Aronimink Golf Club closed to its members on November second. Six
months later, the world's best players begin practice for the one
hundred and eighth PGA Championship on the same property. What
happened in between is what you'll never see on television.
The course the pros play this week is not the course members played
last fall. The fairways are narrower — averaging thirty yards across
on the championship setup. The rough is taller. Every green compound
has been tuned for firmness and speed the field has to face. A new
forward tee on the thirteenth hole was built during the closure — a
piece of turf that didn't exist last spring.
Two men negotiated every decision. John Gosselin is Aronimink's
Director of Agronomy — twenty years on the property, Penn State Turf
Science class hull city tickets of 1987, winner of the Philadelphia Association of Golf
Course Superintendents' Eberhard Steinegger Award. He sets the
agronomic ceiling: what the bentgrass cultivars can take, what the
irrigation system can sustain, what six months of Pennsylvania weather
allows. Kerry Haigh is the PGA of America's Chief Championships
Officer — the man who sets up every PGA Championship at every venue.
He sets the championship floor: what the field has to face, what the
broadcast frame requires, where the gallery goes. Between those two
limits, the course gets negotiated.
The Donald Ross design opened in 1928. Gary Player won the only
previous men's PGA Championship held here in 1962. The course on
television this week brunch was built in the months since November. Dave
Stofanac runs daily operations on the ground under Gosselin's
direction with a thirty-person agronomy crew. It won't exist after
Sunday's trophy presentation.
Sources:
- Philadelphia Inquirer — Aronimink PGA preparations, May 5, 2026:
- PGA Championship official course guide:
- PGA Magazine — A Closer Look at Aronimink:
- Wikipedia — Aronimink Golf Club:
CHAPTERS:
0:00 The Last Member Round at Aronimink
1:25 The Parallel Course on TV
2:13 A Course Doesn't Get Set Up — It Gets Negotiated
3:02 John Gosselin and Kerry survivor Haigh
4:59 Two Examples: The 13th Tee and the Green Compounds
6:57 What 180 Days Actually Looked Like
9:47 The Handoff
10:55 Every Course in America
Now you know what they do before you tee off.
#AroniminkGolfClub #PGAChampionship #GolfCourseSuperintendent
