Saturday’s rain didn't dampen the spirit of the fans for round three of the Traveler's Championship in Cromwell.
“The rain woke us all up in the morning and now it’s a beautiful day. The sun came out a little bit,” Erin McCann, visiting from New York City said.
“We had the umbrellas, but we really didn’t have to use them,” Todd Sauer, of Willington, said.
The early wet weather in Cromwell not deterring fans from enjoying the third round of the Travelers Championship watching the some of the best golfers in the world.
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“I was just amazed at how good they were. I didn’t see a bad shot all day,” Sauer said.
Tournament director Nathan Grube says his team was ready. It included grounds crews, meteorologists, and the PGA Tour all coordinating together to see how to account for the rain.
“It’s so many different layers. You’re trying to think fans the fans backwards. How do we make this experience as easy as possible for them?” he said.
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That’s when the decision was made to delay tee times a couple of hours and have players play in threesomes using both the first tee and 10th tee as starting holes for the groups. Grube says the long days of summer gives them flexibility.
“You can play golf from 6:50 in the morning to 9:00 at night so we’re very fortunate that’s how it lays out and we got a normal event in today,” he said.
Efforts were also made to ensure fans had a good and dry experience at the course.
“There’s material that we put out that soaks up water. There’s gravel that you put down. There’s a lot of pre-work. You know where water pools and you steer it away,” Grube said.
Fans giving the grounds crew a thumbs up for their work.
“I haven’t stepped in any puddles. Shoes, I wore white shoes and they’re somewhat clean,” McCann said.
Grube says that’s what he likes to hear.
“It’s a coordinated effort to where hopefully the fans felt like ‘Hey! That was easy,’” he said.
As for the final round, the tee times will be back to normal starting around 8 a.m. with the tournament leaders teeing off at 1:55 p.m.
