Proxy, Primo -- a lethal combination

Richard Dunn

The greens are lighting fast at Newport Beach Country Club, just the

way the doctor ordered.

But the man in charge of the golf course, Newport Beach

superintendent Ron Benedict, will never forget 1997, when the

microscopic yellowish bulbs known as poa annua, grass that is

indigenous to this area, took over the golf course and blanketed the

greens like wild flowers.

Players who rarely complain about the greens, complained. Those

who usually whine about the greens here, or any other California golf

course, did so even more. It was bad PR for Newport Beach Country

Club, which made sure it wouldn’t happen again by using two chemicals

-- Proxy and Primo -- to suppress the poa annua seed heads.

The greens in California are usually bentgrass with poa annua

mixed in, because it is almost impossible to prevent poa from getting

into bentgrass greens. Players’ golf spikes get kicked around.

While Benedict and his crack staff work hard to keep the greens

smooth, poa annua can sprout in the late afternoons and cause havoc

on East Coast golfers in the PGA Champions Tour event.

Since ‘97, however, Newport Beach’s second year of hosting the

event, the player complaints about the bumpy greens seem to have

dwindled, thanks largely to the new chemicals.

“(Primo) is a growth regulator,” Benedict said. “It reduces the

vertical growth so the greens are more consistent with the morning

and late afternoon. The greens don’t start getting all furry.”

The other chemical, Proxy, is a seed-head suppressant.

“There are less complaints, but there’s still poa annua,” Benedict

said. “It’s kind of a different grass (for the players). It’s

different from what they play on all year. Here, in California, it’s

bentgrass and Bermuda and poa annua. With the poa annua, this year

won’t be quite as bad, but there are 100 different varieties of poa

annua and it grows at different rates ... I had one (Champions Tour)

player last year ask me what we did to the greens, how we got them so

nice ... hey, this is our eighth rodeo, so we’re getting it figured

out.”

Benedict was pleased with the amount of rainfall the golf course

has received this year and PGA Tour agronomist Tom Brown has given

everything a big thumbs up.

“(Brown) was happy with the way things looked during advance

week,” Benedict said. “We’ve done some fine-tuning as we go and it

should be in great shape for the event.”

*

The wives of Champions Tour players are also getting involved in

charity, and Orange County-based Casa Youth Shelter is the latest

outreach.

Casa Youth Shelter announced it has received a grant of $37,500 to

support its innovative Community “Crisis Prevention” Outreach Program

through the PGA Tour’s Champions Tour Wives, Inc., formerly known as

the Senior Tour Wives, Inc., a nonprofit organization that was

chartered in 1994. The membership is comprised of approximately 100

women whose husbands are professional golfers on the Champions Tour.

Martha Jenkins, wife of Champions Tour player Tom Jenkins,

presented the check to the shelter. Tom Jenkins is playing in this

week’s Toshiba Senior Classic.

*

The first of four Toshiba Senior Classic Pro-Ams will start today

at 7 a.m. with a shotgun start. Lee Trevino, Bruce Lietzke and Ben

Crenshaw are among the Champions Tour players in the early pro-am,

while Chi Chi Rodriguez, Gary Player, Tom Kite, Gary McCord and Dave

Stockton headline the 12:30 p.m. pro-am shotgun start today.