Superintendent Ethan Jones’s journey to Sea Island GC and hosting the RSM Classic

There aren’t many professional tournaments held during the winter months of the year. The weather is unpredictable, and it can be tricky to maintain the turf.

Ethan Jones, superintendent at Sea Island Golf Club in Saint Simons Island, Ga., says he has his fair share of challenges while hosting the RSM Classic in November.

“We have to fight with the weather a lot around that time,” Jones says. “Especially with it still being hurricane season and being on the coast, we have to watch out for that.”

With the end of the year being a battle with the weather for many courses, the coastal states typically experience an increase in rain during that time. Jones says their tournament in 2022 was especially rough when Hurricane Ian hit the East Coast.

“Our whole shop flooded a week before the tournament,” Jones says. “It was a nightmare.”

Jones says he’s incredibly thankful to all the people who help during the tournament, including both crews from the Seaside Course and the Plantation Course, the staff and the volunteers. In total, there are over 60 people who help get the course in tournament-ready shape.

There’s no question that the week of a tournament is an all-hands-on-deck kind of event. The stakes are high, and it can be an incredibly stressful time.

Jones says his dog, 6-year-old Scout, acts as a morale booster and helps keep the crew’s spirits up on the job. He says she even gets an “all-access” pass for the week.

It’s in his blood

Before Jones found himself at Sea Island, there was a time when he almost took over his father’s landscaping business. He grew up around grass and knew it was going to be a part of his life one way or another, though.

Once he entered college, he soon found a passion in the golf course maintenance world. He started at Quail Hollow Club in Charlotte, N.C., and worked his way up before getting an offer at Sea Island.

Despite claiming he’s not very good at the game of golf, Jones says he fell in love with it and the work that goes into taking care of the courses.

“Every single day, I think, ‘I love my job,’” Jones says. “I’m not too big on the waking up early part, but when you get out here and see the sunrise and the wildlife that springs up, it’s life changing.”

Jones says his favorite memory on the job so far was going through a full course renovation in 2019 with Davis Love III, Mark Love and Scot Sherman from Love Golf Design.

“Watching the course go from a golf course to nothing and then back to a state-of-the-art course was something I’ll never forget,” he says.

Golf never sleeps

Throughout his career, Jones says there’s one piece of advice that has stuck with him through the years.

“Our Tour Agronomist, Bland Cooper, told me, ‘You can’t let things slide. You have to stay on top of everything. If you see a disease, you spray there. If you see a blade out of sorts, you need to jump on it right then. You can’t let things just ride out,’” Jones says.

Now, after being the superintendent at Sea Island GC for five years, Jones says the advice he has for supers who might want to maintain a tournament course one day is to “just be ready.”

“Be ready for the ride because it’s not like your normal golf course, especially at a resort course where play never sleeps,” he says. “We don’t get any breaks. With most tournament courses, you get a few weeks of preparation.”

Jones says his crew only gets two days of prep time when the course is closed before the RSM Classic begins. The very next day after the tournament, he has events stacked up.

“It’s nonstop,” he says. “Golf never sleeps around here.”

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