Where there are never mulligans

Andrew Edwards

A well-manicured green, hot grilled lunches and some refreshing

weather have all been part of the show so far at the Toshiba Senior

Classic golf tournament. But behind the scenes, some long, long

workdays go into the event.

The professional tournament is set to open Friday at the Newport

Beach Country Club, where activities leading up to the contest

started Monday. Tournament operations manager Marc Sorgatz said the

hardest part of running the show is keeping the course in top shape.

The biggest challenge is “not destroying the golf course; we’re

very protective of the golf course,” Sorgatz said.

It’s course superintendent Ron Benedict’s job to keep up the

greens and fairways. Since the beginning of the week, Benedict said,

grounds crews have worked close to 18 hours each day to maintain the

course.

On Wednesday, Benedict said he showed up for work at 4:30 a.m. and

expected to go home at 10 p.m. Benedict and the course’s

groundskeepers mow the course daily during tournament week, and have

to start early to beat the 7:15 a.m. shotgun starts for the Classic

Pro-Am and the tournament itself.

Benedict has to stay late to make sure the course’s sprinklers

shut off at the right moment.

“If a sprinkler decides it wants to stay on and it runs all night

and floods the fairway, we’ve got a big problem,” Benedict said.

Benedict said his job will likely get easier once the professional

competition begins Friday, but the pressure usually returns once the

event closes and the time comes to get the course back to normal.

“The tear down is just frightening,” Benedict said. “You can’t

stop it, there’s going to be damage. The course just gets beat.”

Inside the country club’s clubhouse, food and beverage director

Steven Carson has been busy working to fulfill dining needs laid out

in an inch-thick booklet. During a typical week, Carson said, the

country club’s food requirements fill up a few sheets of paper.

“It’s kind of funny -- people don’t realize how much [work] it

really does take,” Carson said.

Sorgatz said he is one of four employees who works year-round on

the tournament for Hoag Hospital. Last year, the tournament raised

about $1 million for the hospital, as it’s done for the past five

years.

Preparations for the tournament, which include lining up vendors

and ordering supplies, start to get busy around October, Sorgatz

said.

About five weeks before the tournament, Sorgatz moves from an

off-site office to a trailer at the country club before construction

of more than 25 temporary structures and installation of about 100

phone lines.

During tournament week, Sorgatz said his job is mostly “putting

out fires,” and he patrols the course in a golf cart responding to a

torrent of requests, needs and warnings he hears on his radio and

cell phone. When a golf cart breaks down, parking lots get packed or

someone wants to know if it’s time to unlock a portable toilet, they

call Sorgatz.

With all the hard work, does anything come easy?

“In the summertime,” Sorgatz said, looking forward to spending

Independence Day on the Balboa Peninsula.

* ANDREW EDWARDS covers business and the environment. He can be

reached at (714) 966-4624 or by e-mail at [email protected].