Course closed but appearing quiet

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welshjim22

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Tried to get a game in today as the only day this week i can get a full round in. Rolled up to the club nice empty car park and i could see 1st,17th and 18th holes empty. Though i was in for a good round until i started walking round to the 1st tee and pro shop to find course closed notice. Went inside to check this was still the case as the course looked quiet and was informed closed till 4:30 or 5:00. Too say i am not impressed would be an understatement.

Never looked at the diary they gave me when i joined just normally look at the online diary and events pages which show nothing for today. However i have just noticed the paper diary shows the course closed for Junior open and in fact closed for ten different days from May to October. How many other courses close to members and to what degree. We don't have a tee time system but i would have thought on these days you could have one and if the event the course is closed for isn't busy the times could be made available to the other paying members.

Wish i had known earlier could have gone elsewhere but cutting it fine to travel elsewhere and be back for family commitments this afternoon.
 
Our course is rarely closed except for county and pro events and even then not normally all day and certainly advertised well in advance. I'm seeing a growing number of societies (there's one tomorrow afternoon) which book the tee for an hour or so and make the pace of play slow but I guess its much needed revenue at this difficult time so its churlish to complain
 
There are about 10 open comps a year at my club but once the last competitors as tee off you can then tee off your self
 
We close all day for the West Herts open, ladies open, junior open, invitation day, club champs, finals day, any county events, West Watford charity day, Watford Observer charity day, and probably a few others. Obviously it is also closed during any medals, unless you are in it.

I would expect the course to close on the above days. That is why you get a club diary. I would expect this to be not unusual.

We also have a lot of societies, when the tee is closed for specific times.
 
We close all day for the West Herts open, ladies open, junior open, invitation day, club champs, finals day, any county events, West Watford charity day, Watford Observer charity day, and probably a few others. Obviously it is also closed during any medals, unless you are in it.

I would expect the course to close on the above days. That is why you get a club diary. I would expect this to be not unusual.

We also have a lot of societies, when the tee is closed for specific times.
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Thats alot of closed days are these all year or limited to the summer. I hope your subs are low. I am currently considering my future at this club mainly due to financial reasons and starting a family closed days with no mention on the clubs website diary don't help. When i can get a decently paced round in i quite enjoy the course.
 
Subs are about a grand.

My way of looking at this, is that any course worth joining, will have the same sort of events going on, and lots of societies. It is just the way it is.

I don't think the number of days it is closed is that bad.

If I wanted to play whenever I want, on a totally empty course, that is magnificent, I just need to stump up £150 a time and play The Grove.

Not going to happen.
 
If you think the summer (optimistically) is around 120 days, then having the course closed for 10 of them isn't bad is it??

A quick call to the pro shop "Is it busy? Anything on today?" Would have saved you the trouble.
 
That's why you get a fixture card at the start of the season. All the big events will be planned well in advance and can be penned into the diary to ease any confusion. The online diary should show any alterations to this and any late bookings for outings and the like.

If the course is holding opens in the near future, perhaps the greenstaff need some time to get the place looking tiptop condition.

Don't see a problem if the fixture card is properly detailed. I must say, there are always folks turning uop to play on a nice saturday afternoon and finding a competition is on the go.. if only they looked at their fixture card ;)
 
We are much luckier now than we were. When we were sited in the middle of the raccourse we lost every days racing which was around about 30 days a year plu the week before and the week of Royal Ascot. Now we are open during racing and only lose 6 holes in Royal week for helicopter landings and the practice ground as a coach park
 
..........Now we are open during racing and only lose 6 holes in Royal week for helicopter landings and the practice ground as a coach park
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Can't you declare them temporary immovable obstructions and keep playing?? :D :D

The down draught may have an effect on club selection though :D :D
 
You all seem preety understanding of course closure. To be fair patience isn't my strong point. In fairness i could have rung up but have never needed to except for weather related closure.

If you don't see a problem could i ask how many closures would be acceptable? If the place had been busy i would have understood more but it looked very quiet.

I guess this goes in the things i don't like about golf. Slow play, pitchmarks and divots not repaired, old boys school and my all time favourite people being overly fussy about dress codes.
 
If the course was closed for an event once a week during the summer then that would be reasonable to me. Add to that the tee closures on certain days for societies etc.

It's things like that which stop us from paying even more for our annual subs.
 
Who knows what is reasonable to you? Apparently just one closure is enough to send you heading for the exit door. For me, I know in advance when the course is likely to be closed, I know when the comps are on too. Often if the course is closed I can get a courtesy somewhere else (if I plan ahead), so I don't see a problem with it being closed a number of times a year. There are 365 days, so if I can only play on 355 I don't feel that hard done by.
 
I guess even when we were on the racecourse we accepted it as part of the costof being allowed to use the course. Now we are our own entity and not at the beck oand call of the racecourse we need as much traffic as we can in terms of societies/green fees and wet/dry trade in the clubhouse.

That said I would hate us to get to a point like near neighbours Mill Ride which is pretty much geared towards corporate and society golf and members seem very much an afterthought. We are seeing more visitors but we also don't have booked tee times so its easy to roll up for a game and you can usually get off the 10th if its busy anyway.
 
Anywhere. I used to be a member of Moor Allerton about 15 years ago, before I moved abroad. I have played Temple, and Wike Ridge recently.

Does Roundhay still have the rubber tee mats? That was the only thing putting me off playing there.
 
Yeah on Yellows they are but from whites its some type of decent astro turf which plays better than mats. This time of year there is only a couple off them, the rest grass, the course is in pretty good nick except the 3rd green at the back where flooding has damaged the grass, but the rest of the course is looking great. The council has just spent a fair bit revamping the course and adding the new astroturf.
 
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