Doug Bottamiller

Doug Bottamiller took a mulligan. After leaving the golf course maintenance industry, Doug took a job in landscaping. But something was missing, so he went back to the course where he started: Green Spring Valley Hunt Club in Owing Mills, Maryland. Now the superintendent, Doug spearheaded an extensive renovation in 2020 by noted golf architect Tyler Rae. It was also around this time he started working with USGA Course Consulting Services. Says Doug: “I needed reassurances that we were doing the right thing.”

Q: How did you get to Green Spring Green Valley?

Doug: I've worked here twice. I graduated to college and went and worked at Oakmont Country Club in Pittsburgh under John Zimmers for a couple of summers. At that point, Green Spring was looking for an assistant. I got the job, worked here for three years. I got married and the fall of 04 and I resigned in the spring of’ 05. I actually left the golf business for a couple years, went into landscaping. And then got back in in '07 and haven't looked back since.

Q: What brought you back to the golf course industry?

Doug: The thing I love the most about my industry and what I do here is that I work with a team. And working together cohesively to make a product that we do day in and day out. I didn't have that in the landscape business. It was I was very isolated. I was just a regional manager, and there was no camaraderie. The teamwork aspect is really what drew me back into the business. And I haven't looked back since.

Q: Let’s go to the renovation and how you brought on USGA Course Consulting Services

Doug: We brought in Tyler Rae to do the renovation. And after we were done, we knew we needed to bring other professionals into the realm. And one of the things our agronomist said was you push these greens too hard too fast. He explained it’s a five-year process. You can't expect these new green expansions to perform like your greens that have been here for 100 years. And it was like the light bulb went off for the rest of the membership in the room. They are only six months old. Why should they perform like the greens that have been here and cared for 100 years? It was little things like that.

Q: What do you like most about CCS?

Doug: The biggest thing that I like is that I never feel like an idiot when I call them. I don't know everything. This is a team environment, and it's not just my team. It's also the team at the USGA and, my team, my committee and the golfers here. We do a really good job day in and day out, but when you get into a situation, it's nice to have somebody at the other end of the phone to pick up and ask, hey, what could this be?

Q: And you’re now using the DEACON® platform?

Doug: The DEACON platform is like set it, forget it. So long as you're collecting the data, it's putting it in the charts for you automatically. And I've already used some of the data in my communications to management a couple weeks ago.

Q: And the GS3 ball as well? What metric appeals to you most?

Doug: It's all about the smoothness and the trueness. And then the firmness as well. You can have fast screens that are soft, but you can't have soft greens or firm greens that are slow. What I'm saying is the speed number is not important to me. The firmness, the trueness, and the smoothness are what matters the most.

Q: How important is data collection to you?

Doug: The entire season, we are building on our firmness and our trueness numbers. By the time we get into September, those greens are as firm and as smooth as we're going to be able to get them before we must physically go in and do some cultural practices. Without that data, it would have been a harder case to make. But it works and the membership loves it. Data collection is paramount to what I do and drives all my decisions, day in and day out. I know what it's going to take to get greens up to a certain speed after a half inch of rain now because of the data that we take daily. I didn't know that before.

Q: And you’ve been collecting data for how long?

Doug: We’ve been doing it for three years. That's what drew me to the DEACON platform because it was a one stop shot. You can get all your different readings, plug it in, hook it up to your phone and boom, it's done. I went away for a few days last week and I could still log into the DEACON app each day and know where we were, what we were running, what our moistures were, what they were in the morning versus what they were in the afternoon. And you know, having that information just gives you a little bit of peace of mind. We do what the data tells us to do.

Q: Do you think you’re seeing a return on investment?

Doug: We used to mow fairways religiously. Monday, Wednesday, Friday, every week. We have almost 30 acres of fairways. That's an expense. Every time those mowers go out. Not only is it an expense, it's a risk. Every time that mower leaves a shop and goes out onto the fairways, there's a risk that's going to have a leak. There's a risk, it's going to break down. I don't think people really understand about the total value of the data collection that you get. Because it's more than are your greens smooth and fast? For me, it's all encompassing. The data collection really helps my entire operation function more smoothly and efficiently. We're focusing on detail work that we have historically not been able to get to. We can do things differently as long as we have the numbers and the data to back it up.