Very Cold Outside, Time for Indoor Prep Work

Extremely cold outside today but still plenty of work to be done on the inside in prep for this season. We make every effort to extend the life of our course amenity materials such as tee markers, ball washers  and other items that are out on the course every year.

The guys are beginning this season's prep work by sanding off the varnish from our tee markers. Once this is completed we are putting a coat of wood stain on them before we dip them in a Marine Spar Varnish to protect them from the elements outside.  The extra Spar Varnish protection gave us 2 years before refurbishing plus gave them a nice, shiny look throughout both seasons.

Russ and Tom sanding off the tee markers yesterday.  With three and sometimes four sets of tees, we have well over 100 markers to clean up.  Jason staining and Lady providing the tough leadership in the background.  Thank goodness I have her.  She works cheap, hamburger at lunch and a couple cookies during the day.

Additional work inside includes painting distance markers(barber polls) on the driving range, dividers for hitting stalls for the grass tees, bag stands for range and benches that are located on each hole. We will probably need to paint the metal tee signs as well which are beginning to lose their paint.  Our plastic ball washers are fading and are looking pretty shabby.  We are going to have them painted professionally giving us many more years of life without having to replace them.

We will also be replacing the Vinylguard (shrink wrap) on our flag sticks/bunker rakes.  The flag poles and bunker rakes are fiberglass.  Over the years, the fiberglass breaks down from the UV rays from the sun and can render these course amenities useless.  The shrink wrap material is heated, shrinks to the surface and creates a renewed smooth surface allowing us to use them well past their normal life time.  The material only costs about  $4 per stick to replace.  A new flag stick is over $18. We also in time must cut off the top flag holder and the ferrule which goes down into the hole on the green.  You can do this once, maybe twice before the poles must be replaced.  Our  flag sticks are 8' and cutting off the top and bottom can remove 4-6" off of a stick which can cause depth perception issues when hitting at the green/flag.  Normally, we replace the bottom ferrules and threaded tops at the same  time which keeps the same consistent height throughout the course and at each green.