Going to extremes for a tee time is nothing new for the early-morning players of the Dawn Patrol at Torrey Pines, but it reached a fever pitch, even for this crew, in the days leading up to the U.S. Open.
ED ZIERALSKI
Torrey Pines Dawn Patrol regulars (from left) Robbie Mason, Doug Thomas and Billy Coyne often sleep in their vehicles to secure an early tee time.
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As golfers, all of whom had stayed in the parking lot or had a buddy do that duty, took their places in line in the gray light of morning on the Saturday before the course closed for the Open, there was this exchange:
“I can't believe the guy with No. 1 in line got here at 3 in the afternoon yesterday.” George Brdlik, a veteran Dawn Patroller, replied: “That's nothing. The guy with No. 1 tomorrow is already in line in the parking lot.”
That guy with No. 1 would be Billy Coyne, another veteran of the system that allows golfers to get onto a U.S. Open golf course. As more and more older players moved on and quit playing the South Course after it was toughened by Rees Jones for the Open, Coyne developed a nearly scratch golf game. He's been a Dawn Patrol member since 1986.
“The best thing about this is being with the guys out here, enjoying the camaraderie before and after we play,” Coyne said. “When I first started coming out, I'd get the number, pass it on when someone came and then would go over and putt and chip on the South green. There used to be a light there at the old Inn, and I'd go there for hours. No one chased me away. That's how I got my handicap down.”
Coyne and others will tell you it's almost as much fun getting the number as it is playing a U.S. Open golf course as fog rolls off the fairways. They play fast because they know they're setting the tone for the entire day's play at Torrey Pines.
They do the same thing at New York state-owned Bethpage Black on Long Island, a public course and host site of the U.S. Open in 2002 and again next year. Bethpage State Park has five golf courses, so their system is much more regimented, with wrist bands given to the sleepover guys playing the coveted Black Course.
At Torrey Pines on weekends, the player sleeping over – and it's a rule that he must not leave the parking lot – leaves his parking lights on for a spell or marks his vehicle in some way to identify it as the most recent car to arrive. On weekdays, players put a golf bag or club, something to mark their spot outside the starter's booth.
Sorting it all out on this day was Jake Perkhiser, a starter at Torrey for the past 17½ years. Perkhiser has had to break up a couple of disputes before they turned into fistfights over the years, but a few weeks before the U.S. Open, he saw his first punches thrown on the deck in front of the pro shop.
“There was blood on the deck,” said regular player Robbie Mason, who has been playing early at Torrey since 1989 with buddy Gordon Gutzka. “They sounded like fish flopping around up there.”
City of San Diego Golf Operations Manager Mark Woodward was called in, as if he didn't have enough to do preparing Torrey South for the Open.
“One guy got a little carried away and lost his city card over it,” Woodward said. “It was a heat-of-the-battle sort of thing out there. But the demand for tee times was so incredible before the Open. We'd have 85 to 100 people out there on that deck. It got out of control, and it's unfortunate that it happened.”
Coyne, Mason and Gutzka, being the veteran Dawn Patrollers they are, form a kind of night watchman's crew. They took it personally when the fight broke out.
“We're like ambassadors for this place here at night, and we take that seriously,” Mason said. “It's a self-regulated, self-maintained system that works because the guys here get along for the most part.”
Like many local golfers, Mason struggled with the redesign of the course. Many of the early players switched to playing the North Course. They went back to playing the South when it was upgraded fully in the last year for the U.S. Open.
“You look at what getting the U.S. Open here has meant to the entire course,” Mason said. “There are better facilities, a better parking lot, entrance, atmosphere, the whole bit. Once I learned to embrace the changes Rees Jones made, I became a better player overall. It took me 25 to 30 rounds to finally get it, but I figured it out. And once I lost my fear of playing there on the South, it became a joy to play here.”
As the U.S. Open became more and more a reality, many in the Dawn Patrol crew wondered how long the city of San Diego was going to maintain control of the golf course. Their worry is that Bill Evans, owner of the Lodge at Torrey Pines, will take over the tee times and take the sunrise away from the Boys of Dawn.
“Getting the U.S. Open was great for the golf course and the city, but I think it's going to be bad for the public golfer in the end run because it could lead to the end of the Dawn Patrol,” Coyne said.
“If the hotel gets control over the tee sheet, there won't be any more early-morning play out here and residents will have a hard time getting on. We don't have the money some of these guys have to lobby politicians and get things done. We go to the city council and yell and scream, but it doesn't do any good. This course is supposed to be for the residents of San Diego, a municipal golf course, but it all comes down to big money. I have a feeling this is the start of the end.”
Woodward is leaving after the U.S. Open to be CEO of the Golf Course Superintendent's Association of America. He's endorsing his assistant, Jon Maddern, as his replacement, but he knows the decision on the Dawn Patrol and other facets of the course won't be his anymore. But he leaves saying the Dawn Patrol should stay in place.
“When I came here the Dawn Patrol program was in place,” Woodward said. “It was working and it allowed residents to get tee times before the regular tee times start at 7:30 a.m. Everyone seemed to like it, so I didn't mess with it because it worked and it's a good idea. I don't see any need to change it in any way, shape or form right now. I think it will remain that way.”
Mason and his buddies hope so. They all do this as a way to escape their regular routines. On Monday, they go back to their jobs, Coyne as a concrete plant manager, Mason as a tile setter, Gutzka as a window washer.
“I work all week and my reward is to play Torrey Pines, and come Sunday morning, at the crack of dawn, I get to walk in the footsteps of golf gods,” Mason said. “This is my church. I'm religious, and this is where I come to worship every Sunday.
“I just hope the powers that be don't forget the little guys like us who do this every week just to play golf on our municipal golf course. I hope they remember this course should be about the little guys and making it accessible as they can for us to play.”
Ed Zieralski: (619) 293-1225; ed.zieralski@uniontrib.com
