Astroturf

[Jay Ducharme]

The Athletic Director at HCC said he can get his hands on some Astroturf. He suggested to me that it might make a good surface for tee pads. What are your thoughts on that? There would be a bed of traprock dust underneath the Astroturf. That would probably be better than what we have now (nothing), but would it be much worse (or better?) than Flypads?

[Rob Tatro]

I've often thought turf would make great tee pads Jay and given the question you pose ... turf or nothing - no brainer, go with the turf. Steve Dodge had a guy install a turf pad up on hole 16 years ago and I've always liked throwing off of it. I have old driving range turf pads on my home tiki course and they're always good to throw from too.

We recently put in an pool and ordered used turf to put around it from a company called ondecksports.com which is out of Brockton. They sell all kinds of recycled turf from institutions who have recently upgraded to the newest stuff and needed a place to dump their older stuff ... they also sell the new stuff too. You should check it out if you get a chance.

All in all, I think turf surfaces are great and give your planting feet a chance to hold onto something and pivot on. Hope that helps

[Jay Ducharme]

Thanks, Rob! That's good to hear. If we go with turf, we could conceivably have all 18 at HCC finished by the tourney on the 20th.

[Eric Kevorkian]

I think astroturf gets kinda slick when it's wet...just a heads up.

[Jay Ducharme]

That was my main concern. Perhaps small drain holes can be drilled through it to help alleviate that problem.

[Eric Kevorkian]

Possibly may help...there are certainly different "grades" of astroturf, maybe the high-end ones aren't as slick.

[Craig Smolin]

Hate to see an increase in ACL tears due to astro-turf ... lots of knee torque involved in throwing tee shots ...