Ohio Golf Journal October 2017

Chad Mark, created a list of items that needed to be addressed to make Inverness relevant in today’s Hi-Tech golf world. They also laid out a systemized attack to solve these problems. The first step was the total reseeding of the course a few years ago. Most of the grass that was on Inverness was the original seeding from over 100 years ago. It had to be replaced with newer, more hardy and playable grasses. When Head Greens Superin- tendent Chad Mark left Inverness in February to take the same position at Muirfield Village, Inverness hired, John Zimmers, one of the most respected superintendents in the country. Zimmers had spent 18 years at Oakmont and has extensive experience preparing golf courses for USGA championships. He oversaw Oakmont for both the 2007 and 2016 U.S. Opens, plus the 2010 U.S. Women’s Open and 2003 U.S. Amateur. When Inverness began the search for the right person to take on the solemn duty of, not only maintaining the Ross legacy, but renovating the course to accommodate today’s 350-yard drives and modern technology, one interview stood out from the others. Andrew Green is a relatively new name in a deep field of golf course architects that includes, Tom Doak, Gil Hanse, Bill Coore & Ben Crenshaw, Tom Fazio and more. How could he compete against the big boys? Green has paid his dues in the golf design industry. He worked for 14 years digging in the dirt and becoming a lead designer for McDonald & Sons, one of the foremost golf course design and construction firms in the world. He recently completed a renovation of Oak Hill in Rochester, New York that has received rave reviews among golf purists. Oak Hill Iconic Inverness is GettingaFacelift The Inverness Club has been the site of four U.S. Opens and two PGA Championships. Legendary names such as, Ted Ray, Dick Mayer, Billy Burke, Hale Irwin, Bob Tway and Paul Azinger all hoisted major trophies at Inverness. Ray had to beat Harry Vardon in 1920 while the great Bobby Jones played in his first U.S. Open at Inverness the same year. Ohio’s own Jack Nicklaus made his inaugural U.S. Open appearance in 1957 here. However, the last major championship was held 24 years ago, completely missing the Tiger Woods era. More recently two U.S. Senior Opens, 2003 and 2011 have been held in Toledo, but the USGA and the PGA of America have not been interested in awarding a new championship due to thecurrent configuration of the golf course. Something had to be done to attract amajor golf tournament to one of the most iconic golf courses in the country. When the current Head Professional at Inverness, Derek Brody arrived in Toledo five years ago, he felt a “Master Plan” needed to be created to accomplish the work necessary to bring the historic Donald Ross course up to date. As all of us get older, we need to update, occasionally. That was the case with Inverness. Brody, along with club President, Steve Mitchell, General Manager Joe Furko, and theGreensSuperintendent Ohio Golf Journal Ohio Golf Journal