Superintendent Series: Javier Campos of Cal Club

00:00:00
Speaker 1: I miss a green, for example, I'm already upset. When I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset. And when I find my.

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Speaker 2: Ball in a bright egg Frida egg, the dreaded Frida egg, Frida Egg egg Bride.

00:00:11
Speaker 1: Egg Lie, I'm about ready to run off the golf course.

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Speaker 3: And welcome back to another edition of the Friday Egg Podcast. In today's Superintendent Series interview with Javier Compos As always, Today's Superintendent Series is brought to you by Toro for more than a century. With cutting edge turf equipment and irrigation solutions, Toro has had your front nine cover and your back nine two. In fact, Toro's always had your back period. Toro is as committed to your long term success as pros are committed to their shot. That's down to top notch customer support from Toro and its dedicated local distributors, both of whom are passionate about delivering turf equipment and irrigation solutions that solve real world problems. Follow at Toro Golf on Twitter and reach out to your local Toro distributor today. As mentioned before, today's interview is with Javier Compos. He is the head superintendent at the California Golf Club of San Francisco. Most people know of it as Cal Club. Javier has been there for a number of years. He started working there at age seventeen, and I think he's got a tremendous backstory in terms of how he got into turf that we get into, but also just I think he's got an amazing story from what he presents day and day out at the Cal Club. It is one of the finest conditioned golf courses in all the world. They use fescue grass in the fairways in the rough and bent grass greens, which is rather unheard of in this part of California. I've been wanting to talk to Javier for a long time and was really excited to get this interview set up and spend some time with him. He's a great guy, really looking forward to everybody hearing about his life at KEL Club. So real quick, before we get to the Javier interview, we're going to talk a little bit a little follow up from last week's conversation with Joseph Lamanna on Friday. If you miss that, we talked about the PGA Tour season thus far, what's been working what's not been working. And we talked a lot about the designated events. So designated events are the tourist new events that the top players will all attend into and with the majors and the players along with the designated events, there will be seventeen of them. An idea that spawned out of that Joseph had this idea was to have FedEx cup Points only count for designated events and majors, which I think is a tremendous idea and I think this will be a first in Frida egg history. Well maybe not quite a first, but we are going to debut our own really spin off of the FedEx cup points. We're going to do designated events FedEx cup Points, and we will keep this tracked on the website as well as social media. But I just wanted to run down. You know, it's kind of interesting when you start to look at this. So it would be an actually meaningful statistic if they put it together, because it would give us an idea of who when they teed it up against the best, played the best in twenty twenty three so far three events in one of them is the Century. I think it's important to note that the Century is going to provide a little bit. That's the one that doesn't fit. It didn't have a full field. It was a you know, a much smaller field, so you know, in terms of the amount of points, they don't distribute quite as nicely as the other one. So you know, early in this count, by the time we get to seventeen events, it will have normalized that out and it won't make that much of a different but difference, but early in the season, I think it does make a difference those that played in the Century event and those that didn't. So in terms of the standings as of today, the top ten would be John Ram, Scotti Scheffler. And just to point out, John Rom's got double the points of Scotty Scheffler at this point in the season because obviously his play has been out of this world. He's got a first two first and I think he finished third in Phoenix, so that's just an astounding start. So Rom Scheffler, then Homa is the third rank player if you go designated events, Klin more Kwa's fourth, Nick Taylor is fifth, Patrick Cantley sixth, Tom Hogy seventh, Justin Thomas eighth, Will Zeal Taurus ninth and Jason Day tenth. That's your FedEx Cup top ten if you only count designated events.

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Speaker 1: But this is a.

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Speaker 3: Great idea in something that they should absolutely look get doing when they revamp the schedule in twenty twenty four. It just it makes too much sense. It's actually provides a real barometer. Like you know, all the big big players are at these events, so it makes sense to have the points just given out at these events, have a different set of a point points for the other events that doesn't always have the best players. It gives us a real clear PGA Tour type of ranking on the year. It'll be really cool if they do it this way. So we want to get out and kind of put this out there as more than an idea, put it on paper.

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Speaker 1: So that's your top ten.

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Speaker 3: And now, without further ado, here is Javier compos.

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Speaker 1: All right, tell me about this winner here in San Francisco. How's it been.

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Speaker 2: It's definitely been one of the one of the rougher ones. I would say, just I'm probably gonna say from the standpoint of how many trees we've lost, I think between the storms we had like that three week stretch and even last week I think we're north of like seventeen trees now, and I mean the cleanup of that, I mean it's just demoralizing for the guys. I mean, before it's been in winters past, it's been like, oh, that's gonna repair washouts, you know, spend a ton of time doing that. This year, it's been like, a, right, let's clean up all these trees. I think we had eleven down at one point. Just as we were finishing, like literally last Tuesday morning, I'm like, all right, we're finally done, and then up here coming other six trees down. So our guys are just kind of like done with with tree work, I mean, and so it's been tough from that standpoint, but definitely glad that we're getting the rains because every season has seemed like so long, you know, in years past, because of the lack of rain.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean when it when you get rain, obviously it seems like it's a good thing. But then what complications does the rain create?

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Speaker 2: I think out here, especially because during the year, we don't have too much time to be doing you know, a couple extra projects and stuff. You know. I think we're one of the few courses that's open every Monday during season, so I don't really have the maintenance Monday, as a lot of guys call it. So in the winter time is when I try to get into some of these things. But then when you have you know, rain and you know, having a rain maybe once a week. If I could schedule it out, it'd be awesome, but I can't. But when we get it like that where it's like, you know, two weeks NonStop, it really just takes away from us, you know, diving into some of those projects that we want to do for sure. But at the same time, you know, it's a good opportunity to get the guys trained up on stuff that again we don't get to do during the year. So it's it's not all bad, but it definitely gets in the way of small projects that I want to attack.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean obviously it was like, you know, for a while in the winter it was like historic range here. Did it cause any outside of trees, any huge damage to the course.

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Speaker 2: We've had an issue on our seventh hill side now for some years. I'm actually gonna say it's like going back just right after the renovation and we went in there, we did a big repair. You know, maybe a week before that three week stretch in a January, I think it was when it was raining so much. And that's probably been the biggest one this year that that hillside eroded kind of washed into our driving range, and you know, you spent the time member see like, oh, you're doing a ton of work, you know, great, and then the minute they see that it's washed out, they're like, oh, well you did that for nothing, or you know, whatever you did didn't work. But there's just you know, you plan for rains and like I told people, the repair that we made was you know, to be able to withstand normal rains, but not you know what do we have like thirteen inches I think in like five days. So it definitely wasn't going to withstand that. So that's probably the biggest one we had this year as far as damaged.

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Speaker 1: What how do you go about fixing likes?

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Speaker 3: So for anybody, everybody's probably seen like a picture of your seventh hole, you know, plays kind of along this hill. It wraps around it and it's like almost like a canyon on the right side, severe slope that falls down to the range and it's you know, mostly it's just native grass on the canyon. What type of things can you do to prevent erosion in those areas? And you know, what are you how are you guys looking at repairing it?

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Speaker 2: That's one of the things we had done is just using what probably most guys do, you know, lining up a bunch of sand bags, you know, to divert some of the water runoff because it, like you said, it's pretty steep for the amount of water that's coming off of there. But this year what we did is we added some herring bone right before those storms, put a channel drain, you know, you know, the property kind of around that native line, and again we thought that was gonna be sufficient, and it wasn't just with that amount of rain. But this year what made matters worse is the erosion caused our two inch irrigation pipe to break, and so that just made that canyon that much bigger. So one of the things, you know, we have Frontier golf out here, and this time they're gonna help us just because we don't have the big equipment that it's going to be necessary, but they're actually going to add a catch basin, a much larger catch basin, change the size of the pipe, you know, to trap as much water as actually comes down from that hill. But we actually might shift where we put this stuff down, you know, between the basin and the pipe where it currently sits. We might shift where that's at, just because they've kind of found that this is a soft spot on that hill and we've gone there, and I mean I've been here since then. I'd probably tell you we'd repair that thing like six times already, and they're like, you know, you keep trying to compact it and you know, keep doing the same thing over and over. They're like, it's just become somewhat of a soft spot. So we kind of shift where that canyon currently sits. The hope is that we're going to stabilize that soil a lot better. But yeah, their plans come in with a big equipment key in, you know, everything that they're doing, just compact it, just in layers. Like I said, switch the pipe size. But at this point I'm like, all right, I'm gonna let them do it, because yeah, everything that we've done it hasn't seemed to hold up.

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Speaker 3: Unfortunately, it seems like that that hell side is like one of the banes of your existence. Because I remember a few years ago you had like a gopher problem there or something.

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Speaker 2: Right, it's still there. I mean that's so we had a soil engineer come out and he actually saw the amount of gopher holes, which when I tell people, you know, Jay Blozzi's actually gout. You know. He reached out about, you know, what we do to control them, because there was a project that he was going to be working on and they had a similar issues. But I don't know if it was with gophers or with scrolls. So I'm like, man, we contract the workout because we used to do what most guys do and just use traps. What happened is guys would forget where they set these traps, and you know, or we'd have coyotes walking off with gophers and just leaving the traps all over the property. But to this thing on seven hillside, we saw the amount of holes and tunnels that they build. When the soil engineer came out and he saw that, he's like, you got to address this gopher issue first, because anytime you got a rain, it would literally create like a cascade of like mud on this hillside. And so we've been trying to address that. But man, I mean everywhere else on the golf course. Seems like we have it under control, but I don't know if that hillside is just that much more active, which we're still gonna try, and I just hope after they make this repair it holds up because I don't know what else we can do about these freaking gophers. Man. I feel like I'm in that movie. It's like, yeah, a Caddy shock. It's like, I don't know, I don't know what else to do about them. I mean, contracting them seemed like it was the last last resort, so let's hope it worked.

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Speaker 3: That's the I mean, it's interesting. It's crazy because like it's like almostly I think it's like a perfect encapsulation of a job of a superintendent is like you've got this headache of the gophers to start, but then that's like creating a huge, bigger problem with your erosion on the hill. Yeah, because like you're you're talking about how like I imagine gophers tunneling around on the hill or making more soft spots and making it easier for that hill to road on when it rains.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, because so before we had the problem and it seems like it just keeps moving up closer to the green because one of the bigger repairs we did. You know again, you know the property where that first fairway bunker is, where number seven is, that's where we used to have you know, another canyon kind of built. And so when we went in there, I think it was like four or five years ago. We put in a ton of gopher wire after we you know.

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Speaker 1: What, let's gopher wire.

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Speaker 2: So it's like I think it's just like stainless steel. Almost looks like a mesh because the way that they design it. I mean you probably have maybe like a half inch little holes in between. And guys use this in landscaping all the time. I mean, anytime you're gonna do like a synthetic turf job, you lay this down over the soil so as they try to dig up. You know, the hopes is that it's like, all right, it's like a barrier. I don't know that anyone's really used it on golf courses. They probably have, but it's so bad out here with the gophers that are our valve boxes that are in our naturalized areas. We've wrapped them around with gopher wire now because those little guys like get in there chew up wires. But on seven we did a project where we put you know, like four sheets of this stuff and I'm sorry, that's probably like two hundred square feet each one of these roles. And we did it and it's like, all right, great, it worked there, But then they just moved further up onto the hillside, you know, as you get closer to the green. So it just seems like, you know, we can't put wire along that entire hillside. I mean, geez. So I just hope now that what we've done actually actually controls them and we don't have this issue going forward, because it's been a pain man.

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Speaker 3: Well, and you have like all of that, you have like a lot of coyotes. I feel like I've seen coyotes out here a lot, and it's like that's like a predator and that's not even doing it.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I mean, those those coyotes look pretty healthy right now, so I'm sure they're feasting on them. But yeah, I don't I don't think it's enough. I mean, I've had members because they thankfully they see it, you know, and everyone suggests this stuff like bringing hawks out here, bringing owls. I mean, we have hawks, you know, we've seen them out here all the time. We have coyotes, So again, I don't know. I think someone even throughout the idea of bringing snakes, but I'm like, geez, I don't want I don't want to be those people that create some like crazy effect on the habitat here by bringing snakes in or something like that.

00:15:16
Speaker 1: What's the craziest suggestion? Snakes? The crazy I think.

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Speaker 2: Snakes was the craziest. And I forget what kind of snakes it was. I'm sure they were probably harmless to other areas, but I'm like, yeah, what's gonna happen when they start reproducing here? Is like I don't want to battle snakes now. I'm like, yeah, I don't want to do that.

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Speaker 1: I'm sure that they probably dig holes too.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly. Now you're literally just gonna, you know, come in and create another problem. I think a great story is that when Thomas was still here, he hired this guy who, uh, I don't know. He just sold him on the idea that you know, he's gonna do a great job. I don't I can't recall it was exactly with gophers or crows, because crows are like the other thing we deal without here that tear up our turf. But long story short, this guy came out with hawks and he claimed that the hawks were gonna, you know, help clean up the golf course and get rid of these things. Well, the guy comes out, you know, I think everybody had a drink in their hand. We go out, we meet by the short game area, and this guy starts just doing like a show with his like birds, where like he's like, oh, I'm gonna get the bird to fly under your legs, you know. And we're like, how we all expected like a blood bath, like these hawks going after like the gophers or the crows whatever it was, and yeah, it was. It was a dud. Like the guy literally just came out here, super odd guy. I mean, he had a bunch of hawks with him and all all he did was just like aerial tricks. And we're like, all right, little by little you saw remembers just like leaving this like show that we expected to I don't know, like I said, be a bloodbath. And it's like, yeah, no, this didn't work out. So he thought he was.

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Speaker 3: Gonna fix a problem and he was there to give you a hawk show of wild bird.

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Speaker 2: That's all it turned out to me. He's like, yeah, you guys could hire me. It's like, no, we're not looking to have aerial shows out here.

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Speaker 3: You got a you've got a little bit different background. I think getting into your job here is the superintendent of cal club. Then then I not you know some superintendents, and it's I think it's an interesting one. Can you walk us through how you got started working here and and kind of like, you know, how you got into turf and golf?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I think you know, as I was telling you Monday. The funny part is, I didn't even know if this was actually a golf course. And I've lived, you know, somewhere in this area for the longest time. There's a library right next door. You know, I probably went to like twice. But when I was working at JC Penny at that time, my sister was, you know, dating someone that was already working here, which you know now they're marriage so I have to see him every day. But he's like, yeah, you know, we're hiring, come on by. It was like the summer I think I was. I was seventeen at that time, and I was telling you, I was like, man, I was making seven to twenty five at J. C. Penny and then here they were offering ten. I was like, you know, I'll take it, you know, but I was looking at it as just just a summer job. I think at that time I probably had like three of my buddies that were going to do the whole police academy thing, and I was like, that might be something I do, you know, But in the meantime, you get this job. And I remember I showed up and I I always remind Thomas as like I came in like jeans and like a button dresser. And then first thing out of time was like, why are you so dressed up? He didn't even know me, and I was like I don't know. I'm like, you know, trying to get a job. And he's like, well, do you have any experience. I'm like, you know, I've cleaned yards and stuff. He's like, what are you looking to do. I was like, yeah, summer job. You know, I want to be a cop and he literally cop like that was his reaction. Was like so from the get go, I knew what it was going to be like to work with with Thomas, but you know, he just fat fast forward. I had a great summer, right away started feeling like, man, this is something I can I can do.

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Speaker 3: But again, what do you think appealed to you or if you can go back early on, like what was it about the job that you like really drew your interest when you started doing it?

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Speaker 2: Yeah. I think the fact that, you know the way that I kind of progressed pretty quickly, and at that time we had, you know, I like really good assistance. You know, I worked under Matt Mullinbrook Grant Johnson at that time, and those guys are really the ones, you know, when I got involved with like whether it was just flagging greens for them when they were spring, I just thought that whole process was like all pretty cool. And then they started telling me that there's actually career opportunities for this because I didn't know. I thought they were just assistance because they moved up but I didn't know even had to go to school for this and all this. But they really started kind of getting in my ear. And then Thomas, but it wasn't really until the renovation.

00:19:27
Speaker 1: So what year about did you get hired.

00:19:30
Speaker 3: I got hired in four four, so this was you were here when there was a pond and.

00:19:35
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, I was here the ponds and all the hedges around twelve and all that good stuff. I actually gave someone a tour the other day inside the clubhouse and showed them all that, and I was like, I just can't believe they had done this to the golf course. But yeah, six, you know, just when we were starting with the with the renovation, I don't know, just something about working those long hours, just really seeing how we just tore everything up and just started putting it back together. Like at that point it really hit me like, dude, this is like super cool, Like how cool would it be to actually get a career in this. And I remember telling Thomas like I think this is what I want to end up doing. And he ended up telling me, he's like, just don't waste my time. He goes, and I'll show you everything you want to do. And during the renovation, that's what it was. I mean, it was literally trying and getting into all different aspects of it that were going on and I and I really think that's what That's what really kind of just turned something on in my head. I'm like, yeah, I think this is what I want to do for a living. But you know, you were talking about my career path. There was a time, you know, as you know and golf were like there was no jobs, and it just seemed like it wasn't going to turn out to be a great career. But we ended up going through with it, and I ended up doing the program at Rutgers.

00:20:46
Speaker 1: And that online or I actually had to move there. Yeah, he moved in New Jersey.

00:20:51
Speaker 2: Yeah. It was terrible. I mean, I just feel like unless you're from over there, I mean, I don't know, I'm biased. I mean, I've been in California my whole life, but I remember I think it was twenty thirteen the first year I went, and that was when Hurricane Sandy had just hit. I don't know that was my first or second year. I can't recall, but I had never been to Jersey and I see on the news was minus seventeen wind chill, and I remember taking off and I was just wearing like a hoodie here because I just told my wife I was already married at the time. I'm like, how cold could that actually be? I'm just literally going to exit the airport catch a cab, Dude. I was freezing like it was like my chest was hurting like I remember telling her about it. I'm like, yeah, that was bad, Like that was the worst cold I've experienced. So I learned quick. But I always tell people like my experience with it because I got stuck in this like tiny like the whole room was just pinstripe. This guy was a Yankees fan. This house that we were renting, you know, two other roommates, but I was the last one to arrive to Jersey, so they chose the best rooms and I got stuck in this like prison looking room where it was all pinstripes in the walls and it was just a tiny desk, and I'm it was like depressing. Like I remember telling my wife. I was like, I got the I got the worst card here.

00:22:00
Speaker 1: You know, did you have kids at that time too.

00:22:03
Speaker 2: No, just just married, And it was yeah, I trust me. It was hard enough. It was like three and a half or four months that that we did that. So I did that. You know, we'd come back do the you know work here, get the work experience, and then just went back to finish out the the second year. But you know, we both talked about it now, I was the sacrifice that was super worth it. I Mean, people are like, why didn't you just do it online? But I'm like, I don't know. I just thought that was around. I think Josh Smith had just done it too, and I just heard from guys it was it was a good program, So I don't know, I don't regret. I thought it was great.

00:22:33
Speaker 3: So you work here for if you did that, So you were here for like nine years and you'd moved yourself up and at that point, the turf school was a natural thing to do, just to continue to progress, right.

00:22:45
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure, And because I mean that was the whole thing. Like I was. It was different in the sense that I hadn't even completed the school, but Thomas made me an assistant and he's like, but as part of it, you know, you got to go finish this. And I always say, you know, the the club stepped up. You know, I don't have any school debt from that. I mean, they took care of everything. At that time. We actually had a new general manager of coming in Glenn because everything was, you know, a verbal agreement. Thomas was like, you know, you'll go, we'll pay for your school, you know, your housing there and all this stuff, but we want you to stay here. At least two years after you finish school, as you know, a way to kind of pay us back if you will. But then, I mean, Glenn didn't even know me at that time. Thomas went to him asked, and yeah, I mean the rest is history. Glenn approved of everything, and yeah, super fortunate that it did work out that way. But I thought I was done with school, you know, at that time. But then sure enough, I get back. You know, I'm working, I'm happy, I'm an assistant, and me and Thomas are out for a run one time, and you know, we start talking about school again. He's like, no, you still consider getting a four year degree. He's like, you know, because you want to be competitive if one day you want to, you know, move up, you know, whether it's here or elsewhere. I mean, I don't hate school, but I also don't love it. And so to hear like, yeah, you should work on a bachelor degree now. And so when my daughter Went was born, that's when I started, you know, working towards my bachelor's degree, which i'll be done in May, thankfully. It's it's been a long one. I told my wife I could I could have been a line that one. I uh so my schedule was crazy. Like when I first started that, I was doing classes, going there, coming to work, going back at night, you know for classes. So my schedule was all over the place initially, but then when I started calling, what for most people is like the last years, once you're past, like all your ge and stuff. I've done that part all online. It's a business program that I was able to get into that offer to that flexibility, which which has been awesome. Man.

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00:25:41
Speaker 1: Now back to Javier, do.

00:25:49
Speaker 3: You ever think about how you got introduced to the game of golf, like not knowing really anything. Do you think that was beneficial to your growth and turf like by actually not having any like pre existing knowledge of the game.

00:26:06
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, are you referring to like actually playing or no, no, just your profession. Yeah, I think so, because I think I probably started viewing everything more from like a maintenance standpoint once I was actually introduced to it. So it's weird, I mean. And also I will say it's in effect of like the people that I worked with. I always give Josh you know who's over had written now a ton of credit, and like when I got introduced to golf, it always came with like looking at certain details and working with guys like that, you know, George, you know who was one of the Shaper's good really good friend as well. Getting introduced to the game of golf and having such like great minds if you will, kind of explain certain things too, was like I just got the best of everything you know, I started learning about the game of golf itself, but also like you know, architecture and all this stuff from these guys you know, maintenance and you know, agronomy from Thomas. So I had like a really good grouped I got that introduced me into golf. So yeah, I got to see it from so many different perspectives, not just you know, coming up and from the maintenance crew and just seeing the day to day operations. So yeah, it was great in that standpoint.

00:27:14
Speaker 3: It's interesting because like you know, Bill, Bill Core and Ben Crenshaw, like a fair amount of their shapers and people that have worked for them come from the construction backgrounds and aren't into golf until they get into that job, into that job, and then you know, and it's it's it's almost like you just I feel like so many people want careers in golf because they like playing golf, and then they get in and maybe they like see a side of the game that they don't like, you know, yeah, and don't maybe don't play as much as they want to want to, and and then you know, it's kind of the opposite, right.

00:27:48
Speaker 2: Yeah. If I would have gotten into golf because I played, I would have hated it because yeah, it's so frustrate. It's like I always tell people, was probably the most frustrating sport that I've attempted to play. So no, I think the fact that I got into it and introduced to it and like I said, just kind of learned how to see it from all from all angles, I think that was to me the best way to have been introduced to it.

00:28:10
Speaker 3: It seems like I obviously and this is not a groundbreaking, but you know, just from listening to you talk, Thomas Bastis, the superintendent here was obviously a big part of your life and h and developed it. Like what part of his leadership do you think about and admire the most in getting you to where you are today?

00:28:32
Speaker 2: Sure there's a few, but I definitely think one of them that comes to mind the most is his organizational skills, because man, I mean ever since he was here, it was like, you know, a calendar for this, calendar for that. You know, we'd have a yearly calendar. All those are things that you know, I've still maintained. I mean I've probably added like a couple more to the lists and stuff, but it was just always super important that he always says like, if you have a good plan, you know, you're not reacting, you know, as you would always call it shooting from the hip, like you always have a plan in place, and that way, if you do have to make you know, some type of audible or something, even those things you're already ready for, you know. So I think the organizational aspect is huge, and also just trying to promote and trying to train guys. I mean, I think that's I think that's what I really enjoyed about working with Thomas because our relationship we got along well because we were into similar things. You know, He's always been crazy about like the workout stuff. I don't ride bikes, would do any of that stuff, but I was always into you know, like rock climbing at that time. So I think that really like helped create the relationship. So it was like talking points that we always had, you know, but seeing how he kind of incorporated that into his lifestyle, like the discipline you know, where it was like work and then he was still making the time to like do his workouts. So I know for some people that's not a big deal, but it really showed that's like all right, you can have you know, a big job and still do everything that you liked. But he always came back to being organized, Like if you're not organized, you don't have time to do all that stuff, you'd be all over the place. So kind of to see that, and really during the renovation seeing the different skill sets he had, was like, that's pretty cool, Like you could literally jump on any piece of equipment and be able to operate that, be able to show your guys how to do that. So that became another thing for me where I'm like, I really need to get good at I guess everything that you do on a golf course, and you saw when you got here, we're like training guys because I really feel like you can't teach guys unless you yourself know how to do pretty much everything that you need to do on a golf course. So I think I think from that standpoint with Thomas, it was that like the organization and just like different skill set that you have to have as a superintendent to be successful.

00:30:44
Speaker 3: Obviously, one of the huge issues with with you know, there's a bunch of issues with maintaining golf courses in Northern California in particular, but one of them, I think you hit on a little bit is labor and the idea of developing guys because you know, it stands out because it's hard enough to find people to work, you know, it's probably you know, it's becoming more and more important to develop them, you know, and develop skills and make you know, the people that you hire, you know, more valuable over time. Like what are the types of ways that you guys go about developing talent?

00:31:19
Speaker 2: I here, you know, first off, with labor, I tell guys we're in a good place because a lot of times a guy would be like, hey, I know someone that wants to work, and it tends to be like family and stuff. So my problem almost ends up being like I can't hire everybody. You know that that's one. But how we develop them is just I think the fact that I speak Spanish, you know, And this is why I tell my assistants learn it, because especially in California, if you're not able to understand your crew, it's not just giving them certain jobs and oh yeah they understood what I told them, but it's actually understanding what they value. I think the fact that I have that relationship with guys where I mean, you'd be surprised like, not all guys want to get paid more. I mean, everybody likes more money, right, But the point I'm making with that is some guys actually will tell you like I just want to learn how to do a bunch of different things. So really understanding what those guys value is what has made it easier where it's like, all right, you know, I'm going to train you in this, you know, train you how to do that, And it to some guys just a lot more important to develop a bigger skill set than just you know, offering them more money and stuff. But I go back to if you're not able to communicate and get to know the guys from that standpoint, you're not really going to know how how they want to be developed. Or honestly, some guys are just happy doing what they're doing. Like some guys are happy with just jumping on a rough more and just letting them ride out into the sunset with that. But other guys. You know, I have a guy why I tell people every day like he could be someone's assistant right now. Problems like he doesn't have the turf, you know, degree, you know, he doesn't speak great English, but he sprays all of our greens for us. He does all that stuff. But he's a guy that when I talk to him, he said, I just want to learn how to do a lot of different things. And he's he's there. I mean he's pretty much working side by side with my assistants now, I mean doing everything. So I think from that standpoint, just being able to understand those guys and that's what's made it easier to develop people.

00:33:05
Speaker 3: That makes sense, you you know, like what motivates different employees, you know, no matter what profession you're in, Yeah, is completely different. Like everybody, everybody has different things that get them going, and it makes sense, like you know, the only way you find that out is by communicating.

00:33:21
Speaker 2: With them, right.

00:33:22
Speaker 3: And you guys, just in the recent past, you've built a brand new maintenance facility.

00:33:28
Speaker 1: We're sitting in it now.

00:33:30
Speaker 3: What types of things did you guys think about when building this with like kind of like you know, setting you guys up to have like a great maintenance program. Like what were the things that went into building this because I imagine you were highly involved with like the planning and everything.

00:33:48
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think most importantly was just the efficiency. I mean efficiency in the sense that anyone that came out to cal Club before. I mean the amount of tents that were scattered across the parking lot. I mean you have to grab a trailer in one tent and then go across the parking lot and grab your mower. And then you just imagine like when you don't have a one stop shop to grab everything. Like guys were forgetting stuff all the time. And our usual star time is like five thirty. It could be six thirty and guys were still in the parking lot and you really couldn't blame them because it's like, well, where's this at Where's that? We didn't really have a specific place for anything. It was like, all right, we'll try to put all the tools in one tent. Let's try to have all the mowers in another tent. So man, so the fact that believe it or not, I mean some members still didn't think it was like an urgency to do. I mean, it just blew my mind. So, I mean that was the biggest thing in my opinion, I think efficiency. But the other was like crew morale. I mean, yeah, now I can laugh about it, but our restrooms over there in the parking lot, like we were in a trailer, like a two y trailer and we had like a restroom naturally, but it was just a holding tank where they had to come and clean it out like three times a week. I think they were.

00:34:58
Speaker 3: Probably like you would run into it like a music festival or event, right, it's like like one of those like temporary toilets.

00:35:05
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's not what you want your you know, that's not what you want your crew to be doing. I mean I remember sometimes that thing would overflow and we'd have to lay palettes down and like walk across, you know, to be able to get into the trailer. And I remember it wasn't until I showed a board member when he was our club president at that time, pictures. He's like, oh my god, I didn't know that that's what you guys had over there. Like members just assumed like they have a restroom. It's a normal restroom, this and that. But it wasn't until you started showing those pictures and like getting into detail about what the guys were dealing with. That all jokes aside. I mean that that was terrible. The guys were that was their lunch room, but you'd have this like overflow that you know, all the stench was coming in there. It's like some guys would eat in their cars. So morale and efficiency was just like, man, we got to get this done. And so now, I mean when everyone asked and you talk to our guys. My biggest concern when we moved down here was, you know, our guys gonna be able to like flip that switch take care of the building because they're so used to just leaving everything laying around. But they were. I mean I think you know, we drilled it into them. You know, hey, the membership is making this huge investment for you guys, for you know, all these you know reasons. But when they moved in here, I mean you see it in the building now. I mean they they've really taken ownership. Like I said, I mean them araw. I mean it speaks for themselves. Like the guys are just happy that they have some more where they could just eat lunch during COVID. You know, it was a big deal. I mean we even have like outdoor seating, you know out here. So yeah, it's just it's been the best thing. And I mean, yeah, we are super efficient now because I think we've been here just more than two years, but just little by little you know, we've made tweaks on how to just get more organized. But now you almost see when the guys come in, it's just like you know, a half circle, if you will, when they come in between grabbing trailers, mowers, you know, blowers, whatever it is, and they're out the building. But again, before I was saying five thirty we start, guys would be in the parking lot at six thirty, guys are out the door here by like five, you know, forty five whatever, and they're out there doing their first job.

00:36:58
Speaker 3: So what what is that you guys added on site housing here? So you have some rooms that that staff stated. How has that helped with you know, recruiting retention?

00:37:11
Speaker 2: Yeah, well for sure, I mean initially, I mean because when we moved in, it was just when I think COVID was starting, So that really affected how many interns we were actually able to get. But like I says, for interns or yeah, it was mostly for interests, I mean, but especially when assistants from moving in here from like out of state, that's when we offered it. So I had an assistant when he moved here. He lived in the building for six months. So we have six dorm rooms. We decided because the Pro Shop, you know, they sometimes want to bring you know, guys from outside as well. So two rooms are usually dedicated to the Pro Shop staff, you know, whether it's an intern or an assistant, and then the other four rooms are designated for us. You know, I have three guys plus one of the guys from the Pro Shop living here currently. In March we get two new interns. So it's just it's been great to actually offered to guys. Like the guys that are coming in March are from Ireland, so yeah, so the mini, yeah, they're turf interns. One of them for sure, I know is from Ireland. And so when you're actually able to send these guys photos of where they're going to be staying. I mean if I was like twenty one and someone said, hey, you don't have to pay for a single thing, you know, we equipped the rooms like pretty nicely for that reason. Like the guys just jump at it right away. I mean, you're on property. You don't ever have to drive anywhere if you if you don't want to. So it's it's been it's been easy to sell it to guys, you know, when we're offering that, especially living in the Bay Area, because if you try to come out here and rent even one bedroom, I mean you're probably looking at more than two grand easily. So to be able to tell, you know, twenty some year old or whatever age like, hey, you can be housed here for free. You got a comfortable place to say that, I mean, they're they're all in.

00:38:46
Speaker 1: Yeah, I imagine even with assistant. It's nice that you said you had assistan in this state and here for six months. It's like just to save up so you could, you know, afford a place that you've watched last month.

00:38:58
Speaker 2: It's pretty expensive in the Bay.

00:39:02
Speaker 3: You guys do something obviously, you're a you know, like as you alluded to, seven days a week all year round. You know, golf doesn't stop here, which I think puts puts a big strain on all staff at courses that don't really have.

00:39:16
Speaker 1: An off season.

00:39:17
Speaker 3: Yeah, one of the things that you guys have instituted is a two week like maintenance break where the club closes down and you guys do like intensive maintenance work. Talk us through what that those two weeks look like from your end, and obviously like those are two weeks.

00:39:34
Speaker 1: Off for you guys like you know, it's still you still have the.

00:39:37
Speaker 3: Same problem where you don't really have days off, but you know, like what does that two weeks do and what impact has it made on the golf course since you instituted that.

00:39:46
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was gonna say, I mean just what you just said. I mean, we still have to be here. But it's always funny when aerifications coming up. You know, I'll have members like, oh, what do you what are your plans during erification because that's when everybody takes off, you know, the pro shop staff takes golf trips. I'm like, I'm gonna here, like we still have to work, like you don't come back and everything's just like done. But for us, I mean we get eleven days. I mean, that's that's been huge. I Mean we started with just having the one day off for aerification if that, and you know we've just progressed to eleven. But the first call it four or five days of that. It's just doing our entire aerification process. You know. Now we we pull cors on fairways, you know, we do it on the greens and surrounds and stuff. But once once we wrap that up, and I'm really good about showing the membership too, what we've been up to. It's a great time to get in and do whether it's details in your bunkers. You know, we get to do some edging on bunkers again, just small projects that you weren't able to do during the season. You get those eleven days where you know, we go through the entirety of like the natives get get after weeds and everything. So there's always like a bunch of projects, but like the first four or five days are always literally just for aerification, and after that it's you know what has been on the docket that we haven't got to. You know, we've done everything from tree planning or taking trees down, you know when members are out, stuff that we really don't want to be interfering with, especially when we airfy in August, because by the time guys come back Labor days, when we say the golf course has to be back, you know, fully healed from verification, you know, not be in the middle of any like big projects or anything like that. So you can imagine, I mean we usually aerify like the second week of August, so by Labor Day when guys come back, we're not really going to be doing many projects, so you almost have to try and get everything done within those eleven days. So yeah, guys stay pretty busy. I mean, we run a ton of overtime, like I said, but it ends up being worth it. I mean, because the members really see by the time they come back how much work we actually got done, you know. So it's definitely something that I hope we keep when I think we will keep going forward.

00:41:46
Speaker 3: What do you think the difference in terms of like how many projects you're able to do when they're like I'm just curious, like no golfers for eleven days versus you know, a regular eleven days stretch. What would you say in terms of, like, you know, like work that you're able to done.

00:42:02
Speaker 1: Is there like a percentage you could apply to it?

00:42:04
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, you know, probably the fact that I know we're terrifying. I mean, that's that's an easy one. You know, that's probably not something you're gonna be doing when your members are here. But project wise, i'd probably say, I mean, you're probably doing like sixty to seventy percent of your projects within those like eleven days because we've done everything from regrassing like hillsides, you know, or prepping like certain areas, you know, say it is a piece of fairway that you want to redo, and I put more of it. Of like how long it's going to take you to do because when members are here, you know, it's the constant stopping. You know, when does God forbid you say you're gonna close a hole or something like that. So I think you'd literally take a project that you can finish with nobody here in like two days, rather than take a full week, you know, or almost like seven days, you know whatever. I talk about full week in like five days. But sometimes things get stretched out. A good example is, you know, we redid some of our surrounds, like some of our callers that get really beat up from traffic, you know, again you know the property like the right of number twelve, not just such a narrow walkway there for members, like along the green.

00:43:11
Speaker 1: Where everybody walked everybody exits off the green in the same spot exactly.

00:43:16
Speaker 2: And so those are areas that when we talk about like having those eleven days where we're closed, if I were to go try and do that project, you know, even start on a Monday, because of the amount of traffic, like that's probably going to take you like three or four days to knock out the entire right side, but when you're closed, you knock it out in like half a day probably. And because now my staff doesn't have to go more fairways, they don't have to go rag bunkers, I can actually throw a ton more guys at certain projects and just get it done that much faster.

00:43:42
Speaker 3: You guys were using the Club Cadet autonomous mowers for your greens and then like they just like kind of like vanished out of business, Like they just like discontinued it one day.

00:43:55
Speaker 1: What was what did you like about the.

00:43:58
Speaker 3: Autonomous green mower and then what was the transition back to like not having them?

00:44:04
Speaker 2: Like I think what I liked best about it is because we still you know, we still had picked Poe out here. I mean, it's not a bunch, but when we had those autonomous mowers, it was nice that the mows is like literally you know, mowing. He was doing all the work, and at that time the guy was just dedicating you know, maybe it was like at that time, like five ten minutes to just kind of scan for seed heads, checking stuff in the surrounds.

00:44:28
Speaker 3: Go ahead, so just so everybody has a little bit more context is like these mowers would just mow the green, right, and so somebody would drive a cart basically have the mower on the cart, drive to the green, put the mower.

00:44:41
Speaker 1: You put the mower on the green, and then it goes right.

00:44:44
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean it would. It would each mower, you know, to mow green on average was probably like twenty five minutes. So it's twenty five minutes that that guy had.

00:44:52
Speaker 1: Where instead of sitting on a mower.

00:44:54
Speaker 2: Oh yeah yeah, so instead of that guy having attend to it. And the only thing, so I'll get into like the nega part, you know, of having those mowers. But on the positive side for us was the fact that a guy could do all these extra things without having to take that extra time, you know, whether it was fixing ball marks properly, you know, checking posts, starting the bunker. We have one hundred and fifty six bunkers out on the course. You know that the guys have to be doing day to day. So any extra time we had for that, you know, because of these autonomous mowers was great. The downside of them was the weight. I think there were over seven hundred pounds like per more because of all the batteries and stuff. So being fine fescue on the surrounds, I mean, they'd really take a beating. So we have to start using turning boards at the time, which now it was great because now we actually still use them. But that was the only thing because guys still have to tend the turning boards, so it's not like he could really completely get off the green. They're really to me on my end, like, there wasn't too many negatives with them with the mowers aside from the weight and the pressure that they'd put on the callers because of that. But yeah, made us way more efficient. But when we did lose them, uh, and guys had to start walk mowing again. Some guys were actually happy. I think I'm one of those, like there's something about like mowing your own greens. You know. Also because without getting into too much, sometimes when it was windy, which is very windy out here at times, the autonomous mowers would have issues because it would make interference with the signal, the RTK signal, and so you sometimes end up with like a skip or huge overlaps because of that because the more we're trying to compensate as much as it could. But then when it was done, the guy would have to take that mower which was super bulky, and go try and fix you know, some of these because you're not gonna leave skips all over the greens. So when it was windy, guys hated them because it's like, man, I have to go remot like ten passes anyway. So now that we have, you know, we're back to walk mowing. Like most everybody, I think guys are happy with that because it's like, all right, I'm gonna mow the green. I'm gonna have to worry about remowing it. And there's also something to be said that if a guy's mowing every pass, I feel like his eyes are like just way more on that green than just scanning it when he goes in there and just like blows it off, you know, or check is checking ball marks. So from that standpoint, it's better. And also the weight because now on the callers, like we still use turning boards because I think that really taught us that. You know, it's it's a great tool just to keep the fescue healthy and from getting super worn. But you know, you're talking seven hundred pounds versus a mower. That's you know, probably just under two hundred pounds, so it makes quite a difference for us. And I think from that standpoint, you know, I'm happy getting back to the old school way if you will.

00:47:33
Speaker 3: What in terms of what do you think about obviously autonomous is I think a big part of the future of turf. What do you what would you be most excited about about autonomous It seems like greens maybe not the best spot for him, but like where what what parts of the golf course would you most like to see autonomo miss mowers or autonomous technology help out?

00:47:57
Speaker 2: I think because we collect clippings. I mean, I know already talks about fairways and getting the fairways mode is great, but we collect clippings, and so I feel like, what.

00:48:05
Speaker 1: Do you what do you do with the clippings? Why do you collect them?

00:48:08
Speaker 2: So it became so when we first reopened after the renovation, we're probably like most people, like we weren't collecting clippings on the fairways, but we started seeing I mean, Nora Coyle's is pola heaven. I mean, if you want to grow pola, you know, as we were told by consultants, I mean, there's a perfect place to do it. So when we first opened, we never collected clippings, but we did notice. I mean, you're just flinging a ton of seed head out there when you do have pola, you know, on the fairways. So when we started collecting, you know, in other parts of programs and stuff that we were incorporating at that time, we saw a huge improvement, you know, with that. So that's one of the main reasons why we do collect. And we also don't like putting the clippings back out onto the course. You know, we like keeping things really lean, you know, keeping things really clean. So when we started collecting clippings, it became a thing. Where we started the fairways. We do the same thing on our surrounds. So autonomous would be great, but the reality is I still have to have a guy there tending to that. But you know, we'll see once once we get there. I know there's a couple of ferry moors out there, you know, in the UK the guys are using, But for me, it would be the rough because at least in the rough, I know, I mean literally send this thing out and you know the fact that you're not gonna have to worry about dumping the clippings because we don't do it in the rough. But we have one inch rough and these new autonomous mowers, I mean, you know, I saw a demo at the show. I mean, man, they're mowing at like heights of like twoint fifty, you know. So if I can just have you know, say five of these things, you know, which is what I'm hearing that guys have to be able to mow their roughs, that's just one or two guys that I don't have to worry about anymore. You don't have to worry about maintenance on a large piece of equipment. The cost of equipment, you know how quickly it's rising, and again the labor costs. So to me, the roughs would be like the best area we're here at Calculu. We could incorporate them and have good success with it.

00:49:53
Speaker 3: Yeah, and like you said with the green stuff, it's all of a sudden you have labor that's freed up to do something else like and it's just getting yourself more closer to doing project work it's opposed to daily maintenance work.

00:50:09
Speaker 1: Let's talk a little bit.

00:50:09
Speaker 3: So you've alluded to it, but you guys are one of the few places in northern California that maintain fine fescue greens and fairways.

00:50:20
Speaker 2: It's fairways pretty much all playing services rescue and then the grass greens.

00:50:25
Speaker 3: Bent and grass greens. So how have you guys gone about the kind of like day to day maintenance of it. It's obviously something that people are like, I ow, we can't do that, We can't do that and kept it, you know where I think most people are always amazed that.

00:50:42
Speaker 1: You guys have.

00:50:43
Speaker 3: I mean, if you come to San Francisco, everybody talks about the playing surfaces at Cal Club and you know, I think that's like, but like, what what are the things that go into maintaining it and what are the biggest challenges I think.

00:50:57
Speaker 2: You know, as far as what goes into it, I always tell people I think fescue and band grass, and I always say it's what works for our property, because you know, anytime we sometimes describe so you know, we get the oh, that wouldn't work. But so I just want to be very clear that it's like, it's what's worked for us. But with the fescue specifically, it's really keeping it lean because you know, I tell people, you have to know what fescue is and it isn't like if you think like, oh, I have the weather conditions, I could grow find fescu. You know I'd be fine. But the minute you try and treat it like you know a rye grass or grass that needs like you know, heavy amounts of inputs like fescu, you don't need to be putting a ton of end down for it. Like it performs best when you almost leave it alone, like just just let it be. I mean there's guys that I reached out to, you know, in first taking over, because I was really interested in like how can I make the surfaces even better? And mostly from the guys that I talked to, they said, just let it be, like you know, back off on growth regulators, make sure you know you're applying in at the right times of year. It just very many more quantities like these guys literally right, yeah, nitrogen. I mean, these guys were saying, you can almost just focus on like when you're getting heavy amounts of play, you know, maybe you want to be specific to where your traffic areas are to applying your end. Because the thing is find fester is a big thatched producer, and I think sometimes people think because it's a fine you know leaf, it doesn't. But no, it's a big thatched producer. So when you're adding a ton of nitrogen and stuff, you know, well, now you're adding to that especially you know. The other thing is do you want to be mowing your your grass a bunch of times? Because find fester is not a grass that you know you kept lean, you don't, you're not going to be mowing it a ton. So that's from one standpoint is make sure you're making sure you're keeping it pretty lean so you're not having to do these things, you know, like mowing it a bunch, like regulating it a bunch.

00:52:49
Speaker 1: Who who did you?

00:52:50
Speaker 3: I'm just curious, like when you reached out you said you reached out to people, Like who were you reaching out to? Because obviously it's not like a very popular grass, and so.

00:52:59
Speaker 2: I reached out to guys. At that time it was the Island Golf Club, I think I was in Ireland. I reached out to, you know, call it Coast to Coast ken up abandoned who I should say. I mean, I hadn't even met him in person, but the fact that I reached out to him, he was like so cool about like just sharing information everything from like mowing heights, you know, fertility practices and all this stuff top dressing. So I mean you could see. I mean I just really went I think the guy is called Festuca man on Twitter to Dave Haspell talking to those guys, and I mean I got those connections thankfully through uh Thomas. But again, I mean just those are the guys that are known for growing like great rescue because in California, I don't know that anybody else is growing like a full fine Festi golf course. And that's always been the challenge because when you talk to these guys, they're also built on sand dunes, you know, and they start telling you that, it's like, hey, just also take this with a grain of salt, because we're a different growing environment. They're on coast, so you almost have to take what they tell you and see how you can to apply it here. But I think for the fescue that was one of the biggest things that I had to do. I had to go outside and ask, you know, more people to see what are the different things I have to do, And the water management side of things became I think a huge component for us. I think now that we're probably as best staff as we have been in several years. We've really gone away from just relying on overhead irrigation. We're now you know, before it was like, oh, relying the overhead irrigation supplement with handwatering. Well, now it's kind of the opposite. Like I'll have five or six guys in the summer on any given day hand watering, and at night it just becomes like supplementing with that. So I think from the water management aspect, that's been huge to keep the surfaces as firm as they are. But with the greens, it's kind of similar to we're big on minimal disruption, Like we've never verticut greens out here for bankrafts. I know a lot of guys, you know, I've been told like, oh, there's no way you can't do that. But again I'm just telling people what we do here. We brush greens, you know, to aintain density, and there's you know, there's a whole lot of that goes into that, from timing to when you do it to how often, But for us, that's what's worked. We keep the greens really lean as well, and as far as mowing, like mowing traffic, rolling traffic. That's another thing we try to minimize. I mean, I think during season, I probably mow greens like three maybe four times a year. In the winter time, you're like doing it once a week, sometimes once every other week or something like that. But it's just understanding when you need to do something, and more importantly again I'll say, is when you don't need to do something.

00:55:32
Speaker 1: So a lot of it's just like not doing stuff, you know.

00:55:36
Speaker 3: I mean when I think about what you're talking about with fescue, it seems like less, less inputs, so less you know, chemicals that you're putting into the grass.

00:55:46
Speaker 1: So you know, in.

00:55:48
Speaker 3: Terms of like obviously you have more handwork that needs to be done for yeah, where you're gonna be paying labor costs on that on.

00:55:56
Speaker 2: The green on the green side, yeah yeah.

00:55:58
Speaker 3: But then in terms of the the grass itself, less chemical inputs, less water. Yep, it's in in a substantially better playing surface if you can pull it off.

00:56:12
Speaker 2: Yeah, one hundred percent. I mean, and again I mean maybe I'm biased because you know we're here, but I mean you do see the difference. I mean you see it when you play, when you play in in the summertime here, how guys will ride away say, I mean it's it's a very hard surface to hit off of because they're not really getting the balance that you do, you know, as if you were playing off of rye grass. But that's one of the things that makes it challenging out here. That makes it fun to matter.

00:56:37
Speaker 3: What's the soil profile like on the property and is it consistent throughout or like you know, there's a there's a good amount of elevation and kind of different pockets of the golf course.

00:56:47
Speaker 1: Does it vary throughout?

00:56:49
Speaker 2: Yeah? I think, I mean after we went through the renovation, I think it made it a lot more consistent.

00:56:54
Speaker 1: But I do think there's a sand cap, right or I wouldn't call.

00:56:58
Speaker 2: It a sand cap, you know, especially by definition. But they they tried mimicking like I think they said at the time, like seven or ten years of top dressing and the way they did as they did add sand over the top, but they actually tilled the sand into the profile, so it wasn't just left on top, you know, as most guys would call it like four or five inches you know, whatever guys end up going with. So that actually created a much better growing environment. And so there's a couple holes like holes fifteen through eighteen that seem like they have a lot more clay in them, and maybe that was just the way that you know, materials were end up ended up being dispersed during the renovation, but those holes are holes that the soil is a lot richer, you know. And a great example without how we see this too is during the season, if we mow all the fairways just once a week and they're fine with that holes fifteen through eighteen, we have to go out there moment a second time because that's how much they're growing, and that's how much the soil is impacting that.

00:57:57
Speaker 3: I'm always fascinated about how like you have like the like different quirks and corners of your property that react completely differently to everything. But hey, you know, I really appreciate the time, and it's always I think anybody that's ever been out here would testify that it's a it's an incredible pleasure to play at a place that's so meticulously maintained on a on a daily basis, Like you know, it's it's really incredible.

00:58:26
Speaker 1: And thank you for coming on and sharing your story.

00:58:29
Speaker 2: Thanks a lot for having me Andy, I really appreciate it.

00:58:41
Speaker 3: Thank you for listening to another edition of the Frida Egg Podcast, and thank you to Javier for coming on as well as Matt.

00:58:48
Speaker 1: Rush's for producing this episode.

00:58:50
Speaker 3: Thank you Matt. As a quick reminder, we are off and running. We've got all of our event registrations are live. We've got a good amount that are sold out. We've got a few that have some spots left. A few that I wanted to feature. Soul Park our event the Boomerang in Ohi, California, that is in late April April twenty fourth.

00:59:12
Speaker 1: The Saturday in Ohi.

00:59:14
Speaker 3: I can't think of a better place to spend a weekend than Ohai, California. It is, it would be great that time of year. It's you know, the last couple of years we've had it there, it's been about seventy degrees in sunny both times. Really cool golf course and it's got super neat Gil Hansson design greens and really fun place to spend a day.

00:59:36
Speaker 1: If you're looking at it, you know, it's a great place to.

00:59:38
Speaker 3: Spend a day with significant other as well to spend a weekend with a significant other.

00:59:43
Speaker 1: Lots of good restaurants and things to do in town.

00:59:46
Speaker 3: So check out the boomerang if you're looking for something to do in late April. And thank you for listening to another edition of the podcast. We will be back on Friday with a new episode. Thank you guys again