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%%wppa%% %%slideonly=2%% %%size=400%% %%align=left%%We traveled down I-90 a bit, to take a look at a fantastic private club near Albany. Country Club of Troy is an original Walter Travis course (same guy who designed Cherry Hill, Stafford and Orchard Park) maintained by an excellent superintendent and staff.

Here is a bit of information from Bruce Hepner, the golf course architect currently retained by CCTroy for consultation and restoration:

Amongst the din,  I thought I’d straighten out my involvement at CC of Troy.  I’ve been the Consulting Architect since 1998, originally representing Reniassance Golf and now Hepner Golf Design. Chris Strong was hired a year or two later. I knew Chris when he was the 2nd assistant at Ekwanok and helped him get the jobs at Mid Ocean Club and then CC of Troy. The restoration work really kicked into gear once Chris came on board. He’s done a great job and it has been great fun working with him and his crew.

Like all my typical restoration work, we started with the mowing lines. We first expanded the putting surfaces out to the edges of the original green plateaux.  They had rounded off and lost strategic pin positions. It took a few years to get expansions to putting surface quality and Chris has done a great job keeping them up to speed.   This was done by scalping down the turf followed by repeated topdressings and over-seeding. The important thing is that we recaptured the putting surfaces back to their original sizes (without rebuilding them) and they are obviously a spectacular set of Walter Travis surfaces.

We then concentrated on getting the fairway edges back out to the original strategic widths while bringing the fairway bunkers back into play. This was also done by scalping and over-seeding. The expanded approaches and short grass areas around the green-sites were from a little artist liberty on my part.  I had just gotten back from a play/study trip to the Melbourne Sand Belt and I thought the concept would work well around these great green complexes. I think they work well with the existing  roll offs and add a great element to the game.

We’ve also taken many trees off the property opening up views and allowing the design to breath. Chris keeps on top of the forest and has a free swing at any trees that he feels conflict with proper agronomy and or the design. 

Most of the bunkers we added were inspired from Travis’s original plan. That work was done over the last 10 years with me in the excavator and Chris and his staff doing the heavy lifting. We also added a few tees to keep the course current from the tips and the forward score card. 

Overall I think we’ve done a pretty good job on a very small budget. All the work was done in-house and Chris Strong, his staff, and the encouraging membership should take full credit for the restoration work. It’s a great golf course and one of my favorites hidden gems.
Country Club of Troy

Country Club of Troy