USGA selects Bob Farren as Green Section Award winner

The USGA honored Bob Farren, CGCS, director of golf course management at Pinehurst Resort & Country Club as the Green Section Award winner for serving as a leader in sustainable golf course maintenance practices.

“This year we celebrate barrier-breakers, innovators and individuals who have witnessed – and overcome – great challenges in their respective fields of the game,” Mike Whan, USGA CEO, said.

Bob Farren, CGCS. (Photo: USGA)

USGA Green Section Award – Bob Farren, CGCS

Farren began his 40-year career in golf course management in 1979. Three years later, he joined Pinehurst Resort & Country Club and advanced to his current role as director of golf course management in 2001. Since that time, Farren has been a principal force behind a dedicated effort to restore Pinehurst’s historic architecture while advancing the environmental and economic sustainability of its now 11-course footprint.

Those efforts have included reducing more than 40 acres of irrigated turf in favor of signature sandscapes that feature native wiregrass, converting greens and fairways to more drought-tolerant turfgrasses, eliminating resource-intensive overseeding throughout the property and championing training for his team. He was also a principal founding partner of the Greenkeeper Apprenticeship Program, launched in Pinehurst last year with the USGA and Sandhills Community College to provide education and mentorship for golf course maintenance workers. Through Farren’s tenure, Pinehurst has become a beacon for innovation and a successful testing ground for advanced, data-driven maintenance practices and on-course learning for generations of superintendents, agronomists and others.

Among the 11 USGA championships Farren has worked at Pinehurst, one of his team’s most significant agronomic accomplishments was in delivering a consistent playing experience for the back-to-back 2014 U.S. Open and U.S. Women’s Open in consecutive weeks.