Dear Member,
BEING READY FOR THE NEXT PHASE OF COVID-19
It is pleasing to report, in these most difficult of times, that our new Head Green Keeper, Mark Hudson, who has joined us from the Rotherham Golf Club, has settled in really well.
Mark is now working full time as we prepare for our course to re-open.
The absolute priority has been to maintain the course. But your Board has had to deal with many challenges as you can imagine and these are some of the issues that our golf club, like many others have faced and still do: –
- Cash is King – cash flow management and cash preservation has been critical as headroom tightened in a fast-moving scenario as the pandemic took a grip across the UK.
- Furloughing – England Golf’s decision to close golf complexes in their entirety led to the furloughing of all our house and administration staff. We have considered how best to stay in touch with Gemma and her team. We are allowed to talk to staff, but they cannot do work that helps our business operate.
- Temporary Funding Options – we have taken advantage of the help provided by Government and will continue to do so and other agencies as support becomes available.
- Stakeholders – we will maintain dialogue with our staff, members, bankers, landlord, creditors and suppliers as long-term relations are critical.
We are now preparing for when the course can re-open and although it will come a bit later, the clubhouse too.
Returning specifically to the maintenance of the course itself we have adhered to the guidance provided by The British and International Greenkeepers Association Limited (BIGGA). That has enabled us to do the following maintenance work: –
- Completion of the Winter programme.
- Tees and green surrounds have been mown regularly.
- Greens and fairways maintained.
- The rough has been cut as necessary to minimise stress on the turf.
- Irrigation and nutrition has been carried out as necessary to keep the turf alive.
- Machinery and equipment has been maintained to ensure that it has been kept safe and operational.
Having walked the course at the weekend I am pleased to say that it is in first class order. It is remarkable how good the course is having had a very wet start to the year followed perhaps by the driest April on record.
Our next challenge, as alluded to earlier, is to be ready to resume playing golf when we get the go ahead to do so. Clearly, we are pushing for that to be sooner rather than later. We take some comfort from the fact that Denmark and Australia, among others are re-opening their golf courses. With social distancing being something that is fairly easy to achieve when playing golf, together with the other practical measures, like keeping the flagstick in, removing rakes, reducing the size of the playing group, etc, to protect golfers, golf is well placed to be in the vanguard when it comes to the easing of the current lockdown.
While none of us will have experienced anything quite like this, thanks mainly to our wonderful British weather, many of us will have had sizable lay-offs before. Any form of recompense would not have been contemplated in the past and for reasons I’m sure you understand, this was not possible now. However, in expectation of golf courses re-opening soon we intend to move forward with our invitations to continue your membership. As part of that process we look to thank our membership with some reward for its loyalty in the package going forward. More about that very soon.
May I close with a personal message?
This was certainly not the way my fellow section captains and I envisaged our year getting underway. However, I’m sure that together we can move forward, get back playing golf and make this still an anniversary year to remember for some of the right reasons. You, like me, will have been touched by many amazing acts of kindness, heroism and fortitude. Right now I’ll settle for much less. Simply a bringing back together of our Crow Nest Park family.
Best wishes, thank you and keep safe,
Steve Yendley
Club Captain 2020/21