Jeff Wallach » Personalities

Peter Kessler Earns New Nickname

Jeff Wallach — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 00:05:51 +0000

Peter Kessler is the only golfer I know who can talk in the middle of his own backswing, though much of what he says to himself cannot be repeated

Peter Kessler is the only golfer I know who can talk in the middle of his own backswing, though much of what he says to himself cannot be repeated here for fear of scaring small children. It's often an admonition aimed at himself, his putting stroke, a stranger who coughed three miles away during Kessler's set-up, or something unintelligible even to those of us who know and love him. Today during an afternoon round at The ...

The Two Rory M.s

Jeff Wallach — Thu, 28 Jul 2011 12:34:54 +0000

One is the US Open Champion. The other is Rory Mathews, the champion of the golf road warriors, the most patient, capable, and warm-hearted host

One is the US Open Champion. The other is Rory Mathews, the champion of the golf road warriors, the most patient, capable, and warm-hearted host you could hope for, representing Failte Ireland, who arranged our ten-day Irish golf adventure. I'll let you figure out which has the better golf swing. ...

Irish Member of Parliament Arthur Spring Jr. on Great Irish Golf (and my chances at the Irish Open)

Jeff Wallach — Wed, 27 Jul 2011 17:01:12 +0000

Between shaking hands with constituents along the fairways (and allowing one fan to caddie for him for a few holes), crushing drives with a lovely

Between shaking hands with constituents along the fairways (and allowing one fan to caddie for him for a few holes), crushing drives with a lovely curving draw, and occasionally wandering a bit toward both the right and the left (with his golf shots, that is, not politically speaking), Artie Spring Jr. proved a delightful pro-am partner at Killarney Golf & Fishing Club this morning. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxBvenMqeHc ...

European Touring Pro John Parry, on the Killarney Golf and Fishing Club and My Chances at the Irish Open

Jeff Wallach — Wed, 27 Jul 2011 16:45:06 +0000

Tough day in the pro-am this morning as the course set up long and wet– starting on number eleven our first three holes were par fours of

Tough day in the pro-am this morning as the course set up long and wet-- starting on number eleven our first three holes were par fours of nearly 500 yards. I don't like to go that far on vacation! The Killarney Golf and Fishing Club's Killeen Course should prove equally challenging to the list of top European pros gathered for the event, even if they're not forced to play with me. Here's a quick clip ...

You Da Woman! An Early Mother’s Day Tribute

Jeff Wallach — Sun, 10 Apr 2011 16:10:50 +0000

Mother’s Day is a great time to celebrate Alice Dye, not so much for coproducing golf course architecture progeny P.B. and Perry, but for

Mother’s Day is a great time to celebrate Alice Dye, not so much for coproducing golf course architecture progeny P.B. and Perry, but for codesigning a portfolio of stellar (and, yes, manly) courses that includes PGA West, Kiawah Island’s Ocean Course, Harbour Town Golf Links, Crooked Stick, Teeth of the Dog (in the Dominican Republic), and the TPC Sawgrass Stadium Course. Next time your wise-ass golf partner calls you “Alice” for leaving a putt short, ...

Please Bogey This Hole

Jeff Wallach — Sun, 27 Feb 2011 22:33:15 +0000

Several years ago, I was playing Robert Trent Jones Jr.’s Royal Westmoreland Golf Course in Barbados with the architect himself. On one hole,

Several years ago, I was playing Robert Trent Jones Jr.’s Royal Westmoreland Golf Course in Barbados with the architect himself. On one hole, Jones faced an impossible sidehill putt. After studying the slick, sloping green from various angles, and frowning his displeasure, he looked up from his ball and said, “I designed it, so I’ll have to play it.” I thought of this recently while playing the eleventh hole at the Revere at Anthem Golf Course, ...

My Best Golf Prediction for 2011

Jeff Wallach — Thu, 13 Jan 2011 18:14:57 +0000

Okay, it’s also my biggest golf hope for the new year . . . 2011 will finally see the demise of the Senior Tour (er, excuse me,

Okay, it's also my biggest golf hope for the new year . . . 2011 will finally see the demise of the Senior Tour (er, excuse me, “Champions” Tour)—an idea so awful creators had to change the name of this most cynical and misdirected sports marketing effort in history. Sure I loved watching Arnie and Jack back in the day, and was sad to see them retire. And I still love Peter Jacobsen and Freddie and ...

Signature Hole

Jeff Wallach — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 18:33:52 +0000

If you were anything like me in high school, you spent a lot of time during history class drawing impossibly difficult golf holes in your

If you were anything like me in high school, you spent a lot of time during history class drawing impossibly difficult golf holes in your notebook. What avid golfer doesn’t imagine he could design a great layout? Several years ago, Phoenix golf course architect Greg Nash-- Billy Casper’s partner, and designer of dozens of courses-- offered me the chance to quit day-dreaming and step up to the drawing board. Nash agreed to build one golf hole ...

Fathers and Sons

Jeff Wallach — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 21:37:42 +0000

We are on the seventh hole of Grand View Lodge’s Pines Golf Course in the north woods of Minnesota in early summer, my father and I. The

We are on the seventh hole of Grand View Lodge's Pines Golf Course in the north woods of Minnesota in early summer, my father and I. The day is perfect, the sky blue, the air clean and crisp as a fine chardonnay. The seventh hole is 150 yards from the back tees, all carry over a lake. Beyond the slate-black surface of the water, a small, undulating, bowl-shaped green warms in the afternoon sun. I tee off first ...

Family Affair

Jeff Wallach — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 17:30:54 +0000

This story originally appeared in Links Magazine in 2001. I’ve always been fond of both adventure travel and golf, and I recently had the

This story originally appeared in Links Magazine in 2001. I’ve always been fond of both adventure travel and golf, and I recently had the opportunity to combine the two-- by undertaking an adventurous golf trip with my girlfriend Renee and my parents. What could be more fraught with danger than risking twelve hours in the car with Mom and Dad? It happened like this: Renee and I decided to spend last Thanksgiving with my folks in Florida. ...

Choosing The Right Club

Jeff Wallach — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 05:02:40 +0000

For my Father, Sidney Wallach, June 11, 1925-February 9, 2010. I’m in the garage of my parents pink house in Delray Beach, Florida, among the

For my Father, Sidney Wallach, June 11, 1925-February 9, 2010. I’m in the garage of my parents pink house in Delray Beach, Florida, among the recycling bins and the stacks of Costco toilet paper and the ancient sports gear, including a tennis racket that hasn’t been hit in two decades, trying to choose the right golf club for a challenging situation. But each time I pull a club out of the old standing bag in the ...

Men In Green

Jeff Wallach — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 17:51:27 +0000

This story first appeared in Links Magazine in 2002. In a meeting room at the Bandon Dunes Resort on the southern Oregon coast, approximately two

This story first appeared in Links Magazine in 2002. In a meeting room at the Bandon Dunes Resort on the southern Oregon coast, approximately two dozen men are planning to make you mad-- if not today, then soon. Not necessarily on purpose, but it seems inevitable. They’re not evil or mean-spirited, these men with names like Jim and Josh and even Robin and Dana. They love their families. They enjoy good beer. Some wear goofy shoes, others ...

Raining Champion: A Q&A with Bandon Dunes’ Grant Rogers

Jeff Wallach — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 23:54:34 +0000

A cold, hard sideways rain rattles the windows at Bandon Dunes as Grant Rogers, the resort’s director of instruction, looks outside. He

A cold, hard sideways rain rattles the windows at Bandon Dunes as Grant Rogers, the resort’s director of instruction, looks outside. He doesn’t appear all that happy about playing in this weather—it isn’t nearly bad enough to suit him. “I like when you have to bring your North Face gear to play,” Rogers observes, scanning the windswept links. “There are other extreme sports. Why can’t there be extreme golf? There’s no bad weather for golf; there’s just ...

The Caddie Wore a Rolex

Jeff Wallach — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 23:52:04 +0000

Several years ago, my friend (and self-made millionaire) Nate offered to pay me $6,000 a month to follow a story he believed would make a gripping

Several years ago, my friend (and self-made millionaire) Nate offered to pay me $6,000 a month to follow a story he believed would make a gripping book and movie. My job was to track the story’s progress, scribble notes and wait to see whether certain events panned out in a way that would make them worth writing about. At the time, I was between book contracts and struggling to finish a novel, and ...

Robert Trent Jones, Jr. and the Edges of Doom

Jeff Wallach — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 23:39:43 +0000

Behind many of his more than 250 golf designs in more than 40 countries on six continents, stands a man who works on many levels, who welcomes a

Behind many of his more than 250 golf designs in more than 40 countries on six continents, stands a man who works on many levels, who welcomes a new challenge, and who sees the game and his pursuit of it as not just a physical-- but as a metaphysical-- journey. Like the best writers and artists, Jones employs subtext and symbolism, imagery and illusion, as well as a range of other techniques from the verbal ...