
Heading into the final round at Briggs Ranch Golf Club, JJ Wood and Shane Hall, PGA Assistant Professional at Sugar Creek Country Club lead the field by one stroke at 6-under-par. Kern sat tied for fifth at four-under-par, just two strokes behind the leaders. With six birdies and an eagle in his second round, Kern climbed to the top, shooting a 36-hole
Robert Scott, PGA Teaching Professional at Royal Oaks Country Club at the Memorial Championship.
score of 10-under-par to claim the title for the fifth Major of the year, his fourth Major win total, and the face of the 2021 season. “It feels really good. Being the Section Champion means everything to me,” said Kern. “It’s an honor to have my name on the Tommy Aycock trophy with a lot of good players. The Section Champ is special.” With his win at the Section Championship, Ben Kern was named Rolex Player of the Year, which will earn him exemptions into the 2022 Houston Open and Valero Texas Open for his outstanding performance on the course throughout the year. Kern will also lead six other PGA Professionals to the 2022 PGA Professional Championship at OMNI Barton Creek Resort & Spa in Austin, Texas on April 17-20, 2022. JJ Wood, PGA Director of Instruction at Golf Performance Group, Gregory Hiller, PGA Director of Instruction at TPC San Antonio, Shane Hall, PGA Assistant Professional at Sugar Creek Country Club, Jared Jones, PGA Director of Instruction at River Oaks Country Club,
Shane Hall, PGA Assistant Professional at Robert Scott, PGA Teaching ProfesSugar Creek Country Club at the Southern Texas sional at Royal Oaks Country Club, PGA Professional Championship. and Derrick Dixon, PGA General
Olmos Basin Golf Course - Worth the Wait
The Olmos Basin Golf Course, originally built in 1963, has been the City of San Antonio’s most played facility for decades. Closed since early January 2021 for renovations, the eleven month and nearly $4 million dollar rehab are now complete.
Under the direction of the Alamo City Golf Trail, who manages the City’s golf facilities, the course went through a tee to green remodel. The course routing is nearly unchanged, but new teeing grounds (five tee boxes per hole), bunker complexes, greens and surrounds, cart paths, expanded driveway, resurfaced parking lot, a facelifted clubhouse, new golf cart storage facility, and a new pavilion have been built, upgrading the roughly 60-year-old course’s original features. Olmos Basin, as the name suggests, is in one of the area floodplains, and heavy rains bring with it flooding and debris. In fact, this project was delayed by a few weeks during construction due to a rare snowstorm in mid-February and heavy rains in late spring and summer.
New golf course infrastructure consists of underground drainage for all the greens, bunkers, and low-lying areas around the course. Heavy rains will always take a toll on this facility simply because of geography, however, the speed at which the golf course recuperates will be much quicker than the original design with no underground drainage.
While the course remains a par 72, the par on two holes were changed. The 11th hole, previously a sub-500-yard par 5, is now a par 4 playing at approximately 375 yards, and the 14th, previously a 221-yard par 3 was converted into a par 4 playing approximately 320 yards. The course, depending on the chosen tee box, will play shorter than before from the forward tees, and longer (at just over 7000 yards) from the championship tees.
“We’re extremely proud of the results we achieved with this project”, said Andrew Peterson, President and CEO of the Alamo City Golf Trail. “The staff, golf course architect Jeff Blume, and the construction crews of VM Golf Services were instrumental in pulling off such a large project in such a short period of time. We think the citizens of San Antonio will like what we’ve done”.
Enjoy the History, the Challenge, and the Hospitality.
As stewards of the golf facilities owned by the great City of San Antonio, we are proud to bring you 8 unique golf experiences. From Historic Brackenridge Park, the site of multiple Texas Opens and the oldest municapal golf course in Texas, to our recently rebuilt and modern San Pedro Driving Range/Par 3 with Bar and �rill, you will �nd a course that �ts your game.
Brackenridge Park Est 1916 Cedar Creek Est. 1989
Olmos Basin Est. 1963
Northern Hills Est. 1969 Mission Del Lago Est. 1989
Riverside Est. 1968
San Pedro Re-Est 2017 Willow Springs Est. 1923
www.AlamoCityGolfTrail.com 210.212.7572
By Steve Habel, Contributing Writer
The number of rounds on this “notso-hidden” jewel of a course show its popularity is growing
It wasn’t that long ago that taking a trip to Lago Vista was a serious investment of time in the truck and there wasn’t much to see or do once you got out on the peninsula of Lake Travis northwest of Austin.
But the journey was always worth it because of Lago Vista Golf Course, a hidden gem that is the centerpiece of the city’s first real neighborhood.
As the Central Texas area has grown out toward the once-sleepy town there has been one constant – the quality of the experience at Lago Vista GC. Yes, there have been some bumps in the road (like at any golf course) but over the past four years, expert care has led to a rebirth of sorts for the golf course, spurred by investment from the city leaders and the management of head professional Chris Godwin.
A round at Lago Vista GC offers a little bit of everything, as the routing moves through the neighborhood and winds down to the edge of the lake. There are
places on the course where the fairways are (almost) too wide to miss, and there are others (the par 4 11th comes readily to mind) where maybe two in 10 golfers will find the sweet spot.
That’s part of what makes the round here so much fun – nothing can be taken for granted.
“We feel like this course has been one of the region’s best kept secrets over the years,” Godwin said. “The word has got out and more people have played the course over the past four years. Our rounds have grown every year we’ve been at Lago Vista GC, and we understand that we need to continue to improve to get players to return and to tell their friends about us.”
Over the past few years Godwin and his staff have reworked a handful of the course’s putting surfaces, returning them to their originally planned sizes and finding additional hole locations that help reduce wear and tear from constant use.
“We’re committed to providing a golf experience for our members and guests that is casual, memorable, and most importantly, fun,” Godwin added.
Lago Vista GC has a bit of a split personality, with a front-nine that’s basically wide open and relatively flat (at least until you get to the ninth hole) and a back-nine that’s more narrow and, from this view, more difficult.
There are a handful of holes that always come to my mind on the drive to the course. I love the 562-yard par 5 second, which plays to a wide landing area over native grass to a slope and then back up to an elevated putting surface, and requires three good shots to put me into position for a birdie.
On the 377-yard ninth, you must favor the right side off the tee, after which you’ll have to walk up the fairway a bit to see the green, which is at the bottom
Bunker Bar & Grill
of a three-tiered hill and hard against the access street, with the clubhouse and the 18th green in the near-distance and Lake Travis plainly in view.
On the back, the aforementioned 11th, challenges with its demand for course management. Large trees and a concrete ditch running across the fairway asks you for two precise shots to reach the putting surface and a back-to-front undulating sloping green can easily turn a birdie putt into bogey.
The round here ends with the 407yard par 4 17th, with its elevated tee and a wide fairway that crosses a shallow valley and slopes left to right, and the 204-yard par 3 18th, which plays over a stream and a street to an elevated green guarded by two large bunkers, all in the shadow of the clubhouse. Lago Vista GC is the place to hang out after your round too, or to see and be seen when you want to check out the scuttlebutt from around the neighborhood. There’s an expansive restaurant and bar area that rivals those of private clubs, with plenty of big screen TVs to watch the big game. The practice facility at Lago Vista GC, with its beautiful view of the lake, is an excellent place to hone your game. Three tiers of natural grass teeing surface and a practice putting green are offered for your enjoyment.
All-in-all, Lago Vista GC remains the place to go for a great round of golf, a nice meal and cold beer afterward, and a totally friendly Texas-style vibe. All of that, and more, make the trip – which somehow doesn’t feel as long as it used to – worthwhile.
Baker’s Bar & Grill
