Peninsula Strategic Plan

President Doug Provis recently sent a letter to all members entitled “An Update on Strategic Planning at Peninsula”. First of all, I’m pleased to see that club management is at least publicising their intentions and plans for the club. However, it would have been nice for the rank and file membership to have had some input into the process, or at least to provide a range of opinions on the matter. Nowhere in his letter does Doug encourage input or debate – it’s simply a declaration of the committee’s intentions.

Well, never mind. I’m going to provide some input and opinions now.

Doug states that the club has “comparatively low course budgets” – presumably compared to other similar courses. I find this surprising considering we have a larger membership that other sandbelt courses, we have accommodation facilities that most of them don’t have and we take far greater number of paying guests, houses guests and corporate groups than they do. I would have thought this would make up for us having 36 holes to maintain rather than 18.

However, it’s impossible to know for sure as the published financial statements clump expenses together in such broad categories as to make any detailed analysis impossible.

For example, what is Gary Richardson’s total remuneration? I have heard that he gets a commission on all non-membership revenue raised by the club. Is this true and how much does this total in a year? Given Gary’s obvious reluctance to look to greener pastures, one might suspect that he’s on a damn good thing at Peninsula. (Not to mention the fact that this gives him a conflict of interest – members access to facilities versus paying guests and corporate groups. We have seen numerous examples of members being excluded from the course due to priority given to paying guests).

So, Doug, a good start to an open and honest discussion on the club finances would be to provide significantly more detailed disclosure.

Some comments regarding some of the points Doug makes in his letter.

1. There is a decline in membership. I know how to fix that. More later

2. Function, dining and accommodation facilities require upgrades. Did I miss something? Didn’t we just upgrade these in recent years?

3. Lifting the standard of maintenance and presentation of the Clubhouse is a priority. Did you ask the members? Everyone I speak to thinks the Clubhouse and facilities are more than adequate, it’s the condition of the courses that everyone complains about.

4. To do this will require an additional $1M per annum. OK – can we see how you came to that figure please.

Doug states the following “facts”.

§         Membership revenue is 48% of total revenue – the lowest level of the Sandbelt clubs.

Well Doug, of course it is. That’s because the other Sandbelt clubs don’t have the same level of alternative sources of revenue that we have – accommodation, paying guests, corporate golf, etc making membership revenue proportionately smaller.

§         Membership numbers are dropping.

I don’t doubt it. I know of some members who have left, but not because the facilities are inferior, rather because of the poor condition of the courses. Here’s a sure-fire way to reverse the decline in membership numbers :

1. Improve the condition of the courses, in priority order :

- greens

- bunkers

- lose-your-ball rough (bracken, lomandra, very long grass) close to the fairways

- grass rough (next to the fairways)

- fairways

2. Stop giving priority course access to paying guests over members. For example, members hate being dumped onto the recently cored greens so that corporate groups can play on the course in good condition.

No doubt, Doug and Gary would say that we don’t have the funds to adequately do point 1, and we need to do point 2 in order to have sufficient funds at all. However, if you’re truly looking to increase membership numbers, then these two points need to be addressed.

But no, the committee has instead decided to decreases the cost of membership in order to increase membership numbers. Reducing your price is the typical tactic employed when you feel you have an inferior product offering. Visionary organisations, on the other hand, employ a strategy of developing a superior offering.

But that’s not us. We’re going to reduce (or eliminate, in the case of 6 day Membership) our entrance fees. Quite a slap in the face for those members who have paid the full membership fee, especially those who don’t regularly play on a Saturday.

Really, what I think the club most desperately needs is a whole clean-out and refresh of its leaders – the General Manager and Committee.

At the next election, rather than have Gary Richardson pick his own team, let’s have all positions thrown open and a genuine attempt at regeneration of club leadership. Let’s actively encourage open discussion, a diversity of views and nomination to committee positions by as many people as possible.

That would make us a club that people would want to be a part of.

Access to the courses

Hey President Doug Provis, are you there? Still trying to attract new members? A good place to start would be not to deny members access to the courses on weekends or to the non-cored course.

On Sunday 1 April, the North Course was blocked out for Women’s Pennant. At the same time, the vast majority of tee times on the South course had been pre-allocated to outside players – house guests and corporate groups. Too bad if a member wanted to play on Sunday morning.

Then on Tuesday 1 May, the North Course was blocked out again, this time for a Corporate Group. Members had to play on the South Course which had been cored the day before.

No one has a problem with one course being allocated to Pennant or cored, that’s just the way it works. But when that does occur, for Clayton’s sake, don’t fill up the other course with outside players. Once again, this shows that us members are just second class citizens at our own club compared to fee-paying outsiders.

The question I have, is this habit of filling up the courses with outsiders down to pure incompetence in club management, or a blatant disregard for member privileges? It’s got to be one or the other.

Course Maintenance (7)

The Trans Tasman Cup was held at Peninsula recently. I’m told that ground staff were seen furiously crawling all over the North course to spruce it up for the event. That’s good, but wouldn’t it be nice to see the same level of activity for regular course maintenance for the benefit of the rank and file members.

It seems the promise of a nice payment to the club entitles you to a course in excellent condition, but if you’re a mug member who makes payment via annual subscription, you’re a second class citizen in that regard.

By the way, I understand that rakes were left outside of bunkers during the event! (Refer to my previous comments in November on this subject).

Course Maintenance (6)

The are many areas between tee and fairway that are exceedingly rough and difficult to negotiate. Yet another example of issues that make playing golf at Peninsula less pleasant than it should be. I’m very glad to see that there seems to be a program in place to rectify this, with 10 North being the first cab off the rank.

However, it seems to me that the newly re-laid surface is not as smooth as it should be, being quite bumpy and uneven. Would it really have been that hard to get a grader to properly level the surface before re-laying the grass?

“Is Melbourne’s Sandbelt Overrated?”

This article appeared in the February issue of Australian Golf Digest. It quotes Geoff Shackelford who is a US golf author, blogger and course design consultant.

After visiting many of the sandbelt courses during the time of the Presidents Cup, Shackleford observed “… I was surprised at how much grass was in the roughs, particularly the long stuff. Dr Mackenzie would not be pleased!” Sound familiar?

Shackleford was also disturbed by the number of trees on the premier golf courses. There is “simply no good reason to have so many trees when you have such artistic and demanding green complexes.” The article highlights the fact that fewer trees allow “an abundance of light and hot sun to reach the fairways fostering the growth of desirable couch grass.”

There are many obvious examples of fairway grass growth being inhibited by tree shadows at Peninsula. Shackleford makes the point that yes, while fairways are targets to be hit, to miss a fairway should not be such a prohibitive penalty - as is the case at Peninsula - due to the dense and abundant rough and trees.

I wonder whether Shackleford makes international consultations.

Course Maintenance (5)

I note with some despair the condition of bunkers and pathways at Peninsula Country Golf Club. Generally speaking, fairway bunkers have lots of soft sand in them and greenside bunkers are hard, sometimes rock-hard. Also, many of the paths around the courses have an excess of very loose fine sand on them, making them very difficult to push through. Surely, this is all the wrong way around. Paths and fairway bunkers should be hard/firm, and greenside bunkers soft.

Perhaps groundstaff could spend a day moving sand from the paths into greenside bunkers? Of course, I’m being facetious, but it’s yet another example of poor course maintenance at the club. In some places the paths have become almost impassable. Here’s another suggestion. Many players have their umbrellas erected on their buggies, to protect from either rain or sun as the case may be. However, the foliage overhang on some paths make them very difficult to negotiate with umbrella extended. It would only take a couple of hours per month for groundstaff to cut back these overhangs.

President Doug Provis, are you there? Still looking to make Peninsula Country Golf Club one of the “leading private golf Clubs in Australia” and trying to attract new members? Making the courses a bit more pleasant to play would be a good place to start!

The reason for the hard surface in greenside bunkers, but not fairway bunkers is obvious. Unbelievably, we water greenside bunkers! Anyone at the club towards the end of the day will notice that the sprinklers watering both 18^th greens also water the greenside bunkers. Also, you can’t fail to notice puddles in other greenside bunkers even after days on end without rain.

Surely in this day and age, technology exists to enable greenside sprinklers to only water a controllable portion of their 360° arc, thereby avoiding water getting into the bunkers. Either such equipment doesn’t exist (a business opportunity for one of our more entrepreneurial members?), or more likely, a general level of incompetence or indifference exists in the grounds management.

Peninsula rated in Australia’s Top Courses.

Golf Australia released it’s 2012 course ratings in January and our North course was rated number 17 in Australia and the South course 28. I find this somewhat amazing. Do the people making the rating actually visit the courses? Do they not take course condition into account? If they did visit our club, they would have seen greens and bunkers in a disgraceful state, out of control rough, paths that are almost impassable and areas that almost rattle your buggy to bits and are liable to sprain your ankle.

So what exactly is it that, in their view, makes our North course top 20? The layout alone? That’s not what they say.

By contrast, Australian Golf Digest, which claims the high moral ground by not making the “preposterous mistake of allowing its judging panel to be infiltrated, even dominated, by course architects – the very people whose work we’re appraising”, has the North course rated at 30 and the South at 41.

It’s interesting to note their comment about Royal Adelaide having a priority of “fixing” Mike Clayton’s contentious 17^th hole. Hey Mike, I suppose it’s just another example of the “subtlety” of your brilliant design work being “beyond” them.

Anyhow, I have been a great critic of Mike Clayton’s work, but I guess one of the main benefits in paying him a truck load of money is the influence he peddles in these course rating matters.

Membership

A while back I played with a new member who was pretty ignorant of basic golf rules and etiquette. I’m all for people taking up golf, and everyone is a beginner at some time, but surely members should have a basic knowledge of rules and etiquette. I suggest it’s the nominator’s responsibility to ensure the new member has these.

And what is the purpose of the test round that proposed new members go through if it’s not to see that, among other things, they have a basic knowledge of rules and etiquette. I guess that’s not really of interest to the club – the main (only?) qualification that really counts is having a ready ten grand or so to spare.

Course Maintenance (4)

The changes made to 9 South over the New Year period have greatly improved this hole, in my view. If it was me, I would have gone further and reshaped the green somewhat, but that’s just my personal view, and I applaud the changes that were made.

However, where the hell is the forethought and planning at the club? No sooner have the green and surrounds recovered from the work and put back into play, than they decide to re-lay the area in front of the tee! While I again applaud the sentiment of re-laying this area, the timing is appalling. Doesn’t anyone in charge there think it would have been a good idea to do all of this work at the same time? And why only do half the job? Why didn’t they do the area between the men’s tee and the women’s tee?


The inescapable conclusion is that this club is run by morons!

Ground Staff

I have yet to talk to anyone at Peninsula Country Golf Club who thinks the groundstaff do a good job and an honest day’s work. On the rare occasions you see the groundstaff on course, there’s a pretty good chance they will be standing around having a chat and not doing anything of much use.

Without exaggeration, I estimate that at least 20% of the time I see groundstaff they are standing (or sitting) around not doing anything. No one begrudges staff a smoko every now and then, but our guys have taken the smoko to the extreme. I have heard (OK, this is hearsay only, but I can believe it’s true) that amongst other clubs, the level of work done by our staff is considered a joke.

We constantly hear from club management that for an 36 hole course, we have to make do with a relatively small number of groundstaff. Maybe, but if they all did something approaching a fair day’s work, it would be like recruiting an extra 20% of workers.

When they do grace the club with a bit of work, as often as not they stuff it up.

I have mentioned before the regular appearance of workman’s boot prints in bunkers, and tyre tracks left in bunkers. We have also had quite clear machinery damage on a number of greens. On some days, early in the morning, it’s clear from the dew marks on some greens, that mowing staff can’t be bothered mowing the greens right to the edges. And we’ve all seen those painted markings on some fairways saying “do not mow” that are constantly being mowed over.

Again, where’s the supervision, where’s the management, who is taking responsibility, where does the buck stop?

Mike Clayton (Again!)

A little off-topic but nevertheless revealing. I read Mike Clayton’s article “Open is the real business” in Golf Victoria’s December/January magazine.

A good portion of the article is a justification for the changes Mike Clayton made to the 13^th hole at The Lakes course in Sydney. First thing to say is that I find it amazing that Golf Victoria so readily provides Mike Clayton with a forum to make self-serving rationalisations of his own work. The guy’s influence reaches far and wide, it seems.

Mike Clayton admits that the new hole is “despised by more than a few of the members.” His retort is that the hole’s “subtlety” is “beyond” many of the members. Yes, stupid members for not immediately recognising and appreciating the brilliant “subtleties” of design that Mike Clayton has bestowed on your club.

Actually, it’s Mike Clayton who fails to recognise and appreciate the fact that it is the members who are paying his (not inexpensive, I’m sure) fees. There aren’t many areas of business where you can provide something that displeases the people who are paying, yet still receive considerable remuneration. Not to mention the disrespect Mike Clayton has for the members (his employees) by bagging them in a magazine.

Mike, if you owned the course, and payed the fees, then you would be entitled to do whatever you like in your design work. However, as it is, a bit of respect for the members, their wishes and opinions (even if you don’t agree) is the least you could do.

Mike Clayton and conflict of interest.

By now you can tell that I don’t think much of many of the changes Mike Clayton made at Peninsula Country Golf Club. A great number of the changes seem rather pointless to me other than serving as change for change’s sake.

It would be really nice to think that the changes Mike Clayton made were truly for the benefit of the club, and that my disagreeing with them is simply a case of an inferior golfing knowledge on my part (or at least a different point of view). However, the sad thing is that a purely self-interest motivation on Mike Clayton’s part cannot be ruled out.

Mike Clayton, through his Golf Design company was acting as both consultant and contractor to the club. This is a clear conflict of interest.

If you want convincing, consider 4^th and 5^th South as just one example. If Mike Clayton had nothing to gain by changing a short par 5 followed by a long par 4 into a long par 4 followed by a short par 5, then his recommendation to make such a change would be above reproach. However, Mike Clayton the consultant, making this suggestion and convincing the club to proceed resulted in Mike Clayton the contractor making a motza on the actual construction work. Nice work if you can get it!

I find it distressing that the Committee either didn’t see this as a conflict of interest, or chose to ignore it. And from what I’ve seen of how the club runs, I’d bet my own motza that their actions in so doing were overwhelmingly influenced by Gary Richardson, Mike Clayton’s good mate.

Mike Clayton - Conclusion

I will finish up my views on Mike Clayton’s changes with a bit of an overall summary. There’s three points I’d like to make.

First of all, there are too many (one would be too many) cases of tees being too close to the preceding green. Examples of this are 6, 7, 12 South and 3, 8, 9, 14, 17 North.

Sooner or later someone standing on a tee is going to get bonked on the head by someone playing to the adjacent green. I hope the club has good insurance.

Secondly, golf is after all a game, and the purpose of a game is to be enjoyed. After Mike Clayton’s handiwork, there are far too many instances of the course handing the player bad breaks, thereby diminishing the enjoyment of the game. I’m thinking of all the times a well-hit shot can catch a slope and run into trouble.

For example, the tee shot and approach shot on 1 South, the domed shaped green on 2 South with slopes into the bunkers on either side, the runoffs into bunkers on either side of 3 South, and so on. You get my drift.

I’ll finish with a couple quotes from Dr Alister MacKenzie (who designed Augusta National and Royal Melbourne golf courses, just to name two).

“Remember that golf is a game and no player ever gets any fun in searching for lost balls.”

- the thick rough very close to the fairways on both our courses leads to far too much searching for balls.

“Most courses have too many bunkers. They should be constructed from a strategic and not from a penal point of view.”

- way too many penal bunkers, ones that catch good hits.

Finally, I want to discuss what I believe constitutes a conflict of interest for Mike Clayton – stay tuned!

Mike Clayton (11)

15 North.

A very poorly designed hole. With the tee shot, the player needs to avoid the bunker on the LHS of the fairway while avoiding the water hazard on the RHS. The tee shot landing area for the average golfer slopes steeply from left to right into the water hazard. Many a well-struck drive will end up in the hazard if they are just a couple of degrees right of where they are aimed.

This is bad enough, but there is an additional problem. The rise in the fairway prevents the golfer from observing the final resting place of the drive. A tee shot that is well-struck but heading towards the RHS of the fairway will therefore not be observable towards the end of its journey.

I have seen many players who have not found their ball, make the assumption that it must be in the water hazard and take a drop near the hazard. This is incorrect procedure. The Rules of Golf state that in order to take such relief, “it must be known or virtually certain that the ball is in the hazard”.

There is a Decision on what constitutes “known or virtually certain” which you can read for yourself, but it basically says that you need to either have physically seen the ball go into the hazard, or alternatively, there is no place the ball could physically be other than in the hazard.

Neither of these applies to this hole. You can’t see the ball go into the hazard, and it is always possible for the ball to be hidden in the long grass and bushes adjacent to the hazard. Therefore, if you’re a stickler for the rules, the correct procedure is to treat the ball as lost and take a stroke and distance penalty.

This is far too great a penalty for a good drive that was hit only slightly to the right of the required line.

18 North.

Yet another badly designed fairway. I have seen a number of strong drivers hit drives well to the right of the fairway bunker, only to have the ball catch the slope and dribble back down as much as 15m into the bunker. Once again, a good shot is punished by the course.

Mike Clayton (10)

13 North.

Of course, a par 4 as short as this one needs to have some protection and generally speaking, a small tough green is a valid option. However, I have heard it said that even Mike Clayton reckons he made this green too small (when you consider the edges of the green cannot be held with an approach shot). Again, I’ve often seen people putt off the green.

What I’ve heard is that Mike Clayton says if he had his time again, he would have enlarged the green by about a metre or so around the edges. Well, if he reckons he got it wrong, then if he had any integrity at all, he would fix the problem at this own expense. Or at least, not take the fee he was paid for this hole. After all, the club is paying him as a consultant to get these things right, not to stuff things up.

14 North.

Yet another hole which is as much a test of luck as it is a test of golf. Particularly if the pin is located in the RH half of the green, in order for the tee shot to hold the green, it must be hit within a metre of two of the correct distance. Otherwise, if short it will roll down the false front, or if slightly too long, roll down the slope at the back and off the green.

Course Maintenance (3)

Anybody playing at Peninsula in recent weeks will not have failed to notice the disgraceful condition of the greens and bunkers. Is this really the best we can do? Yes, we have had adverse weather conditions recently, but other nearby courses present themselves in much better condition.

The condition of the greens and bunkers would not be up to local public course standard, let alone one of the “leading private golf Clubs in Australia” (I quote from the President’s September letter). To add insult to injury, a number of greens show signs of machinery damage. Workmen on their machines are damaging the greens! Fantastic.

In that letter, Doug Provis, El Presidente of Peninsula asks how we can increase membership. Well, improving the condition of the courses would be a darn good place to start, Doug!

And who takes responsibility for the poor condition of the course? We have a number of people making excuses, but no one taking actual responsibility. Where does the buck stop? The superintendent, the general manager, the committee? It’s got to stop somewhere. All I’ve seen so far is people ducking responsibility.

Mike Clayton (9)

I was very pleased to read that 9 South green shape and surrounds are to be modified in conjunction with its resurfacing. It remains to be seen how good the changes will be, but damn good idea, in this blogger’s view!

Yet again, this shows that Mike Clayton’s opinion is not the be-all and end-all of golf course design, and begs the question about how well our considerable money was spent in his employment.

The story goes (if I’m wrong, please speak up) that at the time of the course “modernisation”, the committee requested Mike Clayton to modify this hole, but he said he thought it was a good design and “refused” to change it. Really! He refused to change it. Any half self-respecting committee would have said change it Mike, or we’ll get someone else. I mean, who’s paying who?

But of course, that didn’t happen. Weak committee at the time, controlled by Gary Richardson, whose friendship with Mike Clayton is a clear conflict of interest. But, has anything changed nowadays?

Mike Clayton (8)

OK, it’s time to start talking about Mike Clayton’s golf course design at Peninsula Country Golf Club again – the North course.

1 North.

My only comment is regarding the pin location board at the first tee. What’s the point of having such a thing if it’s wrong half the time?

3 North.

A very large proportion of second (or third) shots on this hole will find the collection area on the RHS of the fairway about 100m out. Doesn’t matter if you hit a good solid shot straight down the middle or a topped shot down the left or right. Chances are it will end up amongst the diviots in the collection area and you have to have a fair bit of luck to get a clean lie.

Any hole that has such a collection area is badly designed in my view. Again, it means that luck comes into the outcome far too much (with respect to the lie), as well as the fact that the fairway in that area sustains much more than the normal amount of wear and tear.

6 North.

The uphill, flat green makes a difficult approach shot with anything other than a pretty short iron (particularly if the pin is tucked behind the greenside bunker). This means you have to be fairly aggressive with the tee shot if you decide to play to the right of the fairway bunkers, or extremely accurate/lucky if you play to the left.

The landing area to the left of the fairway bunkers is quite small and slopes steeply down into the bunkers. If you drive to the right, the shot must avoid or clear the first fairway bunker and the tree overhang just to the right of the women’s tee. If you achieve both of these then you run the risk of going too far and being stymied by the large tree on the right of the fairway.

Whenever I play this hole, I always feel I need a fair amount of luck as well as hitting good shots to achieve par. I think the hole would be greatly improved if one of the following were done:

- the landing area to the left of the fairway bunkers increased in size and flattened

- the tree overhang near the women’s tee removed

- the first fairway bunker removed

- the large tree on the RH side of the fairway removed.

This would make this hole, again, more a test of golf than a test of luck.

9 North.

I’ve no problem with this hole as such, just worth commenting that the recent changes made to the hole once again support my view that Mike Clayton is not the golf master of the Universe at Peninsula that a number of committee and Gary Richardson would have us believe.

12 North.

In my view, the most difficult hole at the club. The severe ridgeback fairway will severely punish any tee shot or second shot that is even slightly off-line. I have no problem whatsoever with difficult holes, provided they are fair. That is, they reward a good shot and don’t unduly punish shots that are ever so slightly off. I don’t know of anyone who likes this hole and what’s the point of that? It might give Mike Clayton a devious sense of gratification to know that all golfers at the club struggle with this hole, but I would have thought building a good, fair, albeit tough hole would be more in line with good golf course design than a ridiculously unfair one.

Course Maintenance (2)

The recent heavy downpours have lead to problems with the condition of the course that are unavoidable. However, I make the following points.

We have too many bunkers located at the bottom of steeply sloped fairways. Just a couple of examples – fairway bunker on 10 South, fairway bunker on 18 North. These bunkers not only catch too many shots, but get excessively flooded and damaged by water flowing down the slope of the fairway. Nice course design Mike!

Access to the fairway from the tee on 9 North has become impossible without having to walk through ankle deep mud. It is literally impossible to get to the fairway without getting mud in your shoes. If it was me in charge, I would put a priority on putting something in place so members could avoid mud foot. Even just a couple of planks temporarily across the mud would do the trick.

I see they have replaced much of the fairway grass harvested from the left hand side of 18 South. However, they have filled in the area close to the tee and left the far area bare. I mean, fair suck of the sauce bottle, who the hell is in charge? Wouldn’t plain common sense say that it would be better to replace the area where balls actually finish than the area where balls never go?

Bunkers

I have mentioned previously my view of those selfish, inconsiderate members (and guests) who do not rake bunkers. Another bunker problem is the habit of many golfers to leave rakes near the edge of the bunker where, if the rake catches the ball, it leaves an impossible shot stymied by the bunker lip. Both these actions (not raking, leaving rakes near edges) occur all too frequently despite repeated requests from the committee to treat bunkers properly. On any given day, when playing a round I have observed at least 50% of bunkers on the course have either unraked footprints or badly placed rakes or both.

What to do? Well, there is one obvious action that would immediately improve the situation dramatically. Have a policy where rakes are left out of (on a designated spot), rather than in, bunkers. Such a policy would have a number of benefits.

First of all, many golfers who do not rake bunkers do so (I believe) because their ball in the bunker is some considerable distance from the nearest rake in the bunker. This can be as much as 10 or 15 metres. Having to walk this distance to the rake and then rake that 10-15m in addition to raking where you played from is too much of a disincentive for many golfers. This problem would be alleviated if rakes were located to the side of the bunker and players could easily take the rake into the bunker where they enter.

The problem of badly placed rakes in bunkers would also be immediately solved if rakes were placed to the side of the bunker.

I know this has been suggested to the committee, and presumably they’ve considered it. So why don’t we do it?

Well, first of all, the paragon of all things golf at Peninsula Country Golf Club, Mike Clayton, once stated that it was against the rules of golf to leave rakes outside bunkers. This is wrong.

Miscellaneous Decision 2 from the RoG refers to the question “Should rakes be placed in or outside bunkers?”. You can read the decision in full if you want, but in summary it states :

Therefore, after considering all these aspects, it is recommended that rakes should be left outside bunkers in areas where they are least likely to affect the movement of the ball.

Although it does state that ultimately this is a decision for the committee. In any case, leaving rakes outside bunkers is not against the rules as Mike Clayton asserts, or at least used to assert.

Perhaps his error was pointed out to him, as Mike Clayton’s position is now that bunkers are hazards which are meant to be avoided, therefore if a players encounter difficulties with rakes in bunkers it is only just. He also advocates that bunkers should not be raked at all, as they are hazards to be avoided, after all.

Well, yes, hazards are to be avoided, but bunkers are different to water hazards. The game of golf expects players to generally take a drop out of water hazards, but play the ball out of bunkers. Having an impossible lie in a bunker is therefore not in the spirit of golf, in this humble blogger’s view. Also, I’d like to see what Mike Clayton thought of unraked bunkers, or being stymied by badly placed rakes, when he was playing in professional tournaments. I bet he’d be writing a scathing article on the running of that tournament if it was him being affected.

Another reason given for keeping rakes in bunkers, this time by the committee, is that we don’t have enough ground staff to adopt this practice. In other words, this would increase the workload on ground staff undertaking mowing by more than we can afford. Really? What analysis has been done in support of this view, or is it just an excuse to keep the ground staff happily in their seats. (Ground Staff management is an entire topic for discussion another day).

Well, I have done some analysis, and here it is.

There is a total of approximately 127 bunkers on the two courses. (I might be one or two out, but that’s about right). Virtually all bunkers have one or two rakes in them – let’s say an average of 1½ rakes per bunker. That’s a total of about 190 rakes.

Now, I estimate it would take about 20 seconds for a groundsman to get off his mower seat, pick up the rake, mow the area, and then return the rake and remark the painted guide if required. So, for the whole course, that’s an extra 190 x 20 seconds work. That is, about one man-hour per day.

And this assumes that every single rake would be placed in a position that requires daily mowing and that no two bunkers could share a single rake – both of which are not the case.

So, according to club management, we can’t afford less than one additional man-hour of work per day to achieve this substantial benefit to the club and players.

Of course, that’s rubbish. The real reason is that club management (ie. Gary Richardson) wants to stay sweet with the groundstaff who don’t want to trouble themselves with having to get off the seat of their machine.