U.S. Open

Q & A With Jim Hyler

Roger Schiffman talks with the USGA president

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By Roger Schiffman

June 2010

USGA president Jim Hyler is the classic Southern gentleman. In his Virginia drawl, he's disarming yet assertive. His audience gets his point, whether he's helping plan the U.S. Open at Pinehurst (which he did in 1999), talking about the financial industry (retired as COO of First Citizens Bank in Raleigh, N.C., he serves on the boards of five companies and two hospitals) or discussing the future of golf. Lately, he has taken up the cause of making the game environmentally sustainable. Managing Editor Roger Schiffman caught up with Hyler, 62, in Durham, N.C., at Old Chatham Golf Club, where he's a founding member.

Roger Schiffman: Jim, thank you for agreeing to sit down with us. One of the first things I wanted to ask you is, when you became the president of the United States Golf Association back in February, you said in your acceptance speech at Pinehurst, "When it comes to the issue that is perhaps of greatest concern to golf's future, namely water, we must reset the way we look at golf courses. We need to understand how brown can become the new green." What experiences in golf made you decide that the USGA needs to take a leadership position in this area?

Jim Hyler: Well, the USGA has actually been taking a leadership position on the issues of golf and the environment since the 1920s. Our Green Section has been doing a tremendous amount of research in this area. Unfortunately, it is probably our best-kept secret. And, as I said in my remarks at Pinehurst, that will be changing because we need to make a lot of this research more public and let people understand the relationship between golf and the environment. But from my own experiences, I would say there are several things that have impacted my thinking on this. One is in the Piedmont North Carolina area. In the last few years we have had several severe droughts that have really impacted the golf courses and available water. Secondly, the last four years I have had the privilege of working with [senior director of rules and competitions] Mike Davis, as Chairman of the Championship Committee, and working with a number of our Green Section agronomists and getting a much better understanding of what firmness really means and how it affects playability. And I've come to gain a much better appreciation for firm and fast. And then lastly, the economic meltdown that we've had has had a really severe impact on golf courses and golf-course finances. And I think that as you look at this issue of water, that dialing back the use of water, fertilizer and pesticides can clearly have a positive economic impact on clubs and courses. So I think all of these things have sort of come together and really made me realize that we need to reset the way that we look at golf courses.

Schiffman: So you're saying the economic downturn we've experienced could actually have a positive effect as far as golf and the environment is concerned.

Hyler: Absolutely. I think it will offer opportunities for clubs and courses to look at their maintenance budgets and realize that trying to get that last 20 percent of perfection on manicuring is really not worth it. It has almost nothing to do with playability. It's all about cosmetics. And then you get to this issue of water being a very finite resource -- and do we need to put as much water on the course? I think when you consider dialing back your water and look at the domino effect back through a maintenance budget, it can have a very significant impact on that budget.

Schiffman: Let's discuss the playability of golf courses when they are firm, fast and possibly brown. How does that affect shotmaking and the skill levels that are required?

Jim: Well, I think it offers so many more variables to shotmaking. You have so many more options if you're able to play the ball on the ground as opposed to just an aerial game. I think if you have a soft golf course, you are playing an aerial game because you can't bounce the ball. On a firm, fast course, you are able to use the contours and the slopes that the architect gives you. You are able to play different kinds of shots, bounce the ball on the green, if you have firm approaches. I think it adds much more fun to the game. I think it makes it a lot more fun to play for any level of skill. So I think firm and fast would introduce many more opportunities for people to make shots and increase the playability a lot.

Schiffman: Assuming we don't get a monsoon at Pebble Beach, will that course play more firm and fast?

Hyler: If we get a monsoon in mid-June at Pebble, that will be news! Pebble Beach in mid-June will be very firm and fast. In Coastal California you are really able to dial in the setup in mid-June, so we expect Pebble to be very firm and fast. Schiffman: And will it have brown areas?

Hyler: Well, we are talking with the superintendent there, Chris Dalhamer, about his water application leading up to the Open, and he will go to hand watering several weeks out. And then we might very well see some brown, but keep in mind that Poa annua fairways do require some water to keep it alive, but it will definitely be firm and fast.

Schiffman: Speaking of grass strains, let's talk about Bermuda grass and the courses in Florida and in the Southwest and in desert areas, like around Scottsdale and Tucson. There are two schools of thought as to overseeding these courses in the winter with ryegrass for a green playing surface. One is that, yes, it is necessary because it maintains the health of the turf, especially if there is a lot of cart traffic. However, there is another school of thought that says the Bermuda grass should just be allowed to go dormant. The overseeding actually hurts the turf and means it takes more time for the Bermuda to come back. What is the USGA's position and philosophy on this, and does the USGA have any research to back up its position?

Hyler: We have not been doing any research on this overseed issue. And it gets back really to the individual courses as to whether or not they choose to overseed. Our agronomists can come in and give advice on process and procedures to overseed -- what it means to overseed both in terms of planting the ryegrass, seeding the ryegrass in the fall, and then what you do to transition it back to Bermuda in the spring. But we've not done any research there. And what our experience has found, that the question about overseeding gets down to one of traffic on the golf course. If a golf course is getting an extraordinarily high number of rounds, it might make some sense to overseed. But typically, competition can also get into the equation about the course down the street, and it looks green, so therefore we are going to overseed. I do think that, at least in the Carolinas, you are seeing a trend today where courses are overseeding less than they were five years ago. It's an economic issue in terms of cost to overseed, and then it takes a lot of water, particularly in the fall to get that ryegrass out and growing. So I think you are seeing a trend away from overseeding. But it does get back to a traffic issue and what the golfers want.