Thursday, May 2, 2013

Sand Valley Lands Polish Open

It doesn't get any bigger than hosting the National Open.

When designing and building Sand Valley, this wasn't something I thought of or considered. You usually expect these tournaments to go to major population centers, not a town of 12,000.

The only job, like all projects, was to protect the investor by leading construction daily, seeking every opportunity to communicate and refine the project in real-time. It's as Kai Hulkkonen stated, published in Rescuing Sand Valley, Paul Daley's book Golf Architecture a Worldwide Perspective Vol. 5:

Specifically, he clearly sees how daily involvement by the architect is a tremendous driving force, especially in an emerging golf nation and continent where golf course builders are a scarcity. He believes an architect leading construction daily provides “something really valuable for product quality” because continual assessment and improvement of strategic value and the creation of special details makes “stuff look just stunning, yet does not cost all that much to build; details just not possible on a turn key project”. 

How much time was dedicated to designing and constructing Sand Valley?
Here it is... Sand Valley by the Numbers:

·   Total Schedule: 483 days. This includes Saturdays and Sundays.

·   Number days I worked: 457 (days missed were due to bad weather)

·   Number of hours worked/day on average: 11 hours (as documented in my Daily Design/Construction Diary)

·   Total Hours: 5000+

It is the rarest of commitments in the history of golf course architecture... it is typical of my services to my clients, and what they rightly deserve.



Polish Open sponsored by LOTOS update:

The winning score was -9 by Florian Fritsch. Congratulations!

Special mention must be given to the sponsor LOTOS for putting on a first rate event, and club president Marek Majewski for helping bring the tournament to Sand valley.