re: The Bluffs condition report

Notice I said perfect. Trust me, I work on a course where we gotta hand rake bunkers daily, trim edges, maintain a certain height of a "lip" from sand to bunker edges, etc. I believe in a maintained playing surface in bunkers or else I wouldn't work at a place like I do. Budgetary restrictions aren't a problem, so I don't mind spending that time and labor to get them right.

My old course, we should have managed our bunkers a little differently IMO. So many man hours spent on them everyday. Super/club refused to use a SandPro on a few big bunkers that cost us at least 2-4 man hours a day.

Every course is different. Bunkers at every course should be handled different. The real courses I feel bad for are the public courses built with 150+ bunkers, where half of them are unnecessary or too penal for the majority of golfers. Courses, and especially bunkers, can be often designed without a single thought to maintaining them. Good sand can be very, very expensive. Transport costs alone are insane for some places.

So I don't mind seeing some slightly neglected bunkers on an otherwise, well conditioned golf course. I know that probably means more time/money is being spent on playing surfaces in play, like tees and fairways.