Elk River Club, Banner Elk, N.C.

By |  November 12, 2013
Elk River Club, Banner River, N.C. Photo: Elk River Club

Elk River Club, Banner Elk, N.C. Photo: Elk River Club

It’s winter mode at Elk River Club, located in the mountains of North Carolina.

The course is shut down. No golfers until May 1st. Superintendent Josh Smith breathes a sigh of relief.

“I’m feeling good. We’re shut down, repairing flood damage,” he says. “In spite of a wet season, we finished well.”

The 18-hole private course took on 24 inches of rain in the 31 days of July. It was rough going for Smith and his crew, but it was a heyday for the local fungicide sales reps.

Smith was excited to learn that not only was Golfdom featuring his course as “Course of the Week,” but also that his course would be featured on the November cover of the magazine

For the November cover story — arriving in mailboxes soon — Golfdom discusses the results of a recent survey, in which we saw that many superintendents, if given the choice of going to a higher-profile golf course, would stay right where they are. The cover reads “My Green Heaven” and features a beautiful fall shot at Elk River.

It’s clear that Smith loves his position at Elk River Club. He first worked at the course back in 1984, as an intern. He returned in 1989, accepting the position of superintendent in 2002.

For more on Elk River Club, visit www.elkriverclubnc.com.

This article is tagged with , and posted in Course of the Week

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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