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POPPY HILL GOLF COURSE MEDIA CONFERENCEMarch 20, 2014Bruce CharltonAmanda EvansRobert Trent JonesMitch JuricichScott SewardBrad ShupeSCOTT SEWARD:ﾃつ Thank you for being here.ﾃつ I'm Scott Seward, the director of communications for the Northern California Golf Association.ﾃつ This is a day we've looked forward to for a long time.ﾃつ Everything inside this clubhouse is new.ﾃつ It's a tremendous achievement we believe.ﾃつ We are ready to rejoin our colleagues here in what we like to call golf's greatest ZIP code.ﾃつ It is a tremendous moment for us.ﾃつ We really appreciate you being here to join in the celebration. I want to make a couple introductions, and then we'll have more to say later on. Joining us here on stage are two of the three members of the design team from the Robert Trent Jones, Jr. design firms.ﾃつ We have Robert Trent Jones, Jr., his chief design officer Bruce Charlton, and in the audience is Mike Gorman.ﾃつ We have one other gentleman to introduce that's going to be up to joining us here in a second.ﾃつ But two people in the audience I want to acknowledge, our leadership, the president of the Northern California Golf Association Mr. Brian Morse and the chairman of the Poppy Holding Board, our for-profit organization, Derrell Biddy. One person to bring up on the stage is our general manager of Poppy Holding -- Mr. Brad Shupe.ﾃつ Brad is a PGA member; he came to us late last year. I'm going to turn it over to our emcee for today's ceremony, Mitch Juricich. MITCH JURICICH:ﾃつ It's nice to see all of you here.ﾃつ I'm just looking around, two words come to mind: great anticipation.ﾃつ Behind us, take a look at that, just from what we're seeing from here.ﾃつ Then if you look to your left, with despair, I don't see any (indiscernible) over there.ﾃつ There will be some this afternoon, all right (laughter). How many people were here in 1986 for the grand opening?ﾃつ Do you remember the day?ﾃつ I remember, as part of the media, they put us in the cart and gave us four packages of poppy seeds with a map of the golf course -- thinking that the media could read a map -- with instructions on how to plant them.ﾃつ Tear them open, put them on the worst dirt you could find, and step on them.ﾃつ It didn't work. I think the birds had something to do with it. Also on that day they gave us one of these cool little things right here that I kept.ﾃつ It says inside that it is good for one free round of golf, signed by Paul Pugh.ﾃつ Is this still good?ﾃつ (Pugh says yes from the audience.) What the hell do you care, you're gone, right (laughter)? ﾃつIt's good today, yeah. Before we throw this open for questions, I'm going to do the first one.ﾃつ I'm going to go to Bob Jones. Bob, talk about the experience of this golf course as it relates to all of the neighbors that you've got here.ﾃつ There's some fantastic neighbors. ROBERT TRENT JONES, JR.:ﾃつ Mitch is tough.ﾃつ He likes to throw hardballs. First of all, as Scott said, I believe that Pebble Beach and its environs is the best golf ZIP code in America.ﾃつ I have had the privilege of working throughout our nation and the whole world for that matter.ﾃつ This is the greatest place for golf.ﾃつ It's where the greatest golf art has been created by masters of other times.ﾃつ We're in great company.ﾃつ So we as artists had to pay up.ﾃつ We got the second chance to come back and refresh and renew the course. I think all these courses are great and we're happy to be among them. MITCH JURICICH:ﾃつ You told me earlier today, redoing something you did earlier is like what? ROBERT JONES:ﾃつ I forget. MITCH JURICICH:ﾃつ Renewing your vows.ﾃつ It's right here in the script, Bob (laughter). ROBERT JONES:ﾃつ All right.ﾃつ See, I'm getting Alzheimer's. MITCH JURICICH:ﾃつ We'll throw another one over to Bruce to soften things up here. Sand was one of the big factors here.ﾃつ What else were the big plans when you redid this?ﾃつ Just standing here for these few holes, I can see immense changes. BRUCE CHARLTON:ﾃつ I think the project was born out of a water conservation concept.ﾃつ Poppy Hills was looking at totally changing the irrigation system, looking at some of the newer technologies out there.ﾃつ We took it and basically analyzed the existing course with the Toro Company as a series of mapping techniques they use to analyze existing golf courses. We looked at that.ﾃつ I think two gentlemen from Toro, John Lawrence and David Angier are here today. They were invaluable in helping us analyze the water aspect of this golf course. Bottom line was to try to reduce the amount of water that we irrigate on this golf course.ﾃつ We reduced it by 20 acres.ﾃつ By doing that, we actually made things wider, but we have a lot of areas that are more naturalized, tie into the natural beauty of the forest, make the forest feel like it embraces the golf course, feel the forest more, yet creating wider playing spaces.ﾃつ It was all about water conservation. MITCH JURICICH:ﾃつ I'm guessing with those pants, problem with the Maytag at home? BRUCE CHARLTON:ﾃつ My wife says I dress in the dark (laughter). MITCH JURICICH:ﾃつ By God, she's right (laughter). Brad ... firm, fast, fun.ﾃつ Talk about that in terms of the experience that the NCGA members are going to enjoy here and from an operational standpoint. BRAD SHUPE:ﾃつ We're thrilled to provide an asset for the 150,000 members.ﾃつ We believe this golf course, it has 60 acres of fairway.ﾃつ That number may not mean something to everybody, but a typical golf course is 15, 20 acres, it's an unbelievable opportunity to keep your ball in play, find your ball, keep golf fun. I think we all need to keep golf fun. Something important to keep growing the game. It's unbelievable what these two gentlemen have done, look you to get your ball on the ground, play golf on the ground.ﾃつ Aerial golf has been the American style of golf, but there's seven or eight holes where how you access the green is get the ball on the ground and use the natural slope to feed your ball onto the green.ﾃつ It's just a testament to their vision and then Frontier's ability to build the golf course, how they envisioned it. MITCH JURICICH:ﾃつ I have a deal with R.J. Harper at the back there.ﾃつ I have a standing tee time at 10:00 at night.ﾃつ Can I get the same tee time here, would that be all right? BRAD SHUPE:ﾃつ Yes (laughter). MITCH JURICICH:ﾃつ Who wants to play with me (laughter)?ﾃつ I have a hand back there.ﾃつ Oh, she's taking a picture. BRAD SHUPE:ﾃつ That's my wife Julie.ﾃつ She moved up here with me.ﾃつ Spent our whole life in Southern California, but we're thrilled to be part of the Northern California family. MITCH JURICICH:ﾃつ You're not a Dodger fan, are you? BRAD SHUPE:ﾃつ I am. (audience boos) MITCH JURICICH:ﾃつ I didn't mean for that to happen.ﾃつ That's okay, we'll talk slower (laughter). We're going to open this up for questions.ﾃつ I know there must be a bunch of them out there.ﾃつ Tell us who you want to answer your question. Q.ﾃつ Where does the name Poppy come from? ROBERT JONES:ﾃつ I think we now bow to our friends of the NCGA.ﾃつ The name is the state flower, poppies.ﾃつ Fran Watson Sr. told us they adopted that in the beginning of their association, 1901, Poppy Hills. I hope I'm saying that more or less correctly. MITCH JURICICH:ﾃつ There was a big contest, for those of you who couldn't hear that, and Poppy Hills won out. Q.ﾃつ Since you redesigned the course, do you think there's a signature hole and which one? ROBERT JONES:ﾃつ My dad and I were in Brussels doing a golf course.ﾃつ Went into the museum.ﾃつ He wasn't a fine-art lover.ﾃつ He saw this painting.ﾃつ Oh, that's a signed painting.ﾃつ It was a Rubens.ﾃつ What does that mean?ﾃつ It's more valuable because it was done by the master. He came back and created an ad that said ﾃや徃ive your course a signature designed by Robert Trent Jones.ﾃや敕つ Thus the entire marketing idea comes out of fine art through Spyglass Hill. Q.ﾃつ Do you have a favorite hole here? ROBERT JONES:ﾃつ My favorite is where I make par.ﾃつ There's many holes.ﾃつ I think No.11 is a new golf hole.ﾃつ I think that No.9, which Bruce was primarily responsible for, plays down, used to play up.ﾃつ Now No.10 plays up, used to play down.ﾃつ There's a lot of change in rhythm. I think it's up to you to find your favorites.ﾃつ I like the rhythm of the whole course.ﾃつ I think the opening at Spyglass Hill is like Beethoven's Fifth.ﾃつ This is more like Rhapsody in Blue with that long siren clarinet solo.ﾃつ It's going to seduce you into the golf course and then you're going to find your work cut out for you in the first five holes. Q.ﾃつ (No microphone.) ROBERT TRENT JONES, JR.:ﾃつ Again, I'm going to be very brief.ﾃつ But history.ﾃつ The golf course property was sold in the late '70s at the time when the Coastal Commission prohibited any development here.ﾃつ Under the Act they could have recreation.ﾃつ That was why they did that. The original routing was made by George Fazio.ﾃつ That became the perimeter of the property which was sold.ﾃつ Unbeknownst to both the parties, part of the Cypress Grove was in that property. After they decided to actually build it and they would have a contest who would design it, we were fortunate and grateful to get that opportunity.ﾃつ We had to reroute the course to our liking and get out of the Cypress trees, environmentally sensitive area.ﾃつ Thus we made that sharp dogleg which was a forced thing. Another thing.ﾃつ Chuck, correct me if I'm wrong, I think the board at that time, and Paul, wanted a par 72.ﾃつ We had to find a way to make 18 and 12 par 5s because we had five Par‑3s.ﾃつ From my point of view, par is irrelevant.ﾃつ Now we get rid of the awkwardness and No.12 is the beauty place.ﾃつ You can see across Monterey Bay, and see where that other architect, MacKenzie, used to live. Q.ﾃつ What kind of golfer are you trying to attract with this redesign? BRAD SHUPE:ﾃつ The number one thing we want to do is simply making golf fun.ﾃつ We truly are here to create a special place for the NCGA members to enjoy the game of golf. ﾃつThat has been the number one thing we're here to do. We think that they've done a great job of making golf where you can find your golf ball.ﾃつ We have a wide variety of tees that allow you to play the right yardage. But then the uniqueness, what these two experts have done, there's a few expert golfers in the room, they're going to really see it today, there's some amazing design features for the scratch or better‑than‑scratch player to delight them, as well. It's beautiful.ﾃつ It's fun.ﾃつ It's still going to be challenging.ﾃつ We're really looking forward to having great amateur tournaments here in the future. BRUCE CHARLTON:ﾃつ One of the things I think I've really enjoyed in doing the recrafting of Poppy Hills is understanding what the NCGA is all about, how popular this golf course is with their members.ﾃつ The average handicap of the NCGA member is 18 or slightly above that.ﾃつ So one of the things I've learned, Bobby has taught me over the years, is as golfers age they don't hit the ball as far.ﾃつ That's obvious.ﾃつ But their short game usually doesn't go away. One of the things we've really tried to accomplish here at Poppy is really make a player that has great imagination around the green surfaces, bring that player to the forefront and let him or her have the ability to score really, really well.ﾃつ It may take one more shot to get there, but if they're crafty, got good skills around the greens, they're going to love it. MITCH JURICICH:ﾃつ You don't hit the ball as far as you get older. ROBERT TRENT JONES JR.:ﾃつ But where there's a wedge, there's a way. Q.ﾃつ Brad, tell us how Poppy Hills works regarding kids. BRAD SHUPE:ﾃつ It's interesting.ﾃつ My passion is running golf courses.ﾃつ I served two country club memberships in the past.ﾃつ The first thing that struck me when I got here, through this foundation and this program called Youth on Course, it's the most amazing thing I've ever really been a part of.ﾃつ They made golf accessible for kids. Any child can join Youth on Course, which is a values‑ and golf‑based program, and play virtually any daily fee golf course in Northern California for $5.ﾃつ We've had tremendous success from a lot of these people in the room supporting that to allow that to happen. That's just the tip of the iceberg.ﾃつ We're bringing back caddie programs at country clubs.ﾃつ It's not so this privileged person can have a caddie.ﾃつ We're bringing caddie programs back where the foundation pays the child $25.ﾃつ The golfer doesn't pay the caddie. What we want is that mentorship, which is what we all look back to.ﾃつ Those of us that remember caddie programs, these kids, young adults, learn from these people.ﾃつ They make relationships that stick with them for the rest of their lives. We're getting them on course, exposed to people in country clubs.ﾃつ We're starting internships to get these kids, as they get old enough, to get into the workforce and be exposed to people and learn from them.ﾃつ We've got scholarships to help get these kids into colleges and allow them to afford it. That program, going from serving 475 well‑to‑do families, to be able to serve the youth of the game, has been an unbelievable experience for myself and my family. MITCH JURICICH:ﾃつ Excuse the shameless plug, but it's one thing to get a kid hooked on golf, but we can't turn them loose and have to pay $75, $80, $100 green fees. This is great. Q.ﾃつ Bobby, what did you do right the first time and why did you change it and for what reason? ROBERT TRENT JONES, JR.:ﾃつ First of all, we're very grateful to the NCGA, the Poppy Holding Board for choosing us to do it the first time.ﾃつ I am a proud member of this golf association, played in the amateur in the old days, Spyglass Hill.ﾃつ It's the most progressive golf association in the United States, bar none, including the USGA.ﾃつ Spyglass Hill, founded by its members during the Vietnam War, not an easy time to raise money for golf.ﾃつ It was the first to have many of its programs such as the handicap system, now Youth on Golf.ﾃつ You are by far the most progressive golf association, and I've worked with many of them.ﾃつ We're very grateful to be a part of it. What we did originally was the money was raised.ﾃつ Paul, you were handling the money in those days being the accountant, the good one that he is.ﾃつ It was very strict.ﾃつ They had to raise money by the handicap system over a period of about seven years, as I recall.ﾃつ It was a budget, very strict. To give you an historical perspective.ﾃつ Spyglass Hill was also designed on a budget.ﾃつ The entire golf course was built for under $500,000 in 1965. Fast forward to Poppy Hills.ﾃつ It was built for about $2.5 million.ﾃつ Inflation, yes, but also environmental laws changed. Now we come forward to the next iteration.ﾃつ I don't know the numbers. But the point is that we've now been able to do those things, which we couldn't maybe do under the budget well, particularly drainage, sand capping, those kinds of things.ﾃつ We got it right the first time.ﾃつ Obviously it held many championships, including the NCAA in 1991, then the AT&T, as well as its own NCGA championships.ﾃつ It was a very good golf course. You're going to make the judgment after you play it.ﾃつ In my humble opinion, I am proud as well, it is now a great golf course.ﾃつ You'll see for yourselves. Q.ﾃつ Talk about mapping and water. BRUCE CHARLTON:ﾃつ Basically the Toro Company has a product called Precision Sense Mapping System.ﾃつ It maps slope, sun aspect, soil salinity, soil moisture, off the top of my head.ﾃつ They created a map of the existing golf course.ﾃつ Basically what that did is it showed us where we had drainage problems and where we had hotspots, where it was always dry.ﾃつ We were able then to incorporate those thoughts into the redesign mostly of how we're handling water once it hits the ground.ﾃつ That was an extremely useful tool, something that we didn't have on any other project, for example, before. It allowed us to use some technology and also when we used that technology, we also applied that to the golf shots.ﾃつ Simple, wherever water goes, the golf ball follows.ﾃつ That gravity thing going on.ﾃつ We utilized that thought process of getting water off the golf course and also helping the golfer with the way their ball will feed into prime positions and fairways. MITCH JURICICH:ﾃつ It's my pleasure to introduce Amanda Evans, director of sponsorship and marketing for the Monterey Peninsula Foundation.ﾃつ She has an exciting announcement to make. AMANDA EVANS:ﾃつ It's a pleasure to be here at the grand reopening of this fantastic course.ﾃつ I haven't been here for a number of years.ﾃつ I'm here today with Chris Richmond from Nature Valley and Dan Walker from the Champions Tour, and together we're very pleased to announce that Poppy Hills will be joining Pebble Beach as host course for the 2014 Nature Valley First Tee Open. The tournament benefits The First Tee, which is an organization whose mission is philosophically in step with the NCGA Youth on Course program, making it a great fit between the tournament and this course.ﾃつ We're looking forward to seeing the Champions Tour players and the juniors competing here in September. There will be an official release but we wanted you to be the first to know.ﾃつ We'll be available for questions after.ﾃつ Thank you very much and enjoy the rest of your day at Poppy Hills. MITCH JURICICH:ﾃつ All right.ﾃつ Bob Jones wants to make one more comment. ROBERT JONES:ﾃつ Everything living is created by Mother Nature and Father Time.ﾃつ Their gifts to us are life, death and transfiguration.ﾃつ Today is the first day of spring.ﾃつ Poppy Hills is renewed.ﾃつ Let's enjoy life. MITCH JURICICH:ﾃつ Very nice. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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