Located just outside of Washington, D.C., in Arlington, Va., Washington Golf and Country Club (WGCC) has transformed itself from being described as a “sleepy” club with outdated facilities and an idiosyncratic golf course to a trendsetting, yet comfortable and familiar club that boasts a waiting list of more than 150. Founded in 1894, the club has a rich history and storied membership including past presidents Teddy Roosevelt, William Taft and Woodrow Wilson, Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge. More recently, the club needed to aggressively adapt to elevate itself back to its highly desired status.
The change began in 2004 with the development of a new clubhouse that opened in 2005. However, WGCC’s transformation was accelerated by General Manager/COO Patrick Tobey’s CCM, CCE, CEC, arrival to WGCC in 2008. Tobey oversaw the addition of a pool complex in 2008 and spurred the addition of a pro shop and cart barn in 2010, and a fitness and tennis center with additional outdoor courts in 2013.
Through Tobey’s leadership, the culmination of the transformation was the 2019 completion of The Turn, a golf practice facility and restaurant space, and the Tom Doak-renovated golf course that was completed in 2020 (see sidebar).
The Turn is a state-of-the-art practice facility equipped with food and beverage services, scenic views and hangout spots that have turned the space into a new melting pot for club members. A microcosm of the 17-year transformation, The Turn converted the club’s outdated driving range facility, known as the “9th Tee Shack” into a vibrant new space for members.
Inside The Turn
The $4 million facility opened on Nov. 1, 2019, and averages roughly 200 visits a day. The Turn’s driving range hosts 18 hitting bays on its two levels. Bays are equipped with heaters and fans for cold and warm weather, allowing the range to be comfortably used year-round. The driving range also utilizes TopTracer technology that elevates the learning and social experience. Each bay has a monitor that allows members to use an app to log in to their account and track their shots. The technology records the path of every shot the member has ever taken, including which club they used. Members can play virtual courses in the bays and compete against each other in various games by syncing their play. For example, a member in bay 4 can challenge another in bay 18 in games, including traditional golf, a driving contest and even play an adapted version of Go Fish. For Thanksgiving in 2019, with the course still undergoing its renovation, (no golf course at that point) the club ran a virtual tournament using bays to host foursomes.
On the lower level, The Turn hosts golf lessons from WGCC golf pros who use TrackMan technology to monitor and measure their students’ development. Two simulators located upstairs allow members to play their favorite courses and games year-round. One simulator allows members to play football, bowling, hockey and other sports in addition to golf and the other includes a WGCC hole that was scanned using geogrid technology and installed into the simulator. Downstairs, an indoor putting and chipping range equipped with turf and padded walls allows members to hone their skills.
On the upper level is the 63-seat restaurant that serves casual and grab-and-go fare and is equipped with indoor and outdoor TVs. The Turn hosts comfortable outdoor seating, a smoking and nonsmoking section and a firepit. The club also made sure to have glass exteriors to give members views of the vistas from inside the facility.
Planning and Process
Developing The Turn began more than five years ago. Once the project kicked off, a board member compiled a team to take on the planning process. The team had a core group of five club members and key staff. Bob Kelly Jr. was the “driving force” who managed both the golf and range projects, says Tobey. His background is in finance. The other team members had complementary expertise in construction, commercial real estate and zoning. Staff involved included the Director of Golf Jay Dufty and Superintendent Corey Haney (since retired).
The team met weekly to plan the new facility and the golf course renovations amid other projects that needed to fit with the club’s overall goals and aesthetics. During meetings, they discussed features and designs from the indoor putting green to the fireplace and outdoor fans. The team took into consideration member feedback to guide the process.
“We were constantly changing features to accommodate our members … it was a lot of collaboration with a lot of people,” said Tobey. Tackling multiple projects in a cost-effective way added to the challenge, but Tobey points out, “We didn’t take the easy way out. We took the right way out.”
Results
“The Turn is a game changer,” says Tobey. While the club speculated that the new facility would siphon members from other facilities like the Men’s Grill, the result has not been the case. In fact, WGCC discovered that The Turn is attracting its own group of regulars. One of the most impactful outcomes of the new facility is its engagement from members of all ages and club segments. Children enjoy The Turn as much as adults. When the pool is closed, kids come to The Turn to swing clubs using the TopTracer technology, practice putting and enjoy other activities. Parents can bring their kids to watch games on the TVs, use the simulator, take a golf lesson, hone their skills at the indoor putting green, and later grab a bite around the firepit. “You can spend all day here,” says Tobey.
Tennis players, female members, gym goers and other member groups also regularly frequent The Turn to relax, enjoy the firepit, have a meal and take in the views overlooking the course. Members regularly plan to meet at The Turn and have fun at the bar or organize club activities. Some members are there for so long they need to shift their chairs to the other side of the facility just to stay in the sun.
The Turn takes advantage of trends seen outside of the club world. In the public space, companies like Topgolf have grown to prominence for offering a fun way to improve patrons’ golf game, eat and drink, and socialize. However, it is important to note that while the project is cutting edge for even today’s most up-to-date clubs, The Turn’s development began more than a half-decade ago, signaling the strong, forward-thinking vision the club had for its members. Despite the newness of the facilities, Tobey ensures that WGCC is a truly comfortable, familiar and unique space for members. He preserves the club’s rich history and connects members to it by adorning the club’s walls with WGCC artifacts and pictures, including a 1940 birthday invitation to President Franklin Roosevelt and the 1898 roster, which included 33 women, and bylaws.
The Turn’s financial impact has been significant. The club budgeted for a significant loss for 2020 because of the unknown of how the membership would use the facility. By the end of the year, the club had only lost a faction of what it had projected to lose and had no layoffs, in part from the success of the new facility.
A Full Turn
Amid a golf course renovation and other capital projects, Tobey has led the club to even greater heights by delivering The Turn. Through its success, the club continues to add new and enjoyable experiences for WGCC members, growing its reputation as a respite for members and completing its transformation into one of the preeminent clubs in the region.
Realizing its Potential
Renovating WGCC’s Classic Course
By Alistair Tait
What do you do when you’ve got the ninth oldest course in the United States with a history stretching back 125 years and a lineage inspired by revered architects in Donald Ross and William Flynn? You call in a revered modern architect to cement the club’s place in golf’s firmament for the next 125 years.
Tom Doak of Renaissance Golf Design, with a lot of assistance from his friends, has helped Washington Golf & Country Club (WGCC) realize the potential Ross first saw in 1909 and Flynn further enhanced in 1919. The result? “The best course the Mid-Atlantic region,” according to former Green Committee Chairman Bob Kelly Jr.
The $8.5 million major modernization process transformed WGCC. Kelly and the club’s board took a brave step in 2014 that started out, in Kelly’s words, as a “basic infrastructure issue we had to solve with the greens that turned into a complete modernization”.
“We had a number of greens that were always on the edge of failing,” Kelly adds. “Our climate of 95 degrees and 90% humidity put a lot of stress on a lot of greens. The question wasn’t whether we were going to lose a green, it was when.”
“That’s how it started. Then we began looking at the underlying infrastructure, the entire picture. We had let trees grow for 100 years that obviously weren’t there when Ross and Flynn looked at the course. The trees had changed conditions: air flow and blocked off sunlight changed the architects’ original intentions of how the course should be played.”
The club was able to attract Doak thanks to local connection Mike McCartin, who has collaborated with Doak’s Renaissance Golf Design company since 2006. Tom Doak and Renaissance Golf Design’s Vice President Eric Iverson looked at the course as a favor to McCartin and fell in love with it.
From that point, the project’s scope went from just rebuilding greens to an entire makeover. Kelly recalls, “We were on the sixth hole and Doak said: ‘Listen, if you just want to do the greens then I’m not your guy. But if you’re willing to do a proper job on the whole course, then I’m interested.’”
“Having someone with Tom Doak’s gravitas saying we could transform our course was important to bring the members on board,” says Kelly.
McCartin took the role of chief planner. With the help of Iverson, he set out to put Doak’s vision into place.
“We saw straight away that the course had lost any sense of cohesiveness, certainly any sense of connection to the design ideas behind the original course,” McCartin said. “There was just a hodgepodge of styles and green design types, bunkers had been added that wouldn’t really fit a Flynn or a Ross course. And, perhaps most importantly, large scale earthworks projects on the 9th, 10th, 11th, 13th and 16th holes made it impossible to recapture major elements of the original Flynn and Ross design.”
The members voted to allow Doak, through McCartin and Iverson, to give WGCC back its cohesiveness and to breathe renewed life back into America’s ninth oldest course. From there, Doak and his group from Renaissance Golf Design, ably assisted by recently retired head greenkeeper Corey Haney and his team, set to work.
The result has transformed the club from what looked like a tight, tree-lined layout into one full of open spaces, a transformation that shows Washington Golf in its best light. “Tom’s vision was to highlight the undulating landscape,” McCartin said.
“When you have a small piece of ground, you want it to feel bigger by sharing spaces. Iverson was key to ensuring we made the course feel bigger and to show off the property rather than trying to compartmentalize it. There is an openness to Washington Golf & Country Club now, the way Ross and Flynn would have seen it,” said McCartin. “You can appreciate the scale of the golf course and how it shifts over the landscape. The course starts on a hill and you immediately get a view of a big open space cascading away from the clubhouse. Then you get down into the course and there are places where the narrow valleys make you feel very alone only to later burst back into brilliant openness that shows off course’s soul.”
“I discover something new every time I walk the course,” says Kelly. “I realize how good Tom Doak, Mike McCartin and Eric Iverson are at their jobs. They’ve done a first-class job. The changes they’ve made are stunning. I believe we have something truly special. We have a course that is deserving of our history, our lineage. We’ve written a new chapter in the club’s history that should stand for another 125 years.”