The Rich Conwell Show - September 7, 2024

Eric Kulinna joins Rich to talk about the First Tee of Pittsburgh's impact on the game, his start in golf, and more.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to the rich Come we'll go show. I realized
that I continually try and try to find interesting people
to talk to, and it's actually not very very hard
to do. So maybe that has something to do with
my Maybe you guys can call me a slacker because
I don't have a good work ethic. But this week
we are joined by Eric Klenna. Eric, we're gonna let

(00:23):
Eric's a PJ professional and has a great, great golf story,
a great golf story. There's there's a lot in Eric's world.
It's really interesting to hear about. But as with every
guest that we have, we're gonna give first of all, Eric,
thanks for doing this. I really do appreciate. I know
how busy you are.

Speaker 2 (00:39):
You're welcome, Richard. I appreciate your inviting me to be on.

Speaker 1 (00:42):
That's awesome. So so first off, as we do with everybody,
and we'll see if you can you can ring the
bell like everybody else does. Talk to me about how
you got your start in golf.

Speaker 2 (00:56):
Okay, let me. I try to be as brief as
I can, but to weave a story properly. So my
first golf memory was watching the nineteen seventy seven Masters
when Tom Watson Water and I was ten years old
and we had come home from Easter Sunday and was
in the den at my maternal grandparents' house watching with

(01:16):
my grandfather, watching him get all excited, well watching won
the Masters, and I was like, you know, I was
in tuch mceller. It was pretty cool, right. My grandparents
on both sides of the family played golf, but my mom,
my dad, my brother, none of them play, and so
that was just kind of unusual. It was really sort
of like the first time I'd ever really seen golf,

(01:39):
and that sort of has always stuck with me. Tom watching,
you know, was my favorite player growing up, probably because
he was the first one I ever really saw win.
And then a couple of years later, in nineteen seventy nine,
I had a paper route, so I was already working
a little bit, had a little bit of money. And
I don't know whether it was the e could knock

(02:01):
economic circumstances at the time, or whether my dad was
just you know, doing what dads do, but he told
me that in the springtime that my parents could pay
the fee for me to sign up for the Little
League baseball. But if I wondered, the new met when
new spikes, I was going to have to get those
with my own money.

Speaker 1 (02:17):
I love that.

Speaker 2 (02:18):
And so I had a little bit of money from
the paper route from delivering the postcasette and he said, well,
you know, if you want to make some more money,
you could go caddy. And so I grew up in
Whitehall Borough, right across Route fifty one from where Baldon
High School is. That's where I went to high school
and right off the fifth fairway of South Hill's Country
Club and it was literally one hundred and fifty not

(02:40):
even one hundred and fifty yards from my front lawn.
And so my dad said, you know, you're twelve, you
could grow up and you could caddy at the club
if you want. And I was like, okay, well that's cool,
maybe I'll go and do that. And so I went
up in mid March and found out what was going
on right after registration for Little League Baseball started and

(03:01):
they were like, yeah, he's got to come up and
we'll do a little training. And went did the caddy
training and started caddying there at age twelve, and so
part of the caddy training eventually once school was out
and we could go on Mondays when the club was closed.
One of the assistants there. He was the second assistant
at the time. His name is Chuck Cullison. And the

(03:24):
first assistant was Sam Deep and I think you know Sammy,
and a guy named Ray Lanknese was the pro at
the time, and Ray had been there for a short
period of time. The longtime pro at South Dales Country
Club was a guy named Ted Luther. And then you
know before that was was Sam Parks right nineteen thirty
five US. That was a pretty cool place, super fast

(03:48):
greens and a great place to learn golf. And you know,
I first I tell people and even today I learned
golf as a caddy first and then as a player second.
But once the caddy clinics started and Chuck was the
second assistant, and so mondays at like eleven o'clock before
the course opened at noon. You know, if you had clubs,

(04:10):
you could go up and he would show you how
to putt, and he would show you how to hit
some balls. And then from noon until dark you had
to run at the place to go and play golf.
And so you know, I played Little league baseball. It
was a third basement and a pitcher at age twelve
was the last year that I played. I was a
pretty decent player, but our team had a losing season

(04:33):
that I found that kind of discouraging. And so as
that was happening, I was learning to play. And you know,
I tell people the first lesson we had on the
range with Chuck, you know, he basically said, look, there's
if you want to learn how to hit a golf ball,
there's three things you have to do. You have to
learn how to hold on to the club correctly. You
have to learn how to hit straight shots to go
at your target. And you've got to learn how to

(04:56):
hit the little ball before you hit the big ball,
right like hit the golf ball before you hit the ground.
But even today, when i'm you know, teaching people that
have never played before, I go those those rules haven't changed.
They have and you know, Chuck was a very good player.
He eventually well. In nineteen seventy one, when he was

(05:18):
just out of college and first beginning working as an assistant,
he set the course record there so at sixty three.
And you know, he had played on the ball in
high school teams with the guy named Jim Misserio, who
had played on tour they won the WL Championship. Chucky
won as an individual. They were good at golf, like
our ball in high school has never been that great

(05:40):
at football, but at golf they'd been pretty good.

Speaker 1 (05:42):
Yeah, okay is unbelievable player. Unbelievable player. Yeah, there is
unbelievable player.

Speaker 2 (05:46):
So yeah, I mean Jim weaves into my story a
little later. But Chuck was the one that taught me
how to play. My grandparents were members at the club
at the time, and so they got me a couple
individuals with him after this caddy stuff, and we became friends.
He eventually became left South Hills Country Cub and became

(06:07):
the golf professional at South Park, and he was there
for twenty some years. And so, you know, as I
began to play more, I could only play at South
Hills on Mondays. When I was thirteen, when I wasn't
caddying and I stopped playing baseball, and I had the
whole summer to myself while my friends were at the pool,
I would ride my bike out to South Park. Again.

(06:30):
I had a paper route and some money from caddying,
so I got a locker, I got a junior membership,
I kept my clubs out there. I would shoes in
a shag bag and I would either ride my bike
out or my mom would drop me off on her
way to work and pick me up on her way home.
And I spent the days when I wasn't caddying at
South Park playing golf. And if I had a question,

(06:52):
Chuck would answer my question. And I tell people like,
I never had a lesson like you think about lessons now, right,
wasn't half an hour schedule or I was paying him like.
I would see him and he you know, I'd be like, man,
I kind of hit some slices today while I was playing.
He's like, oh, you want me to look at your swing?
And I'd be like, hey, does that give me about
thirty minutes off? We'll go over and take a look, right,

(07:13):
And he'd come and watch me for five minutes. I'd
hit a few shots and he'd go, thanks to your grip,
move the ball a little forward. Try that, and I
hit a shot or two. It'd be better, almost usually automatically, and.

Speaker 1 (07:22):
He'd be like, Okay, cool, I gotta go, I gotta go,
I gotta go. I got home and so.

Speaker 2 (07:29):
And so that was That was how I learned to
play and then you know again, eventually back in the day,
there were guys that were there, you know, older high
school kids, college and adults that were good players, and
there was always a game going on if you wanted
to find a game. Once I learned that, and once
they all learned that this little kid had money, right,
you were going to play, you were going to lost, right,

(07:52):
you were you were going to ask to be in
the games. And so you know, again I I paid
to learn how to play by my mistakes, right, I mean,
you know, it was a Skins game. The general game
was a flat buy in on a Skins game with
however many people are playing and then you know the
low gross actually got a skin too, and so it

(08:14):
was great training, right, And you know, while that was
going on, I was continuing that was just basically in
the summer, and I was continuing to pursue my main sports,
which for years and years were wrestling in football. And
you know, I started wrestling when I was in kindergarten
and I started playing football when I was in third grade,
and so you know, those were my loves in the

(08:35):
nineteen seventies growing up. And eventually I had a couple
of concussions my sophomore year playing football, and doctors told
me should play anymore. So my parents were like, well,
you know, going into my junior year, the rule in
our house was you had to play a sport after school, right.
My mom worked, my dad worked.

Speaker 1 (08:57):
You're not going to sit here. You're not going to
sit in this house.

Speaker 2 (08:59):
Yeah you're not. You're not coming home by yourself and
sitting around for a couple hours. You've got to play
a sport. And so my junior year it was either
running across country or play on the golf team. And
so I had never really played that much competitively, but
I went out for the team and was the number
two player. A guy that was a senior who played
at Alleghanty College by the named of Dave Lebicky was

(09:20):
the number one player and I played number two behind him.
Most of the year. I was like, oh, okay, I'm
all right at this, but it was still just kind
of a placeholder, you know. Wrestling was still my main thing,
and my last two years in high school I put
most of my energies into wrestling, and my senior year
in high school pretty good. It was thirty five and seven.

(09:43):
My senior year but for the losses.

Speaker 1 (09:45):
It's a little better and pretty good bye. That's a
little bitter. I'm pretty good man.

Speaker 2 (09:50):
For the losses were to the same guy. I never
beat him. We wrestled probably a dozen times over the
course of our career, from middle school all the way
through high school. I lost to the same guy in
the Christmas Tournament, our duel meet, the Section championship. I
finished second in the Section, and then we ended up

(10:10):
facing one another for the third place match in the
w p i L Finals, where in the top three
went to States. And in the last match, I tried
something I probably shouldn't have. He caught me in a
headlock and tinney. So the very last match of my career,
I got pinned and the guy, the guy's name is

(10:31):
Eric Engele, It's it's Kurt.

Speaker 1 (10:35):
Yeah. Yeah, you're running up a wall, but you're running
straight up a wall, straight up a wall, right, running
right up straight up a wall.

Speaker 2 (10:42):
You know. I told people like I was okay, but
I didn't realize how good I was at the time
because there was this one guy I couldn't be and
it was pretty discouraging. And I had been looking at
trying to go to college at Duke University and wrestle there.
I was a pretty good student in high school and
when I lost angle that coached and got pinned, the

(11:02):
next interaction I had with the coach at Duke was like, Hey,
you didn't make it to the state tournament. I'm sorry,
I can't get behind your application. You know you're probably
not going to be admitted here, but you know, I
hope I see you on a team for somebody else.
And I was young, and I was young and dumb,
and my high school guidance counselor had told me not

(11:22):
to do this. But the only other school I applied
to was Penn State, and so I didn't have many
options at that point by the spring of my senior year,
and so I ended up going to Penn State. But
before I did that, I was I don't know, in
today's world, I probably would have been diagnosed with depression.

(11:46):
I was pretty bummed out after all that happened my
senior year, and I was reading Golf magazine back in
the day and found an advertisement for a junior golf
school in Scotland in Saint Andrew's And so part of
the aftermath of losing this match was I had broken
up with the girl that I was dating, wasn't going

(12:08):
to go to the problem with her, and had saved
some money for that, and I was like, well, I
had some money, and I talked with my parents about
this school and they were like, well, maybe that'd be
kind of cool. And unbeknownst to me, they talked with
my grandparents and my graduation gift from high school from
my grandparents and my parents was to go to a
two week golf school in Saint Andrews, Scotland, and so

(12:31):
I spent two and a half weeks in Saint Regula's Hall.
We had passes which meant you could play the old
course once a week and the other three courses been
New and and Jubilee whenever you wanted to. It was
there with a company called Adventures in Golf who I
was in contact with the owner almost up until he
passed Ken Hammel. It was amazing and it changed my life.

(12:55):
And you know, I had I had really enjoyed golf
when I went to St Andrews, like I fell head
over heels for golf.

Speaker 1 (13:03):
Well, I think this is also something to be said
for everything happens for a reason, you know, angle get
you in a headlock, and that that girl says we're
not going there, and that dude guy says we're not
doing that. You know what? That that all leads to something.

Speaker 2 (13:16):
Absolutely, And so I came back from Saint Andrews with
a confidence in my game. I had done nothing but
play golf for two weeks. Right, we had a pro
that was over there that was helping us with our game.
So I really for the first time at somebody like
every day that was like, oh, let's do this, let's
try this, and I try it, it would work, and it's like,
you know, I mean, I tell people, I shot seventy

(13:38):
five on the old course the second to last day
we were there and won the competition amongst all the
kids that were there from there were like twenty five
of us from all over the country. And brought this
little silver cup home and was like really full of myself, going, oh,
this is pretty cool. And so a couple of weeks later,
I had to go to Penn State to sign up

(13:59):
for all my class. So there was no electronic registration
back then. It was, you know, the summer of nineteen
eighty five. I had to drive up to Penn State
and you know, in the morning it was a through
K and in the afternoon it was all through Z
to sign up for classes. So my last name starts
with K. I went up in the morning, got everything done,
and now I've driven up there, and what am I
going to do? And I'm like, well, I'm going to

(14:19):
go try the golf courses. And so I drove out
to the course. There's nothing really going on in early August.

Speaker 1 (14:26):
Might that's right, there's no students.

Speaker 2 (14:29):
There anything else. And they were like, yeah, we've got
this professor that's playing. He's a member. When do you
go join him? And so teed Off played the first
two hole well, played the first hole the Blue course.
Teed Off on the second hole of the Blue Course,
which was at that time a part five, was walking
about thirty yards off the tee and it's like lunchtime
and this guy comes driving up in the cart with

(14:50):
a flag on the back. He's the ranger of the
golf course. And he slows down and he looks at
me and he goes Eric Calena. And I looked over
and I was like, mister Kahn. And so it was
a gentleman who I had caddied for at Southfield's country club.
He passed away now, but his name was Lowry Khan.
He was an insurance agent. He went to the church
that I grew up in. He wasn't good friends, but

(15:12):
he knew my grandfather. Knew me from caddying for him
as a kid, and he had been an insurance agent.
He was a Penn State grad. He had retired. He
had moved to State College with his wife and joined
Center Hills and his boys, Dick and Jim Conn. Conn
had played on the golf teams at Penn State in

(15:33):
the seventies, and so he was working at the golf
courses just so he could give golf privileges. And he
would play after done with his shifts, and he was like, Hey,
I'm going to go get my clubs. Can I come
out and join you? And we were like, yeah, sure.
There were just two of us playing, and so he
came and joined us on the third tee and played
the last sixteen holes with us, and I played pretty well.

(15:55):
I had never seen the course. I shot seventy three,
made an eagle on one of the par fives in
the back nine, which I think was probably the thing
that impressed in the most. You know, a driver in
a three wood and made about a twenty foot putt
and when we got done, he's like, so, are you
playing on the golf team at Penn State? And I
was like, no, mister Colin, and I hadn't told him
any of the story. Gave him a brief thing about
wrestling and why I was at Penn State, and he

(16:17):
was like, well, you need to play on the team.
And he's like, I'll introduce you the coach. She's over
on the range given the lesson. Well, at that time,
the coach of the men's golf team at Penn State
was a woman named Mary Kennedy now Mary Kennedy Cercy,
and she had been the women's coach, and Joe Paturno
had wanted when the men's coach, Joe Boyle had retired,

(16:37):
Platurno had wanted to shut the men's team down. Yes
it was, it costs money and the football team was
supporting the entire athletic department, right right, And Mary said, no,
don't don't do that. This was in I think eighty three,
a couple of years before I matriculated there as a freshman.
She said, no, don't do that. I'll coach both teams
and just let me get a grad assistant so I'm

(16:58):
not overwhelmed. And so that's what they did. And so
she was coaching the men's team and the women's team,
and you know, she was one of only two female
coaches of the men's sport in all of Division one.
I believe the swimming and diving coach for men and
women at Brown University was a woman at the time. Right,
it was just Mary and this other woman, and she

(17:20):
was amazing. Lady still is. I here at our alumni
outing every year and she said, look, mister cons brought
you to me. I'm trying to build the team up.
I have eleven of my twelve players from last year
coming back. I've recruited five guys to come that are
going to be freshmen and whoever makes it to the

(17:41):
open tryouts. What they still had to have for general students,
She's like, we're going to have twenty to twenty five
people playing for twelve spots. But since you've been admitted
already here in University Park and you're in the College
of Engineering, which was, you know, hard to get into
and it still is. I've got one recruit the College Engineering.
He doesn't have a roommate. Yet, if you room with

(18:03):
my guy, I'll let you try out for the team
and not have to go through the open tryouts. Well
that sounds pretty good, that's okay. She's like, you know,
you have to rumor with them all year and if
you make the team, great and if you don't, but
you're gonna get a chance. We'll play four rounds the
first week a school and so to you ad by
your word. I tried out for the team and I

(18:25):
was a twelfth man on a twelve man team by
two shots over four rounds.

Speaker 1 (18:28):
I love it, Okay. So so before.

Speaker 2 (18:32):
I got access to the game, there you go.

Speaker 1 (18:34):
There you go before four years. Before we go, before
we talk about the rest of Penn State and forward,
we have to take a quick break. But this is fast.
It's fascinating how I love these stories that just kind
of tumbled down like that happened, and this happened, that
caused this to happen. And so when we come back,
we're going to talk about a little bit more about
Penn State, and we're gonna start talking about like all

(18:56):
the awesome stuff you're doing in the world today. This
is the rich Comboll Golf Show. Welcome back to the
Rich Comboll Golf Show. We are joined this week by
Eric Kalina. Eric is it's gotten this to his four
year career at State college. And Eric, I gotta ask
you this question. Did you did you win any events

(19:17):
at Penn State?

Speaker 2 (19:20):
So? Uh, we won thirteen times as a team, qualified
for the nca Championships in nineteen eighty seven. And I
actually won the last event that I played in as
a senior to I up Invitational in Indiana Country Club.

Speaker 1 (19:35):
See, you flipped the whole thing. So your last wrestling
match was not a good memory, but your your your
last collegiate NCAA golf golf tournament was a good memory.
See everything happens for a reason, all right. Yet that right,
so you got so you get through there, So you
get through there, and then so then then I'm assuming
that I don't know this, but I'm assuming that you

(19:57):
just automatically assume you go in the golf business or
did you have other ideas?

Speaker 2 (20:02):
Engineer, I had no, So I had I had no
thoughts at that time of going in the golf business.
One of our the captain of the golf team my
freshman and sophomore years was a guy named Terry Hertzog,
and Terry's won a couple of Pennsylvania opens. Sure as
really really good player. I never beat Terry on the

(20:24):
golf course once my freshman sophomore year, never had a
score lower than Terry's on the golf course. And he
Terry went to Florida and tried to play the Mini
Tours and got kicked around a little bit. But you know,
guys like Mark Kackabeci and Ken Green, you know, and
and came back and took a job as an assistant
at Lancaster Country Coven. So when I was a senior,

(20:45):
he had made that decision. You know, we still saw
him every once in a while, and I'm like, look,
if I can't beat Terry, like what, I have no
business going to Florida and trying to play the Mini Tours.
And so no. I went to graduate school at the
University of Illinois. I had some of the professors that
I had. My undergraduate degree at penn State was an
exercise in sports science. I transferred from engineering and some

(21:06):
of the professors I had, like Bob Christina was a
golf nut, and you know, they started talking to me
about grad school and kinesiology and that kind of thing.
And so I went to grad school at the University
of Illinois with the intent of going into what they
call the MD pH d program, where you go to
medical school and get a PhD, but before you do that,

(21:27):
you have to get a master's degree and whatever your
PhD is going to be in and they kind of
hold you for two years ago it's going to be
about ten to twelve years in this program. Let's make
sure you have all your ducks in a row before
you start. And my advisor was a golfer, great guy,
Richard Boylow. And the inventory that they gave me when
I went to graduate school was, you know, what can

(21:49):
you teach for us? What can you do for a
grad assistantship? And I had played on the golf team,
so they assigned me to teach golf classes and the
undergraduate physical education program. Right, so I'm twenty two years
old and now I'm teaching PE classes to undergraduate teach
them how to play golf. So yeah, so that was
my first exposure to kind of coaching and teaching. And

(22:11):
it was two classes a week for eight weeks in
the fall, right before it got cold, and then two
classes a week for eight weeks in the second half
of the spring semester, and I had basically the last
eight weeks of the fall in the first eight weeks
of the spring off, so to speak, where I didn't
have to do any teaching. I was like, oh, that
sounds pretty good. And so the first semester that I taught,

(22:32):
pretty good. Job. At the end of the session, I
got the big stuff back from the students, the evaluations,
and they were basically like, Eric was a really nice
person who obviously knows enough about golf, but I didn't
really learn anything, and so that was sort of a
slap in the face. That's what I had really sort
of kicked button in the class, and I started trying

(22:54):
to figure out why, and over the course of that winter,
I realized, with the help of of my mentors that
it was because of the way the class was set up,
and it was teaching people to play from the tee
to the green. Like the first thing I tried to
teach the undergraduate students was how to make a full swing,
and then the last thing was putting, and then we
were supposed to take them out on the golf course. Well,

(23:16):
you know, I was a pretty decent player. So I
was trying to teach them stuff that I knew right
as a player. Right, And you know the analogy I've
used for years is, you know, they wanted to learn math.
I was trying to teach them calculus and trigonometry, and
they didn't know how to add subtrack, multiplayer.

Speaker 1 (23:32):
Divide right, exactly exactly. I have hockey, well, I have
hockey skates. And guess what I ain't getting near of
those guys that go that, do that, do that? For real? Yeah,
I get it completely, yeah, right.

Speaker 2 (23:44):
And so the next semester, in the spring of my
first year of graduate school, I said, can I switch?
Can I take this syllabus and flip it upside down?
And there wasn't really anybody there that was a golfer.
That was the reason I was teaching it. They were
all like, as long as you cover these topics, you
can do it in whatever order you want. So I said, okay,
I'm gonna flip it around. I'm going to teach them
how to putt first, and then ship and then pitch,

(24:05):
and then hit some webshots and then try to hit
some woods, and then we're going to go play right
and that worked really well, right. And I also found
a textbook quote unquote, how to Become a Complete Golfer
by Bob Tosky and Jim Flick, and I used that
in some of it in class, and I was like,
these guys are pretty good. They ran the golf guy

(24:26):
I did schools. I knew their names right, right, and
so that worked really well. And then I had people
at the end of the spring that were like, hey,
can you teach golf too? And I was like, we're
going to be here in the summer. We want to
take a golf two class. And I went to my
Boston was like, can I teach golf too? And they
were like, right, the syllaba short, that's cool. If the
kids want to take it, go go for it. So

(24:47):
I tied a golf two class and then at the
end of the summer those kids went can we take
golf three? I don't know, let me find out. And
went to my Boston said can I teach a golf
three class? They right to syllables, I have had it, yeah,
And the kids had to have three dee credit hours
to graduate at that time, so it made sense they

(25:08):
could get them all in golf and so you know,
I that was my exposure to teaching and coaching I
flipped everything, and then I had people that wanted to
stick with me and keep learning, and I really love that.
And as I did it, I got better and better
as a player. And while the people that like cohor,
the people that I went to graduate school with, got
more and more excited about going to ED school. I

(25:30):
had gotten married, my wife was working on her PhD.
And my advisor went, hey, I don't think you're going
to be real happy going to medical school and having
to put your clubs away for ten to twelve years.
Like I'm not saying not play a lot, I mean not.

Speaker 1 (25:47):
Play at all at all, Right, say goodbye to it.

Speaker 2 (25:50):
So you know, yeah, I mean in the summer of
nineteen ninety two, I had qualified for the US Amateur,
Public Links and the Western Amateur, just misqualifying for the
US am and finished in the top ten in the
Illinois State am against some pretty good competition, and was like, yeah,
you're probably right. And so then I turned to a
couple of my former teammates at Penn State who were
in the golf business. Terry was one of them, my roommate,

(26:13):
my freshman year is now the general manager's procession down
in Hereford, South Carolina. And another classmate of mine is
the coach at iup Dan Brown. You probably know Danny.
And I called those guys and said, hey, you know,
I think I might want to get into golf business.
What do you think I should do? They said, yeah,
get in the business. And Terry said, find the best

(26:35):
guy in your area and go to work for him.
And I went to work at champagn Country Club for
a guy named Larry Brady who was a great dude.
And my main job with him was teaching all the
women's clinics and all the beginners. Right. Larry had his clientele,
He had a first assistant who had played at ball State,
He had people that he taught, and he was like, look,
you can teach anybody, but you can't steal any of

(26:56):
our quote unquote steel, not really steal, but like, you know,
I have a client tell Scott as a clientele. You
can anybody else's free game.

Speaker 1 (27:03):
You can't hijack. You can't hijack.

Speaker 2 (27:05):
Go find your own, right exactly. Teach the kids, teach
ladies that want to learn to play, and so that
kind of became my daily link. I was good at
it and I liked it. And then you know, when
I finished and became a PGA member, my wife at
the time finished her PhD. We moved to Detroit and
I worked at Detroit Golf Club and ran the junior

(27:25):
golf program there. It was a thirty six sold place
to where they played the Rocket Mortgage Classic now and
then you know, spend a year running junior golf, spend
a year as a teaching pro, and then spend a
year or three years as an associate head professional. And
you know, I was trained early in my career to
be the head pro to private club. And then we
had a son, and my now former wife, I had

(27:48):
gotten tenure, and so I went out then to teach
on my own. And when I was working at Detroit
Golf Club, I had met Bob Toski. He was the
instructor for the guy that was my boss, John Traub,
who was a former seat champion, and they had proic
Detroy Golf Club at the time, and Bob used to
come in and do schools with us for the numbers
in the spring. And then you know, I said, Bob,

(28:09):
do you think I can go out and make a
living teaching on my own, and he said, oh absolutely.
So I found a place to put a shingle up
and spent a couple of years in Detroit teaching on
my own. And then my wife when she got her tenure,
she was pretty hot in the job market and she
got a job offer from Arizona State. And she was
from Oregon. Her dad had retired, he was a public

(28:31):
school teacher. He wanted to move out of the rain.
Her mom had passed away, she had had cancer, and
so it was just her dad. We had a son
who was two, and she said, i'd, you know, like
to move out to Arizona and go to Arizona State.
There's a lot of golf courses out there, and so
we moved to Arizona and I spent thirteen years doing
different things in the business, but primarily coaching, and we

(28:56):
fined my skills. Eventually became a First Tea coach and
got involved in the First T although that had started
a Detroit golf club where one of our members is
one of the guys that wrote the incorporation papers for
First Tea, and so I had I've been aware of
First t since it started in nineteen ninety seven and

(29:17):
I had a good friend in Arizona, Gregavont, who owns
a place called Bone Tree Golf Club in Channel, Arizona.
And in twenty twelve I went to Greg and I said, look,
Greg's the director of golf. He had a general manager
and a head pro who they were both friends of mine.
And I said, look, I have the opportunity because of
the job my wife has to try something and I

(29:38):
want to run this idea by you. And he made
me the director of player development. And I used PGA
Junior League first te get golf ready. I was like,
it was in a senior community. He didn't have a
junior golf program there. And I said, just let me
see if I can build something from scratch and how
quickly it takes right, He said, okay, that's fine, right,
knock yourself out.

Speaker 1 (29:58):
That's your energy, not mine.

Speaker 2 (30:00):
Yeah, he said, you know, we have three rules here.
The thing has to make money. It can interfere with
the ways we already make money. And everybody that is
in the program has to love it and come back
being a raving fan. And if you checked those three
boxes off, we're good to go. So I built with
the help of the first tie of Phoenix and Hugh Smith,
who was the executive director there at the time, and

(30:21):
Tina Barrett, a former tour player who is a program manager.
With their help and with Greg support, I built a
junior golf program at Loan t that had no kids
to over three hundred and fifty kids in about two
and a half years and won the Southwest Section Player
Development Award and had a great experience, had a lot

(30:43):
of volunteers and really like learned how to do it
all over again, used all of my skills and kind
of built the thing from the ground. Dump and personal
lives change. In twenty seventeen, my wife and I were
getting divorced. I was tired of the heat and moved

(31:03):
back here to Pittsburgh. Got a job at a local
club at Channapin Country Club for about for two years
while I was going through the divorce. And while I
was at Chanapin, I was contacted by the guy that
used to run the scholarship program for PGA Reach and
pg Junior League, and he said, look, Dick's Sporting Goods

(31:25):
has given the PGA of America half a million dollars
to help the PGA Reach, so that we can fund
PGA Junior League programs. The First Tea chapters all over
the country, but the First Tea of Pittsburgh no longer
has a PGA professional working for them, and they would
like to have a PGA Junior League program here in
Pittsburgh and be a signature program. Do you think you
could help First Team Pittsburgh do that? And I said yeah.

(31:48):
This is in the fall of twenty seventeen, and so
I got connected with the people here in Pittsburgh helped
them put together PG Junior League. It turned into be
a pretty big success. And they said, look, we're we're
thinking about tearing down this old clubhouse here at Shenley
Park and building the Arnold Palmer Learning Center. Would you
be interested in coming to work for us? And I said, well,

(32:09):
as soon as there's a hole in the ground, you
guys call me.

Speaker 1 (32:12):
Right right, I'll bring my I'll bring you the shovel
to put the hole in the ground. Let's go.

Speaker 2 (32:18):
As soon as there's a hole in the ground, like,
give me a call. October twenty eighteen, the then executive
director now former president and CEO, he's retired, Markfield called
me and said, hey, we got a hole in the ground.
We are going to build this thing. We want to
talk to you. And I came to work for them

(32:39):
in March of twenty nineteen full time. And I've been
here at the Baba Counter Golf Course in Pittsburgh and
Shenley Park working as the first tea coach and as
a director of golf and player development ever since. And
it's been a huge blessing and I've loved every minute
of it, and I think we've done some really cool things.
And so you know, we have programs for just about everybody. Obviously,

(33:05):
the first T is devoted to character development and youth
and we use the game of golf as a vehicle
for doing that. And that's the main reason that we're here,
right That's the reason that we, you know, have a
long term lease with the city to operate the golf
course on their behalf. But then, you know, a little

(33:25):
over a year into my tenure year, COVID happened, right
of course, so we were already in the process of
Operation thirty six, a program that I think you're familiar
with in line to use to use with our kids,
right right, as sort of a way for them to
have a little bit more structure in their golf skill
development and some you know, additional resources above them, beyond

(33:48):
us as coaches. So we were already in the process
in February of twenty twenty of putting up twenty six
in place for use by the kids, and then COVID happened.
When we came out of COVID, we had, just like
most golf courses, I had people calling me, I want
to learn to play golf. I want to get back
into the game. What do you have, what do you offer?
How much does it cost? Right?

Speaker 1 (34:09):
Sure, take all my money, take take all my money,
and take all my money and just teach me. Just
teach me. I just want to be around you.

Speaker 2 (34:14):
This is great, right, I mean it was. It was crazy.
I mean like nothing I had ever seen in you know,
thirty years now of the golf industry. Like I had
never seen anything like it. And Aaron Lindauer, who's a
colleague of mine, fellow first tea coach, he used to
be our assistant professional but now has joined the PGA
Associate program, has been promoted to head professional. Aaron and

(34:35):
I looked at one another and He's like, what are
we going to do? And I'm like, we're going to
take off thirty six and we're going to start offering
classes for adults. I'll just adapt it and use it
for adults. And he said, well, do you think people
will be insulted when we start them at twenty five
yards instead of And I'm like, don't.

Speaker 1 (34:50):
Care, don't care, right, don't care, don't care. It's what
we got.

Speaker 2 (34:54):
We're going to we're going to run with it, and
we're going to see how it goes. And he started
using that program. And I knew from my time in
Arizona where people could play year round and I had
loan two was in a retirement community, and so one
of the things that I had tried to do when
I was there was to figure out exactly how long
does it take somebody that's an adult who picks up

(35:16):
a club that's never played before until they're comfortable going
out onto the golf course and playing a full nine
or eighteen whole round, right, Because I've never seen a
study done on that. In my entire time as a
golf pro, I've never seen anybody go, well, this is
pretty much how long it's going to take, right.

Speaker 1 (35:32):
Right, exactly, I know how long? How many lessons you
think I need, I have no idea, man, go nobody else.

Speaker 2 (35:40):
Well, I figured out this is just anecdotal. This is
my experience. It's not tested by any type of study.
But I figured out if if somebody came to a
ninety minute class a week and they played or practiced
or got on the range and hit some balls once
or twice a week outside the class, it was going
to take them about a year to eighteen months until

(36:02):
they were ready to play golf. And I mean come
to one ninety minute class with me and then play
a practice outside of that class on their own. And
I told Aaron that when we started, and I said,
we're going to test it here in Pittsburgh, and we're
going to track and see how long it takes us.
And it's taken us. For the people that we have
in our program, it takes them about a year to
eighteen months. One class a week, you play a practice

(36:25):
once or twice on your own. Right. We have some
games where you go out and you go through level
one at twenty five yards, level two at fifty, at
level three at one hundred and what we found the
sticking point here at our course because it's so hilly
and the holes are kind of tough. One hundred yards
is kind of the sticking point, rich, Right, I can
believe that I have. If they can pass, if they

(36:48):
can shoot thirty six or below from one hundred yards
basically nine hundred yard par three course, they have the
skill to be able to go and play someplace on
their own. And we give them hats when they graduate.
Like you know, we got some special black and gold
hats made up right with the off thirty six logo.
And you're in Pittsburgh. You know, everybody thinks that the

(37:10):
busts or home bets when they find a thirty six
on it, right, people like them, and we put it
on our Instagram page and Facebook page, and you know,
celebrate the people when they do it. And you know,
we have about two hundred people a year now in
that program that we're teaching to play. Some of them
stay here, some of them go to North and South
Park where they can ride in a cart and have

(37:31):
a cheeseburger and a beer when they're done. Some of
them go to privately owned public courses. You know, I
have one guy that's joined the club after he graduated
from our program, joined the private club here in here
that's awesome, that's okay. We want to teach him to play.

Speaker 1 (37:44):
And well what you do with that knowledge is up
to you now, but I'm the one that did it.

Speaker 2 (37:50):
Yeah, it's up to you. And so we've circled back.
You know again the first t stuff that we do,
you know, teaching kids how to play. I mean that's
for me as a coach, is about the way people
treated me when I was a young person in mind
as a caddy. Right, are adults treating you with respect? Right?

(38:10):
Are they giving you responsibility? You know? Are they teaching
you how to interact with courtesy? You know? The nine
core values that we have and now you know what
we call the five key commitments with with our new curriculum.
Like that's all stuff that's been around in golf forever, right, right,
And so we teach that to the kids, and you know,

(38:31):
we teach it to the adults in our OP thirty
six program. Like I usually like and playing golf. I'm like,
you have rights as a golfers and you also have
responsibilities group all the other people on the golf course
and golf in general. Right, Right, you're going to tell
you say, you're a golfer you've got rights and responsibilities,
and it's much like driving a car, you know. I mean,

(38:53):
like we don't we don't require a license in the
United States to go and play golf. If you're in
Sweden or Germany, like you have to go through classes
and get a license. And I try to tell people,
if you come through our class and you make it
through level three and get a hat, you'll have a
license to go play just about anywhere, and you'll know
what to do. You'll know how to check in, you'll
know how to make a reservation, You'll know what the

(39:15):
golf course is going to expect to you, you'll know
what the other players are going to expect of you,
and you'll be able to play the game for the
rest of your life.

Speaker 1 (39:21):
That's awesome.

Speaker 2 (39:22):
That's that's what we're trying to do and bring as
many golfers into the game as we can.

Speaker 1 (39:27):
Right So, now what we're going to do is going
to take another break, and then we are going to
talk about where we go from here with your with
your with your effort, and with your facility and regionally
and i ultimately nationally. But let's see what happens. I
want I'm interested to hear what the next steps are.
This is the rich Comboll Golf Show. Welcome back to

(39:50):
the rich Comboll Golf Show. We are joined this week
by Eric Kolenna and Eric. This has been a fascinating
story and a fascinating point up until this moment in time,
which is like we've gotten to this point now, and
so I want you to tell me, like, how at
Shenley Park and how in your efforts are you just

(40:12):
going to grow this game?

Speaker 2 (40:16):
Well, our goal right now, i'd now the future of
golf in Shenley Park and what's the best use of
the land here in the park that's been devoted to golf,
you know since eighteen ninety seven. So our golf course
is really truly unique. You say that, but I mean

(40:39):
I've never been in any place like it. You know,
the original nine hole course was laid out here in
eighteen ninety seven, and you know it was called Pittsburgh
Golf Club at the time, and the clubhouse for Pittsburgh
Golf Club is you know, four hundred yards away from
where I'm sitting talking to you from the Arl Palmer
Learning Center. It's a historic landmark, a beautiful club, you know,

(41:00):
had many of the people that built the city as
its members right at the end of the eighteen hundreds
and early twentieth century, you know, it was one of
the founding clubs of the West peng Golf Association. And
what I have found, as you know, I'm now kind
of our designated historian. During COVID, I had people that

(41:23):
were telling me stories about things that happened here in
Shenley Park and I call them, you know, stories from
the Bob because it's now called the Bob O'Connor Golf Course,
named after the former mayor. And I'd be like, where's
the documentation of that, and people go, I don't know,
it's just been a my know. And so I got
a newspapers dot com subscription and dug into the history
of the course and found out about Karl Kaufman and

(41:45):
what years did he win ten city amateurs in right,
we know he won three Public Links championships, and we
know that the place was busy in the twenties. Well,
how many rounds did they do a year in the twenties.
Well I found out it was, you know, almost fifty
five rounds a year we played here, right, Yeah.

Speaker 1 (42:02):
And that's busy now that's busy right now. If you
fifty thousand rounds, now you are you're in a factory
times two, right.

Speaker 2 (42:11):
And you know who built the golf course. There's no
records of who built the eighteen hole course here. That's
eighteen holes shoehorned into fifty five acres. And found out that,
you know, the club champion at Pittsburgh Golf Club in
eighteen ninety nine, the year before it was expanded eighteen holes,
was HC. Phones, the founder of Oakmont. There we go

(42:33):
and as I told Bob Ford and some of the
members from Oakmont that are on our board, I'm like,
you know, I know, mister Phones did a great job
at Oakmont, It's amazing. But you know where did he
Where did you learn how to do that? I mean,
my own hypothesis is that he was the one that
expanded the course here to eighteen holes. He was a
member at Pittsburgh Golf Club. He had the money to

(42:54):
do it. The club has no records of paying anyone
to do it, right, right, So the only reason that
was been was was because a member did it at
their own expense, right, And so you know, and in
nineteen hundred when they were trying to build a championship
course here and expand to eighteen holes. Oh, by the way,
the golf ball changed, right, and we went from the

(43:14):
got a Purcha ball to the Haskell ball. And you know, like,
if you played this golf course where you hit two
hundred and twenty yard shots, it's pretty pretty hard. If
you played it where you hit two hundred and sixty
yard shots, it becomes really easy. And you know, I
think it was part of the impetus of him buying
the land to build Oakmont, right.

Speaker 1 (43:34):
Because he said he wanted to make the hardest golf
course he did.

Speaker 2 (43:38):
He did, he wanted to pursue championship golf. And so
by nineteen ten the property was you know, became one
of the first municipal courses, and Pittsburgh Golf Club as
a golf entity and a private golf club basically ceased
to exist, right. You know, joh Hutchison was a pro
here for two years, their last two years before he

(44:00):
went to Alligating and became the pro there, and he,
you know, taught all these people how to play. And
then you know, North Park and South Park were basically
built because this place was so busy it needs to
because Carl Kaufman won the US Amateur Public Links Championship
in twenty seven, twenty eight, and twenty nine and was
called the Sanley Sphinx. Right. And our place, this golf,

(44:24):
this place in golf in Shenley Park is kind of
the wellspring of both private golf and public golf in
western Pennsylvania. And you know, if that's the case, as
I believe it is, then you know our job as
the stewards of this place. And when I say that,
I mean first t right on the city's behalf is

(44:46):
to create a gateway for people into the game. Right,
And we're unique. You can't ride a cart here, it's
walking only. It's too hilly. Right, there's public roads bisect
the golf course, right, we.

Speaker 1 (45:00):
Only have that's asking for it. That's asking for it, right.

Speaker 2 (45:03):
Yeah, I mean there's there's all these things that most
people see as drawbacks. And when I started working here,
I'm like, can we can we find the best things
and when can we build on those? And the best
things are location. We're in the middle of the city,
it's easy to get to where we now have an
indoor facility that's rivals anything anywhere certainly that any first

(45:24):
tea chapter has. And I would argue any indoor facility anywhere,
two indoor checkmen, you know, simulators and indoor putt and
green in the fitness area and classroom space and everything else.
And you know, a really cool golf course, you've got
to walk it. You know. Again, we don't have carts,

(45:44):
but we can teach you how to play. And if
you can play here, just like you could one hundred
years ago, you can go and play anywhere, play anywhere,
because it's a challenge, right, even from one hundred yards
the nine hole course that we use for up thirty six.
From one hundred yards you play into the same three
greens from three different angles, right to play the nine

(46:04):
whole course, and I'm like, they're uphill, they're downhill, their
side hill, and they're hard.

Speaker 1 (46:08):
There's no bunkers, right, but it's hard. It's hard, There's
no doubt. It's hard.

Speaker 2 (46:12):
It's tough to know. You got to know what you're doing.

Speaker 1 (46:15):
You know, it's funny, you say, it's so funny. You
say that because I put the operation thirty six in
Wieling' cut a club and and I had very nice
turned out. I had twenty four kids, twenty twenty seven kids.
I'm like, you know, and it was more expensive than
than this community was used to And it was interesting
because I had a couple of parents come to me

(46:36):
and said, well, well, you know, do you really think
that's the best way to do this? And I said,
what do you mean? Like, well, is he really going
to get better or she from twenty five yards? I said, well,
do you have any idea how hard it is to
shoot thirty six from twenty five yards? Well, you know,
you just got to hit it on the green. I said, well,

(46:56):
why don't you go with Timmy? Go ahead, you do it.
You do it because I'll be honest with you know,
you're a better player than I than I am. But
but the thing of it is is you know as
well as I do, I put you in fifty yards.
I'll tell you what, especially because you know, we work
in this business and don't play all day long. Like
it's it's a different gig. It is. Yeah, Like you

(47:18):
got to get up and down from fifty yards is
effectively what you're doing, you know, I mean, And like
they're like, what's not that hard? I said, well let
me go try. It came in after six holes, I'm like, yeah, see,
I'm to teach these kids, like you said, before, the
hit the little ball, hit the big ball, that ball
goes up in the air. We find it. Keep going,

(47:39):
keep going, keep going.

Speaker 2 (47:41):
Yeah. Yeah, And it's just you know, once, once people's
eyes are open to that, right, I mean, you know,
there's all kinds of research out there about how many
shots PGA's where players you know, hit inside of different gardages.
And you know, if you want to be a great player,
i mean, you know, aspire to play on the PGA
Tour Division I college golfer, yeah, you've got to be

(48:04):
able to hit the ball really well, right. Might absolutely
have to be able to drive at three hundred yards
and hit chrispyronshots and everything else. But if you're just
looking to go and play golf with your friends and
be able to play in four hours or less and
be able to play anywhere, then the main skills that
you need. You can bunt it along the ground and

(48:24):
roll it one hundred and fifty yards off the tee
right and squid a seven iron down inside of fifty yards,
But then you've got to be able to wedge it
on the green and put it in the hole. And
if you are four putting and five putting on fast
greens because you don't really know how to putt, and
if you know, if you can't chip it up in
the air, pitch it up in the ear and get
it to stay on the green. That's where slow play happens.

(48:46):
And that's where people start to get upset with you.
I know, I know you, right, That's where you know,
you're on the interstate on you know, trying to drive
forty five miles an hour and everybody else is trying
to drive six right right, and they're honked. They're honking at.

Speaker 1 (49:03):
You, and they're pissed. They're just pissed.

Speaker 2 (49:05):
Yeah, And so you know, I tell people it doesn't
you know, a lot of adults will embrace it. For
kids like, oh, okay, you know, seven to ten year old
age group in first t Yeah, you're starting at twenty
five yards. I get it, right. Oh, but I'm an adult,
and I go, well, I don't understand how it's any
different until you can actually do that thing.

Speaker 1 (49:26):
Right, exactly right, right, until you can run a hundred,
until you can run one hundred yards. Don't talk to
me about ten Yeah, don't talk to you about ten.

Speaker 2 (49:34):
And you know, and I tell people, if you if
you want to pass it one hundred, then the key
to passing it one hundred is to shoot twenty seven
at twenty five yards to be able wherever you put
it down from twenty five yards to pitch it under
the green and have it stay on the green in
tupot every time, right right, Because if you can do that,

(49:56):
and when you're at one hundred or one hundred and
fifty yards, all you've got to do is get it
somewhere near the green, right right right. And then all
you've got to do from the tee is get it
somewhere where you can get it close to the green
with your second shot.

Speaker 1 (50:08):
Right. So now, now I got three hundred and eighty
yard part four, and I hit a driver one hundred
and eighty yards, and I and and I bone my
seven hundred and sixty two yards like, oh, I'm in business.
I'm in business.

Speaker 2 (50:18):
Yeah. But from but from fifty or sixty yards, you
can take a ledge and pitch it on the green
and put you still just made a bogie, and you're
gonna shoot ninety and you're going to beat most of
the people.

Speaker 1 (50:28):
Do you play with? So okay, so this is this is,
this has flown by, This has been a lot of fun,
this is this is awesome. This was awesome. So let
me let me ask you a question. How much bigger
you think you can pay? How much bigger you think
you guys can get.

Speaker 2 (50:45):
Well, that's where we talk about the future of what
we have here. I mean, I think we currently reconfigured
the eighteen holes into what we call the Bob nine.
So we have the best of the eighteen hole course
that we could you know, keep in And so we
have a nine hole course south of Shemley Drive on
about a forty acre property. It's pretty good right now,

(51:07):
but we believe with some a little bit of renovation
and some tender loving care, we could create something that
rivals the Winter Park nine down in Florida. That's you know,
gotten a lot of press. I mean, it's that kind
of cool. And then the fifty acre, the fifteen acres
that we have north of Shenley Drive where we have
three of the old holes from the eighteen whole course
that we now call the Palmer Loop. We have enough

(51:29):
room in that fifteen acres we believe we could build
a nine hole par three course or practice facility, right,
that would allow us to have more kids in first
tea classes, That would you know, attract more adults to
our up thirty six classes for you know, new and

(51:49):
beginning and returning players. And you know, give us something
that would be really cool that people could come out
and play, because you know, there used to be a
few par three courses here in the area in Pittsburgh
when I was growing up, aside from Scaley's. Right now
there isn't anything, right, and so you know, that's the
gateway for people into the game. It was for years,

(52:13):
and we're limited by the amount of land that we
have anyway, So you know, I tell people, why not
be best in class and create something that would you know,
people would love to play. And you know, as I've
told some of our board members who are members at
some of the best clubs in town, I'm like, if
somebody travels to Pittsburgh and goes to play Oakmont Country Club,

(52:35):
because that's a lifelong dream, right, and they play in
the morning with a member and have some lunch and
now it's two o'clock, but the game at PNC Park
where they get to go see Paul Skeene's pitch right
start until seven point thirty? What am I going to do?
And you know, if the staff at Oakmont, if Devin
and his staff were able to go, well, maybe you

(52:56):
should go play the Bob nine or the par three
course down in Shenley and see your Palmer Running Center
on your way downtown. We think you'd really enjoy it.
And and our courses were cool enough and in the
kind of shape that people like that would want to play.
I think it would flip on its head sky and

(53:18):
give thee give the people of Pittsburgh that are that
live here right that are learning how to play a
beautiful place to come and do it. I mean, our
setting is amazing. And you know, we have a superintendent
who does the best job he can do. But he's
got a thirty year old irrigation system. He's got greens
that have never been rebuilt or really touched for over

(53:40):
one hundred years, you know, and so there's only so
much you can do with that. And you know, I
struggle when people go, oh, you know, the golf course
is historic, and I go, well, the people that played
here and the things that they've done, those are certainly historic.

Speaker 1 (53:56):
Right.

Speaker 2 (53:56):
But I mean, you know, the historic place here in town.
Oakmont Country Club just got done renovating their golf course.
They recognize that the times change, things evolve, infrastructure needs
to be renewed, right right, And I'm like, we don't
want to change the general nature of the place. We
wanted to remain Parkland. I want the people that live

(54:18):
around here that don't play golf to still feel like
the golf courses their front yard like they do now.
But I think we could, you know, renovate the Bob
nine and reconfigure the Palmer Loop to make what we
have even better than it is and to allow us
to bring the game to even more people each year

(54:39):
than we do.

Speaker 1 (54:39):
Now, that's awesome.

Speaker 2 (54:40):
That's awesome. That's our next goal.

Speaker 1 (54:42):
Perfect. So in the fall, I'm going to call you.
I'm going to see where we are with that. It
is the fall, I mean, as we get close to
the end of the year, we're going to start talking
about that. But I wanted to tell you how absolutely
enjoyable was talking to you. I knew it would be,
but it's just it was awesome talking to you. And
you know, I hope you know that if you ever

(55:02):
and I know you don't need help, but if you
need help, you I hope you know to call me
because I will come do whatever I can do, because
that's an awesome place, and I'm a big believer in
what you guys are doing a huge place.

Speaker 2 (55:15):
I really appreciate that. Rich. I know you're doing PGA
Hope just like we do. I mean, I didn't even
touch on that. We have, you know, our third our
third PGA Hope class starts tomorrow for the fall PGA Hope,
and you know, that's just another thing that we as
golf professionals love doing. I mean, you know, at the
end of the day, I tell people, I'm incredibly blessed.
I get up and get to go to the golf
course every day, and you know, I get to spend

(55:38):
most most of my time helping people learn to play
the game of a lifetime. It's amazing.

Speaker 1 (55:44):
So it's awesome. Good blessing, Eric, Thanks tons, I appreciate it.
I'll talk to you soon, all right, Thanks, Rich, Take care,
Take care. This is the Rich Combell Golf Show.