Golf Courses See 80s, Open After Long Winter
As any Minnesotan can attest, this winter had some challenges.
“Too much snow,” said Pat Litecky, a golfer from Brooklyn Park. “Basically too much snow.”
“Oh, it was a rough one,” said Lindsay Hickey, a golfer from Minneapolis. “I mean definitely lots of snow. Lots of cold.”
At Brooklyn Park’s Edinburgh USA golf course on Thursday, there was lots of warmth and lots of sunshine — a beautiful day for golf.
“I mean how could you not come out on a day off of work and a day to enjoy some sunshine,” said Hickey.
April 13 marked opening day of the 2023 season at Edinburgh USA. That’s later than last year’s opening on April 4, but those fortunate enough to be off work on Thursday had no complaints.
“When I hear the golf course is open, focus on projects around the house tends to diminish,” said Litecky.
Pat Litecky of Brooklyn Park practice his putts on the Edinburgh USA short game practice area.
The fact that Edinburgh could even open this week is something of a minor miracle that didn’t seem possible at the start of April.
“You know, 82 degrees changes a lot of things, as far as the dryness of the course,” said Don Berry, the director of golf at Edinburgh. “And obviously we had a lot of snow, even on Monday, the back 9 was pretty much full of snow.”
Warmer temperatures this week moved up their timetable for opening. It didn’t take long for them to be booked solid, Berry said.
Yet if perfect weather wasn’t enough, Edinburgh made a $35,000 investment to help improve the experience at the course — every single one of the 63 new golf carts has a built-in GPS system.
“You can do a lot of fun stuff through it,” Berry said. “You can play music, you can order food from the restaurant through it. So it’s got a lot of capacity.”
The GPS system also helps golfers see the yardage for each hole. However, the one thing it won’t do is drastically improve your game.
“It’s not going to hit the shot for you,” Berry said.
Related: Long Snow Melt Delays Start to Golf Season
