August 2009
U.S. Amateur and U.S. Open Championship Preparations
By David Wienecke

Chambers Bay welcomes August with our latest installment in the series on championship preparations and course conditions leading up to our hosting of the 2010 U.S. Amateur Championship August 23-23, 2010.

Why sand topdressing?
The simple answer is that light applications of sand are done because links courses provide firm, smooth playing conditions when sand is incorporated into the turf throughout the year.  Over the many years since golf began on the links courses of Scotland and Ireland, greenkeepers have seen the result of nature's windy conditions blowing over sand dunes in the ocean-bordering links land.  The windblown sand lightly covers the turf throughout the year resulting in firm smooth turf and outstanding ball roll and playing conditions.  Another result of the windy links land conditions are that the holes created by sheep burrowing into the dunes to escape the wind that became bunkers on the golf course.  Golf course architects have adopted the burrowed sheep hole concept into their course design, and the resulting bunkers are some of the most famous in the game.  In keeping with the sandy links land concept, Chambers Bay has twice as much sand, found in dunes and bunkers, than mowed turf.  The light, frequent sand topdressing done at Chambers Bay maintains high quality fine fescue links turf for golfers throughout the year and is also an integral part of our championship preparations.

Green approaches and surrounds
Over the last two weeks the Turf Care crew has cultivated and topdressed the approaches and surrounds of all greens at Chambers Bay.  From this point forward, the putting surfaces and green approaches and surrounds will be treated as one integrated piece for rolling and sand topdressing.  Golfers will see the results of these procedures in the form of dramatically increased ball roll throughout the rolling dune landscape of the entire green complexes.  Between now and August 2010, we will be actively applying sand to greens, approaches and surrounds, and fairways to achieve and maintain optimal links turf conditions.

What has been the impact of the high temperatures and dry weather on the fine fescue turf this summer? 
For most of us in the golf turf acre business, summer is a time of heat and drought concern, with superintendents counting the days until the cool autumn temperatures return to relieve us of the stresses of summer.  Our experience at Chambers Bay is very different from the normal stresses of summer golf turf management.  We find fine fescue to be an amazingly drought and heat tolerant grass.  Summer is the season when we can stress Poa Annua with hot, dry conditions with deep and infrequent irrigation.  The dry conditions also make sand topdressing easier to incorporate in the turf.  Golfers benefit from these conditions by seeing incredible ball bounces and rolls on the firm, dry links turf.  The tolerance to heat and dryness also result in fine fescue being a very water-thrifty grass, requiring less water than other cool season turf species.  The simple answer to the question "How are we handling the record setting temperatures?" is to say that Chambers Bay is in the best condition it has ever been.

For more information and volunteer opportunities, visit the 2010 U.S. Amateur Championship website at www.2010usamateur.com.