ROYAL ST GEORGE’S: OPEN PREVIEW
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Royal St George’s, Paul Larsen – and a misty morning
he Open Championship at Royal St George’s Golf Club is going to be a wonderful event. The course, one of the best on the Open rota, will be in immaculate condition, the weather will be superb and the golf will be exciting, irrespective of how many spectators are there to create the galleries. How can I be so sure? Well, I’m merely following the old adage “Good things come to those who wait”, and oh how the club, and, in particular, Head Greenkeeper Paul Larsen and his team have had to wait. At the beginning of last year everything was on track for The Open, in July. The long and medium term planning had gone well and Paul and his team were hoping for a good spell of weather in the months ahead so that the course would be fast and running, just how the R&A like it. And then… The decision was taken to postpone the Championship for a year on April 6, and immediately the date, which had been penned into the diary since 2017, when Royal St George’s hosting was announced, disappeared over the horizon. “To be honest when the news about the postponement came through my mind wasn’t really on The Open. It was on the virus,” recalled Paul.
36 | TURF MATTERS | JULY-AUGUST 2021
“I only had five people in, including myself, everyone else was on furlough, and we were just doing the bare essentials on the course to keep it going, as we were instructed to do. We also had the heatwave at the same time so we were hand watering everywhere and not really cutting. “To be fair the fescue was thriving but The Open was suddenly in the background,” said Paul, who admitted that he was one of the first to take the virus seriously. “Without going OTT we were doing all the cleaning of hands and equipment, which eventually was official advice, from the very beginning.” With the US Open being moved from June to September, The Masters moving to November and some European Tour events being played before the original Open date, there were thoughts that a slightly shorter delay may be possible but Paul was pleased that the ultimate outcome was the end result. “They have considered holding it later in the year but had they moved it to September there would have been light issues and it would have had to have been a reduced field, but around that time we were going into quite a severe lockdown. “I personally think they made the right decision. There was no
messing about, and everyone’s health came first,” said Paul. The postponement was announcement before any of the huge stands or marquees had been erected but most of the underground infrastructure, TV cabling etc, was in place. “In a way it has meant that they had a head start for this year,” reasoned Paul. The club took the greenkeeping staff off furlough when it was deemed safe to do so and they took the opportunity to carry out work that was possible with the course devoid of golfers. “It was great by the club that they took everyone off furlough and it meant we could get a lot of work done. We’ve done a lot of path reshaping which would have been difficult with golfers on the course and we’ve cleaned out a sand dune behind the 4th green, an area which might be in play.” Ironically, the original Open week was an exceptionally busy one at Royal St George’s. “We held an Open tournament for the members which was open to everyone and people could play off the Championship tees if they wanted to. We were getting 120 people playing each day and the weather was great and the course