One of my biggest complaints about golf courses is the way that many of them try to pull the wool over my fellow golfers when it comes to aeration/punching or other goings-on that might otherwise dissuade one from wanting to play a course.  I’ve long said (before I started this blog) that courses should publicize any aeration or partial closures (i.e. temp greens, temp tee boxes, etc.) and let an informed customer make the decision.  Golfers will respect this; where you lose people is when you have the starter tell them what’s going on, and you send people off in a frustrated mood.

Last Saturday (5/17) I played Northwest Park; as I’m want to do I made my tee time in advance, and if you remember (if you live in this area) it started raining.  And raining. And holy crap Sweet Baby Ray did it rain.  So I came home after work on Friday, and Northwest Park had left me a voice-mail letting me know that the back nine had flooded out, and they were using the front nine and the “inside” nine as the second nine, and were offering a reduced rate due to the closure.

On the day, the guy in the pro shop, and the starter, could not have been nicer.  The starter was adamant that it was cart path only (understood, and I also understand he’s doing his job) but otherwise was quite pleasant.  He explained the problem holes (13 and 16) and was quite polite about it.

Here’s the thing- everyone in my group was okay with it.  We understand that you can’t control the weather. But you can control how you react to it.  That phone call was a great example in how to handle a difficult situation.

Take note course operators.  This is how you handle things like this. And well done Northwest Park and Montgomery County Golf.

Now…if we can just talk about your damn speed cameras…