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BELL CANADIAN OPEN

September 8, 2004

Peter Kinch

OAKVILLE, ONTARIO

PETER KINCH: It's stuff to say what it will mean in terms of getting a playoff, but from a course maintenance perspective we've planned for such an event ahead of time. So I have bunker pumps on site, I can draw additional staff from other pub links golf courses at a moment's notice, in addition to an extremely large staff we have here right now. Squeegee rollers, you name it, anything we can use to help get the golf course ready after a heavy rainfall, we've got it on site.

With respect to getting the players on the golf course, that will be up to the guys in charge. But in terms of getting the course ready, we feel we have all the tools in the case that the inclement weather sets in.

Q. How perfect the weather was in the Canadian Open this year (Inaudible)?

PETER KINCH: We had a great growing season, from over the winter. The golf course came out of the winter wonderfully, and then you couldn't ask for a better growing season. Timely rainfalls, not extraordinarily hot, so everything that your typical holiday er loves and didn't get, we got it, we loved the rainfall, we loved the cool weather, it's good for grass, so that led us to the course conditions we see now with a very green presentation, terrific playing conditions and nice consistent turf.

Q. (Inaudible)?

PETER KINCH: To be honest, with our greens being on a sand base, we can get the green speeds we need even through a season like this relatively easy, just by using the tools we have, the machines we use to cut, the rollers we have, we can get our green speeds even in the case that it's a wet season. We don't fertilize an overly amount, so by having a steady fertility program, even through heavy rainfalls, you can still keep the green speeds.

Q. Is it 10, 10 and a half?

PETER KINCH: It's 11, up to 11 and a half.

Q. How would you like to see the golf course play to protect itself the best? Would it be hard or fast or would it be a little softer, or played a little longer?

PETER KINCH: I guess it can go both ways. You can have hard and fast conditions and have it play difficult, or if we get this rainfall that's closer to two inches all of a sudden you won't get the roll on the fairways and the bunkers will play tougher and the rough will feel longer than it is. If I had my druthers, it would be dryer, just mainly a bunker perspective. We like to have powder bunkers, better for presentation and playability.

When you talk about the difficulty of the golf course and standing up to the players, I keep hearing a lot about the changes that were made with respect to how it's maybe overly difficult. We kind of consider is that a compliment.

Q. I'm wondering if you've got a sense of whether you've got a little more freedom, this is being the 100th anniversary, to do what you can do to protect the course a little bit more than past years where it has been considered another PGA TOUR stop?

PETER KINCH: I think it's mainly with respect to the rough. We were given some flexibility with density and length of rough this year that you wouldn't see on a traditional Tour stop, because they know it's our national championship, it's one we consider our major. So with that flexibility, we've gone to the max, and with the growth we have this week, we expect the rough to get up a little more than it is right now and it's plenty tough right now.

Q. What is the regular PGA TOUR stop?

PETER KINCH: My book says closer to 3 and a half inches. We started advance week at 4 inches, so by the end of this week, with rainfall we had yesterday, with the potential of four, it could get out of control, something closer to 6.

Q. Peter, I'm sure you talked to other superintendents at other Tour stops and we found a different philosophy about course setup at Oak Hill, last year's PGA, we saw a different one last year for the Open. Are you talking to these guys? Are they saying they have more flexibility overall to combat the advances in club and ball technology?

PETER KINCH: Absolutely, and that's not just yardage and rough, it's pin placement. So in the past, the TOUR would use something like four strides from the edge of the green as the minimum you want to take a pin to the edge of the green. Now, technology, playability, you're looking at more like three strides from the edge of the green. Something they wouldn't have looked at 10 years ago, they're now looking at. It very much plays a part in keeping up with technology and how a course plays.

Q. Bob Tway was just in here and he was talking about how he wishes, rather than just moving tee boxes back a little bit further, that people and venues would look more at doing things with contours of fairways and perhaps narrowing them, and you illustrated the point of growing the rough a little higher. I'm just wondering your response to sort of his insinuation that there's just more than one way to toughen a golf course?

PETER KINCH: We totally agree, and we knew that going into the renovation, and that's why we narrowed all the par 4s and 5s on the golf course down to in the landing area for the pros, closer to 26 yards. So for your daily player you've still got that width, you have that playability, but if you go out and measure what we have on the golf course and the planned landing area for the pros, it's closer to 26 yards. So we actively went out, resodded and brought those fairway lines in last fall, with the exception of 17; we didn't touch it. There's enough bunkers there to take care of it.

In addition, a new bunker on 16 and 18, and we feel we did some things other than just building the tee as far back as we could, we looked at all the aspects that could toughen up the property while being fair, in addition to dropping the bail out, that bank grass area behind the 13th green was lowered two feet, so finding other ways to make creative shots instead of just pushing all the tees back.

Q. How do you spell your last name?

PETER KINCH: K I N C H.

Q. I know the weather will be a factor, can you give me some insight what the winning score will be?

PETER KINCH: I've been asked that one a few times. I think you asked me earlier in the season about that one. I can't say what the winning score will be, but the way I've seen the players hit the ball around the last couple of days, the practice round, the Pro Am that's out there right now, I like what I'm seeing. I think the course is holding its own and it's playing fair, and from what I saw with the holes we changed, guys are still hitting the par 5s in two, they're hitting 16 in two, for the majority, and we can play with those tee blocks a little bit, so we're just hoping we're protecting that minus 22 that we saw in 2000 and that the course stands up to a solid number.

MODERATOR: Thank you, Peter, for coming in.

In closing, I just have one introduction. Terry, she's the managing director of membership services of the RCGA, and she would like to make a presentation to Glen Abbey and Peter, as well.

[] TERRY: The Autoban Cooperative Sanctuary Program for golf courses is an educational program that provides golf course owners, managers and superintendents with information to enhance wildlife habitat and protect natural resources. The golf course starts the process by first registering with Autoban International in New York state, then an environmental plan.

And once this environmental plan has been approved by the organization, you can embark upon a certification process. And that's done by applying for and implementing some things on your golf course to receive certification in five different areas: Their wildlife habitat management; chemical use reduction and safety; water conservation; water quality management; and outreach in education.

On behalf on the Royal Canadian Golf Association and past president of the Autoban Cooperative System of Canada, I'm pleased to present this blue bird print to Peter Kinch and congratulate him and his staff on their hard work to become fully qualified for wildlife, a whole different perspective on a golf course.

I would also like to acknowledge the Pub Link Corporation of their support of their staff in environmental stewardship.

Peter, congratulations.

Do you have any questions about the program or anything specifically that Peter has done on the property, we would be happy to entertain those now.

Q. How many different varieties of animals and stuff have we got there? I know I've seen herons. What have you got out there?

PETER KINCH: The Autoban is making a list of all the wildlife you have on the property, all the vegetation, trees, shrubs, flowers, grasses, you name it. And it's a long, long list. It takes a couple of years to finalize that list of all the wildlife and grasses and trees that you have on the property. So everything from fox, coyote, dear, we've got three resident deer that are here every day, great blue herons you've seen, terns, a lot of great unique wildlife. The list is long.

[] TERRY: In fact, there are 26 nesting different species that actually nest on this property, and quite a few migratory species that pass through and use it as a significant corridor.

Q. What kind of day to day maintenance are you going to be doing over the next few days on the course?

TERRY [] are there any other questions about the wildlife on the property and what they've done here with the Autoban program?

PETER KINCH: Getting back to the golf course, our maintenance regime include double cutting the greens in the morning, and getting the bunkers prepared and filling the divots, so the morning duties are relative limited , it's the evening duties that take up most of our time. So after play is when we cut fairways, cut tees, cut the greens again, roll them.

So the majority of our duties in preparation for the next day take place in the evening. And then in the mornings we're just fine tuning, changing the holes, getting the bunkers ready for that day's play. That tends to be our regime on a daily basis right through the tournament. Our advanced week before the tournament starts is when my staff has the golf course to themselves and we did a lot that week, long hours, big days in preparation for the event, whereas this week it's just a matter of cutting the grass, changing the holes and getting ready for the golfers.

Q. (Inaudible)?

PETER KINCH: All the bunkers in Glen Abbey this week are hand raked. We have 90 bunkers on the golf course, they are very large bunkers, so we actually go in there and hand rake everything. It's a huge undertaking, and it just gives a great look to the property, the playability is wonderful. It's raking every grain of sand every day in preparation for play, and it's smoothing the surfaces and ensuring you don't get balls burying in the sand, so we're doing that every day.

Q. (Inaudible)?

PETER KINCH: Using a rake, a special golf course bunker rake to rake the sand, and that's very much a spec rake for the conditions you're looking for, hand rake.

End of FastScripts.

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