The Golf Shop Radio Show: Blackmoor Golf Club

Speaker 1: Joining us now, she is the head golf professional down at Blackmoor Golf Club on the Hammock Coast Golf Trail, Jennifer Lundberg joins us. Jennifer, welcome into The Golf Shop.

Jennifer L.: Oh, good morning. Thank you. Thanks for having me.

Speaker 1: Yeah. For our listeners out there that may not know a whole lot about Blackmoor, kind of give us a little bit of a feel about what they’re going to get when they tee it up at Blackmoor, because we talk to somebody on the Hammock Coast Golf Trail every week, and we like to find out what the experience is. Is there a lot of bunkering? Is it tree-lined? Is there marsh and water land, a lot of carries and stuff like that? Give us a feel for Blackmoor.

Jennifer L.: Right. So at Blackmoor, you’re going to get a little bit of everything. If you look at the scorecard, you know from the tips we’re less than 6,500 yards. But you can’t let it fool you, because we have a lot of doglegs. We’re a Gary Player design. The bunkering is strategic. We’ve got a lot of elevated greens, elevated tees. The greens aren’t too undulating, so that helps out your amateur golfer. You see what you see and you just putt it. Not too tricky on the greens side. Like I said, for those long hitters, they’re out here driving 300 yards, they’re not going to be pulling out their driver on every hole, because of those doglegs. So it forces the players to really take some kind of strategy off the tee, and actually pay attention to what they see in front of them. For your recreational golfer, that’s when you’re driving about 220-230, it’s great for them, they can probably take a drive every hole, and it’s definitely very lady friendly. Probably one of the most lady-friendly courses down here.

Speaker 1: Yeah, and that brings up the question: being a Gary Player design, I have no doubt, it sounds like a golf course that you may need to think your way around a little bit. Does that really bring up the opportunity for you and your staff to, maybe, talk to people a little more about course management and finding your strength in almost playing a golf course backwards, sometimes?

Jennifer L.: Oh yeah, for sure. Every ranger I have on staff and every starter I have, they’re going to give you a nice little spiel, especially for the people who are just visiting. They’ll tell you what you need to look for at the desk. The guys will pull out a yardage guide and guide people around the trickier holes, because we do have a couple blind shots. So the course is very well-marked. Like I said, you’ve got to look at it from green to tee on a lot of the holes, but it’s not too tricky that your regular, average guy can’t come out and have a really good time. It’s not going to kill you, you know, it’s forgiving.

Speaker 1: Yeah. And that’s the thing. I mean, we watch these PGA TOUR players and even the LPGA Tour players, Lexi Thompson and, you know, people like that bombing the golf ball all the time, but for the most part these players aren’t just getting up there and, maybe other than John Daily, gripping it and ripping it and hoping for the best. I mean, they are taking into account, hey, if it’s a 350-yard hole, par 4, and if I blow a driver up there and I miss the green on a specific side, what are my chances of getting that up and down for birdie? I mean they’re taking calculated risks even though it doesn’t necessarily look like it, and that’s what we need to be looking at from when we talk about the average golfer is, again, play the hole backwards. If 150 yards is a really good shot to you then play it off the tee to 150 yards and it sounds like you can do a lot of that at Blackmoor.

Jennifer L.: Exactly, yes. A lot of guys are gonna want to tee up with a 3 wood, maybe a 4 if they’re comfortable with those long arms and just place the ball right in the middle of the fairway, where we’ve got those light stakes telling you you’re 150 yards out, and you’re good to go, we want to get something out of that dogleg instead of cutting every corner. But, some guys have a really good time trying to cut corners, we’ve got number 8, you’ve got two different routes to get to that hole. So you can hit 270 off the tee, you’re gonna hit the green, but you’ve gotta go straight down a shoot of trees, and then you’ve got the dogleg that if you hit out there about 240 you’re only going to be about 120 out. Two different routes if you can hit straight, and it’s fun for the guys to tee one up there and kind of see which way they go.

Speaker 1: Yeah, that’s interesting, I’ve not seen that before, I am looking at the picture right now, man, that’s awesome looking. In this last week it’s been very warm, I’m sure you guys had a little pick up on the tee sheet. This time of year it can really be dicey weather wise, you can get some warm days, you can get some cold days, obviously down there at the beach you guys are a little bit warmer than we are up here in the Charlotte area, but kinda give people and the listeners a feel for what the tee sheet looks like in this time of year generally.

Jennifer L.: Generally we’re a little bit chilly, you’re hitting 40s to 50s, last year we had record colds, and we were frozen for a few days, but generally we are going to have on a good day about 150 to 180 people out because we’ll single tee right now, just so we can get people at those nice warmer times around 10 to 11 a.m. Today it’s a Saturday, it’s kind of casual Saturday at the beach, almost 50 degrees now, it’ll pick up a little bit around noon, and then we’re gonna get some cloud coverage. Honestly for people who are out of town that feels pretty mild and warm, for us it’s a little chilly, but this week yeah, we were hitting the 80s this week, but typically you’re gonna get a 50 maybe a 60 degree day, but it’s still gorgeous, the course is dry, rolling great, in great condition. It’s really nice down here at the Beach right now, we’re having a really good year so far.

Speaker 1: Yeah, it’s kinda interesting we went from really, really wet and now we’ve had a nice run of dry weather and hopefully that sticks around for a little bit. When you start talking about rates, let people know what the rates are looking like right now and if they want to get down there and get out to play how do they go about doing that?

Jennifer L.: You can always book online, or just give the guys a call in the pro shop, our number is right there on our Facebook page also, and for anybody coming out of town you’re looking at about a $55 to $65 round this time of year, so it’s a great time when the weathers nice, and mild, and calm to get a really good rate, come out and have some good golf, and then you might have time for a replay, get a little emergency nine at the end and that’s only gonna cost you about $30. Rates are really reasonable, very, very reasonable for the quality of course that we’ve got here at Blackmoor.

Speaker 1: Again we’re talking with the head golf professional down at Blackmoor Golf Club on the Hammock Coast Golf Trail, Jennifer Lundberg joining us. And Jennifer, when you’re out playing Blackmoor give me a feel for, I know you mentioned the eighth hole and kind of the risk/reward there, but what shot do you really kinda look forward to, or the hole that you really look forward to that sets up really for you and on the flip side of that, is there a shot on this golf course that you and maybe a bunch of other people go “Man!” and then they start thinking about that one shot that they’ve gotta hit all day long?

Jennifer L.: Right, so for me the back side’s got a lot more character I guess you could say, and it’s kind of a double-edged sword. Number 15, our par 3, has got a little carry, you basically have to carry the distance to the flag. So we’ve got a nice marsh right in front of the green, and then there’s a couple of test bunkers right there before the hill. But that’s probably one of my favorite holes, but it can also be tricky because if you come up short, if you don’t catch that wind right, and the wind is always picky in that area, kinda swirls, so you have to catch it at the right time, and hit the right shot, usually I like to hit a little fade where I’ll cut into the back, the back … is probably my favorite because it’s one of the hardest shots, but most people tend to slice or push it a little bit so it can be easy in that hole location.

Number 18 is probably my favorite, because that’s our finishing hole, par 5, and you can just let it rip, but then you have to be careful coming into the green. That’s probably my most, that’s the one that gives me the most anxiety because I’m sitting there with the wedge, and I’ve got water on my right, I got bunkers, it’s a tight little green, and it all flows backwards, so that’s probably my toughest shot, because I get nervous.

Speaker 1: (Laughs) With this being a Gary Player design, I do notice one thing about Gary Player is that he does sometimes give you an opportunity to not have to worry about hitting bunker shots but he’ll make chipping and the rest of your short game at a premium around the greens, doesn’t he?

Jennifer L.: Yes, yes, you won’t have a good short game if you’re not hitting greens. Gotta be able to play with those wedges, or you know, just something, run it with a hybrid or a A9, but you definitely want to have a good short game because the greens are not huge, and it can turn into target golf.

Speaker 1: That’s one of the things, too, over the years it seems like we as a golfing community, I guess I would say, have maybe lost a little bit of the ability to hit multiple shots around the greens. I mean it always seems like if we miss a green we grab the lob wedge, and we try and flop it up to the hole and the bump and run is kind of becoming a thing of the past, but you do see people who struggle maybe with that flop shot go into hitting the hybrid and stuff like that, but we do need to strike a nice balance there on our short game, don’t we?

Jennifer L.: Yes, yes, you want to be able to have multiple shots, and then that way no matter what situation you find yourself in on the green you’ve got the tool in your bag to pull it off and get yourself within a one-putt distance. That’s one thing, I’ve got a clinic later today, and we’re gonna go over some of those different shots around the green, use the hybrid, use the belly wedge, you know on the fringe, stuff like that, that traditionally people have gone away from that, but if you see the old guys, the old-school players, they’re still doing those shots, and I guarantee that save more strokes than Mr. Sixty Degree Wedge, flopping every green, so, it’s something that people can’t forget about and it’s good to practice those shots.

Speaker 1: I was always funny because I would always, if I missed the green with like an eight, nine wedge, or sand wedge or something like that I would always penalize the club and say, “Alright, you missed the green, you’re the one that’s gonna chip it close.”

Jennifer L.: Yeah, there you go, there you go, I like that, that’s a great answer.

Speaker 1: Yeah, so that’s kinda how I learned to hit a bunch of different shots around the green is I said “Alright, club, make up for what you just did.” It’s always interesting to do that. Again, Jennifer, before we let you go, remind everybody how to get ahold of you guys to set up your round of golf.

Jennifer L.:   Alright, so feel free to call us at our shop it’s (843) 650-5555, you go to our website, www.Blackmoor.com, or you can check us out on Facebook, you can book all three of those ways, whichever way you book is great, just come on down, pay us a visit, we’ve got the friendliest staff on the beach, you’re gonna be treated like a friend when you come here.

Speaker 1: Alright, well, Jennifer we appreciate you coming on with us and we look forward to sending people your way!

Jennifer L.: Absolutely, thank you so much guys.