Continue to Learn Conference 2025 - Day 2

Have you ever wondered how the world's highest performers consistently achieve extraordinary success? Join us for a transformative keynote presentation where you'll gain exclusive insights into the game-changing strategies that set them apart.

Discover hidden pathways to success and uncover the secrets that top achievers use to navigate challenges and achieve unparalleled success. Elevate your performance beyond limits, learn how adopting specific practices can propel you to new heights in both your personal and professional life. Ignite your motivation and drive, tap into the motivational forces that drive high performers and use them to fuel your own ambitions.

An illuminating experience that promises to reshape the way you approach success. Don't miss this chance to unlock the exclusive blueprint of high achievers and embark on a journey toward your fullest potential!

Learning outcomes:

• What do high performers do differently?
• What sets them apart?
• How to sustain success over the long term
• How to bring more joy to performance
• What habits, training and growth opportunities do they seek?

Presented by:

Lora Caven

Founder & CEO

Lora distinguishes herself as a guiding force in the business world, boasting over two decades of invaluable experience and a steadfast commitment to personal and professional growth. Renowned for her compelling keynote speeches, her insights resonate globally, leaving audiences captivated and inspired.

Driven by an enduring passion for high standards and excellence, Lora's mission is unmistakable: to assist and uplift individuals across all aspects of their life and career journey. Whether through targeted coaching, strategic positive psychology training, or impactful talks, she sparks a transformative fire within others, encouraging them to lead lives that are not only expansive but also deeply meaningful.Lora's dedication extends beyond individual success; she staunchly believes in the transformative power within every business professional. With infectious enthusiasm, she empowers individuals to reshape their professional paths, discover their purpose within the business landscape, and contribute to creating more harmonious and successful enterprises. This commitment shines through in every interaction, as Lora provides practical strategies and mindset tools to guide her clients toward the meaning and success they inherently deserve.

Whether navigating shifts in career trajectory, scaling businesses, fostering strong leadership, improving team dynamics, overcoming business-related fears and challenges, navigating transitions, or refining business acumen, Lora stands as your unwavering guide. Her support not only opens the door to the joy, confidence, and full engagement that comes from consistent excellence in the dynamic world of business but also empowers you to cultivate effective leadership skills and build cohesive, high-performing teams. Embrace the journey with Lora and unlock the extraordinary path to realizing your fullest potential in both your personal and professional life.

Planning for a sustainable short, medium and long-term future of your golf course is an essential skill for modern course managers. A strategic plan for your golf course is the tool that allows us to talk about ecological management, water security, agronomy, drainage, course design, irrigation, member communication and financial planning for your club’s most important asset – it’s course. This session will introduce the concept of strategic planning for your course, and share The R&A’s resources to review, plan and deliver a more sustainable future for the courses you manage.

Learning outcomes:

• Recognise the value and importance of strategic planning for golf courses
• Outline the key components of a golf course strategic plan
• Engage other decision-makers in course strategic planning
• Apply an industry-recognised model to create a stronger future for your club and course

Presented by:

Alistair Beggs

Head of Sustainable Agronomy

Alistair Beggs joined the R&A in January 2019 having previously worked as Head of Agronomy at STRI. In his career at STRI Alistair advised on many different types of turf throughout the world. He gained warm season experience in Asia and has provided advice to clients throughout Western and Southern Europe and throughout the UK. He has gained a wealth of knowledge on the management and upkeep of many different types of golf course. Alistair's qualifications include a Biology degree and a diploma in Golf Course Architecture and he is a member of the BASIS professional register. He is a regular contributor to industry publications and presenter at turf conferences. Alistair is a keen golfer and member at Royal Liverpool, and Rye. Alistair was Captain of Royal Liverpool in 2014.

This session is a look back over 40 years of involvement in the turfgrass industry. Beginning with ‘What was golf course maintenance like back in the last century?’, it illustrates the management procedures in place during the early 1980s. Covering aeration, topdressing and nutritional programmes during that period, we then move through the 1990s, into the 2000s and to the present day.  What has made the greatest impact on turfgrass maintenance over the years? Innovations such as vertidrains, foliar nutrition, sand specifications, plant growth regulators, surfactants, moisture meters, use of robotic mowers and drone technology. John will also cover the challenges turf managers faced in the 1980s and how these evolved over the years to include golfer expectations, chemical restrictions, environmental issues and the pressures this lifestyle has on your wellbeing and family life.

Learning outcomes:

• Understand what turfgrass management was like in the 1980s and how management techniques evolved over the years
• Be aware of how course conditions, golfer expectations and the pressures on turf managers have changed
• Gain knowledge of how nutritional and cultural practices developed over the years and understand how the restrictions on pesticide use impacted the industry
• Understand the role and value of turfgrass education and be aware of the numerous pathways now available
• Be aware of how the greenkeeper’s role changed from a mere grasscutter to a highly trained professional

Presented by:

Dr John Dempsey

Independent Turfgrass Research

John has 40 years' greenkeeping experience and was superintendent of Ireland's oldest golf course, The Royal Curragh. John has conducted independent reserach for the past 15 years and since 2019 has headed Independent Turfgrass Research.

His current work focuses upon biotic and abiotic stresses in turfgrass, integrated disease control and the enhancement of turfgrass disease responses. John has presented at numerous conferences and seminars across Europe and the United States.

Ok, lets start by agreeing that won’t happen, certainly not in a golf club. So how do we handle the environment that creates, when you have 500 members to please and a dirty 30 who might just have it in for you? Everybody is entitled to work in a safe environment and there are some rock solid tests to establish if you are working in one. And while we are on that topic of creating a safe environment, how’s your performance in that area? What would your team say about the environment you create? Come and find out.

Learning outcomes:

• Reframe the realities of your role and get things in perspective again
• Understand what a safe environment looks like and head that way
•  Identify any holes in those foundations that need to be addressed
• Evaluate the environment you create for your team
• Create a non-negotiable set of rules that will be in place in the next 12 months, on your watch

Managing a high quality turf surface can at times be a hard and thankless task. To be able to produce high quality turf requires balancing a large number of factors that are continually changing. Integrated Turf Management (ITM) has always been at the heart of best practice greenkeeping, we just have not always put a specific label on it. However, in a world of increasing pressures on turf managers ranging from tightening legislation and climate change through to water, resource and staff availability, it has never been so important to take an integrated and big picture view of how we manage turf.

This session aims to look at the current and future challenges facing turf managers and will look at how ITM can help. ITM is all about trying to work with biology and the processes in the natural world. ITM is not a series of maintenance procedures, it is a way of thinking and viewing turf and how we manage it. It is vital now and it will become increasingly important to we ensure ITM thinking and processes are at the heart of turf management. With great challenge comes great opportunity and ITM offers a way of meeting the challenges that greenkeepers face while helping to produce high-quality turf in a way that is in harmony with nature as much as possible. Fighting nature is a battle no turf manager can win, but working with the natural processes and environments our turf is in can lead to a more resilient and robust approach to golf course management.

Learning outcomes:

• ITM and its role in producing robust and resilient turf surfaces
• Current and future challenges for turf managers and how we might tackle them
• Understanding the ecosystems and natural processes in the environments of our golf courses is one of keys to ITM success
• Aim to challenge perceptions of ITM and to engage turf managers to think more deeply and critically and what they do

Presented by:

Dr Christian Spring

STRI Group Principal Scientist

Christian Spring trained in Environmental Science at the University of Stirling and stayed there to study for his PhD focusing on soil science. Christian joined STRI in 2005 and has spent his whole career carrying out practical applied research into all aspects of turfgrass management and science. Christian’s current role within STRI is as Principal Scientist, where he works across the whole of STRI Group to support each business with the technical and science needs. Education and training is an essential element of disseminating practical science, as well as ensuring science is focussed on the challenges and problems faced by turf managers. Christian is a passionate and enthusiastic educator and communicator on all matters turf, soil and surface management related.

Turf managers the world over have made use of clipping volume measurements to get the measured growth rate at each mow. The temperature based growth potential is also used to understand the ability of grass to grow in current weather and to put a number to the level of temperature stress. The turf GvX ("growth versus expected", formerly referred to as the 'speedo' or growth ratio) is a combination of clipping volume and growth potential.

In this session, Micah will explain how to find the turf GvX and how to make use of it.

Learning outcomes:

• How to use the turf GvX
• Learn how to use the GvX to tell how fast your grass is growing
• Making confident decisions about fertiliser input
• Deciding how much (if any) plant growth regulator is needed

Presented by:

Dr Micah Woods

Chief Scientist

Micah Woods established the Asian Turfgrass Center (ATC) in 2006 to develop and provide turfgrass information for the golf and sports turf industry. Through the ATC, he provides turfgrass advisory and soil testing services to golf clubs, sports facilities, and select clients around the world. Since 2009, he has been an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Plant Sciences at the University of Tennessee. Since 2022, he has been director of the PACE Turf information service.

Micah manages to keep his eyes on the ground, studying the turfgrass species wherever he is in the world. He remains well grounded in the practical aspects of the golf game and his writing has been praised for its accessible style. Author of over two hundred articles in publications such as GOLF Magazine and Soil Science as well as books with intriguing titles like One Bucket at a Time and 芝草科学とグリーンキーピング: マイカの時間 The BOOK, Micah enjoys spending time creating animated charts and graphs of the data he has collected while discovering unexpected statistics.

 

In this session, Jerry will explain how course managers, head greenkeepers, deputy head greenkeepers and those who aspire to those roles should deal with feedback - and how to turn something that can be negative into something that is positive.

Jerry will also cover ways of learning how to build up your own emotional resilience and how to teach this to your team members, so you do not take complaints personally but deal with them in a professional way.

Learning outcomes:

• Turning a complaint into a positive experience
• How to set up a complaints procedure
• Learning how to prevent personal stress over complaints
• How to recognise the fraudulent complaint

Presented by:

Jerry Kilby CCM

Proprietor

In his 35-year career in the golf industry, Jerry Kilby has held several senior management roles, including Marketing Manager of the PGA and the CEO of the Club Managers Association of Europe. He has also been General Manager of three golf clubs - Nad Al Sheba Club in Dubai and Woodcote Park and Bramley Golf Clubs here in the UK.

He is currently providing independent advisory services to golf clubs and golf businesses in the areas of club governance, strategic planning, operational management and business development.

He has delivered educational workshops for England Golf, BIGGA, GCMA, CMAE and others.

This session will look at the option of bringing inert soils into golf clubs to help fund major improvements at zero cost to the club.

Learning outcomes:

• To show others this could be a legitimate option
• To gain knowledge of how this process works
• To ask those important questions of someone who has completed two major projects
• For the attendees to learn from mistakes we made along the way

Presented by:

Matt Plested

Course Manager

When playing our part in securing the future of our wildlife and plant populations, the first step is to create the perfect habitat. By creating wildflower and ecological areas, you can be assured of the benefits these will bring to the environment and the crucial role they provide in attracting and sustaining wildlife.

This session looks at how to improve the biodiversity of your facility with the addition of wildflower species and will look at the mixes and methodology for creating the very best wildlife and wildflower areas on your site.

Learning Outcomes

• Discover the differences between annual and perennial wildflower mixes
• Learn about native and non native species
• Understand companion grasses within mixes
• Where to employ species mixes to provide ecological success
• How to prepare your areas and best practice sowing techniques

Presented by:

Stuart Yarwood MG

Northern Region Technical Manager

Some believe rolling the putting surface causes compaction, wear on turfgrass tissue and creates disease. Dr Thomas Nikolai will discuss his research, as well as others for more than a century, to demonstrate that rolling is a critical best management practice instrument and plays a key part of an ITM programme.

Learning outcomes:

• Rolling/mowing frequency programmes
• Rolling fertility interactions
• Rolling’s impact on turfgrass pests such as diseases and weeds
• Rolling’s impact on soil health
• Determining the best rolling programme for your greens

Presented by:

Thomas Nikolai PhD

Senior Academic Specialist

Thomas A. Nikolai, Ph.D. discovered frequent rolling on the putting surfaces decreases dollar spot and other turfgrass pests and he initiated mowing/rolling frequency research that maintains consistent green speeds, reduces turfgrass stress, and leads to economic saving. Thom also discovered mulching deciduous leaves into turfgrass canopies results in fewer broad leaf weeds and he initiated alternative spike research which paved the way for the demise of the metal spike which increased customer satisfaction and resulted in economic savings for most every golf course on the planet. He is author of the book The Superintendents Guide to Putting Green Speed and is world renowned as the Dr. of Green Speed due to the numerous studies he has performed that investigate putting green cultural and mechanical practices. In 2010, he initiated a study to investigate the social, economic, and environmental impact of turfgrass on an urban society by mowing and fertilizing around abandoned homes, lots, and parks in Flint, MI. Courses Thom has taught at MSU include Turfgrass and the Environment, Pesticide and Fertilizer Technology, World of Soils, Turfgrass Irrigation, Turfgrass Management and Turf and Landscape Analytical Practices. In 2003 and 2017, Dr. Nikolai was voted “The Outstanding Faculty Member” by his students and he has penned the column called Up to Speed for GCM Magazine and was awarded the 2019 TOCA Merit Award for "Series of Columns". Thom is also well known as being the creator and host of the GCSAA Turfgrass Talk Show. Thom has given presentations in 30 countries, 8 Canadian Provinces, and 36 States.