Duncan Ross Sports
Contractors has used its drainage expertise to successfully revitalise three
fairways at Longridge Golf Club that had previously suffered heavily with water
retention.
The 18-hole,
5,904-yard, course provides outstanding views over the Ribble Valley, Forest of
Bowland and the Fylde coast, and, is maintained to an exceptional standard by
Course Manager, Andrew Read, and his four staff.
During his 18-years at
the club, Andrew had to contend with moisture retention on the third and ninth
fairways.
Recently, this had
caused the third fairway to become near unplayable and action was taken to
bring it, and the ninth and eleventh fairways, back in line with the rest of
the course.
Duncan Ross was picked
to rectify the drainage issue based on Andrews requirement to find a contractor
capable of delivering a high quality and tidy project.
He said: “It is the
first time that Duncan has worked on our course. I know of the company’s
reputation through word of mouth from other greenkeepers and going on Twitter
and seeing the videos and work they have done recently, so it’s the overall
reputation and recommendations which swayed it for me.
“The third fairway
this time last year was horrible. It was black in places, you could hardly walk
on it, so if you can’t walk on it you can’t really play golf on it.
“We had more problems
when it came to cutting because it would make a mess. In the autumn it never
dried up, so I had a meeting with our greens chairman and explained that we
needed drainage work done, and they went to the council and funds were made available.
“We then got Duncan on
site and he looked at the third, ninth and eleventh fairways and came back with
a plan. I had drawn some plans up and Duncan looked at those and decided what
the best way to achieve it was, and he’s got the experience, so we were happy
to go with what he recommended.
“Going into September
we’ve had over 160mm of rain and the drains have started working well. We’ve
checked the outlets and there is loads of water coming out of them, so it’s
been a sound long-term investment.
“The third fairway and
the ninth, which is a short fairway, are now playable. I checked the outlets on
the ninth recently and they were running well, and the fairway is dry.
“Golf is a 12-months a
year sport now, in the past getting into September and October people started
putting their clubs away but now they want to play all year round. The ninth
used to get churned up because we’d need to have buggies on for people that couldn’t
walk around the course, so we did the ninth because it was wet but also to make
it more playable and get the buggies going on there.”
Whilst the main
objective of the drainage installation was achieved on the third, ninth and
eleventh fairway, Andrew and the club’s members were also impressed with the
clean and diligent nature the Duncan Ross team carried out the project.
Because the course had
to be allowed time to dry out from the wet winter, work began during May for
two weeks when the course was in use. This meant work needed to be flexible and
accommodate competitions the course was hosting, requiring the work to be done
in a clean and tidy way, something the company is renowned for doing.
“The men worked around
us, if we had a competition on then they would move onto another fairway, so
the only disruption was the drainage lines that were left afterwards but they
were nice and tidy, and the golfers were really impressed with the work and how
tidy everything was,” Andrew explained.
“The golfers are happy
and we’re happy because we didn’t have to spend time clearing up after the
work, we were able to concentrate on looking after the rest of the course
instead."
