“This doesn’t look anything like it did back then,” Mike Whan laughed before sitting down at a high-top table in the bar area of Coldstream Country Club.
Whan has spent 95% of his adult life in golf between Wilson Sporting Goods, TaylorMade Golf Company, the LPGA and his current position as the United States Golf Association (USGA) CEO.
On Friday, Whan, an Anderson High School graduate, returned to Coldstream Country Club, one of the places that helped fuel his passion for golf. It was his first time back in nearly 40 years.
USGA CEO Mike Whan (middle) became an honorary member at Coldstream Country Club on Friday, April 19, 2024. Whan became a grounds crew member at the club when he was a student at Anderson High School. (Photo courtesy USGA)
Tough, hourly work
Driving down Asbury Road Friday morning was a blast from the past for Whan, who now resides in Gladstone, New Jersey. Everything came back to him.
He remembered the lake near the road, where he shocked himself while working on a pump with a screwdriver, waking up a few moments later on his back. One fairway jogged a memory of a one-sided battle with a hornet’s nest that he hit with his head while cutting fairway aprons. With the wave of hornets chasing and stinging him, he jumped into the lake. A few hours later, he was left with severe swelling while watching Jimmy Buffett serenade a sold-out Riverbend crowd with “Margaritaville.”
“I wasn’t missing the concert,” he laughed.
Whan had caddied in Illinois before moving to Cincinnati as a sophomore in high school. He wanted a job on a local grounds crew and was introduced to Coldstream Superintendent Cal Gruber.
USGA CEO Mike Whan putts on the 10th green during the first round of the 2023 American Express in La Quinta, California. (Photo: Taya Gray/The Desert Sun)
Gruber showed Whan a barn full of every piece of equipment needed to maintain a golf course. The only problem? It was off-limits to the rookie.
“He (Gruber) goes, ‘Here’s my deal with all my people. You have to make it through one summer as a bunker boy. If you don’t quit, then next year I’ll teach you to ride all that stuff,’” Whan said.
Like many high school students, Whan spent his summers in the sand – and nowhere else. From 5:30 a.m. to 2:30 in the afternoon, Whan was edging, weeding and raking bunkers and working on drainage.
“It’s a miserable experience. It’s tough, hourly work,” Whan said. “I worked here every summer until I graduated…
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