By Miles Flynn | Southern Indiana Business Report
FRENCH LICK — With the 1917 Donald Ross Course and the Pete Dye Course, which opened in 2009, French Lick Resort boasts some of the best from two eras, and that intersection of yesterday and today continues to play out in the hosting of some of golf’s biggest events. This summer, it’s the return of both the Symetra Tour Donald Ross Classic event July 7-9 and the Senior LPGA Championship Aug. 23-29.
This summer’s events
The Donald Ross Classic is expected to bring quite a show back to the same course where Walter Hagen won the 1924 PGA Championship.
“We’ve got 144 of the best young players in the country and out of the country,” said French Lick Resort Director of Golf Dave Harner. “It will be a strong field.”
To back up his assertion, he noted that winning scores all prior years at French Lick have been 12 under par. He invites spectators to come take a look for themselves. Tickets are $5 at the course each day, and parking is available on site.
“It really is the proving ground of the LPGA,” Harner said.
Now in its 41st competitive season, the Symetra Tour’s mission is to prepare the world’s best young women professional golfers for a successful career on the LPGA Tour. Since Symetra’s inaugural sponsorship year in 2012, the Symetra Tour has grown from 16 tournaments and $1.7 million in prize money to $4 million in prize money awarded in 2019 and 2021. With more than 600 alumnae moving on to the LPGA, former Symetra Tour players have won a total of 445 LPGA titles.
A total purse of $250,000 awaits the field at French Lick. Individuals will compete in a 54-hole stroke play format with a cut to the low 60 players and ties after 36 holes. The winner’s share for the event is $37,500.
“French Lick Resort has been an outstanding host since they first welcomed us four years ago. We are grateful for their support of women’s professional golf and eager to have the Symetra Tour return this season,” said Mike Nichols, chief business officer of LPGA Qualifying Tours.
Defending champion Patty Tavatanakit of Bangkok, Thailand, won’t be among the competitors, as she finished second in the “Race for the Card” in 2019 after earning three wins. Since graduating onto the LPGA Tour, Tavatanakit is now a major champion. In addition to winning the ANA Inspiration, the UCLA alumna has claimed four more top-five finishes.
“Winning the Donald Ross Classic is a cherished memory as my first win on the Symetra Tour. I was two months removed from turning professional and was coming off an incredible week at the Thornberry Creek LPGA Classic,” said Tavatanakit. “It helped build the momentum for the career I have now, and I’m excited to see who comes away as champion in this year’s event.”
The players, staff, media and fans are expected to give the resort a bump in room nights as well as exposure. Then next month, the Senior LPGA will fill rooms all around the area and bring event highlights to device screens across the globe via the online presence of the resort, Visit French Lick West Baden, and the LPGA.
Harner noted the presentation of online highlights, rather than televised play, represents a change in media strategy for this year’s event. “We’ve found very few people sit down and watch a golf tournament for two or three hours,” he said. Besides packaging coverage into bite-sized pieces, the new plan will also save the resort a considerable sum of money. Harner noted televising play comes with a price tag of approximately $850,000.
The defending champion is Helen Alfredsson of Sweden.
Building an economic engine
Both the Donald Ross Classic and the Senior LPGA Championship, now in their final rounds of four-year commitments locally, continue to bolster the historic resort’s long-held reputation as a golf destination.
“It’s not a short-term strategy,” said Harner.
Evidence of French Lick Resort’s commitment to growing that economic engine is readily apparent. Since Bloomington-based Cook Group’s acquisition of the resort a decade and a half ago, Harner reported, the company has invested approximately $40 million to bring the Ross Course back to its former glory and carve the Pete Dye Course out of neighboring Mount Airie — a location Dye initially called an impossibility. Now, counting the Ross and Dye courses, as well as the nine-hole Valley Links Course, golf at French Lick requires a workforce of approximately 50 crew members in operations and about the same number in golf maintenance. Many of those personnel, including Harner himself, are from the local area. (Except for a two-year stint in Kentucky, Harner’s been at the resort since 1976. He started as a bag room attendant for $2.35 per hour.)
And the resort’s dedication to golf appears to be a strategy that’s paying off for the property, which in addition to being home to the top two public courses in the entire state, is also the only place around with two courses designed by World Golf Hall of Fame architects.
2021 has been a banner year for the courses. Numbers so far are running about 61% over pre-COVID 2019, Harner said, and the three courses are expected to host in the neighborhood of 25,000 rounds before the end of this season.
It isn’t just the resort that is benefiting. Harner said the great thing about French Lick is it offers plenty to do for non-golfing members of the family, too, and neighboring hotels and restaurants in the area are also packed during major golfing events.
Golf giving a helping hand
There’s another facet of the economic impact of golf at French Lick Resort: local and state charities. This month’s Donald Ross Classic will once again provide a significant boost to Orange County Habitat for Humanity’s mission of constructing quality, affordable housing in the county. Each year of the Donald Ross Classic, the charity has received approximately $30,000-$35,000.
August’s Senior LPGA Championship will again benefit Riley Hospital for Children. The Indianapolis institution has received approximately $1 million during the tournament’s run at French Lick.
The Evans Scholars program is another beneficiary of golf at French Lick. Thanks to an affiliation with the Evans Scholars Foundation of the Western Golf Association, 12 caddies at the Pete Dye Course have earned full-ride scholarships since 2009.