Newport Beach Country Club Magazine: Winter 2020
Adam | Photo by Dondee Quincena
Instructor Q&A
All Fore Fitness
Whether you’re holding weights or a golf club, Adam speaks to the importance of maintaining a regular exercise routine on and off the course
Adam has firsthand experience with the benefits golfers will see upon implementing a fitness regimen. When he first started playing golf, he didn’t think the two were connected, but everything changed six years ago, when he broke his neck surfing.
“From that point on, it became more of a personal life choice to become stronger and fitter,” Adam says of the accident. “I really started getting into fitness about two years ago. My back was hurting so much and I couldn’t handle it anymore. I’d play one round of golf and then I would be out.” What started as a once-a-week gym visit quickly evolved into an almost daily routine. “What I’ve seen is not only do I feel better, but just being active and conditioning and some strength training has actually allowed me to become more consistent and I’ve hit the ball farther,” he explains, noting that, if members would like to follow this path, the on-site fitness instructors and golf pros are available to help bridge the gap between their domains. Here, Newport Beach Country Club Magazine sits down with Adam to discuss this intersection of golf and fitness.
Newport Beach Country Club Magazine: What level of fitness should golfers be maintaining?
Adam: It doesn’t have to be an extremely high level of fitness like some of these TOUR pros or athletes, but if you’re able to maintain any level, you’re going to be able to play golf longer and not get hurt; you won’t have injuries as often as just that person who comes out, doesn’t stretch or warm up, just goes on the course and then goes, “Aww, my back hurts.”
If you’re having certain issues on the golf course, whether it’s getting tired or your body hurts or something, there are things you can do off the course to make sure it isn’t happening as often.
NBCCM: How have you seen clients improve after they start incorporating fitness into their routines?
AB: Going through this fitness journey, your legs get stronger, your core gets stronger and your overall being gets stronger and then all of a sudden you start realizing, “Well now I’m hitting the ball farther than I thought I could have.” So there’s a direct relationship with not only strength and power, but consistency. If I feel better, if my body is warmed up and used to this kind of movement, then I can repeat that movement, I can be more stable, I can make the same consistent swing, so I’ve linked it to power, consistency and just feeling better throughout the entire round.
Photo by Dondee Quincena
NBCCM: What types of exercises do you recommend to your clients?
AB: It depends on their fitness level. If someone is getting tired and fatigued, it could be a balance of some sort of conditioning, such as using your off day to walk 4 or 5 miles (because that’s the length of an average golf course). If you up that energy level and you can jog or you can run, that’s a great way to just get back into it.
If somebody’s never picked up a weight in their life, we’re going to do simple exercises—we might just do basic squats without any weights. Somebody that’s a little more advanced, we might add some weights. And all of the people in the gym here can help with that.
NBCCM: Which areas of the body should golfers be focusing on?
AB: I would say the three main areas that you would want to work on, as a golfer, would be your upper body. thoracic spine, your core and then your legs and your glutes. So, basically, your hips and butt up to mid-chest, because that’s where all this stability and strength has to come from. Then your arms and everything else should follow. I teach in a very similar way; if we can train the bigger muscles in your body to hit the golf ball, you’re going to be more consistent, you’re not going to hurt as much and you might hit the ball farther, too.
NBCCM: Aside from strength training, are there any other aspects of fitness that a golfer’s exercise routine should include?
AB: A lot of stuff that I do in the gym that relates to golf is not only the strength aspect but, as you move, the flexibility of it and being able to rotate better. If you’re physically moving or making an effort to move and stretch, you’ll be surprised: You go out on the golf course and, all of a sudden, you’re not tired, you’re not fatigued, you’re feeling better.
NBCCM: Is there anything that golfers should avoid doing in the gym?
AB: The thing that golfers want to avoid is overexerting themselves in the gym. There’s a balance between wanting to get stronger and more conditioned if you’re playing golf while going through this transition. If you’re pushing yourself too hard in one aspect, then it’s not going to correlate. So you have to find that balance. As you start to feel better, you can incorporate going for a run and then playing golf or going to the gym for 20 minutes before a round.
NBCCM: How have you seen the application of a fitness routine affect professional players?
AB: Years ago, golf and fitness weren’t really classified together. Then Tiger Woods came out and said he was constantly in the gym. Well, he came in first on the scene and dominated everybody: He was hitting it harder, hitting it straighter and playing a long time. Now he’s had some injuries, probably related to going too hard, but incorporating fitness has come back.
Now you see all these TOUR-level golfers, all these serious golfers, that have a trainer, they’re getting stronger, they’re working on those muscles we talked about, consistently getting stronger and consistently maintaining their flexibility when they’re doing that. That’s why these guys are going to be able to play until they’re 50 at the highest competitive level, and even then, they’re going to play for another 30 or 40 years, whether it’s on the Champions TOUR or with their kids.
Photo by Dondee Quincena
NBCCM: What about the mental aspect of it all?
AB: When I’m at the gym, I’m always locked in and trying to be focused when going through specific movements. I like to be there to focus as hard as I can, so when I go to the golf course, it’s easier to maintain that level of focus. In golf, it takes one or two seconds to hit a golf shot and then it takes five to 10 minutes to get the next shot, so you have all this time in between and then you have to only lock in for a few seconds.
NBCCM: Are there any holes on the country club’s golf course that will be extra strenuous for those who don’t exercise?
AB: You play the first 14 holes out here and they’re relatively flat. There’s a little uphill, a little downhill, but 15 is a long par-5 and you have to walk up a big hill. And then 16 and 17 are relatively flat, then you get to 18 and you have to walk back up that hill again. So a lot of people who have already played 14 holes and are tired, you get to the last four and now you have to walk uphill.
If you can build yourself up to have more stamina and more longevity, conditioning wise, whether it’s running or biking or meeting with a trainer, then hopefully, when you get to 15, you’re not tired and it’s easier for you to make that walk up the hill.
NBCCM: Which fitness instructors would you recommend, who are available to members at the club?
AB: Natalie and Jack are both TPI certified, which is Titleist Performance Institute’s golf-specific movements and strength and flexibility. Billy goes on the range two or three times a week and does stretching, so he actually will lay you down and stretch your muscles to an end range that you might not think you were capable of.
So many people come out and they stretch a little bit and then they go and play golf. They really haven’t done anything, but if they go to Billy, they get stretched out and then utilize Jack or Natalie, they get the strength to maintain that flexibility; now, all of a sudden, it all works together.
Paige and Michael at Newport Beach Country Club | Photo by Dondee Quincena
Member Profile
Life of the Party
Paige and Michael are the fun, young couple who knows how to have a good time.
After graduating from college, Paige, a Toronto native, moved to California to escape the cold weather in 1995, the same year that she met her
husband, Michael, through a group of mutual friends. Ironically, it was the snow that brought them together, as they had all met while skiing. “Fast forward however many years, I went to [Michael’s hometown of] Chicago to Christmas shop and I was like, ‘God, I’ve got to look him up; I haven’t seen him in like eight years.’ ”
Two years later, she “dragged” Michael to live on the coast, though he certainly doesn’t seem to mind his new digs. “I retired early from the Chicago Board of Trade, at 45. Then I came out here to hang with Paige, learn how to surf and learn how to golf,” Michael says.
The couple has now been together for about 14 years, spending two-thirds of the year at their home in Corona del Mar and the winter months in Vail, Colorado. They have built duplexes from the ground-up in both cities—Paige, who does the interior design for the units, describes these development projects as the couple’s “later-in-life job.”
Prior to this venture, Paige owned a jet charter business and Michael worked as a commodity trader for a corporate bank, and then for his own entrepreneurial group. “[I] closed that company at the end of 2007 and, … when the real estate market collapsed, we bought three lots in Corona del Mar,” Michael explains, noting that they sold five out of six duplexes and kept one front unit where they currently reside. To bring their visions to fruition, the couple partnered with architect Chris Brandon, who has since hired Paige for other modern interior design projects.
“We’re kind of pausing right now, though, to crush life for awhile,” she says, noting that they haven’t taken on one of these projects in a little over a year. “We’re just traveling, golfing (for him more than me), surfing, I’m taking Spanish lessons, he’s taking guitar lessons, visiting family—you know, just doing the things that I don’t want to be too old to do later.”
The topics of age and family are pertinent to Paige, which makes sense after hearing what she considers to be her greatest accomplishment. “I gave a kidney to my dad and it’s like the coolest thing I’ve ever done,” she says, adding that, most of the time, when people have cancer, their loved ones can’t do anything to help. “… I could do something, and he lived another 13 years.”
Michael says that he is most proud of taking a risk in his career: “For me, it was leaving the security of a trader at a corporate bank and starting an entrepreneurial trading operation that we’re fortunate worked out pretty well.”
After all that hustle and bustle over the years, the couple now utilizes the Newport Beach Country Club as a place to relax and decompress, with Michael referring to it as “a peaceful sanctuary.” This is especially true when they take to the golf course at sunset with a couple of cocktails and tunes playing in their golf cart. “We go out at twilight, … there’s nobody out there and we just stop sometimes and look around and go, ‘Oh my god, we live here,’ ” Paige says. “… It’s gorgeous, like, pinch me.”
They have been members for a little over a decade,but what was it that drew them to this property in the first place? “The location and quality of the golf course,” according to Michael. “… [Plus,] if we’ve had too many cocktails, we can walk home. That was our rationality.”
Michael and Paige on the slops in Vail, Colorado | Photo courtesy of Michael Hill
Paige was convinced of country club life through the couple’s membership at the Vail Mountain Club, which is where Michael taught her how to ski. “I thought, well, why don’t we do that with golf? We’ll join, I can walk down the street … and play golf. You know, join a club and that’s how I’ll get better at golfing,” Paige says. “But I’m a really good skier and a really bad golfer.”
Even Michael, who practices on the driving range almost every afternoon, says he is still honing his golfing skills. “I try and surf in the morning if there … [are] waves, and then come and spend hours here [at the club]. So, the amount of hours I’ve spent golfing, relative to how good I am, I should be better,” he quips. Paige adds that it doesn’t matter “how good my outfit looks, I shoot 105.”
But the golf course isn’t the only place you’ll find the Hills. “We weren’t using the facilities much, other than to golf, but then, once the new clubhouse opened up, we loved it,” Michael says, noting that they regularly use the recreational spaces like the gym, spa and pool. They also eat at one of the on-property restaurants at least once a week, specifically the Little Italy nights.
That being said, the biggest culinary draw is one they are truly grateful for. “My favorite event here is Thanksgiving, hands down. We make sure we’re here every Thanksgiving because the spread of food is incredible,” Paige says. “… We do family Thanksgiving on Wednesday so we can come here with friends for actual Thanksgiving Day.”
And spending this holiday at the club makes sense, since they see the staff as part of their family. “We’re actually friends with more of the staff around here than other members because we didn’t grow up around here, and I think the staff is very personable,” Michael says.
“I mean, I’ve lived here [for] 25 years, I have plenty of friends,” Paige adds, “but we always seem to gravitate toward the staff. … The staff definitely puts the members first. More so than any club I’ve ever been a part of; they’re all killing it.”
Golf Course Superintendent Scot with PGA TOUR Competitions Agronomist Brian Maloy | Photo by Dondee Quincena
Golf Feature
Preparing for Hoag
Take a behind-the-scenes look at how the golf course maintenance team gets ready for the country club’s biggest tournament of the year.
With the most prestigious event of the year quickly approaching, members will begin to notice a bit more hustle and bustle around the club. As team members and vendors prepare for the annual Hoag Classic, a golf tournament on the PGA TOUR Champions circuit that has graced the Newport Beach Country Club course for over 25 years. As the only PGA TOUR event in all of Orange County, the club takes great pride in hosting this event as well as presenting a pristine course to the PGA players, and its members throughout the year, too.
Here, the Newport Beach Country Club Magazine talks to Golf Course Superintendent Scot, Assistant Golf Course Superintendent Mike and PGA TOUR Competitions Agronomist Brian Maloy to get a behind-the-scenes look at what it takes to prepare for the Hoag Classic.
Seasoned Professionals
Maloy started working on golf courses after he graduated from Iowa State University with a degree in agronomy. “I was a golf course superintendent for a number of years in the north and in the south, … so you have a lot of different situations to deal with,” he says, noting that he has handled everything from weeds and insects to disease, and he simply loves it.
A part Hoag Classic champion | Photo by Mark Susson/Courtesy of Hoag Charity Sports
This passion is what led him to start working for the PGA TOUR in 2008. Now, Maloy travels around the world for over 200 days a year to prepare various golf courses for tournaments. He works directly with the golf course superintendent and general manager of each club he visits, serving as a liaison between the club and the tournament director of the PGA TOUR.
When asked how long he’s worked on the Hoag Classic, formerly the Toshiba Classic, Maloy recalls visiting the club about 10 years ago, when he first started with the PGA TOUR. “I hadn’t been back for the next 10 years, until just last season was the first season … [the Hoag Classic] was back on my assignment sheet, and I’m going back again this year,” he says, noting that he came to NBCC in December for his pre-tournament visit. Maloy says that the purposes of these visits are “to see if there’s anything we can do with growth regulation or all the things that we put out on the golf course to keep it in great shape to prepare for, whether it’s weed control or insecticides or disease control, and still being environmentally conscious at the same time.”
On the Newport Beach Country Club side of things, Mike has been involved with Hoag from the beginning, and this is the third iteration of the event that Scot has been a part of. “He is with me pretty much every day for 14 days,” Scot says of Maloy. “And then we’re talking and sharing what my plans are, what kind of feedback he’s hearing from the officials and the players, and then collectively we just try to put all of our ideas together.”
And though Maloy visits countless properties throughout the year, this sense of teamwork at the Newport Beach Country Club is an exceptional attribute. “The thing that makes the golf courses stand out to me are the teams that we work with, the guys behind the scenes that you really rarely hear about,” Maloy says, explaining that these individuals are working extra hard during tournament week. “… They’re trying to improve and increase the attention to detail on their golf course to present the best product possible when the players get there, and these guys all do such a great job at that. They work extremely hard during that morning and evening shift and we really appreciate that because it’s time away from their families.”
And, as Scot says, there is good reason for this dedication: “We want the golf course to determine the champion and the golf course to play and show itself.”
Photo courtesy of Hoag Charity Sports
Mother Knows Best
Of course, no matter how much planning goes into any event, there is always the potential for setbacks. In golf, these typically involve the one thing that no one can control and is difficult to accurately predict: the weather.
“What we’re trying to accomplish is to provide the most consistent playing conditions that we can for that week of the event. Now, granted, that’s very difficult to accomplish because, you know what they say about Mother Nature: She’s really the one in charge,” Maloy says. “One day [it] might be raining cats and dogs, the next day it might be over 100 degrees [Farenheit], another … instance, of course, might be going into it after an extensive drought, so certainly that all impacts the decisions we make.”
Of course, ideally, he would prefer not to see any unusual weather events leading up to a tournament. “For instance, … when I was up at a golf course in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, it was also on the Champions TOUR, [but it] basically got hit with a … tornado very close by and so they had a lot of trees that were down that we were cleaning up all of advance week. So, that’s kind of a mini disaster because you’re trying to get this thing read for professional golf a week later and there’s only so much time and so many bodies to get all the work accomplished, … so it can be a challenge.”
Maloy says that one of the toughest situations is when they get hit with high winds or heavy rain, which causes water to surface drain off the golf course. Scot agrees that the weather dictates their approach to water management, and attests to the fact that these things cannot be predetermined.
“There’s a lot of those things where you’re just kind of playing it by ear. You set a plan in place for what you want to do, but you have a Plan B and a Plan C that you’re prepared to go in with if Mother Nature throws you a curveball. Because Mother Nature always wins,” Scot says.
Mike notes that most of the issues they combat are weather related, such as when there are storms and branches fall off trees that they must remove from the green. “You can’t change her,” he says of Mother Nature.
It is because of this that Maloy sticks to the old Boy Scout motto: Be prepared. “I always look forward to sunny skies and clear weather because then we can get the event off without a hitch,” Maloy says.
The Nitty Gritty
Preparations for the tournament begin several months in advance. Prior to this upcoming event, Scot says they were finishing a project on the seventh hole that required time for the grass to become established as well as build up enough maturity and strength for the heavy traffic that inherently comes with the Hoag Classic. Other preparations include protecting the Kikuyu grass, planning for fertilizer and growth regulator applications as well as verticutting the top dressing, which Scot says is because “as the temperatures cool down, the grass growth rate slows down.”
Then, eight weeks prior to the event, Maloy visits the club to touch base with the superintendent and get a glimpse of the golf course, including any projects that have gone on throughout the year and any major weather conditions that may have affected the grass. “We have a chance to see it and kind of dial in or fine-tune the agronomic preparations for that eight weeks leading into the event,” Maloy says, noting that there are also plenty of things that Scot does year-round, such as aerifications, to create the best possible playing conditions for the membership as well.
Dowsing rods help find piping under the course | Photo by Dondee Quincena
In early January, the tournament operations team comes in to start laying out and building structures around the golf course, which Scot says takes about six to eight weeks. These structures include tents that require 4-foot stakes to be placed in the ground, which can strike and burst water pipes if their locations are not calculated precisely. Mike uses dowsing rods for this purpose, though this method can, quite literally, be a bit hit or miss. “I’ve had, some years, as many as 10 pipes break; it’s just bad luck,” Mike says. “The buildup is the hardest and then the last two weeks is when everyone comes in, so it’s the last-minute push.”
Those last two weeks are referred to as advance and tournament week, respectively. “The week leading up to the tournament, we still have normal play, so all of our members are still getting to play the golf course,” Scot explains. “For us, we’re trying to get the last finishing touches because the start of tournament week is when the players start to show up, and they expect to have the conditions be the same, so that they can get their games calibrated to this golf course.”
These finishing touches include trimming bunkers; putting extra cuts on the fairways, the rough and the greens; and ensuring the sand depths are good for play.
“We try to … get everything as consistent as possible for the week of the tournament, … so we do all the heavy lifting … the week before, when I arrive, during advance week,” Maloy says.
Photo by Jim Collins
In the Midst of It
Once tournament week is underway, Maloy points to the importance of paying attention to detail and executing certain maintenance practices more frequently than the standard operating procedure.
“They might mow fairways on a normal, weekly schedule, … [but] when we get into town for tournament week, they’re mowing the green, the tees, the fairways, the approaches [and] the intermediate cut, every single day and, in some instances, it might be a double cut—they might cut the greens in the morning and in the evening—so it really depends on a lot of environmental conditions,” Maloy says.
In order to keep up with all of this additional work, some extra manpower is required, so volunteers are recruited from across the country to come in and help out for the week. Maloy explains that one of the tasks these volunteers are assigned is to collect three important parameters of data. This includes moisture, which is measured using a meter that is stuck in the ground to calculate the volume metric moisture at a 3-inch depth, so they know the root zone of the green and how often it needs to be watered without causing any damage to the grass. Other points of data collected are a firmness test, for which a weighted ball is dropped on the grass and the ball mark that results is measured (the softer the greens, the larger the ball mark will be), as well as the green speed, which determines how fast the greens roll when players are putting on them.
“We collect all that data and now we have something off every green that we can take an average [of] and then we can determine where we were compared to the day before, so we kind of have a baseline that we can keep it in bounds [of] and we can adjust things according[ly],” Maloy says.
Additionally, the golf course maintenance team can be found arriving at the club before dawn and staying until well after dusk. Though members might not see much of them, as they tend to stay behind the scenes in the maintenance building. “We’re always on call, so the TOUR officials are out there managing the play, managing the rules and, if there’s an issue that comes up, like a sprinkler head breaks or a cup gets damaged during the middle of play, they would call us out on a 911 to come out and address the issue,” Scot explains.
“At the end of the day, we want the golf course to show the best that it can for the members, the membership, the Pickup family, the Martin family and for the best golfer to come out on top,” he adds.
A Champion’s jacket on display at NBCC | Photo by Jim Collins
The After Effect
After the tournament, all of those structures that were put in place need to be taken down, so the golf course maintenance team works closely with third parties to ensure this process does minimal wear and tear to the course. “If we’ve gotten some rain and it’s too wet, then they alter their tear-down practices,” Scot says. “So they tear down all the structures and they move out from an area on the golf course, then, depending on how badly it was beaten up, we’ll come in and aerify it and fertilize it and do some extra maintenance and cultural practices to that area.”
Scot also points to the magnets that are attached to the golf course maintenance team’s vehicles, which they use to pick up any loose screws or small metal pieces that have been left behind and could potentially cause damage to their cutting units. “If you get a little metal piece in there, even like a ball marker or a divot repair tool or a screw, they all do the same damage,” Scot explains. “At the same time, they’ll puncture and pop tires left and right, so we try to minimize that type of damage as much as possible.”
Once the clean-up has ceased, everything goes back to normal, but members can expect the same quality course year-round thanks to the maintenance team’s ongoing efforts. “Our goal is to produce the same conditions that we produce for Hoag throughout the year for our members,” Scot says. “So we’re always trying to make sure that, in a sense, we’re ready for any tournament to come in at any time. That’s what our goal is because, ultimately, we’re here for the members.”
Photo by Valorie Darling Photography
Catering
A Tale of Transformation
The catering and events team at Newport Beach Country Club expertly converts event spaces into venues that are reminiscent of a mystical land.
Whether your next special occasion is a wedding, birthday or another type of celebration, the catering and events team at Newport Beach Country Club is available to help bring your vision to fruition. One such event, held in January 2019, honored the marriage of Lauren and Austin while showcasing this dramatic transformation of the venue with floral arrangements, decor pieces and a few special materials.
“We decided that we would need to carpet the ballroom and drape it in its entirety to completely transform the space,” says Lyndsey Moore, principal event designer and planner at The Lynden Lane Co. “Instead of going with the more traditional ivory draping that might fade into the background, we wanted to let the draping really be a part of the design story.”
The color chosen for this purpose was imperative, and Moore says they went with a soft blush color because it “added the perfect amount of romance and sweetness to the space.” For a touch of custom lighting, the company sourced gold and crystal chandeliers to complement and highlight the wallpaper backdrop.
Photo by Valorie Darling Photography
That being said, lighting is always abundant in this space. “It is so wonderful to have a ballroom that offers so much natural light,” Moore says, noting the room incorporates window doors on either side that face the ocean and golf course, respectively. “… Another amazing feature is the private entryway that guests get to enter through. Aside from the privacy of this, it offers another space to design and enchant your guests.”
Though several companies were outsourced to bring the project together, none of it would have been possible without the catering and events team. “We love working with Chloe, [catering service manager,] and her team,” Moore says. “… We also felt that the culinary team did an excellent job of turning Lauren and Austin’s dreams of food being one of the stars of the show a reality.”
Additionally, floral designer Keith J. Laverty concurs that the country club staff is great to work with, as each employee takes pride in providing members and vendors with a wonderful experience. “The team at NBCC has always been professional, easy to work with and very accommodating,” he says. “With all of the events we’ve had the pleasure of partnering with the club on, everyone has been gracious and we have formed a great relationship.”
The catering and events team is looking forward to bringing your vision to life.
