The state’s largest sporting event is getting ready to tee off next week. Traveler’s Championship activities begin Monday with PGA competition beginning Thursday.
The anticipation is building as this year’s Travelers Championship could be the biggest ever.
“I’ve not seen the tournament this big, as far the scope of it goes,” said Tournament Director Nathan Grube.
Magnifying this year’s tournament is its designated “elevated” status, making it one of the PGA Tour’s 17 high money events. The $20 million prize has helped draw a spectacular entry list.
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The world’s seven top players will be there along with their entourage.
“They have their swing coaches. They have nutritionists. They have their physical therapists,” Grube said.
The elevated designation has also drawn more sponsors, requiring additional luxury suites. TPC River Highlands is also looking after the golfers, bringing in more amenities including personal barbers.
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“These guys are busy. They are traveling. So, we have barbers in there during the week so they can get a haircut down in the locker room,” TPC River Highland’s General Manager David Corrado said.
The TPC property is just under 200 acres, with 135 acres of that in maintained turf. Come next week, it will need to be immaculate. A brand-new irrigation system is keeping the course green.
With a spectacular field of players, massive crowds are expected. Enhancing the fan experience are new viewing areas.
“We put new bleachers on different boxes, to have more site lines for people,” Grube said.
With massive fan interest comes traffic. Cromwell police are continuing to work with a logistics company to make traffic flow smoothly.
“It used to take hours. Now I’ve seen it alleviate itself in an hour and a half,” said Cromwell Police Chief Denise Lamontagne.
Preparing for the tournament is always challenging, but perhaps even more so this year after last week’s bombshell news that the PGA and LIV Golf were merging.
“I think everybody went, 'what?! What does this mean? How does this work?' And that’s exactly what we’re still doing. We’re still kind of peeling back what it all means,” Grube said.
The focus though has remained on this coming week, and tournament officials say they’ll be ready.
Next week, Cromwell will be the epicenter of the golf world and tournament officials want to make it the happiest place on Earth.
“We want it to feel like Disneyland when you come out here,” Grube said. “We want your ticket to be like, 'I can walk around and just do a bunch of stuff.'”
With the crowds that are expected throughout the course of next week, there is another reason to be excited. Tournament officials say they could raise a record amount of money for the 140 charities this event helps support.
