Golf
- shirsh33
- Jun 10, 2024
- 4 min read
Updated: Jan 2
Driving Range Privileges
Prior to 2021 the driving range could be accessed by Social or Community Members when they purchased a bag of balls from the Pro Shop.
With the onset of Covid, the thought was less people would be using amenities, such as the driving range. Therefore, the Club chose to offer free golf balls to Social and Community Members in 2021 and has continued with the practice today.
Free golf balls are not currently, nor ever have been, a part of a signed contract when joining the Club. Through the years the Joining Summary has changed with growth of the Club and demands of Membership. As is the case with all Clubs, amenities described in Joining Summaries are not guaranteed indefinitely. Clubs need to balance Members's needs with membership levels. The Club has always had the ability to make changes to amenity usage to meet Member’s needs. Without the flexibility to make amenity use changes, the Club would have no other choice but to make changes to the dues or fees to impact usage.
Reasons
Capacity: There are more and more times the range is very crowded. We realize this is not every day. However, capacity is more than just what we see.
Seabrook Island Club has recently hired a new Director of Player Development, Andrea Grier. She, along with our Head Golf Pro, Brian Theland, and four other teaching pros, Randy Murray, Marc Skowronek, Aaron McClelland, and AJ Schneller, will offer schools, clinics, and lessons. Many of these will be during morning hours, especially in the warmer months. This is in direct response to members' requests.
Our teaching pros utilize the range and practice areas for private lessons. These lessons are a part of their livelihood and are arranged according to free practice areas.
Agronomy: The driving range is a living entity. It needs care, growth, and rest. Capacity isn’t only how many spaces are available each hour. Capacity is also how much use the range is capable of taking each day and still be able to regenerate and survive. **Please see the information supplied by Sean Hardwick, Director of Agronomy
Membership: The Club’s Full and Golf Members have the privilege to utilize the driving range when they choose.
The Board has listened to our golfing staff, Director of Agronomy, and Members and made the following decision. For 2024, the Club has decided to limit access to the driving range to 1:00 PM for membership levels, other than Full/Golf. Members at all levels will continue to have access to the driving range throughout the day 30 minutes prior to any tee time or lesson.
The club needs the flexibility to make small changes to amenity usage to better reflect usage by each membership level.
From Sean Hardwick, Director of Agronomy, on Driving Range Care:
Our range is 45,000 square feet or just slightly over an acre. An older, commonly used USGA formula is the ideal range area size, which is 1000 square feet of tee surface for every 1000 rounds of golf played on your courses. With that formula in mind, we played 65,900 rounds of golf this year, which would translate to being undersized by at least 20,900 square feet. However, the USGA is now recommending at least 2 acres of teeing surface to be able to handle the regular warm-ups but especially the increased practice that we see in golf. We are at least a solid acre undersized for the amount of use we have.
The key is to be able to move traffic as much as possible in order to spread out the divots. This is accomplished by rotating where the hitting locations, or stands, are located. Currently, the range staff starts with the stands up front and spreads 22 stands across the range at a safe distance. We ask them to move them 3 yards back the next day from the previous position in the same line, and so on, until players are hitting off the mats. We fertilize, fill divots, mow, and care for the range weekly, and even then, it takes a herculean effort to keep grass on it with the amount of play we have.
What are our other challenges to optimal range health? In my opinion and experience, the trend in the number of free golf balls available has created much of a challenge since someone can stay at a spot and hit an unlimited number of golf balls, removing most, if not all, of the grass in the process. Obviously, the lack of range size is also a contributing factor to the poor quality of the turf, especially during the winter season when underlying Bermuda is dormant and the seeded rye is slower to fill in. Lastly, golfer habits are the last contributing factor. Players that hit lines of divots leave ample areas in between the lines to help fill in the resultant divots.
Security Numbers:
In the event that you need immediate security assistance around the golf course during normal business hours, please call the Golf Pro Shop to report any misconduct.
If you need to report an incident anytime between 6 – 8 pm, please reach out to our dedicated security team at 843.906.6280.