19th Hole: David Jones

By |  June 7, 2022 0 Comments
Photo: David Jones

Photo: David Jones

David Jones

Superintendent // The Club at Indian Springs, Broken Arrow, Okla.

David, what are you drinking? A Cutwater Vodka Mule. I discovered them for the first time at the GCSAA tournament in San Diego; they’re so good.

Tell me about your course. I’m at The Club at Indian Springs in Broken Arrow, Okla. We’re a private facility with 36 holes. One of the courses has Champion Bermuda greens, the other has SR-1020 bentgrass greens, so the best of both worlds. I’ve been here 21 years, the superintendent for the last 10.

Photo: David Jones

Photo: David Jones

Do you have a family? I’ve been married since 2005. No kids, but we have two dogs, a German shepherd and a Pyrenees mix, so it’s like having kids.

What’s your favorite vacation? Going to Australia. My wife is Australian. We went to Sydney several years ago; I’m looking forward to going back. She still has family over there, her mom and sister. The culture there is so laid-back. Whenever you say ‘thank you,’ they never say ‘you’re welcome,’ they always reply with ‘no worries.’ It’s such a different place.

You’ve played every golf course in Oklahoma. How long did it take? I finished it last May. It took me 15 years. I’ve got a scorecard from every course except one. I’ve got a logo ball as well if they had one.

What is your favorite tool in the shop? The cup cutter. I love changing cups and getting out in the morning, seeing the course. It’s a simple tool, easy to use.

If you had my job for a day, what would you do? You have a pretty cool job where you get to go around and interview superintendents, and you go to a lot of the major championships. I would just enjoy meeting so many superintendents. I love to network in our industry.

What is your all-time golf highlight? I love playing golf; I love everything in the golf industry — I can’t get enough of it. My all-time highlight is getting to play St. Andrews, the Old Course, with (retired St. Andrews superintendent) Gordon Moir. He was a very generous host. We were to be the first ones off, but they had a frost delay. There, you don’t get pushed back, you just get canceled. Luckily, I was with him, so he made it so that we were the last tee time of the day. We got through 18 with just a little bit of daylight left. We then got to tour the R&A clubhouse because I was with Gordon. Just an awesome highlight to an awesome trip.

This article is tagged with and posted in 19th Hole, From the Magazine, People

About the Author: Seth Jones

Seth Jones, a 25-year veteran of the golf industry media, is Editor-in-Chief of Golfdom magazine and Athletic Turf. A graduate of the University of Kansas School of Journalism and Mass Communications, Jones began working for Golf Course Management in 1999 as an intern. In his professional career he has won numerous awards, including a Turf and Ornamental Communicators Association (TOCA) first place general feature writing award for his profile of World Golf Hall of Famer Greg Norman and a TOCA first place photography award for his work covering the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. In his career, Jones has accumulated an impressive list of interviews, including such names as George H.W. Bush, Samuel L. Jackson, Lance Armstrong and Charles Barkley. Jones has also done in-depth interviews with such golfing luminaries as Norman, Gary Player, Nick Price and Lorena Ochoa, to name only a few. Jones is a member of both the Golf Writers Association of America and the Turf and Ornamental Communicators Association. Jones can be reached at sjones@northcoastmedia.net.


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