Liberty National Golf Course set for an international experience

By Grant Gannon| September 27, 2017 0 Comments

(L to R) Eric Greytok, national sales director at Macrosorb, Greg James, Liberty National GC superintendent, and Brian Gjelsvik, owner of Seeton Turf, in the stands that surround hole No. 1 for the 2017 Presidents Cup.

Liberty National Golf Course, Jersey City, N.J., opened on the July 4th holiday in 2006, but this week Superintendent Greg James is prepared for the fireworks that will come along with hosting the 2017 Presidents Cup.

“We had a good summer in New Jersey, we had timely rain to keep everything healthy and the grass growing. That really got us to this point where we are at,” says James, superintendent at Liberty National since before it officially opened in 2005. “In the last two weeks we skirted by with a couple hurricanes coming up the coast but we’ve been able to stay nice and dry. A little heat spell came in last week to help firm the place up and dry it out, and hopefully we get some good winds from (Hurricane) Maria coming up the coast for play this weekend.”

James is accustomed to having professional golfers play the course while hosting The Barclays PGA Tour stops in 2009 and 2013, now known as The Northern Trust Open, but he admits that setup is a little easier for the Presidents Cup.

“For the Barclays we had almost 130 players, and they are teeing off from the the 1st and 10th holes at 7 a.m. This week we’re only dealing with 24 players, and now we’re doing match play so we’re not teeing off until 1 o’clock on Thursday and 11 o’clock on Friday,” says James. “Saturday is our big day with a 7 o’clock start time. So we’re trying to work to make sure we’re off the course when they get to the second hole.”

Typically James has a staff of 28 maintaining the 160-acre property, but this week there are about 120 volunteers helping to get a lot of work done fast for the Presidents Cup. With the course being on U.S. soil one might think the maintenance team is biased toward the Americans but around more than 25 percent of the volunteers won’t be rooting for the stars and stripes this weekend.

“Thirty to 36 of our volunteers are from overseas, old interns from Australia and all through Europe and Canada, and they’re going to root for the International team,” says James. “If (the International team) are in the lead maybe we’ll support them some, but we’re hoping the American team come through with club member Phil (Mickelson) sinking the final putt on 18. That would be a storybook ending.”

Interview by Seth Jones on Sept. 27, 2017.