On a recent trip to Malaysia, I had the good fortune to spend a morning being shown around the Royal Selangor Golf club in Kuala Lumpur.
Royal Selangor Golf Club,
– Was set up by the British in 1893.
– Consists of two 18 hole golf courses
– Plus a 9 hole Par 3 course,
– 7 grass tennis courts,
– 3 hard tennis courts and
– 2 swimming pools.
With security armed with rifles manning the front gate, it is a very exclusive club and strictly open to members only,
In 2016, RSGC hosted the Maybank Championship, a European tour event won by Australia’s Marcus Fraser.
Jack Cheong, the course superintendent of 11 years, (affectionately known as Mr. Jack) was very friendly and kindly showed me around for the morning.
The golf course playing surfaces varied from
– Carpet grass (Axonopus Spp.) in the rough and under trees,
– Seashore paspalum ( Paspalum vaginatum) in the immediate rough,
– Zoysia (Zoysia japonica)/seashore paspalum/couch (cynodon dactylon) mix on tees and fairways
– Tifeagle (a hybrid cynodon dactylon) greens
For those of you recently back from Thailand, you will be familiar with these grasses, but others may not as they do not perform well in Victoria with our often chilly winters.
With a budget of 7,000,000 RM ($2.5 mil) and staff of 100 working 6 �½ days a week it was a very busy place to visit indeed.
Situated in the heart of Kuala Lumpur the 300 acre site believed to be valued in the vicinity of at least 2 billion RM (+$700 million).
Quirky fact Mr. Jack has 1,500 RM a year to spend on feeding the local monkeys. If not fed the monkeys begin to remove tee marker, flag-sticks, tear the cloth of flag-sticks and even attack members!! Money well spent
Regards Travis Stillman
