THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, November 12, 1995 TAG: 9511120251
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C12 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JIM DUCIBELLA, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: Medium: 58 lines
The grand opening of a golf course with grand plans is still several months away. But Bayville Golf Club, the newest private club in Hampton Roads opened Saturday to 124 members who will sample what club president Toy Savage hopes will one day carry Golf Digest magazine's designation of ``the best new course in America.''
Members, who paid $25,000 to secure a family membership for the golf-only club, will be allowed to play the course regularly between now and the ``official'' opening late this summer.
That opening has been delayed until summer so that the Tom Fazio-designed course can mature and better represent itself in Golf Digest's 1997 contest.
``We hope it's a candidate,'' Savage said. ``Tom has had some success in that area annually. Of the four finishing holes, three of them have greens with magnificent views of Pleasure House Creek, Lynnhaven Inlet.
``It's a marvelous site for a golf course, and it's been built to modern design standards. Fazio has incorporated the best in state-of-the-art golf-course design. It should be a big enough challenge for anyone.''
The world-reknowned Fazio and his staff broke ground on the old farm off Shore Drive on Nov. 15, 1994. For the 7,086-yard championship layout to be available for play less than one year later is a remarkable achievement, said head pro Dean Hurst.
``Everything went exactly right,'' Hurst said. ``The greens are perfect, we had a great growing season. It was farmland, so the property didn't require a whole lot of clearing.''
Fazio also decided to use a new, experimental form of grass - called A-4 - developed by Penn State University and tested in Augusta, Ga., for possible use at Augusta National.
``There's three times as many plants per square inch as other grass,'' Hurst said. ``It's heat tolerant, and the major thing is that it needs to be maintained at one-eighth of an inch. On most new greens, you let the grass grow long. Here, you can't do that. The other positive is that we'll have green speeds faster than anywhere else in the area.''
Savage said that club membership stands at 145, with a goal of 350.
``But when we approach 300, we're going to take another look,'' he said. ``We'll decide whether we want a membership of 300 and slightly higher dues, or 350 as we originally planned.''
The club already has changed one fundamental aspect - its logo. Originally, it included an osprey, wings spread, with the word ``Bayville'' overhead.
Now the logo is a drawing of one of the barns that have been retained as part of the course, with the words, ``Bayville Golf Club'' underneath.
``We decided that bird logos are pretty commonplace,'' Savage said. ``There was something about the arc of the barn that really appealed to all of us. We decided to make a change.'' by CNB