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What does a piece of land owe the people around it once the golf stops paying for itself?
In this episode of The Bag Drop: Untold Stories in Golf, host Matt Considine and co‑host Dr. Kevin Moore (a.k.a. “The Professor”) sit down with Blake Conant (golf course architect; co-designer of Old Barnwell and the Gilroy) to talk about the second course he is building in the dirt right now — and the master's thesis he wrote a decade earlier arguing that some golf courses should stop being golf courses.
The conversation dives into:
- Why a painting degree and three months running equipment with Tom Doak at Dismal River turned out to be the right education for golf architecture
- Building the Gilroy next door to a course everybody already loves, and the Snoop Dogg rule Blake uses to keep from chasing it
- The 90-acre parcel Nick Schreiber bought so the routing would work, and why Blake says architects are simply greedy
- A kids course with a tunnel and a ramp, built on Brian Schneider's premise that kids do not actually want to putt
- The 2013 thesis on bankrupt courses: what Blake got right about supply, what he missed about demand, and why the courses that closed were the wrong ones
- The arithmetic that decides whether affordable public golf gets built at all — roughly ten dollars of green fee for every million spent
Connect with our guest
🎨 Blake Conant — https://www.dundeegolf.com/ 🐦 X/Twitter: https://x.com/Dundee_Golf — | 📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dundeegolf/ | 💼 https://www.linkedin.com/in/blake-conant-90566a37/
⛳️ Old Barnwell — https://oldbarnwell.com
⛳️ Old Barnwell — https://oldbarnwell.com
Join the NewClub community
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Connect with Matt & The Professor
🎙️ Matt Considine — 🐦 X/Twitter: https://x.com/consequential85 | 📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/consequence18/ | 💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/matt-considine-103bb21/
📚 Dr. Kevin Moore ("The Professor") — 🐦 X/Twitter: https://x.com/kevcmoore | 📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kevcmoore | 💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevin-moore-177b30b3/
🗣️Contribute to the show! — 📧 email: thebagdrop@newclub.golf
Chapters
00:00 "Make sure your first one is your worst one"
00:49 Welcome, and kudos to the R&A for actually enforcing the rules
04:19 Who Blake Conant is, and how the Professor found him
07:45 Teaching of the week: "Build a Course Today" and the overbuild
09:30 Titleist Vokey SM11
11:11 Conant, Conant, or Conan the Barbarian
12:18 House paint, big canvases, and actually selling art
14:44 Art school to landscape architecture to Dismal River
17:42 The doubts he probably should have had
19:20 Following Old Barnwell: the Snoop Dogg rule
20:53 Was a second course always the plan?
23:12 Nick Schreiber, and hiring people you then leave alone
27:19 The kids course: they don't actually want to putt
29:56 Tunnels, ramps, and a train that isn't there yet
30:37 Who the Gilroy is for, and greens that sit on the ground
33:11 Still testing the good player, just differently
34:41 Buying the purple parcel
37:09 Buy the land before anybody knows you're building
38:59 The 2013 thesis on bankrupt golf courses
41:58 What are we measuring: social, environmental, economic
47:39 The wrong courses closed
48:58 Repurposing, HOAs, and grand ideas that don't pencil
51:05 Should a new project pass the test before opening day?
52:49 Golf as a Trojan horse: programming, foundation, community
55:45 Aiken's building boom and a healthy kind of competition
59:38 The public course he'd like to build without donors
1:03:49 Wrap and thanks
What is NewClub?
Founded in 2017, NewClub is the premier private golf society in the United States. It blends the community and access of a private club with the variety and affordability of public golf. Members enjoy thousands of reserved tee times, competitions and events at exceptional partner courses across our local chapters, as well as signature trips and exclusive perks. NewClub is revolutionizing golf membership, making the game more meaningful for those who love it.
What is The Bag Drop?
The Bag Drop features weekly stories from the culture, community and characters shaping golf today. Produced by NewClub Golf Society, each episode blends authenticity and expert insights for passionate golfers at all levels. Special guests from clubs, courses and every corner of the changing landscape join us for thoughtful, in‑depth discussions on all things golf.
Creators and Guests
Host
Matt Considine
Founder of NewClub and our resident feel player. Matt’s junior golf career led him to the University of Akron where he met our co-host. During his junior year, Matt Studied abroad in Ireland and discovered golf societies. Subsequent trips to Scotland fed his passion for the history, ideals, and culture of accessible, affordable, and sustainable golf, a concept he would later bring to the U.S. with NewClub. Known for his interviewing style, quick wit, and compelling storytelling, Matt brings thoughtful, reflective conversations to The Bag Drop. His professional journey before NewClub included multiple leadership positions in growth-stage startups, where he managed teams responsible for more than $250 million in revenue. Matt actively gives back to the game as a Board Member of the First Tee of Akron and past chair of the Evans Scholar Foundation. Proudly based in his hometown of Akron, Ohio, Matt finds inspiration in family life with his wife, their three children, and their golf dog, Gypsy.
Host
The Professor
NewClub's Chief Ambassador and every golf sicko's favorite educator. Kevin is a thoughtful and deeply curious host. His studied, constructivist approach adds intellectual enrichment and balance to the show. As a professor of Math Education at the University of Georgia, Kevin's background in applied mathematics and cognitive psychology uniquely informs his insights on golf strategy and performance. Originally from Ohio, Kevin was a Division I collegiate golfer at the University of Akron, where his passion for understanding mathematical thinking began. After earning his doctorate from Arizona State University, he combined his analytical expertise with his love for golf by co-founding Golf Blueprint, an organization aimed at helping golfers optimize their games through data-driven strategies. Kevin enjoys balancing deep philosophical discussions with simple pleasures, such as indulging his sweet tooth, cheering on college football, and spending relaxed evenings with his friends, his wife, and their beloved dog, Nole.
What is The Bag Drop: Untold Stories in Golf?
Deeply researched audio documentaries that tell the definitive stories behind golf's greatest clubs + weekly conversations with the characters and communities shaping golf today.
Blake Conant (00:00)
I always think of this Snoop Dogg quote where he says, Make sure your first shit is your worst shit it's it's a good it it's a good litmus test of like, okay, we don't we don't have to try to match that and we're we're actively trying to do something different at the Gilroy than what we did at first course at Old Barnwell. But also like there's no reason it can't be as good as it possibly can be.
And it's not like we just had all our ideas and threw them all at OB One and we don't have any ideas left, you know. The land is very different. there's more like natural green sites at the Gilroy and we're purposefully trying to like make the greens a little bit different. kind of treating it like it's just another creative problem to solve.
Matt Considine (00:49)
Welcome to the Bag Drop, Untold Stories in Golf. I'm your host, Matt Consodine, here with my co-host, the
Blake Conant (00:52)
Snap last night I remember five stars.
Matt Considine (00:54)
Professor Dr. Moore. How are you?
The Professor (00:58)
I'm doing good. You know, I want to start off with a kudos this morning. you know, as a professor, my job is typically just to be critical and identify areas of improvement and ways we can be better. That's just what you're training to do. So I wanna I wanna spin that a little bit and go on the kudos side. I know we're supposed to be an evergreen pod, so I'm not gonna sp talk about the details, but I have to give a shout out to an regulating body, actually regulating and upholding the rules of golf. Kudos to the RNA back at the open.
Just saying, hey, the rules of golf are what they are. We're gonna enforce them. We don't care what you do, you know, how you complain about it, who you wanna call in, these are the rules. Hey, we're here to, you know, enforce that and protect the field. So shout out to a regul regulating body actually doing their duty.
Matt Considine (01:44)
Governing governance is governing again. Once again. yeah, that's that's it was good to see. Probably some other things that might need to be revisited by those
The Professor (01:55)
Yeah.
Matt Considine (01:56)
those governing bodies, but but yeah, like a lot of stir the last month around.
Will it kick off the start a r a renaissance in the rules, Professor? Are we gonna enforce
things once again? Are we gonna revisit some? Do we have a do we have to do another pod on on regulation?
The Professor (02:15)
I mean, the qu quote our friend Todd Schuster out there, it's time to put the fear of God into the players. I think is what he said. And I am for that. it's you know, I think I put this on Twitter. I I en sport is entertainment. And I think there's a level of entertainment that's there when the there is tension between the regulating bodies and the people playing the sport that just adds a layer to it. And we've just been
Too long, twenty, thirty, forty, however many years of just them being lock and step and hand holding and coddling. Hey, we need some tension there between the two.
Matt Considine (02:50)
Yeah.
Yeah, it it it it's kinda who's in the driver's seat a lot of the time, right? For for the industry, for the decisions that are being made. And it's it's just feels like we've been in a a position where ProGolf has had a lot of say over a lot of things and the professionals themselves, the most famous faces in the game, and voices are are kind of driving. So yeah, I think it it it has to be a balance, right? There's gotta be stewardship, there's there's gotta be conversation.
But there's there's gotta be governance and it's good to see that that stuff. Honestly, it I I I think for a lot of us as amateurs just playing in our you know weekly matches, it forced me to think about some of the things I've become a little more lax about. And I know that
The Professor (03:31)
It's
Matt Considine (03:32)
that one walking around your ball and and the path of your swing and you're up against a tree line and you snap a little twig on a practice swing.
I I've definitely been more casual around that. Espe and
The Professor (03:43)
yeah.
Matt Considine (03:43)
with watching people in my group. So I I think it was a good reminder to of like, yeah, that is like a significant fundamental part of the game we need to remind ourselves of.
The Professor (03:52)
Yeah, I think as golfers we've got to remember we're not entitled to anything in the game of golf. You're not good shots, bad shots. There's no no entitlement that comes along with it. And I think with that's, you know, always looking to the Scottish game as something you and I like to do. And I that is always refreshing when visiting over there. You see they by and large in their regular games do uphold the rules very strongly. much much more so at least than the the American game in your typical better ball game with your buds here.
Matt Considine (04:19)
Yeah. Yeah. Well you gotta be governed by, you know, principles, values. And today's guest, I think, this gentleman's guided his career with some some values, some directions, some principles. and and really excited for who you brought on the show today. Blake Conant. I I I gotta ask him if that's the correct pronunciation. It's on the the the T I feel like most people I've heard say it's silent. I wanna be on it today. I feel like it's not, but we'll find out.
Blake is one of your longtime favorites. And I I'm on to you though, Professor. I I know the guy builds from some kick ass golf courses that you like, but you're such a homer. I didn't know this guy spent time in Georgia. I didn't know this guy has Nebraska roots. that that that is like you, you y your family out in Nebraska, you love anything corner husky related. Is that what's going on here? Is this a home game?
The Professor (05:08)
Big red go dogs. certainly no. I I I don't recall exactly where I cros I came across Blake. I honestly think it was one of those Twitter connections. and I've got to interact with him a few times over the years. And every time it's like, whoa, this like there's something I learned, or something he says, or some perspective he offers up. You know, just I file in the the Rolodex of just something to r to remember and pull forward later. But the first time I think it was, I was traveling up to the northeast and
put on Twitter like, Hey, where should I play? And he's like
Go play Cape Arundel. You know, all the Northeast Coast. I was right, I was playing on a qualifier at Essex County Club, up in Manchester by the sea. That's the one he pointed me to. I'm like, well, you know, if he's gonna bypass all these other ones that you know of and suggest that, there must be something to it. So my dad and I went and played there. And one of the more formative experiences for me early on in getting in the golf architecture world of going and playing a place, I don't remember its total yardage, maybe fixty s 5,600 yards. but playing a place and walking off be like,
That didn't feel like fifty-six hundred yards. There was so much cool aspects and features baked into the course, more so than most seventy five hundred yard golf courses I've played on in terms of what you could learn from the grounds there. and that was my first experience with Blake. And from that moment forward I kind of look to consume anything he talks about, puts out there. If I could, you know, the few chances I've had a conversation with him, I just get excited about that.
Matt Considine (06:29)
Yeah, th there's here, here. I mean i the the the just doing a little bit more research on the guy and realizing he was a painter by trade, so I'm excited for that. You know, I love I love the artistic
The Professor (06:38)
I didn't know that. Yeah.
Matt Considine (06:41)
s part of golf course architecture, of golf itself. I I just I love leaning into that. So I'll I'll have some questions from there. But you know, we we we got plenty to talk about. So we'll we'll get to it. The work at Old Barnwell, the Gilroy,
that he's currently on, I believe, now when we're chatting with him. So it's it's a lot to get there. And your crack research, you we're digging deep. We got some old a paper he wrote, right? A thesis that you uncovered
The Professor (07:04)
Thesis.
Matt Considine (07:05)
from decades ago that you you knew would fire me up. So I'm excited to ask him some questions about his former self and and if he still agrees with what his take was back then.
The Professor (07:16)
Yeah, proud masters graduate from the lovely institution of the University of Georgia.
Matt Considine (07:21)
Yeah, it was it was to summarize his thesis was the American golf course bust. just you know, a lot of courses were closing down after the recession of two thousand and eight. And, you know, what should happen to the land if if not a golf course, if it's left behind? How do you measure and and decide what is of value? It was really, really thoughtful thing that I enjoyed. speaking of thoughtful teachings of the week, Professor, you got something for us?
The Professor (07:45)
I pulled some s I pulled some stats from his actual thesis that I thought I would just read through
Matt Considine (07:49)
Okay.
The Professor (07:49)
here to set the stage for a later conversation. You know, he brought up the roots of his thesis go all the way back to, you the Build a Course Today campaign. That was from the N that was the NGF slogan. I think it was nineteen eighty-eight, where they predicted there needed to be a new golf course opening opening every single day for the next decade was their prediction and their message for this. just to meet, you know, the baby boomer demand golf was growing.
Problem was that didn't actually come to fruition, that demand that they predicted. So, you know, over the next, I think, 20 years, gol US added something like 5,000 golf course courses, maybe then maybe more than that. but basically in the 1990s, you had golf course facilities grew by 20%, but rounds up only went up by around four or five to twelve percent, depending on what you're looking at, relative to private public and so on. So it just never matched.
the the build out never matched actually the demand increase and that ultimately led to the big bust that we had. And as you mentioned, then Blake's entire thesis was, Well, what do we do with that land built around golf courses being sustainable? Which I wanna ask him questions about that. You know, when people say golf courses produce sustainability, you know, what does that mean? and his thesis was diving into, well, what do we do with this land to keep up that sustainability that golf courses provide versus, you know, housing developments and other things.
Matt Considine (09:09)
Yeah. Yeah. Timely. maybe he did predict it. I mean, th or the demand didn't come or did it, Professor. I mean, it's been maybe it was just a little delayed. It was just it was just a timing mechanism. That's all. We just had to hang on a little longer. Yeah, yeah.
The Professor (09:17)
Man, which another twelve J just needed a needed a pandemic, I guess, to to help out the
NGF.
Matt Considine (09:30)
thanks to our partners at Titalist for supporting this podcast, supporting new Club Golf Society. Professor, I love talking about my new GTS driver more than anybody. I talk about it any chance I get. However, I want to talk about the all new Vokey SM11 wedges today. I am getting dialed. I I just the the ball flight on these things are coming down. It it hasn't lost its spin for me. It it reacts in a way.
That I want to see out of my golf ball going into a green and and it's at the right trajectory, which is something you know I've struggled
The Professor (10:04)
Mm.
Matt Considine (10:05)
with for a long, long time. A lot of it has to do with the technology updates into the SM11, but more of it has to do with my fitting. And Dustin O'Hara, shout out to one of the best to do it. He's in northeast Ohio now. He moved from Connecticut to here. Titeless fitters are are a step above. They're some of the best in the game. And
If you haven't been fit for your wedges, which a lot of people, professor, don't get fit for their wedges. You gotta make time for this. It makes a significant difference. You have so many options now with the different grinds. I'm an F guy in most of my flighted wedges I'm looking for, but I I rotate between an S and in a T grind on different soils now. And I and I love the nurdery around it, but it helps me play better golf. Help yourself play better golf.
Go check out over at titleist.com. Start your fitting process there and play the new titles. Vokey SM eleven wedges. No other wedge is trusted by more players on tour. All right, professor, let's get on the show.
Blake Conant, welcome to the backdrop.
Blake Conant (11:11)
Thanks for having me. You you got the name right too. Yeah, that's that's that's how you pronounce it.
Matt Considine (11:15)
It do you ever feel
do you ever feel like people don't say the T? I for the longest time I thought that you your name didn't have a T on it.
Blake Conant (11:24)
Yeah, you know, you hear some Conan, you know, as people are like, Are you Conan the barbarian? but no, it's either it's either Conant or Conant. and then I had a I was working on a project in Carmel Valley and there was this this foreign girl who spoke German and French and she's like, Your name's pronounced Conant. I said, Okay, yeah I like I trust you. because it's
The Professor (11:47)
Ha ha.
Matt Considine (11:47)
let's let's go with it.
Blake Conant (11:47)
It's it's got
its it's got its roots back in France or something. So yeah, it's like all right, Conant, there you go.
Matt Considine (11:54)
Than th thanks for clearing that up. The barbarian thing, I know you got the beard, that's part of your look, but that's not fair. You I've heard you're you're an intel intellectual, as the professor said in our intro. and and I wanna I wanna start with the artistic side of your intellect, Blake. And and I I saw you were a painter or you have a paint degree. what what are we working with? Are we watercolors? Are we acrylics? What's your what's your jam?
Blake Conant (12:18)
So I I would use synthetic polymer, which is a a fancy word for house paint. 'cause I painted you know a big scale like four foot by six foot canvases and it was cheap and readily available when you're in college. and it's also archival, which is kind of important when you're in the art world, you know. so I there's a famous artist who I sort of got into and
you know, he he was somebody I looked up to, and his name was Al Held, and that's what he used was house paint. And he did like 20 foot by 30 foot canvases. so yeah, it was big like geometric abstraction. and I actually sold things to people who weren't in my family. So at one time you could have, you know, considered me actually a proper artist, even though it was like I maybe made, you know.
twenty five hundred dollars total in all my sales of art. But yeah, for a for a short period of time I was I was actually making money off art.
Matt Considine (13:17)
How about it? That's I mean that's rarefied air, the paid artist. My mother is is a she's an artist, she's a painter, and she is so nervous about putting herself, she's been invited by a number of people now to come to art fairs and stuff. What what is it about that mental block for people to to get paid for for their art? Like she is terrified that nobody is gonna buy her things. any advice for her to to become a paid artist?
Blake Conant (13:43)
know if I have any particular advice like for myself. I I've heard, you know, creative people and the best creative people are like, just do work and put it out there. And while you're waiting for it to be judged, just do more work. You know? It's like just keep getting your ideas on paper or like keep getting it out. and then you know the other thing people get hung up on is how to price their work. Every artist, you know, undersells themselves.
I I had a professor once who told me, you know, artists fluctuate between massive self ego and crippling self doubt. And it's like st I think a lot of creative people sort of fluctuate between those two. And you know, that's just like you do you just gotta get over that hump and put yourself out there, you know.
The Professor (14:29)
I think you pegged about ninety five percent of research professors right there with what you fluctuate between.
Blake Conant (14:33)
Yeah.
Matt Considine (14:34)
Yeah. It's a it's the timing of those two that lead to your success. You need to really time up well or or else it it fizzles.
Blake Conant (14:42)
Yeah. Yeah.
Matt Considine (14:44)
w well f well from that I mean from that background, what what was it that led you to yeah, you have it have a painting degree degree. I know about your your
your first array into golf, I believe, was at Dismal River, right? With the three months spent with Tom Doak in your home state of Nebraska. But what what what's the in between? What bridges that gap? Like I know you got a landscape architecture, but what what was it about your your art was it your artistic background that supported the decision to go into landscape architecture to become a golf course builder? What what was the thing that connected those two?
Blake Conant (15:24)
Yeah, a little bit. I mean, I always say I graduated with an art degree at the height of a recession. So there weren't many jobs or many people hiring painters, you know. so I tried to dabble in graphic design, but I I actually did a study abroad when I was in art school through the University of Georgia. they have a program that goes to Cortona, Italy. And I gotta spend time with
The Professor (15:45)
Mm-hmm.
Blake Conant (15:46)
there were jewelry makers, there were
Painters and drawers and sculptors and the landscape architecture program had some people over there. and I just found myself hanging out with those guys a lot. We roomed together and, you know, found out that golf architecture was a program that or or something that UGA focused on, quote unquote. and I knew it was a profession at that time. I knew like, okay, you need to
Be good at math, you need to love golf, and you need to have some creative sensibilities. But I didn't know there were like programs and schools you could go to to study it. later I found out there really still isn't. landscape architecture overlaps the most with the things you need to know for golf architecture, but there's no certificate, there's no degree in golf architecture. There and as I got out into this business and started meeting people, they, you know, people come from everywhere. It's like
Brian Schneider has a double major in molecular biology and biochemistry. Eric Iverson has one semester of college. You know, Brian Slanick has an architecture degree. So people come from everywhere, but landscape architecture is a route that a lot of golf architects have taken before. so then I was just, you know, spending a year trying to get into graphic design or, you know, trying to do something in the art world that could make a little bit of money and
I just didn't want to do it. So chose to go back to school and pursue golf architecture. And, you know, once I got to Athens, just started emailing golf architects and calling golf architects and asking how I do it. and you know, rightfully everybody was pessimistic at that time. Tom Doak and Jeff Brouwer were actually the only two people who were optimistic and kind of talked to me. and their message was essentially like, Hey, golf is like golf's fine.
There's always gonna be golf. There's always room for talent in the business. It's like it just goes through these big downswings and upswings and you you just gotta ride the wave.
The Professor (17:42)
Blake, during that time, did you have any doubts about going to the golf course architecture? Or when you made your mind up, you're like, Okay, I'm going, then getting that, you know, affirmation from Tom, you're like, All right, I made the right decision.
Blake Conant (17:55)
probably should have had doubts. They think I was just too stupid to realize that, you know, it's like, this is a bad decision. And you know, most of the people who were not positive about the golf business, maybe I should have listened to a little bit more. But it's like they weren't wrong. but no for you know maybe it's yeah, just having just having that little bit of like ignorance is bliss, you know.
The Professor (18:18)
I was just about to say that youthful ignorance is yeah, it's a strong trait that I wish I could bottle up and put some more back into me of where I was, you know, when I was twenty six years old and just didn't think about those questions. It's just like this is what I'm doing. Well, I would say it all worked out. I I I'm gonna I wanna circle back to your time at University of Georgia and you know, the thesis that we alluded to in our opener. but let's jump forward now because it did work out.
I would argue in the last couple of years, you as well as Brian Schneider put out one of the most successfully designed golf courses with Old Barnwell. Now you're doing your second with Gilroy, so let's let's dive into those two. I want to start with Gilroy and then we'll circle back to Old Barnwell, maybe. I'm gonna give a shout-out citation to Andy Johnson. I was like, hey, we got Blake coming on, you know, great mind. What what should we ask? He's like, start with this. What's the hardest
thing about building a second course at the same location when your first course has been so positively received.
Blake Conant (19:20)
you know, I always I always think of this Snoop Dogg quote where he says, Make sure your first shit is your worst shit and it's it's it's a good it it's a good litmus test of like, okay, we don't we don't have to try to match that and we're we're actively trying to do something different at the Gilroy than what we did at the first course at Old Barnwell. But also like there's no reason it can't be as good as it possibly can be.
And it's not like we just had all our ideas and threw them all at OB One and we don't have any ideas left, you know. The land is very different. there's more like natural green sites at the Gilroy and we're purposefully trying to like make the greens a little bit different. So you know, all that goes into like it's just another, you know, kind of treating it like it's just another creative problem to solve.
You know, we're not doing it's like we're not driving around the first course at old Barnwell at the end of the night, like, that was really cool. Like we should do that over here. It's just been, you know, focused on here's what the land's presenting us, here's what would be cool to build. And you know, we've we talked internally about like this is kind of our our ethos and our like the style that we're going for and things like that that you know then we'll apply to
the site. So yeah, that's you know, it hasn't been it's been a fun challenge. It hasn't been a a difficult thing that we've had to really like grapple with of, you know, how do you build a second one here?
The Professor (20:53)
Like we're winding back to when you first got the old Barnwell job. My my understanding is they always had planned multiple courses. I think with you and Brian in mind for building them. So when you all set out designing old Barnwell, were you already thinking about what the second course was going to be, the potential land that was going to be used and how they might complement and be different from each other? Or was it truly to get old Barnwell done, the original course, and now let's think about the second course?
Blake Conant (21:21)
Yeah, we you know, our our our goal is always like the first one has to be as good as possible. And you can't you can't be saving good land or you can't be saving good ideas in your back pocket for a second one, because if the first one isn't any good, then nobody's gonna come for the second one anyway. so we ended up using, you know, we used
A lot of land for the first one. We you know, it's a big property. It's five hundred acres, or it might be close to six hundred acres now. So we knew like, okay, even if this footprint stretches out a little bit for the first course, there will be room for a second course. we sort of knew where the clubhouse was gonna be. So we the the thing that we didn't consider was like, okay, do we want both courses starting from the same clubhouse? Like we weren't concerned about that.
And I I think that benefits Obi Wan. If you if you couldn't use all that land up near the clubhouse for the first course and you were saving some of it to have a returning one and eighteen, you know, those wouldn't have been as good a holes and this first course wouldn't have been as good. So those were, you know, those were some of the things that we like we just didn't want to compromise for the first one being as good as possible. But we also knew like there's going to be enough land to do a second one. Is there going to be enough land to do a
7,000 yard course or a 5,500 yard course, like that we didn't know. but it turns out there was there was some land we always had our eye on, and our client, Nick Schreiber, ended up purchasing that later on, which allowed us to make the second course a little bit bigger. It'll have a satellite clubhouse, it'll have a a separate entrance that you come to. So you're not like driving through the first course to get there.
You know, so all those things ended up working out and the parcel changed a little bit from the beginning. But yeah, sorry, that's a roundabout way to answer your question.
Matt Considine (23:12)
Lake was there so you know, Obi Wan is is complete. I'm a Star Wars nerd, by the way. So if we keep com re referencing it as Obi Wan, I I fully understand why, but I'm
Blake Conant (23:24)
Ha ha.
Matt Considine (23:24)
just my head is gonna stay in the Star Wars universe and we're gonna end up, you know, talking about characters and tattooing. But I'm a huge fan of of Nick Schreiber's. I I've gotten to know him a little bit and I
just the whole project and and what they're doing. And I I I know he he really trusts the artists, he trusts the architects, like, you know, d to to do what you guys do and and it's so evident in just what you just said there and and and what turned out, you know, with the top one hundred golf course that people just absolutely love. I think Professor, I don't know if you've been down, but I've had had the pleasure of playing it twice now. And it's just it's
I've I've always seen
The Professor (24:03)
It's stunning.
Matt Considine (24:04)
the challenge, the and so setting the stage for this second
Blake Conant (24:08)
St.
Matt Considine (24:09)
course, was there a brief from Nick or others stakeholders that got a adjusted going into Gilroy? what was there when you're having those planning meetings, or was there still that
Blake Conant (24:20)
It's still bad.
Matt Considine (24:22)
freedom to let you guys cook?
Blake Conant (24:27)
Yeah, the the latter certainly. There were you know, Nick is not only with us, but he's that way with like Chase Watson, our director of agronomy, or John Lavelle, the GM, or Kitty Nicastro, the the pr the director of golf. Like he takes his time to hire the right person and then just kind of lets them run. and he's a great leader because of that. So working on the Gilroy with him, or when we started kicking the tires on doing it, it was
you know, a lot of like, hey, what do you what do you guys want to do? What could it be? not imparting a lot of his own ideas, he you know, the only two things he really talked about were let's have, you know, let's let's create a budget and sort of stick to that budget. And I don't really want it to be a par sixty nine. He's like, if it can be a par seventy or more, like I would like that.
'Cause we we knew there were gonna be more par threes on the Gilroy and that we have a we have two or three holes that are like, it's either a long par four or a short par five, like what could it be? And Nick's just like, Hey, do what's best for the golf, but if it could be a short par five, that would be great. those are the only real two things that he's talked about. Yeah.
Matt Considine (25:39)
Yeah. Yeah. I I think there's and those that listen to this podcast regularly know that we've we've talked about the mission of old Barnwell at length and just what they're trying to do from so many different facets of support and caddy programs, to the new a course that was purchased that's a community staple, not n pretty nearby in Aiken County, that they're now under you know management of and gonna be the stewards of.
the Annika Foundation program supporting female golfers. Like there's there's so much there. And I where I'm I'm gonna bring this back to an architecture question because I I truly think there's like this level of empathy that great architects have. Because w we all have the knowledge of like the pro championship courses and we joke. I I know here in in O Ohio we always joke about, yeah, Nicholas built it so you gotta hit the high fade all day, right? It's just his shot flight.
But but there's this this level of of something that comes from places that are built for a broader base. And and and I think the mission of the club actually kind of feeds into architecture and the fact that here's the very real example. You guys built a kids course. You know, you're you're not kids anymore. You were, but you have to put yourself in the mind of a child. And I think that takes a lot of empathy and
I want to hear a little bit about the design work on the kids course, but I want to hear about Gilroy, what you're currently in the dirt building. who are you thinking about when you're out there making design decisions? Like who is that audience? Yes, they're members of Old Barnwell, but is there is there something that you're trying to connect with for those those people that will be playing your golf course a year from now?
Blake Conant (27:19)
well I just wanna I just want to clarify that Brian and I are both very immature, regardless of how well we present ourselves in the in the public. so yeah, building a kids. Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
Matt Considine (27:30)
Is that that's why you grew the beard? You wanted you wanted people to treat you like an adult.
Blake Conant (27:35)
so yeah, the the kids course stuff was actually that was really fun. And and Brian had some good insight of, you know, his kids were his two youngest kids were like
nine and ten or ten and eleven at the time or something. And he's, you know, his his advice was like, hey, kids actually don't like to putt. Like kids don't want to be on some huge tumbly green like three putting. It's like they want to hit the shot. And then if they can make the putt, great. But then they're like, they're moving on. They want and they want to rip drivers. Like so that was that was a really good perspective that I just didn't have. And it was like you see a lot of these short courses and they have
it it's an opportunity to build crazy stuff and to really like sort of put something out there that wouldn't be quote unquote acceptable on a big course. But for us, we just took that of like, okay, let's have holes of varying degrees. Like let's let a kid rip a driver five or six times and then, you know, let's have just d let's let's try to have, you know, 15 different shots that are all very unique that, you know, the green may not actually
you know it's it's more about hitting the shot onto the green and then seeing if you can make a putt rather than like making this big crazy green that i is just wild. so that was kind of our like our our that that was our goal with the kids course and I I think we've got some funky stuff out there that's like really fun to play for all ages. so that was yeah, that was really cool to work on.
Matt Considine (29:03)
Is there any w one feature give me one feature that's your favorite from the kids' course before we move on to Gilroy?
Blake Conant (29:10)
Well, I mean it's got a tunnel and a ramp. So those are two things that are like you you certainly don't see either of those on a golf course, on a on a big golf course. and they're fun. It's like I think we've got to tweak the tunnel a little bit. We were talking about doing that this summer. Like the angle just needs to be five degrees different and maybe it's gotta have a little more pitch to it. and the ramp, you know, there's a lot of people that say the ramp doesn't work as well as it could. I personally have figured it out.
And I know exactly how to hit it and the pace I've got to hit it, but maybe we need to tweak it for these folks that just aren't as you know
The Professor (29:45)
Ha ha.
Blake Conant (29:45)
aren't aren't as skilled as I am with a putter from eighty yards, you know. but yeah, th those two features are probably the coolest and and the favorite out there.
Matt Considine (29:56)
There's one on the tunnel, just a suggestion. I don't know what the budget looks like. Can we get a train? I think kids love trains, my kids love trains. Get a train that's going over the tunnel while you're hitting it adds a just a layer of excitement to it. Just a thought for you guys.
Blake Conant (30:11)
That would be cool. That actually Nick, I I think the name of like the overarching LLC is the Station Land Company. Cause Nick was his kids were really into trains. And that was gonna be like sort of a big theme out here. and we, you know, we just we we do have some of that. It's like the bridge on nine and stuff, but I I love that idea. That's great. It's like keep throwing weird stuff out there, you know.
Matt Considine (30:37)
so so d the second half of my long winded question on on Gilroy, because you guys are currently in the dirt. It's scheduled to open next year. Is there that that ideal of obviously you're thinking about your work on like you said, you got no shortage of ideas. You're gonna bring new fresh ideas to Gilroy that perhaps weren't weren't utilized at Obi Wan. But wha what what what are who are you thinking about?
out there and and i is are you thinking more about the the prior course and how it's different or are are you thinking about in the design changes that are now being made out there, is there a certain a style of play or a a type of golfer that is is kind of f in the forefront of your of your mind?
The Professor (31:22)
I'll ask a sub question real quick. Will it not beat me up as much as O B one is my sub question.
Blake Conant (31:28)
we're not thinking of any one particular golfer. We we both think a lot of playing shots on the ground. So I I do think that generally affects you know, how you bunker a place. you know, leaving fronts of greens or or leaving some part of the green open. It's like that may be the right side of the green and you really gotta swing it around or or play away. but thinking of ground game, you know, thinking of shots that
we all just like playing and you know, Brian and I are the types that like we don't really care about score, but if it if it's hitting a really fun shot, we'd rather do that. so trying to have you know trying to have this the the strategy just be something that we would enjoy playing. And, you know, it's kind of what we did on the first course and it it seems to have resonated with others. This will be a different style of golf a little bit, but that same mindset of like, let's build golf that we would enjoy playing.
and you know, it's it's the the greens are a little bit different. They're more on the ground. So I I think that's part of what beats people up at OB is you know, you get through that stretch of like six, seven, those greens are just sort of up in the air. Nine is kind of up in the air, and it's like any green like that is just gonna be a little more exacting than a green that's on the ground, you know.
So like I said, we had, you know, we had a lot of like green locations at Old Bar the first course at Old Barnwell, but we didn't have a lot of like great natural green sites. and I'd say there's just a few more just like natural green sites at the Gilroy. So that'll end up you know, that lent itself to not doing as much work and the green sitting more on the ground. and I I think people will notice that as much as anything as they go around.
The Professor (33:11)
You did a great job with Obi-Wan making the green sites look natural, even if they weren't there to to find. but that's interesting. I haven't thought about because I know when we had an earlier conversation about Old Barn OB One, Blake, you know, you did talk a little bit about, hey, how do we challenge the good player, right? Like, what are the things we need to do to design this course in a way that the good player is gonna find it a challenge? Are you thinking about that same thing with Gilway? Or it's kind of a sub question to Matt's question.
Or is this Gilway not being thought about so much about the the top level player in that way?
Blake Conant (33:46)
No, it is, certainly. and I think the greens will, you know, at first blush you're gonna think that they're easier, but they've got they're a little bit smaller and they've got a little more pitch to generally speaking. that that wasn't a goal. It was just something that's kinda happened organically. And I I think what you're gonna what what people will find is like, okay, they're they're
As equally challenging, just in a different way. and you're gonna you're gonna want to play it a few times to figure out, okay, I just like I can't be over here because it's pitched so hard at this angle that I just don't want to come in from the left side. so I think that's sort you know, that's sort of the the the the difference, but like the the the test for good players will be
still kind of around the greens and work working your strategy back from there.
Matt Considine (34:41)
was I hope I'm remembering this correctly, but there was additional land bought for Gilroy, correct? And was that on t tell me about that story if there was one. d did did you guys say, Hey, we need this there's a sweet a slope over here th that we wanna get our hands on, Nick or ha
If that wasn't your course, I apologize. But I thought it was for for for Gilroy that there was more land acquired.
Blake Conant (35:06)
No, we did. there was always this little sliver of land that connected to Andrew's Circle Road. And the we had talked to the owner of that land originally, you know, and he was never attached to it. w you know, it was basically he and Nick had had a conversation of like, Hey, if you ever are interested in it, like just chat, we can figure something out. so we started kicking the tight when like Gilroy became serious.
And they started talking about like operations and logistics. And you know, Nick asked us to like could is there any way you could get people from the clubhouse and back? And it was like, well, you could try to buy this sliver that's just adjacent to OB, or you know, you could get this what we called the purple parcel, which is a long, like it's 90 acres, and it's you know, we've we've got the first and seventeenth parallel.
each other on the on the long side and then 18 runs the short side. and it's you know it it was just one of those things that it's like okay this will make it work like we we need a satellite clubhouse we can't have a returning one in 18 to the big clubhouse right now so the this will link everything together and from there it was just you know
Nick biting the bullet and buying the land and getting it, you know, getting it attached to our bigger parcel that we have and then doing the routing from there.
The Professor (36:31)
It's it's stunning how many golf course stories entail something like that. You know, you're from Nebraska, it reminds me. I think both Bally Neal and Sandhills both had situations where it's like, if we could buy this parcel, this will give us this affordance. it's cool how that comes together. Just a great example of how golf course design evolves as the project comes along.
Blake Conant (36:53)
Yeah, we're just, you know, architects are greedy. I think it's like, if there's
The Professor (36:57)
Ha ha.
Blake Conant (36:57)
there's a cool green site over here and it's like if you could just get that land, like it'll make your golf course better. so yeah, it's just it's just us being greedy at the end of the day, you know.
The Professor (37:09)
well and at the same time then for the the owner, right, it makes a better golf course and of course that's their goal is to have the best golf course possible. So once you plant that seed in their mind, you you have to know as a designer they're gonna find that parcel 'cause they do not wanna wake up five years from now thinking, Well, if I just had bought that parcel, this would have been a gol better golf course. At least I would not wanna go to sleep at night thinking that every night for the rest of my life.
Blake Conant (37:32)
Yeah, totally. And you know, land is getting more expensive around here. And it's like once you have a golf club, your neighbors know the value of their land is higher if they're adjacent. So you don't you know, the whole impetus for building in the southeast is it's cheap land. but what once you've got a golf club and you've dumped millions of dollars into it, it's like your neighbors are like, well
This isn't valuable to anybody else but this one guy who actually now wants it and he's calling me up. So they kinda you know, you you're you're better off buying as much adjacent land as you can before you've told anybody that you're building a golf club to insulate
The Professor (38:09)
Yeah.
Blake Conant (38:10)
yourself. It's like once the cat's out of the bag, you don't have much leverage, you know.
Matt Considine (38:16)
That's right. I that that always reminds me of of my early career in tech, a domain that I worked for a large fast, fast growing a tech company and their domain in Australia was scooped up by a a bartender, a sole proprietor in literal outback of of Australia, and he sat on this website page until the price was right. And I always
I I always commend that guy. I was like, man, that's awesome. He chopped on Go Daddy one day. He scooped it up when he goes, They're gonna be coming here. I betcha they're gonna be in Australia soon. I'm I'm gonna sit on this. he probably made a nice payday, but the professor, you wanna take us to take Blake in a time machine here and take us back to a thesis of his?
The Professor (38:59)
That's I think it's perfect timing. You know, Blake, you brought up land and development and increasing the cost of land and the price of land and the value of the land. Of course, then that depends on does the golf course stay around. And, you know, we're writing back over a decade now. You did your master's thesis at the University of Georgia. I'm gonna start with the abstract and title real quick, and then that will kick us off. I know Matt's gonna have tons of questions he wants to go down, but the title was Bankrupt Golf Courses and Historical Analysis and Strategies for Repurposing.
By Blake Jeffrey Connett. More than 800 golf courses have closed since 2003, and approximately 1,000 to 2,500 are projected to close in the next decade. Many of these courses are repurposed as high-end mixed-use development, high-density residential, or big box development. The sustainable benefits of the the golf course, once provided, either diminish or leave completely. As our country's twenty-first century needs shift towards food, water, and energy security, baked grump golf courses can offer repurposing opportunities to plan for
for those needs. The goal of golf course repurposing should be to provide similar or greater sustainable benefits as the golf course once did. Understanding how that land can be sustainably repurposed is vital for is vital for local communities, environments, and economies to thrive in the 21st century. This th thesis will offer suggestions, strategies, and solutions for repurposing bankrupt courses that have yet to be implemented in the United States. Everybody should go read this thesis, I think.
We might be dusting off the cobwebs for you, Blake. I know it's been a while. before we get into the nitty-gritty and details and your suggestions and how you're gonna solve these problems, I wanna ask, how did you end up on this topic for a thesis? You know, I I feel like this is a pretty obscure topic. Even for many people going to golf course architecture, they'd be thinking, how can I build my thesis around building golf courses or that process versus no, these golf courses are closing up. What do we do with that land afterwards?
Blake Conant (40:53)
Yeah, I I was just very captivated by a a lot of the traditional landscape architecture and and ecological things I was learning in school. And, you know, we spent a lot of time at Georgia talking about you know, sustainability and you know, just what the world is gonna look like in the future and how we can better design spaces to accommodate that future.
And so, you know, I didn't I just didn't have anything like profound that I wanted to get into as far as like golf course principles or design or anything like that. I was like, well, let me merge these two together because this is this is something we're seeing in in the golf course design industry. And I didn't know if that would eventually be like, okay, Blake's gonna be the person to like maybe maybe that would be a road I would have gone down. It was like, I'm the I'm the guy to
I'm the guy to figure out what to do with your defunct golf course. but but yeah, it was just kind of merging these two things that I was interested in and you know, seeing where it led me.
Matt Considine (41:58)
Blake, I I professor knew this would hit a chord with me 'cause I've gone into some h deep thought and research and and just talking to people that are you know, I str I started my golf business prior to the the most recent golf boom, the largest golf boom, which came with the the pandemic and the twenty twenty beyond. But prior to that, you know, I was coming into communication with
public courses that were struggling, private clubs that needed members desperately. They needed younger base. They didn't know what to do with their course on a a low budget. And so I I d I don't know. Something about this really hit a hit a chord with me. I think the main thing I I loved was just the argument of well, what are we measuring? Is kind of what I took away from your your thesis here is and I think you broke the early part of it down into environmental, social and economic benefits.
And I think we're just so overindexed on the economic benefits. Obviously you need to be, especially if you're a for profit golf course, because you can't be the other things if if that equation isn't there. But but the environmental and social part I just feel like are so they're like toss in after the the points are being made of what to do with a a course or a facility. And thankfully the economics have gotten better for a lot of places the last five years.
If they haven't, you really should wonder what's happening with their operation because of what what's happened in golf. but I'm curious about environmental and social and how you think, you know, whatever, 14 years later, how are we doing on measuring those? You think? Are do you feel like there's a better across the industry and all your different projects and people you come in contact with? Are we doing a l a little bit better job of of measuring what the impact a golf facility, a golf course does to the environment? What
impact it does to the social and community on on top of economic.
Blake Conant (43:49)
Yeah, I mean, so yeah, those are the three legs of sustainability is the the social, economic and environmental impacts. they're not equal. Economic if it doesn't work economically or financially, like the other two don't mat you're you're just not gonna get that to work in a capitalist society, right? But I I think the the biggest thing that COVID figured out for everybody was the social impact does has does have value and
whether we can quantify it or not, like people could see it and it was tangible because you were losing the social impact in every other part of your life. And so I think that's what that's what really drove the popularity of golf. And that's what really like that's why golf courses started seeing, you know, 25% rounds increase or 30% rounds increase is it was a social aspect. And that's what, you know, people who play golf a lot and
Who have played golf for a long time inherently realize that. But I think it ebbs and flows and you lose sight of that sometimes. It's there's like, we always want a formula for how to like how much value does this have and how do we quantify it? And you know, sometimes it's just like, well, you can't, but you just have to recognize that it does have value. the environmental aspect is is different. Though those are things that you can quantify. You you can
measure water usage. You can measure chemical usage. You can try to be better about all those things. and you know, the the the thing that I was really attached to from like a 30,000 foot view. I don't remember what I put in that paper, but it was just it was particularly like urban and suburban golf courses in in these little nine holers, the green space that they provide, you know, it's like you're you're
You're in an urban area, it's like, and then suddenly there's this place with trees, and it's like the temperature is seven degrees cooler than the surrounding areas. You know, it's like there's green space, there's areas for people to walk, there's this game that people can get exercise. so the the the you know, things like the water use or the maintenance it takes to maintain that golf course is is offset by these benefits it provides to a community. where I think I would have liked to go a little further with that.
thesis and I I don't know if I did, but or I don't know if the timing worked out for when I wrote it. But what you're actually seeing is like the golf courses we kind of want to close weren't the ones that closed. you know pre-recession it was a lot of these golf courses were getting built simply as a a as a driver or an incentive to get people to buy a home. so then you had a a housing development golf course that
Then suddenly they weren't putting the money into it. It was kind of falling into disrepair. And it would be great if those golf courses could close and become like, you know, then you could think outside the box of how to actually make that usable green space for those homeowners so their homes didn't just like sink in value. but what what I think we're actually seeing is like it's the mom and pop nine-holer that we're losing. It's the, it's the
you know, the muni that the city can no longer afford and people didn't learn the lesson from Winter Park. And it's like, well, we're just gonna close that, you know, or shutter that. So that's that's data that I'm just like I don't have data on like what what types of golf courses have closed since I wrote that thesis and what we're seeing. I think I was pretty spot on with the the thousand to twenty five hundred golf courses that needed to close. I think we've actually seen that.
I would just be curious what the breakdown is, yeah.
Matt Considine (47:25)
You were. It's it's
I yeah, I d I I don't have the breakdown, but that was one thing I was gonna comment on is like your actual prediction was pretty much in line with what the the numbers were on that on the supply side. you you
Blake Conant (47:38)
Yeah.
Matt Considine (47:39)
couldn't have anticipated the demand of what you know twenty twenty would bring. but hey, it was seven years prior. You're not the Oracle, right?
Blake Conant (47:47)
Right, exactly. Yeah. I'm if I could predict pandemics, you know, I might give up my my golf architecture game, but yeah.
Matt Considine (47:54)
Yeah, yeah, there's probably
other industries that would would suit you well there. no the the successful repurposing of the cour courses, because you're you're right, and I don't have the data in front of me and this would be a fun thing to kind of dig into, but I can name so many, you know, I could name gosh, historic ones even golden age closures, nine hole mom and pop type places on both hands. But I can't name a
More than one repurposing of you know, residentially built golf course in the the boom of you know sixties, seventies, eighties, nineties. I I the yard in Florida comes to to mind where they turn kind of 18-hole regulation residential golf course into more of a loop for the community with a great b food and beverage operation and live music. And
And that's that's really the only one's coming to mind. Have you seen other examples of those, you know, early tens courses that were struggling that did repurpose their facility to something imaginative or something that was more sustainable?
Blake Conant (48:58)
Yeah, th there is a case. I think there's a case study in my thesis of one in like Houston or Dallas that was doing something cool or trying to do something cool. Like, hey, we've we've got this, you know, the golf course like double barrel housing, you know, but you've got this seventy yard wide corridor that sort of snakes through all these homes of like how could you get that to be a you know, some type of trail or pathway or loop or whatever, you know, similar to what you're talking about.
and I think I've heard of a couple more since then, but you know, that's just the that's such a tricky part of these home values are so attached to golf being there that I
The Professor (49:39)
Mm-hmm.
Blake Conant (49:39)
don't know, you know, and they all I assume have a homeowners association. So is it actually in the best interest of the homeowners association to band together and buy the golf course so that they can then like maintain it? And you kind of
You know, you almost I I think developers were doing that or assuming that that's what would happen. And it's like, cool, now we have this asset that isn't ever gonna make money and we've been able to pawn it off on the homeowners and now it's their problem. but it it's just one of those things like, yeah, man, I'd I guess we'd rather do that than see our home price drop forty percent. 'cause I don't know, you know, it's like I had all these grand ideas of like you could do
Wetlands, you could do solar panels, you could do wind farms, you know, you could do all these cool things that would have a huge environmental benefit. And I probably like lean too hard into like the environmental having more value than it should have. But those are all really cool, sort of out there ideas that you could implement. but it's just how do you get people to go for it? How do you make it like financially viable to do? so
Like any thesis, there were probably like a little two moments where I was just idealistic and, you know, ignorant. But that it's like that's why you have these kids that it's like you can get a good idea, you know, and then somebody who actually knows the way the world works, it's like they they can figure out how to execute it.
Matt Considine (51:05)
Yeah, well I mean it but it takes someone with a little time to dig into the question, right? And and spark it for somebody else or run someone else can run with it. You know, the one thing as I was reading it this morning, I was was thinking to myself, man, this is so true of of those places that I n you know connected with that were struggling had to ask those hard questions of, you know, what do we do? What's the reuse of this? And and and how do we sustain
But I was I I kind of caught myself. I'm like, wait, are are we using this for new projects as well? Like, does it have to be post a failure, post you know, a recession for us to ask the hard questions? And I I think about where you're currently at, old Barnwell, like from the hop, and I just know this from being friends with Nick Schreiber and some of mutual friends that we have here in that story, the social
questions of what is going to be the social impact, the environmental questions of what's the environmental impact, the certainly the economic questions were always kind of at the forefront. And I'm just curious, are we they seem like the anomaly. Like like there doesn't seem to be the same level of attention to those, you know, pillars of sustainability that's called them, or you might have said, in in every project.
that goes out there. And and I'm just wondering if like whose job is it to make sure that all three are represented in in golf, no matter pro public, private, municipal, or mom and pop? Like it just feels that th th those three have to be asked every day.
Blake Conant (52:49)
Yeah. you know, I I think the the best places that we know of sort of do it naturally. The the best public places, maybe. at least the social part. And you know, Nick was Nick was always very upfront of like, Hey, I want you guys to build a great golf course. Like I hired you 'cause I think you're talented and like I know you're gonna do as as well as you possibly can. But ultimately is like I'm into this for the programming and the social and like what
the club can do. He, you know, Nick always talks about golf being a Trojan horse for actually like doing good in your community and like having the the sum be greater than the parts basically of like, hey, you've got 300 people who have they're successful, they're diverse, they're well educated, and they like people are looking for a way to give back. How can like the club be a vehicle to help them do that? and if they band together
Can their, you know, can their collective efforts be greater than just a single effort, you know? so Nick's always approached it from that point of view, which I think is just really refreshing. And he he got a lot of ideas from, you know, clubs in the area or like he he did his due diligence of talking with people and seeing what works well, you know. He they're not the first club to have a foundation attached to
their golf club, you know, it's like Congoree quietly does really good stuff. there there's tons of clubs that, you know, quietly go about these things. and Nick talked to all of them and was like picking their brain of like, okay, what works? How would you do it differently? Like if you were us, what would you do? And I I think that really benefited him a lot as well of like just, hey, we want to make this place like this is our goal.
Yeah, we we love having a good golf course, but like this is our ultimate goal. So how do we like lean into that and just keep making it better?
Matt Considine (54:40)
There it it's so cool to hear that. just just in the the process for for for doing that because you know all those that of us that just eat all this stuff up, we want to see courses like the Gilroy and places like Old Barn will exist and and you know aspire to go play congery and places like Broom Sedge and th there's just so many great projects. We're in this kind of second golden age, as a lot of people have have called it. But I have seen
this generation of of leaders and founders of these places, and I wasn't around, you know, back when people were building the the others, but it does feel very collaborative and they're just sharing across ideals. Do you find the same collaboration from your architectural peers, like, you know, now that your name is is one of the the popular names that'll be on scorecards, do you feel like y you you have that? Do you have resources to go to that you can, you know
call or is or is there a still a healthy level of competition as any, you know, capitalist thing is, right? And is golf is still a business. is there is there a balance? How do you feel amongst your peers, Blake, in that regard?
Blake Conant (55:45)
Yeah, I think, you know, golf's a small world. everybody kinda knows everybody or at least knows of everybody. And there's people that, you know, I've worked with over the years of just like, hey, I'm, you know, working with Kai Golby, and we're both working for Todd Eckenroad out in California or like, you know, I worked with, you know, Brian for twelve years, worked under him as, you know,
on multiple projects and so there's just like there's people that I just have a relationship with and you know a Aiken's kind of funny because there's just so much being done you know at the same time. So like we had a barbecue a couple months ago and you know we know Brian Zager from working at the Lido and working with Doke. And so Zegger came over and Eric Iverson was helping with him well helping him at 21 club and
Kai came over and Brian's doing New Holland. So we had guys from all three projects that are happening in Aiken and it's just like, well, yeah, we're all friends from these, you know, different pasts. And it's like we just wanted to get together and have a beer and cook some meat, you know? So that's like it sort of happens organically that way. you know, there's other people who I stay in touch with, or I'm just like, hey, I saw this thing, like that's really cool. You know, I
I think there's a healthy level of we're all competing for the same jobs, but like you're not resenting anybody and you're really just looking for folks who are doing cool work. And if somebody does something cool that I see, it's like I'll text them or I'll send them a note on Instagram of like that was awesome. Like, good job. Like congratulations, like, you know. so I I think the golf world is, yeah, there's this very healthy like community that surrounds it. And
You know, the i it's a healthy level of competition as well.
The Professor (57:35)
Blake, I'm glad you brought up all the work going on in Aiken because it is it's sort of surreal the number of courses that are popping up there and high-level great architecture golf courses. With your personality, do you like to go check out those projects and see what they're doing as you're working on Gilroy? Or are you someone that wants to ignore what the other person's doing because you don't want to fall in the trap of like, man, that's really good. And now maybe feeling reluctant about what you're doing. What's your what's your personality on that?
Blake Conant (58:04)
No, I I like to see stuff. I I'm not as good as like Brian Shatter gets out and sees everything. and I'm less good about that because I'm traveling back and forth between here and Nebraska. So it's like when I'm in Aiken, I just there's a s there's an amount of work I need to get done while I'm down here. And then I'm like it's hard to tell my wife with a four and two year old at home and she's playing zone defense,
The Professor (58:26)
Ha ha ha.
Blake Conant (58:27)
like
Hey, I'm gonna stick around for two more days and just check out these golf courses and drink beer with the fellas. and get away with that sometimes, but it's like it's not all the time. but I went and saw 21 Club when they had last year when they were they had 12 of the greens done. Well, six of the greens done. you know, I went over and saw New Holland as Brian was getting going.
You know, when Kai was working on the tree farm, we went over there a couple of times. you know, I I'm always like it's not gonna affect me at all to see what somebody else is doing. It's more about like I don't wanna step on your toes or I don't wanna take up your time. Everybody's busy, you know. So I'm always happy to say like,
The Professor (59:09)
Mm, mm-hmm.
Blake Conant (59:10)
Hey, I'm here, you don't need to guide me around, just like show me where the first tee is and I'm happy to walk. Like I don't need somebody touring me around for three hours and taking that time out of their day when
I know they're busy and wanting to work as well. so yeah, it's it's more about like you know, it's more about empathizing with them and finding the right time for them for me to come check it out. But I I love seeing new stuff and I love seeing what people are doing. Yeah.
Matt Considine (59:38)
Blake, in the spirit of of being busy as I know you guys are now, I'm gonna squeeze in one more question and we're gonna let you go. But I I'm gonna take us maybe in a more sen sentimental direction to to to wrap. in that thesis the professor uncovered that you you do use one of the case studies in it was a clerk course that did c did close that I think was near and dear to your your childhood.
you grew up playing and l Long Shadow, which was maybe Highland Country Club prior to that. an old Jewish club in O Omaha that that didn't survive, right? Didn didn't make it. you you can't go back and resurrect it, or maybe you can. I don't know what it was repurposed for. You could fill us in. But what's a what's a thinking about those rounds and and you know what it meant to you as a kid
It sounded like it had a tremendous amount of social value to you. what what's a project that you'd like to work on that would kind of pay tribute to that? You know, give the next Blake out there years from now the same type of golf education, golf social construct that you had. What would it be? Where where and and what?
Blake Conant (1:00:52)
Yeah, that's you know, doing something in a city would be great. It's just so hard nowadays, you know, something like something like the park that Gil did down in West Palm, I think, would be very fulfilling. I would love to do that without needing a bunch of people to donate their money. It's like, can we figure out a way to construct it and like let this be an actual business, you know?
The Professor (1:01:19)
Mm-hmm.
Blake Conant (1:01:19)
But the
that's the tricky part. It's like private golf clubs, what why you're seeing a lot of them is c construction is so high, but they can charge more for their rounds. But it's like if you know, the the rule of thumb is for every million dollars you spend, that's ten dollars towards your green fee. so if I want a sixty dollar green fee, I can only spend six million bucks. So it's like, well, irrigation systems cost four million dollars right now. Like
And you can
The Professor (1:01:48)
Yeah.
Blake Conant (1:01:49)
you can do them bare bones for cheaper than that, but it's just like labor and petroleum-based products are they they've gone crazy since like summer of twenty twenty one. And that's what's
The Professor (1:02:03)
Mm-hmm.
Blake Conant (1:02:04)
gonna be really hard in the future is like how do we build public golf courses that aren't reliant on you know wealthy donors to basically support them.
so that's something I would love to do. I I do think like where this ties back into my thesis, and maybe I don't know if I wrote about it or not, but it's like Mike Young, who's a fellow Athenian, or was it was an Athenian. I think he's in Lagrange now. But you know, he's like, Hey, it's it's the th
The Professor (1:02:30)
Yeah, he went back to Lagrange.
Blake Conant (1:02:32)
it's the third owner who makes money because you can buy you can buy the golf course for ten cents on the dollar, and then you can actually like
You don't have the upfront cost to carry somebody at, you know, the bank carried that or whoever. So now you can actually just run this golf course and try to make some money. So where I see an opportunity is a golf course that's struggling, but it's on a good piece of land with good soils. It's like, hey, that's actually close to people. If you put some money into it to, you know, you could make the routing better, you can make the greens better.
You don't have to sink the money into it. That would be the cost of an entirely new development from scratch, but you'd sink money into it to make it a good golf course. It's already well located. And then you can then you can have a golf course that isn't $300 to play. It's reasonable for locals. I I'd love to see the industry turn more towards that than just seeing these little like hundred, 120-acre parcels kind of
Go to a developer and then, you know, turn into a mixed use development with some homes and businesses and it's like yeah, they I I think you could take another crack at it that way before you have to turn to you know, turn to the the vertical construction.
Matt Considine (1:03:49)
I'd like to see your talents unleashed on that, Blake. so
Blake Conant (1:03:51)
huh.
Matt Considine (1:03:51)
keep it keep it up, man. Looking forward to seeing what you guys end up with at Gilroy and and congrats on everything, man. Really appreciate you you joining us today.
Blake Conant (1:04:01)
Thanks very much for having me.
Matt Considine (1:04:05)
And thank you guys for listening. The show has been the joy of the professor and I not just connecting with each other every week and some really fascinating people in golf, but also now our listeners. You guys have been reaching out and we thank you for doing that. You can always email us at the bagdrop at newclub.gov. if you're not subscribed to the show, please do. It it goes a long way in just helping us out and making sure that we know people are listening and checking in with us.
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