Superintendent Kingdom

The Orange County Convention Center, Orlando, Fla.

It takes a certain amount of preparation to make it through the wild that is the Golf Industry Show. Let us be your guide through this year’s trade show safari.

Disney has its Animal Kingdom theme park, which features attractions that showcase creatures from far-flung locations of our world. Every three years since 1996, the Golf Industry Show turns Orlando’s Orange County Convention Center into the Superintendent Kingdom trade show.

From Feb. 4 to Feb. 9, superintendents and golf industry professionals from near and far will learn and interact together in this confined space. Each year, the trade show provides new and exciting experiences at its more than 500 exhibitors, 108 educational seminars and sessions and Golfdom’s Herb Graffis Businessperson of the Year Award presentation. We’ve ventured through the catalogue of events to select the four (in no particular order) that attendees should visit to get the most from their GIS experience. Except for the Graffis Award presentation. We expect to see everyone there.

Surefire Ways to Increase Plant Health: Products Edition

Superintendents at every Golf Industry Show are presented with new or unfamiliar products whose manufacturers claim can improve a course’s plant health. That’s probably the case, but sometimes other factors can cause misuse and hurt a facility’s plant health. This seminar, on Monday, Feb. 6, from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. in room W203BC, lets attendees in on the questions they need to ask before buying a product, as well as how to decide whether that product is suitable to use on their course.

Frank Rossi, Ph.D., associate professor of turfgrass science at Cornell University, and Golfdom contributor Bill Kreuser, Ph.D., assistant professor and turfgrass Extension specialist, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, will discuss plant growth regulators, turf colorants and pigments, plant health activators, hormones and fungicides. The pair also will facilitate a discussion on possible positive or negative effects on turf when different products are combined.

Syngenta tests your turf knowledge

Looking for an opportunity to make a difference in the lives of others? Are you a competitive person? Did we mention there’s something in it for you?

If all these things interest you, head over to the Syngenta booth (2618) during both days of the trade show to participate in Syngenta’s turf knowledge trivia challenge. For the first 500 players who take the quiz, Syngenta will make a $10 donation to the Wee One Foundation, a group created to assist golf course management professionals who incur overwhelming expenses due to medical hardship. At the end of each day, the top scorer will win a YETI Hopper 30 cooler, and every contestant who plays will be entered for a chance to win one of 10 random drawings for a YETI Rambler 36-ounce tumbler.

This ain’t no filibuster: Government affairs briefing

By the time attendees arrive in Orlando for this year’s GIS, Donald Trump will have held the office of U.S. president for more than two weeks. No matter your political affiliation, the forthcoming transition from the Obama Administration to the Trump Administration holds the possibility of dramatic change. The GCSAA’s Government Affairs Committee will host a session on Tuesday, Feb. 7, from 1:30 p.m. to 3 p.m. in room W304EF to present recent developments in government that hold the potential to affect golf courses on the national and state levels.

The West Concourse of the Orange County Convention Center, Orlando, Fla.

With GCSAA Government Affairs Committee Chair John Fulling, CGCS at Kalamazoo (Mich.) Country Club, serving as moderator, the group will detail how the recent election’s results will affect the association’s priority issues agenda and its members in 2017. Also, members of the Grassroots Ambassador Program will provide first-hand accounts of their efforts promoting the golf industry at all levels of government, and the recipient of the 2017 Excellence in Government Affairs Award will be recognized.

Want to get more bang for your buck at this session? Stick around for GCSAA’s official launch of the “50 in 2020 BMPs” initiative. CEO Rhett Evans will be there to outline this Best Management Practices program, which is planned to be ready for all 50 states by 2020, and its importance to the industry.

2017 Herb Graffis Businessperson of the Year Award reveal

According to Hallmark, the modern gift for the sixth anniversary is wood, and Golfdom will be following suit with an engraved wooden plaque ready to present to our 2017 Graffis Award winner. This award is presented each year to one of the top businesspeople in the industry, no matter their time in the business, as proven by our recipient history. The last two recipients of the annual award have been the more than 30-year veteran Bill Larson, CGCS at Town & Country Club, St. Paul, Minn., followed by the 34-year-old superintendent of The Peninsula Club, Cornelius, N.C., Jared Nemitz.

Golfdom cordially invites you, our readers, to attend the unveiling of our annual award, given in honor of our founder and World Golf Hall of Fame member Herb Graffis. The ceremony will take place on Wednesday, Feb. 8 at 2 p.m. in Golfdom’s booth (2753.) We encourage you to stop by to hear Rees Jones, “The Open Doctor,” say a few words about Graffis, congratulate our selection for the 2017 Graffis Award, and get an exclusive sneak peek at our February cover.

All photos courtesy of Orange County Convention Center