NEWS
Noto Honored To Follow In Footsteps of Greats F
or a long time, the greatest thrill of David Noto’s golfing career was shooting the low round of the tournament for Georgia Southern University at Augusta National Golf Club too many years ago. His 74 that day, 34 and 40, earned him a $100 gift certificate for the pro shop where he chose a tie - Augusta National green – that he still owns to this day. But what Noto did in the Georgia GCSA golf championship last fall was “right up there with that.” It wasn’t simply that Noto, 45, from Mossy Creek Golf Course in Cleveland, won the superintendent golf championship. He’d already checked that box, winning in 2011. But to do so in November at Atlanta Athletic Club was something several magnitudes for someone with such a genuine appreciation for the history of the club and the game.
Palmer Maples, Jr., CGCS with host superintendent, Ken Mangum, CGCS and Milliken’s Cordie Morgan.
Golf championship presenting sponsors from Greenville Turf and Tractor, Lon Fleming and Mark Hendricks, along with Georgia GCSA golf committee chair, Lane Singleton, welcome winners to the stage.
“I really wanted to win the championship there. I’m not going to downplay how much I wanted to do it at all,” he says. “To be playing on that course where so many of the greats of the game have played made it really kind of special. When I was chipping and putting I was thinking about some of the names of those who had walked on that same ground. To see all the trophies and plaques in the clubhouse, well, I was very honored just to be there.”
David Noto walked down the halls of history as a champion at Atlanta Athletic Club and paid homage to Bobby Jones along the way. 8
Through the green
Noto’s anticipation and enthusiasm for the event was so great that by the time he stepped onto the first tee he was, quite simply, “really nervous.” It showed. His swing was quicker than it should have been and he struggled to find the fairway over the first four holes, making bogey on each. “And they were good bogies,” he says, referring to some quality scrambling to limit the damage. Even so, things certainly weren’t looking good.
January-February 2014
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