Business is sky high By Jim McCabe, Globe Staff

Jan 19, 2007

GOLF NOTES

No snow job: Business is sky high
By Jim McCabe, Globe Staff | January 11, 2007

What started with a stretch of warm fall weather and turned into a run of mild winter weather has made local golfers positively giddy.

How wild has it been? Last Friday, while PGA Tour members were unable to play in Maui because of heavy rain, our prideful New England golfers were out in full force, bright smiles adorning their faces thanks to temperatures in the high 50s and low 60s -- on Jan. 5, no less. Certainly it has been a winter unlike any other. Heck, in what other year were courses shutting down in December, even while the phones were ringing with golfers looking for tee times? Christmas Eve has never been a golf day in these parts, but it was this year -- and for good measure, so were New Year's Eve and New Year's Day.

A bonus? No doubt. But it's not as if it wasn't deserved -- or have we forgotten last May and June, when it rained every day, or so it seems? The cancellation of the Bank of America Championship PGA senior event at Nashawtuc Country Club in Concord was surely the lowlight to that stretch of weather, but there was plenty of misery as local owners took a bath.

Much of that sting, however, has been taken care of thanks to the last three-plus months, and to provide a picture of what the good weather has meant to course owners and operators, consider Granite Links Golf Club in Quincy.

In May (2,573) and June (2,579), a total of 5,152 rounds were played high above the Southeast Expressway. More rounds were played in October (2,806) than either of those prime, warm-weather months, and since Oct. 1 the number of rounds at Granite Links is a whopping 6,192, which includes the 604 who teed it up in the first seven days of January.

As for the most fitting way to finally draw the curtain, someone at Granite Links should take a bow, then raise a toast to a gentleman named David Vang. Playing in the final group on what had been declared the final day, Vang aced the par-3 seventh hole. That's right, on Jan. 7, Vang used a 7-iron to ace the seventh.

http://www.boston.com/sports/golf/articles/2007/01/11/no_snow_job_business_is_sky_high/

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