0:10 Welcome to Level Select, a golf podcast by Fair Wagers, where we aim to help you learn more about some of the nation's most talked about golf courses as well as uncover some hidden gems with a little help from our friends and their first hand experiences. I'm TJ Van Gunten, and with me, as always, is Sean Massey. 0:25 Today we're talking about America's hardest tea time to get No, we're not talking Bandon, Pebble or literally any other golf course in Southern California right now. We're talking about Landman Golf Club in Homer, NE with Brett Sapp of bird darts. Brettt, welcome to Level SELECT. 0:43 Gentlemen, it is so good to finally like do some real time talk with you. We've exchanged messages for probably over a year at this point. So fantastic be here. Thanks for having me. Oh yeah, yo, very excited to to have you on. I think you are technically Must Play's first podcast sponsor, officially or unofficially, however you want to call it. 1:05 But yeah, I think, I think we're on a year plus of just exchanging DMS back and forth with no actual human interaction. Yeah, it's been a heck of a run. I mean, if we had the if, I would have learned about the Tiktok streak pet a while ago. We've had a beast by now. Oh my God, yeah. 1:24 That was that was something that I did not know about until the other day either. I am not a frequent Tik Toker, but there's, you know, I think the algorithm might be better. And that's actually why I'm not a frequent Tik Toker, because it's actually scary. Yeah, it can be. I think maybe for year 2, though, we can like raise that little golf animal together there, yeah. 1:44 I like that. I like that. OK, so before we get into talking about land men, I just honestly want to thank Brett for his support over the past year and always being ride or die with us always being down to send over darts whenever we need darts. So I want to take this moment to just throw up a quick cheers and thank you for just being along with the journey on us. 2:05 We appreciate you a ton and as always, this cheers is brought to you by Vice Drink Ware, the official glass of Golf. Cheers. Just joy. What are we sipping on today? Boys, great tequila for our guy over there. Oh yeah, tequila is the drink of choice. 2:21 I got opened up a bottle of Fortaleza. I've been saving it for a special occasion. And that special occasion was today talking some Nebraska golf. We are honored, OK, and. So you are you're, you're making me want to take a trip right now, even. Before we dive in, I've, I mean TJ can attest and this is probably a fair disclaimer. 2:41 Speaking of Homer, I'm an absolute Homer. I was born and raised in Nebraska. I'm a Cornhusker through and through. If you've met one of us, it's we're all kind of similar in that regard. So I think it's a very special Gulf state land. Man's a very key piece and kind of the whole state make up. But I'm excited to talk about it. 2:56 It's a special, special experience and a unique blend of beautiful golf and just really relaxed environment. OK, OK. So I'm so yeah, Sean Sean's like I'm in. I'm booking trips. To happy episode we're done we. Don't even need to go through the reviews now. 3:13 Searching for fights. Yeah. So in addition to golf, Brett and I mutually have an affinity for mid to late 90s and early 2000s basketball, if you would say right. Brett, question for you, if you could compare Landman to a basketball player from that era, who would it be and why? 3:36 Oh, from that era, so you're saying. From that, if, if you want to go, if you want to go modern, you can go modern too. I I think that I think that'll still play to the viewers. I mean, yeah. Millennials like us. The low hanging fruit when you first asked this basketball player was thinking kind of Larry Bird, but I'm going to I'm going to skip on that one. 3:52 That's not here's one for you to test. You guys remember Big Country? Brian Reeves, Of course I do. Yeah, I'm gonna go with that one. I mean, I think that's just fitting. I mean, the land man's all about scale. And Brian Reeves was just this massive human. 4:07 I remember him at Oklahoma State. I grew up going to Nebraska basketball games. So we saw him in the Big 8 and he's still to this day one of the biggest humans I've been around and seen. So I'm I'm taking Bryant Reeves. That might be that's early 90s, but it's a great that's. It's a great pull. 4:23 I also, I love that Bryant Reeves jerseys still get play because of the vintage Vancouver Grizzly jerseys with the the symbols on the trimming on them. Like those are incredible jerseys. So you still end up seeing Bryant Reeves jerseys on people who probably have no idea who Bryant Reeves are. 4:41 It's yeah, that color way and those. Jerseys are ultimate classics. Yeah, I still, I, I used to have the throwback vintage hat and I, somebody stole it from me and I still miss that hat to this day. OK, sorry. We won't, we won't go too far off on late 90s. 4:57 We could go way off. We'd start talking in one mixtape and everything. So Brett, you obviously came to us. You're like you said, you're a Homer through and through. Why did you want to talk about Landman? Why was this your choice to to pitch to us today on Level Select? 5:15 I think one, I've been fortunate enough to get to play it a couple times and it's new, it's exciting, it's obviously gotten a lot of press and love and it the press has I think been all very well deserved and you go and play this. It's such a unique style of golf, not just Landman, but even the kind of that whole area of Nebraska and further West. 5:36 It's just a style of golf. You don't really get to play many places in the world. I think I haven't really gotten to really explore some of the other kind of Dune style areas of the country or even the North Atlantic, but it's just unique and it's just so fun and if anybody gets the opportunity to get in line and actually get a tee time, it is worth the trip out there. 5:59 How hard is it to get a tee time right now? Like what are we looking at? So I think this year they sold all of 2025 out in about an hour and that included some website downtime with like a server crash. I think it's I think the first year that was done in maybe 36 hours or a couple days and it's just kind of gotten progressively quicker and quicker each year to this year might have been under an hour right there. 6:25 Yeah, I can. I can spoil one of my one of my fun facts here that I was going to get into a little bit later, but last year in for in 2024. So I believe when they were selling all the 2025 tee times, they sold 10,000 tee times in 50 minutes. 6:44 So that's 40,000 people in 50 minutes last year. The crazy thing, too, is that I remember when it was being built, there was a lot of comments on like, who the Hell's going to go out there in the middle of nowhere? It felt like for all the people, it's just sold. And even the and. 7:01 They will come. It's truly Field of Dreams. I think that's a spot on comparison 'cause it's I'm in West Omaha and it's almost 2 full hours for me to drive there from here. Now there's definitely more remote spots you can get to and that's kind of one of its pluses is you can do it in a day. 7:18 And so you get a lot of traffic from Omaha and Lincoln still going up there and booking those tee times for once or twice a year. But it's, I mean, there's nothing else around it, I. Mean that's that's the trend in golf for the last, I don't know, maybe decade Max, which is the you have this precedent of like Bannon going out there and you drive there and you truly are in the middle of nowhere and it's a pilgrimage just to get to the course. 7:44 Then you open Mammoth Dunes and stuff, and then, you know, Sandhills and all these other places that are just like, it's not a destination city. You wouldn't think of it in terms of tourism. You think of it only for that purpose. You're going there for the Gulf. But once you have that clear mind and you're like, well, no, This is why we're doing this. 8:03 I feel like you probably get way more people spending more time and money at your place than working it into a trip. Right. So yeah. Yeah, you're definitely kind of captive to these places a little bit because they are so isolated now. 8:20 You have some bigger resorts as you go further W they have, I would say probably a little bit more on their property for you to do if you're done with your round or whatever. I think that's probably in the future for land, man. They're seeing the need. They have some cabins there on property, but they have their sister course, which is about a 10 minute drive called Old Dane. 8:41 And that was actually the first course that the Andersons bought. The family that owns and built Land Man, They are actually that's actually under renovation and they brought back the architects to redo that and that's going to kind of be their bonus round. When you get done with a rounded Land Man, it's kind of hard to turn and go again. 8:58 They're going to start sending you up to Old Dane and you can go play another 9. Holes or whatever shuttle or something. I wonder, I wouldn't surprise me if they do that because it's, you know, funny thing is out here, it's like it's 10 miles away, but that's like 10 minutes. Yeah, this is a great shot. Yeah. It's just too high. 9:14 Just take that straight up, yeah. As the crow flies, or as they say in Nebraska, just however you get there like that's terrible joke, guys. I missed on that one. We can cut that one. We can cut that one. I'm I'm keep it. I don't care. Hey, man, you miss you miss 100% of the shots you don't take. 9:33 Wayne Gretzky, Michael Scott, Michael Scott. OK. So Sean, yeah, I think you hit the nail on the head when you talk about like the trips and that's where everything is starting to go where they realize like, oh, people are done paying whatever dollar price they want to pay to go do. 9:49 I mean, people still do the Scottsdale trips and go and play the courses there. But like you can get somebody to your destination and get them for multiple rounds or and then an overnight stay, all of the eating done on premise like, and those costs are a little bit easier to maintain once you have everything set up and all the infrastructure. 10:09 I think it's, they didn't really set up a really good blueprint for everyone to even follow to like half of the scale. Like you don't need 6 golf courses like Bandon does. You can do it with with two, which is what they're trying to do there, right? Right. And I think the cool thing too is that you have some courses that take that approach, but they build the resort. 10:29 So you have your cabinets, your dream resorts that are like, we're going to build attached villas, homes, places to, you know, do stuff afterwards. Then you have courses. Maybe I haven't been laying, man. Tell me if this falls in this category where there's minimal infrastructure around it still. 10:47 It's not necessarily that built up yet. And so it's really about the Gulf there. Is that true? Is that accurate? Right? Yeah, absolutely. There's, you know, they have kind of the basic, I would say amenities that you'd expect from a golf course. 11:03 And not to say those services are basic in themselves, but it's truly about the golf. You know, there's definitely no sort of like swimming pool or anything like that. You have kind of the the food is even out of like a food truck style thing. 11:19 So the clubhouse itself is a very small footprint, which is actually consistent with the other King Collins course I've been to. But it kind of really fits the whole farmers golf course theme with the place just kind of being that minimalist and just all about this maximalist golf. 11:36 Are you saying that you've been to Sweetens Cove? I've not been to Sweetens Cove. I actually stumbled on, I think it's called Ennis in upstate New York. We were up there for a wedding and my wife was like, well, we have kind of a down day. Do you want to go golf? And I was like, is that rhetorical? 11:52 So I started poking around and found this Ennis, which I looked up. I was like, Oh my gosh, this is King's Collins. And I think it was about the time when Landman was still under construction. I don't even think it was open. They had just opened that place maybe I bet a couple months prior, like the fairways and stuff. 12:10 We're still setting in, but it was very similar. It wasn't as dramatic of a landscape, I would say, as what you see at Land Man, but you kind of saw the same style of just really wild undulation. Them playing and kind of toying with that line of is it gimmicky or is this just fun? 12:26 And it's just a really cool, unique experience. And that one I was kind of lucky to find. And it's been a nice kind of comparison point for me to have for the architects themselves and getting to see their work at Land Man. Yeah, you can. See that? So diving into a little bit of some of the fun facts and maybe a little bit of the trivia that I pulled from beforehand. 12:48 Obviously we, we tipped my hand a little bit here talking about the tee times that it, it had sold out in less than an hour. I think that's partially because in 2022, Golf Digest named it its best new public golf course. And then I think at the time it was like #3 in Nebraska. 13:04 And it now sits at 24 among all public golf courses. And then one of the other kickers that I hope I'm not stealing from Brett here later on is. It's also wildly affordable. I think tee times are only like 150 bucks. Yeah, and that's what they started at too. 13:23 That's oh, that's cool. So they haven't raised the rate since they opened. Oh. Nope. I like that that's, I mean, that's cool. I mean, if the T-shirt stays full, that's, that's all you can ask for, right? And again, I think it kind of fits the vibe of the place too. 13:39 Again, it's like the whole thing is, like I said, this is it's one of the better like top to bottom brand executions I've seen at a golf course in terms of just all of those little pieces kind of fitting together and meshing. You meet the owners. Like I was in, when I was in there, the GM, one of the GMs that works closely with the Anderson family was there and he was running around in flip flops and just like kind of hanging out. 14:03 Like it's very low key. It's very laid back. And like I said, it just all these little pieces fit together, the price included. They want people out there to have this experience, build that community and kind of build on that fervor that they got going, but make it, you know, a public spot. 14:19 There's a lot of guys from the community around there. Since they have old Dane closed down, that was kind of the community golf course. They've been giving some of those guys some tee times. I saw gentleman who was from Dakota City, which is just a stone's throw away from Land Man. I bet he was 70 and I'm being maybe generous and he was heading out to go play Land Man with a couple of his buddies because old Dane was closed and so they went out to Land Man instead. 14:45 Wow, that's cool. I love that. I like that. Continuing on, I think the I read that the land that Land Man was built on was originally deemed too tilted for farming. Brett, I think there's probably a really easy Nebraska joke that we could swing in here about too tilted being what, three degrees 4° for Nebraska? 15:10 You know, insert flat Nebraska joke here. Brett, I need you to confirm this one. Whole handicaps change based upon which direction the wind is blowing that day. Yeah, that is true. And that's on the scorecard itself. 15:27 It's so the prevailing winds are out of the northwest or the southeast. And if you kind of overlook at land man kind of the course overview, you can see a lot of the course is laid along that line either with it or against it, unsurprisingly. 15:45 So yeah, they have. I mean, it's a big, the kind of teeth of this course not to get too far ahead is I mean basically hills and wind there. I don't think there's a single tree on the entire course. It is just open hilly Prairie essentially that has this beautiful golf course kind of routed through it. 16:04 And so every flag stick, another nice brand touch that they do. Instead of having a regular flag, they have a wind sock like you'd see at an airport. And that's kind of been their big, I guess all other logo besides their L, you pull up to the clubhouse on a giant flagpole is a massive wind sock that looks to be, I don't know, 1520 feet long. 16:26 And so on most days, that day has enough wind to, you know, be kind of out there and kind of show you the direction of the wind. And so, yeah, they have obviously as you're playing to the southeast, if the winds at your back, those holes on that sort of day went out of the northwest get graded easier. 16:41 But your back 9 is going to be graded much tougher than what the front 9 was. So it's a nice touch. And I don't know if I've ever seen a course handicap differently based off of something like that, aside from men's and women's Tees being different distances or something. Yeah, I don't think I have, Massey. 16:58 You've obviously played a lot more golf than I have. You got you think you got anything like that? I've never played a course that hasn't changed ever like such a new concept, but I love that concept. It's such a fun way to play. Question here for the, I would say more experienced or some might even say better golfers than myself that are also on this podcast right now. 17:20 Do you think that a course, I guess the designer would be the one who chooses the routing of the holes, correct. Does the course designer technically do you favors by laying the holes out in the direction that the wind blows so that you're only dealing with mostly headwinds and tailwinds that are a little bit, I would say easier to determine if it's clubbing up or clubbing down for those versus US, like versus winds that go, I won't say east to West, but I go side to side where like if you're trying to play a ball out to the left and you know the wind's blowing severely hard to the right side of the hole, you don't know how how far left or right you actually need to put that out. 18:04 Whereas conceptualizing hitting a ball further or or shorter is a lot easier to do in your head. OK, can I get nerdy with my response here? That's This is why I asked this question. OK. So typically the designer and the owner agree on a routing, right? 18:23 And the designer comes with concept, shows what they want to do, usually takes the owner out to the land, they look at how it's being played, right? But in each routing, you have to figure out not only the playability of the holes, but how are you going to get golfers out and back in? 18:39 And if you're going to have them come back in, do you have them come back in at 9:00 so that amenities, food and other things that you offer are available next to the clubhouse when they make the turn from 9:00 to 10:00? Or are you going to have them stay out and put another place out there by 9:00 and 10:00, like some courses we've played recently do, where you know, you're not making it back to the clubhouse. 18:58 You're you're kind of still out there, but eventually you got to make your way back in that routing itself. You can figure out if it's going to be out and back, if it's going to be more circular where you might swing around back to it. But the things that obviously kind of dictate that are sometimes the size of the acreage you have to work with. 19:18 So golf courses that are tucked in neighborhoods or other places not like this course have all of those complexities to work with. Then you've got natural things like the coast of a Cliff or here in Scottsdale, Core and Crenshaw design a course out on talking sick resort. 19:35 But they went right up against a boundary with Native American reservation. So they had a a very strong boundary that they could never cross and they had to figure out what they were going to do. So factor all of that into the decision and then wind comes into it. You would have to talk to the owners and other people who play out there or not even play before you build the course. 19:55 Just live out there to say, where's the wind come in the summer? When's it come in the winter? Where is whatever? And if you and then on top of that, I'm still getting nerdy here. But in the winter, is the course even open? So if the course is closed in the winter because it's snowing or you know it's not going to be open, then you don't really care about which way it's blowing that that season. 20:14 So you have a smaller window maybe you care about. So the designer and the owner have to factor all that in, obviously. But I feel like more often than not, the choice, if it all comes out equal and wind is the only factor, is something where you have a balance of the amount of times you're into it versus it's at your back. 20:33 And you want that to be the majority of the holes. And then there's going to be odd ends to that routing where you're going to have to go cross wind just because you have to kind of make the way back or do something. Or maybe the land is telling you like, hey, this will be a really fun shot to hit down this hill. 20:49 But unfortunately it's going to go this way. So there might be cases where you have to make that happen. So I think the wind is a factor, but it's like 1 of 10 things that go into the routing unfortunately that. You know, yeah, probably like I think you did a good job of answering it when you said you'd rather have more people playing a majority of the holes going into or against versus the crosswinds. 21:10 That's that's the answer that I was looking for. And also thank you for saying the word crosswind. That was clearly the word that I could not get out earlier. Yeah, let's talk. OK, so I I I like the other the. Other thing, sorry, the real quick, the other thing I'll say is on routings, if you ever have holes go next to each other like you're going out and back and there's two fairways, a cross wind will make a lot of guys spray into a neighboring hole, which effects pace of play. 21:38 So if you have a win that's straight against or with, often times you're going to stick in your quarter that you want them to stick into and not go on to another fairway, which is going to impede play for another group. So that's another consideration. Too smart. Sorry, Brad design there. 21:54 Brad, do you have any, do you have anything to add or would you like to just say Ditto to that? Yeah, I'm, I would say I'm interested in this sort of stuff. I don't know a ton about it. Overlaying what you said at land man, it fits that exactly. It's definitely a loop course. 22:09 It's not an out and back and you're playing kind of out with the wind. And then you make that turn and they kind of have to battle the crosswinds and they throw in some dog legs and use the land to kind of let you still kind of play with the wind some while you're making that turn. But and then you're kind of either with it or against it going back in depending on what day it is. 22:29 Yeah. OK, OK, so closing this out, I've got one nice little piece of trivia about Landman that I want to ask you guys about. What do we think the word Landman translates to in its native language? And then I will also let you know about the native language. 22:49 I'll defer to shy. Actually, I know the answer to this, so I'll see. Give his gas. You What was the name of the family you said that owned this place? The Andersons. OK, that's. 23:04 The spelling of that probably would be helpful. It sounds like Dutch because I'm just going off of like Hans Christian Andersen or something like that, so I'm going to guess Dutch is the. Language it is. It is not Dutch, it is Danish. Ah, damn it. Oh, wait. And Hans Christian is Danish, actually, damn it. 23:21 And then also layering onto this we still hence the name of the other course, Old Dane. Yeah, I should have. I should have picked that up. OK, but I forgot he is Danish, so I I had it right. I just mixed it with Dutch. What do you? 23:37 OK, So what? So what do you think it translates into though? With land in it, I'm guessing something like farming or I don't know, cultivating or I don't know something like that. You know what if if we were on Jeopardy, I don't think they'd give it to you. 23:55 But we're not. So we're going to give you the the we'll add the buzzer in here. Ding, Ding, Ding. That's what it translates. Yeah, way to. Go. He went full, he broke down the full word. He went, he went language of origin first. 24:10 So yeah, it's a it's a subtle nod to Will Anderson's heritage and then obviously the agricultural origins of the land. So wow. Like. I said through and through the brand hits. 24:26 Yeah, right. It's yeah, they they. Knew what they were doing. Now, yeah, with like the vibe you said they had out there. So Brett, I know you played very recently, but I want to have you take us back to like your first time. Walk us through your first experience at Land Man what it was like, you know how you felt when you booked it or how excited you were to to get out there and then what was it like actually getting out there and getting getting settled into the into the. 24:54 Course I yeah, it was, I got a tee time the first year they opened. I luckily have a friend from the area and so I was getting messages and kind of the same way I have beat you up over the last year, I was getting beat up about this course, like leading up to it, even breaking ground he was telling me about it. 25:14 So I was really excited to see it. I really didn't know what to expect. I had gone and played some of the stuff, you know, Sandhills is kind of the crown jewel of Nebraska in that region and I've gotten played some of the stuff around it, not Sandhills itself. And so that was kind of like, you know, that's the standard of golf in Nebraska. 25:31 And I was curious to see how close to that 'cause it is a little bit of a different geological region, How close could they get to that 'cause it seemed like that's what they were going to try and emulate going in? You know, it's very low key. You take a gravel Rd. outside of Homer along the edge of this Ridge and the sign to get in to let you know that you're at the entrance of the place is about this big. 25:55 And it just, they're like cursive L on it. That's it. And it's like a dark stain too. So it's like I think 3 out of five times I've gone there, I've driven past the entrance just 'cause I don't, it looks like the previous one and I just don't recognize it. The big white barn is the cue to take the turn. 26:11 But you drive in and it's, you know, you see this barn and it's just any other gravel Rd. around there. You finally get around the curve and you kind of see this big hillside and perched on top is the clubhouse and you can't see any of the course still. And so it's just like this big build up finally get parked. 26:27 You can't, you don't park by the clubhouse, you park below it. So you still can't see anything get in your cart. Finally they bring it to you and you take it Outback up and go up another level. And you finally pull up to the driving range and then the clubhouse sits right on the 18th green. So once you get up there, you can kind of get this panoramic view of what's out there before you. 26:47 And I would say at that point it was like really sank into me to how special and unique this place was going to be. And so at that point, I was just really excited to go experience it all. You know, the clubhouse is small, as I said, but they it's, they got a lot going on in terms of merchandise and stuff. 27:05 Everyone's super approachable. So you go a couple times, you've met half the people that are there year after year. And I think they're getting to the point where they're starting to recognize people coming back and making annual trips out of it. And so it's just, it was it really exceeded my expectations given what the I think is a high standard of, you know, our elite courses here and punched way closer to that than I thought they could for that region. 27:29 So. That's, you know, go ahead, go ahead. No, you go ahead. I was just going to ask, what area do you think people who are visiting should stay in? Do they go to Sioux City or do they go staying around, you know, do they make a trek back somewhere else? 27:44 Sioux City is the closest like city if you will. I think it's about 100,000 people. There is a Hard Rock casino and hotel in Sioux City and so I'm betting that gets a lot of the traffic. There are some, as I mentioned, I think they probably got a dozen cabins or something on property. 28:01 They're they're good set up. I think they're gonna start. There's not like I said, a lot to do after your round and that's what they're gonna kind of build out. The kicker with those cabins though is you do get a book your rounds before those other general rounds get released. So it is kind of a different way to kind of get your tee time if you don't want to kind of try and jump in the pool of 10,000 tee times in an hour. 28:27 So yeah, I would guess a lot of people that are travelling in and aren't from Omaha, Lincoln or the area are probably, you know, trekking through Sioux City and making it as part of a trip or, you know, that's their one spot. And I think Sioux City's got a regional airport if you want to fly into, but Omaha is about two hours away, so it's not logistically impossible I guess. 28:49 That's cool. I want to touch on one of the things that you talked about where they do a really good job of building the anticipation before you end up like seeing the golf course. And I don't know, I would assume the great Courses are doing it on purpose because not everybody does it. 29:06 But like it really is a lot of times a true sign of like a really good golf course that like you don't almost don't get to see the course until you have already like checked in or you are standing on the first tee of something. 29:22 Like it very much reminds me of like Torrey where like you pull into Torrey Pines and there's the parking lot. You kind of see some of the course. You get like a little glimpse of the ocean and then you walk past the practice greens and you walk into the clubhouse and you're excited to be in the clubhouse. 29:37 It's the clubhouse at Torrey Pines. It's humongous. It has a ton of merch and everything. But then like Sean knows this, you step out on on that back patio that overlooks one on the on the South course and I think 10 on the north course and you can see all the way out to the ocean and you're like, oh, we're here. 29:58 We're at we're at Torrey Pines and that's when that feeling kind of like fully sinks in. There's probably a handful of other courses that I can think about, but it's, it's a very weird thing that I don't think we as golfers always talk about is the build, but letting the anticipation build. 30:13 Obviously it builds. And we book the tee time, you know, the day before, you know, we we've all sat at work and been like, I have to work today, but I have a golf trip tomorrow. And I'm, you know, breezing through whatever I'm supposed to be doing because all I can think about is my golf trip or going to bed the night before the drive in. 30:30 You know, there's plenty of memes about waking up at 6:00 AM for golf, But if you wake me up at 6:00 AM for anything else, I'm not not all there in the head. Like the anticipation gets there, but we don't talk about the anticipation from like the parking lot to the golf course. 30:46 And some courses do it really well. And it sounds like Landman is is one of them. They do. And I don't know if that was part of their talks with King Collins or if it's just like, hey, this thing's built on the clubhouse. It's on like one of the highest points on the property. 31:01 So you can kind of see that giant windsock from about anywhere on the course as you're going out. So that might be part of it, but I don't know if that was part of the design because they are obviously, and you go and play it. You can tell they very much thought about what's the experience going to be like through and through for people that come and play this and what are they going to want to do? 31:22 What are they going to want to see and where can we surprise them to make this kind of even more elevated? Yeah, Another course that does that, DJ, you were with me is Chambers, where you get to the parking lot and you haven't made it to the Crest yet, where you can look down into where they've built Chambers into like the old quarry. 31:41 And so you, you the starter actually kind of met us up at the parking lot and was like, you guys all played here before and all this sort of stuff, did all the chatter and you're just kind of talking to him walking. And the second you actually get to see the reveal, you see all the Puget Sound out there and the courses in front of you. And it's such a cool moment that like before we hopped on the shuttle, we all stood there with our phones and actually just like took panoramas. 32:04 But that that like reveal your right. Never thought about it but it really is something that sticks with you so I I can only imagine climbing up the hill to win and just seeing it all in front of you. Yeah. And The thing is, once you get up there too, it's like, you know, I think they said at the highest points on the property, there's sight lines for 30 miles, like you can see into South Dakota. 32:23 So it's just, I mean, you talk about flat Nebraska. It is. But this is sitting on a pretty big hill that's, you know, off of an old iceberg. That's yeah, yeah, yeah, I, I think I left that detail out, but yeah, it's like it's, it's it's glacial pasture, not just just flat, flat land. 32:42 OK, so we've let Brett splurge a little bit. We're going to let him splurge a little bit more later on. Why Landman's so great. But I also think it's fair for us to pull in outside perspectives on the courses that we talked about South on level select, we always go out, we grab a five star, then we usually grab a one star. 33:00 In this instance, most of the one star reviews that I could find, we're almost all tea time booking related. I was hoping to find something different but. It was mostly all people either being like no one returns my phone calls or like I can't even change my tea time. 33:19 This is ridiculous. And it's like, yeah, all the tea times are sold out. Like this is of course you can't change your tea time. There's there's no, there's nothing to change. So today we're going to go with A2 star, but I think we found a good two star that's got some other good points that you should be able to rebuttal. 33:36 That's not just like a yeah man, of course you can't change your tee time, right? Yeah, this is the one area I didn't research at all. I was really excited for this segment. So let's do. It so we'll, we'll go into the five star 1st and and and butter it up and then maybe we'll dial it back. 33:52 Yeah, I, I like to think of this, this portion of the show as a nice compliment sandwich. We give it the five star review, we give it the bad review and then we close it out with you talking about must play passes. We we, we sandwich it all really well. OK, so five star review in in quotes here. 34:09 The hills are alive with the sound of golf. If anyone knows that old song that I just ripped off then you can at least appreciate the reference. If you love golf when you are moving through the hills of Landman, you might just want to break out into song. It's that inspiring and that different. 34:27 I've played several other Sandhill courses, but nothing, and I mean nothing, has the land movement of Landman. It is absolutely unique and exhilarating. It's fun, it's quirky, but it's still very good and challenging. Golf you will never forget around at Land Man, that's a promise. 34:44 One other thing, there was a misunderstanding at the beginning of the morning, but Justin JB in quotes stepped in and went above and beyond to make things right. That's outstanding service and I think you'll find that to be the norm. Find the time and go. It's worth the trip, whatever you have to do to make it. 35:03 Brett. Thoughts. I mean. Comments. I, I can't even start to be that poetic. So yeah, I would, I totally agree. Like specifically on like the interactions with the people there. They're super down to earth. 35:19 They're very approachable. There is as much aura as this place has built for itself in terms of in the public media and I you get 0 sense of that when you walk in the clubhouse. I think, you know, I think most of the people that work there are probably from the Homer area. 35:35 I know a fair amount. I always talk to like the kids in the cart barn and those ones, those kids are always from the area and they've kind of like inspired obviously a culture for golf in that area to draw people in and work and build it that way. I mentioned, you know, the people from the community come into play it because old Danes closed. 35:52 And so yeah, I, I think it's spot on. It's so approachable. It's we'll get into the golf here. It's spectacular in that regard too, so I that's not as poetic, but I agree. Nice. OK. Love that. Glad to see that this guy wasn't just buttering it up. 36:10 We had a, you know, you. You're in agreeance there. This should be interesting with this nice two star review. This is where things get. This is the start to get a little. This is where so not not bad enough for A1. Not not bad enough for a one. Well, you'll see why they you know, they they pull out, they they did good and they you know, usually when people do reviews, they start places out of five and they subtract things to get down to A1 or A2. 36:33 So if it has redeeming quality, it gets to hold a star. This person did do that, but this is. Strangest were you? I was gonna say, I think this is the range where you can really get like some meat potatoes, though. It's not just like an emotional one star. It's like you get some thought. They're like, yeah, I can't give it a 1, it's a 2, but I'll see what they got to this. 36:51 Is yeah, this is this is more, this is actually more words than the than the good review. So bear with me here. This one might be a little bit of a long one for the price of play. There aren't many amenities that usually come with that price. The driving range is just weird. 37:07 The farm on Tin cup was better. 12 balls each, no targets, 5 people Max at a time. The practice screen was far too sandy and had no flags. The stimp on the practice screen was probably an 8 or 9, whereas the course was probably playing a 10:50. 37:23 Don't get me wrong, the course was beautiful. Large fairways, great views, challenging undulations, giant greens, but that's really about it. The sand traps were one of the worst I've ever seen. Granted, it may have rained, but when a course charges $150.00 a round, I expect every trap to be raked and groomed every morning by the crews. 37:44 They were abysmal. There was only water two. There was only two water stations throughout the round and they were just Gatorade jugs sitting on a bench. There was only one bathroom facility on hole 8. No trash cans, no ball washers, no GPS on carts, no free water and a pre iced cooler. 38:03 Again the things that make you expect to see when paying that price. The T boxes weren't manicured well, the T markers were just randomly placed, sometimes pointing 45° off target and nowhere near where the hole was. Lastly, some of the greens are a little Mickey Mouse pins placed on top of a molehill. 38:21 Not all, but some. The greens for the most part were in good condition. They rolled pretty nicely and consistent once you figured out the practice green was nothing like the actual greens. For the hype that Landman got, there's a lot of improvements that are needed before I'd consider going. Back There's a lot to respond to here. 38:39 There's, I don't know if you want to go point by point, Brett. I also have some other I have some rebuttals just immediately as a as a golfer individually. One thing I want to ask is you what was the date of the review? So I think this I, I want to say I tried to make sure that this was all before or all after they reopened, right? 39:03 So I want to say that this review was from 20/22 when they had. Reopened. OK, so the one thing I know in the first year they did have some issues with the bunker and I remember the first time I played it, the bunkers, some of the fairway bunkers specifically were definitely playing more like waste hazards. 39:19 I would say they have, I think, I think they replaced the sand in a lot of those bunkers or have at least retailed it and cultivated it to where everything I've since gone back since that first time has been a lot better and kind of more in line with what you'd expect playing out of a actual bunker. 39:37 They have waste areas as well. But so that one I actually think was fair. That was kind of a they, I'm sure heard that a ton in their first year and they responded. So I'll give them kudos for that. The other stuff with the range and the putting green is like spot on. 39:52 Why I have the Iverson test marked. I think it's the most controversial pass. I'm going to give Land Man, but I'll explain why here in a little bit. What was? Give me some of their other points they had. They talked about, they talked about some of the amenities, water stations, 1 bathroom, the the practice green versus like the actual greens on the on the course. 40:19 I would be surprised if that place ever rolled A10 on the stimp. I would say the times I've played it has been more of an 8. When I go play it with new people, I always tell them I was like land man's greens aren't like overly fast, but the ball rolls downhill and there's tons of hills everywhere. 40:38 So I think, you know, they can't. If they make them super slippery, like nothing's going to stay like, like no one's going to get around because there's just so much undulation that it just becomes so hard to manage and tedious to manage for average golfers who are out there playing most of the rounds. 40:54 Yeah, the, the, the one thing that I noticed here was the, the, the leaning in on what the price point was and what they had expected for the price point and knowing when they did this in like 2022. And this is like post COVID golf bump where like golf is just I'm wondering where this person is from, where what they're expecting for $150.00 is probably what you expect out of a $250 course. 41:22 I mean, what I, what I pay for $150.00 round in Southern California, This sounds phenomenal. Like this is this sounds great. It's yeah. And it's all relative, right? Like for the state of Nebraska, it's definitely probably the upper echelon of price points. 41:39 I think the Omaha area, you're nicer public courses are kind of just over that $100 mark now on the weekends. Your muni stuff is probably like 75 bucks I would guess on the weekends. So I think relative to the state is probably how they priced it originally and have just decided not to move it up now. 41:59 I will say for that 150 bucks, there's other courses kind of price around that range in the area. It's kind of a trade off. You're getting much more golf for your 150 bucks than you are. I would say other amenities land man, but I think they've identified that's why people are here. 42:15 So let's lean into that. Let's I think they do a good job of filling the what you want in your golf round. You know, you have food, you have beverages. There is one halfway house after whole 8. Like I said, it's not an out and back. It's a full loop around. And so that's your kind of one spot to restock. 42:32 They tell you there's a separate cooler on the cart. I think they mentioned trash cans. Throw it in there. Like, they're laid back. Just throw it in there. We'll get rid of it later for you. So yeah, that's just the vibe of the place. And so I think everything they said nothing was like struck me as like, wholly untrue, but maybe unfair. 42:50 What? What's the golf season in Nebraska like? What month does golf start after things thaw and when does it end? Yeah, it depends. I think if you're you're avid players, you can sneak out in March and April depending on the weather and the temperature and if you're getting in. 43:08 I've played I'm going to play like one off rounds in December. But generally once school starts again, your courses really slowed down in terms of their business. But I'd say October is probably the end of the season in formally. OK, got you. 43:25 I think that's, I think that's now Land Man's shorter. That's like what Omaha is. I think Land Man runs May through October and that includes they do like a hunt club. It's actually like a, I'm going to not reference this the right way, but they release a certain number of pheasants into the property every year to make it like a wildlife reserve. 43:44 And so they have like a hunt club where you can go hunt in the morning. And I think the people that buy it get to go play unlimited golf at the course 'cause no one else has tee times. And so you kind of get this like you can go hunt some pheasant and then just go play as much golf as you want. And they allow you to like bop around different holes and just have the course and go do what you. 44:02 Want that That was the point I was going to make is that if you're a year round golf destination, like here in you know, T JS in the most year round golf destination ever, Southern California, especially San Diego weather year round is pretty good here out here in Phoenix in the summer, people kind of leave, but the courses are still open and they're still watering and you can play year round golf for people. 44:25 I I'm friends with like back east and stuff who you know, they unfortunately are stuck to The Sims in the winter when they want to try and get some swings out. A shorter season kind of dictates a little bit of the price because there's only so many tee times you can really have in between a shorter window. 44:41 And if you're booking out 2025 in an hour and they're that busy, like it's almost kudos to them that they kept it down to 150 because they could have gone a lot higher with all the demand that's out there. So that's short of a window, I feel like is almost like a value for 1:50 and then add on top of that it being relative to everything else. 45:01 But yeah, I don't think this two star guy had the right price point. Probably not, I think it's really good call for 150 bucks for wherever you're at. Yeah, I would think anyone who's travelling from anywhere else outside of maybe the middle of the country is probably going to be like this course was only 150 bucks to play. 45:21 You know, I know you've got a, you've got a, you've got to drive a little bit to get into it and, and things like that. It's, you know, it's very similar to, you know, wearing the hat here. Rams Hill, like Sean and I went and you play Rams Hill and I don't think Rams Hill is super expensive to go out and play. They'll, they'll give you a free round on your birthday and it's a top 100 course in the country. 45:40 The only problem is, is it's, it's two hours away from anything, right? Like you pretty much. You pretty much have to go do a stay and play if you really want to do it. I mean, you could do it in a day, but it's I love the idea of a 2 hour drive and then a full round of golf in the sun and then another two hour drive. 45:58 Yeah, yeah, I digress. So I digress. OK. So we're going to take a quick break here. Thank our our sponsor for today's podcast, Vice Golf. Yeah, I want to talk a little bit more about today's sponsor, Vice Drink Ware. Vice was created with a simple goal to recount and celebrate the memories we make with each other on the golf course. 46:16 Because let's be honest, our favorite rounds of golf all finish at the 19th hole where we recount the shots throughout the day with a well crafted drink, your favorite cigar and probably a few more gambling games at the table. And the 19th hole, Vice Get is going to have you covered. It's got everything you love from golf, spirits, cigars, gambling that you're going to need to get that after round party started. 46:38 So they offer custom glassware. It's also going to include a coaster ball, markers, lighters and dice for a little bit of gambling. Sean, I know we just got some custom must play ones sent over to us. What are your what are your initial thoughts? I think you've got it there with you. Yeah. Yeah, the packaging was amazing. 46:56 I for anyone watching, he has this really cool rocks glass cover that comes out with the glass in the center and it just elevated the experience before I even took a sip. I just felt like I was excited to put something nice in here. You know, when you get a glass and you're like, this doesn't deserve this. 47:13 It deserves the good stuff. And so that's what I had on her first one and it has our logo right there on the front and it just looks amazing. Yeah, I the, the, the custom etching that came through on the glasses is perfect. The ones that we have currently are the one under that's just going to be just the glass and then they go all the way up to five under where as you step up through the each individual kits, they add another thing into the package. 47:37 So if you want the full experience with all the stuff that we talked about before, that's going to be the five under. And we really think it's a great gift for either your next buddies trip, a golf outing if you're looking to provide a special gift, or if you're running like a corporate event and you want to put your company's logo on there and give them out in swag bags, they're going to be great. 47:54 They can do all that custom etching for you. So if you want to get your own custom glasses built or order one of our own, you're going to head over to vicedrinkware.com. That's going to be VYCE Drink ware.com or for everyone else who wants to look at the must play ones, we're going to include a link down here in the description. 48:12 Head over there and keep the good times rolling. OK, so let's see where this course ranks among some of the questions on the must Play test. Sean and I asked Brett to come to the table with a few of the must Play test questions that Brett would think that Land Man would easily pass. 48:28 He's played a little bit of his hand. He said one of these is getting pretty controversial, so that's going to be kind of interesting. But Brett, what's the first Test that you want to look at here? We're going to start with the controversial one. Let's go to the Iverson test. It's a nice parlay off of the last review here. 48:44 Let's talk about the practice cities, because I know that's something near and dear to this podcast's heart. Yeah. So, yeah, the Iverson test is, does this course have good practice facilities? Would you spend time warming up or just head for the bar before the round? Or it's just a little refresher for those of them? 49:02 Yeah, So definitely warm up suggestion one, there's just a lot of golf ahead of you and it's also part of what you pay for. You get some range balls to go hit. So again, kind of sticking with this farmer theme of being kind of minimalist in a lot of ways aside from the Gulf, you got to realize everything at Land Man is just a different scale. 49:25 And you can look at videos and photos and it's just really hard in that sort of way to give it any sort of validity until you see it with your own eyes. So you go to the driving range, it sits probably 30 yards out the front of the clubhouse. The food truck they have on property that makes, I think that's not a snack, fresh made food for you sits right there. 49:47 There's a big canopy sitting there. It's very social. There's about 5 I would say wooden teas stuck in the ground for you to drop. Some clubs you get a bag of balls and you literally hit out to a field. It is just a field. It's usually about knee high grass, no? 50:03 Flags or anything. No flag. There is one abandoned wagon. It's just wooden wagon sitting out in the field that sits about. I think it's about 160 yards out that you could hit at the rest of it's just like almost unmaintained grassed. I went this time and it looked like it was about like U.S. 50:19 Open rough length like 5-6 inches. So they had voted down to start the season and probably collect balls, but the rest of the year they just let it grow. And so you hit out to it now, not your average practice facility, right? You do have real grass to hit off off of, I'll give them that. But it is one, it's not like your everyday golf course. 50:38 So this isn't where people are going to practice and kind of dial stuff in. You are literally getting some swings in to warm up and it is properly preparing you for what's ahead because everything, like I said, is just massive. I think I remember reading an article interviewing Rob Collins and he said if we realized if we put a 60 yard fairway out here, it would look like it's 20 yards wide. 51:00 So just because you can see, you know, 30 miles in the horizon, it's really hard to get depth perception really see like how far is that bunker or how far from the green am I? It's just everything is so distant that it, everything you know around you is just hard to perceive. 51:16 So it's kind of, you know, open aiming. You aren't really, you're aiming in a direction and to clear certain hills as you play. And for reference to say, OK, it's an open field, you have to be a little more specific than that first T, there's the 1st hole goes out and you have the 18th coming back and there's a section of shared fairway between them. 51:34 I usually play the two TS. It's about which one up from the back and at 2:50 you at the 250 yards out from that T that share fairway is at its widest that fairway stretches 210 yards a wide that you have to hit between. So again, it's sufficient for what you're preparing for because you're aiming, like I said, in a general direction. 51:56 Now, I actually had the same thought on the terms of the putting green. I think the putting green, it actually conjoins on a little neck with the 18th green, kind of sits down below it. And so you can put your way up to the 18th green, kind of watch some guys come in and then kind of go back down and putt. And I think it's still 50 yards wide for the practice area. 52:13 There's only like 4 or five flags I think usually on the whole practice green. And I kind of had a similar thought to her. It's I'm used to, you know, there's like 7-8 things for you to go mess around with. Like, oh, here's a little shorter putt I can do. And they're all kind of like randomly scattered. 52:29 But again, if you go play it, it's like, oh, this actually prepares you for what's ahead. I mean, this place's green complexes are they have four or five greens over 20,000 square feet. And so you know, everything there is, I like to say everything there is bigger except the hole. 52:45 And so you still have this tiny hole placed in middle of a 25,000 square foot green, which the putting Green's like that. There's four or five flags on a 25,000 square foot green. So you're always having these long wag putts that are kind of trundling their way and snaking their way to the flag. 53:01 And so I give the IT a small or a slim pass on the Iverson test because it does prepare you for what is ahead, though it is probably not a great day-to-day practice facility for you. I I like, I like the reasoning. 53:16 I like the I heard from somebody probably last year when they were talking about, I was talking about having some putting wounds and they said, well, what do you do before around what do you? And I was like, oh, I usually just kind of like dial in like some quick little distances on like where my checkpoints are kind of in, like my backswing to where I can have some reasonable, if I know, OK, if I go to like my inside my toe and I hit that, that's going to go this far. 53:38 If I go to the outside of my foot and hit that, it goes this far, dial that in. And they're like, honestly, just go practice lag putts. They're like, you're probably going to be stuck in most rounds at the handicap that you're at. You're probably going to be stuck with a lot of lag putts. So just go figure out what 30 foot to 50 foot putts feel like. 53:56 And this course gives you the opportunity to do that because on a lot of putting greens or on a lot of practice screens, I don't get to do that. Because if you want to practice A50 footer, you're putting past like three people to even roll it toward anywhere towards a hole. Like sometimes you have to just go out there and throw AT in a random spot in the ground to do something like that and not be in everyone's way and be the guy where it's like, oh, this guy just put it across to everybody. 54:19 So I do like that. And that's the other thing with this place too, is actually every tee time is 20 minutes apart. So the flex facilities are like never that busy, right? If you're there an hour early, there's two groups before you before you actually get to tee off. So like there's plenty of space for everybody. 54:35 That's again, kind of I'm kind of beating a dead horse. Like the vibes test, this place gets that and they like lean into that. And so like, you know, 20 minutes between tee times, they want you to go out there and just be slow pace of life, like enjoy the course, soak it all in. I was talking to the gym and he's like, yeah, we encourage people if they want, like there's some fun shots out there. 54:56 You want to hit a couple balls out and do it like you got 20 minutes between you. Like, you know, we're not going to come. There's no Marshall. We're not going to come rag on you if we get, you know, if things really go bad, we'll come find you. But yeah, have your fun. Is the Marshall test one of the three that we're talking about today? Because I mean, talk about not having a Marshall in 20 minute tee time intervals, that that right there is pretty strong. 55:19 That's a strong play. Yeah. And it's, it's for the the pace of play. Like again, this is a destination place. Everyone's coming there to savor and like extend that moment as long as they can and they know that. So it's. But you have the. Comfort to do that it sounds like. 55:36 Oh yeah. And they built it into that and that's, they did it by design, too. They knew they could have done 15 minutes. I think they said when they opened they did 15 minute intervals and they actually thought it was a little too crowded because they kind of booked on average 15 minutes a hole. And so they're like, we kicked it out another 5 minutes after our trial run and just have stayed with it and love it. 55:55 That's so cool. TJ and I just played Rams and we talked about on the pod that there was no one behind us because we played in the middle of the summer on a Monday and it was really weird to keep feeling like you need to go fast. And we look behind us and there was no one there every single time except for like maybe once or twice when there was a single that was just working their way through. 56:18 And it was weird because not only are you used to that, especially living where we live, but it made us think about, well, hold on, I don't need to just kind of look behind this pup once and then go up there and hit it. I have time to actually kind of walk this out maybe, or just like step on this line or figure out what I'm going to do here the way you probably should play golf, you know, because I'm never playing that way. 56:43 We're always just like just, you know, go, go, go, go. That's how. I I think about that all the time whenever I see somebody walk to the opposite side of a hole on a putting green to look at their putt from the other direction. And I'm like, yeah, this guy, I'm like, doesn't this guy know that we got to, we got to play like we got to go. 57:01 We got, we don't have time to do that. Part of it is me. I'm not good enough that that's not probably going to change what I should be doing. But I would love to have. It was, I mean, I would say I, I started to say I would love to have, but having that time to do that was phenomenal. 57:19 It was so refreshing to not have to worry about, you know, we talk about the idea of never having to wait on a tee box to hit and we can just hit when we're ready. But also relieving the pressure of feeling like you have to step on a tee box because you're worried that the group behind you is going to catch up if you start to play slow. 57:39 Yeah. So that, that, yeah, we, I, I think it took us, it took us like the whole front nine that first day to stop looking behind us, right. Yeah. It's such a great way to sorry, it's such a great way to experience a course too. 57:55 Like you get a kind of time to soak it in. And those are the rounds actually I love not that I would want to walk a land man, but those are fun rounds to walk when you can kind of just stroll along and golf's just experience kind of different in that forum. Now. I think a good golf life probably has both of those sorts of rounds. 58:11 Like I like to get a quick nine in in the middle of the week when I can, and I like to kind of have these destination day long sort of adventures where I get to kind of just soak in all this energy and different things around me. Yeah, I have a question about the Iverson real quick test. 58:27 Is there a bunker you can practice in? Oh great question. There is not a practice bunker that I know of. That's a good point, I didn't think about that in my evaluation test. But no, there is not a bunker around the practice screen. 58:43 I mean, it's not a make or break, but it is a nice touch for a lot of practices. Especially at a course like. Kill. Yeah. And of course, it might have a lot of them. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Or whether it's like something that feels like a waste area where you're getting used to what you need, what you think you need to hit out of there. 59:00 Yeah, that's good. OK. So Brett, a debatable pass on the Iverson test, but what was the second test that you wanted to bring up here? Well, I've, like I said, I've talked a lot about this deep brand. 59:16 So we got to go to the Jonesy test and talk about the merch because they do a really great job on the merch. And I know, again, very near and dear to this podcast's heart is the merch involved. The the Jonesy test For those at home, it's Could you see yourself spending $100 on merch in their pro shop? 59:33 Do they have a logo or apparel worth wearing? Absolutely. The I have mentioned the pro shop is very small. I think it's very mighty in terms of what they have available in there though they are very much less, I would say stringent with their brand marks than most courses. 59:54 They have their main marks, but they have a whole locker of alternative marks that they're working in. They have several brand logos developed around. Like the milk carton bunker is this massive faced bunker on the 18th hole that they've built a brand and logos around. 1:00:11 The Hunt Club that I mentioned previously, they have a whole logo set for and have branded stuff around. And in the winter time they'll sell like kind of the old school Elmer Fudd caps with the flap down ears and do fun stuff like that. So so yeah, just to start, you know, you have like a lot of different options. 1:00:27 You're not just getting different polos with this same logo on it. You can look for a different polo that has the logo you want on it. Now, I'd say, again, it's a small shop, so there's not a ton of apparel options and they don't offer any sort of like clubs or fitting or anything of that sort. So it's all merchandise. 1:00:44 They really do a good job though, I think in the kind of golf accessories and gifts, if you will. Very much. They have this series they've done recently where they've actually replaced the giant windsock at the clubhouse and turned it in, found a maker to turn it into like bags and club head covers and stuff like that. 1:01:03 They're they're selling, they hired A photographer to come out, take photos of the course and sell a coffee book that's just like, you know, just picture after picture of different angles of the course to kind of help you remember. And so, and then because they have people staying on property, they have fun things like customized decks of cards and cups for dice and kind of things that they can sell to the guys they're staying in the cabin. 1:01:25 So really strong brand forward. They're not afraid to kind of do some more modern things that a lot of your traditional courses wouldn't. And so it's just a very fun compliment to what is already a great kind of experience across the board and this vision that they had for what modern golf looks and feels like. 1:01:44 I'm looking at some of the merch right now. As you started speaking, I saw, I saw some of those items you just mentioned and I'm already like Harding, two of them that I really want. So that's the one thing I wanted to mention too, is they often times have more stuff on the site. And I know they used to keep a lot of the merch at Old Dane and if you like found it while you were there, they would run to Old Dane during your round and bring it back for when you were done. 1:02:05 You got to pick it up or pick it up when you show up if you order it beforehand. Yeah. That's one that's very cool. I I remember I was exposed to the branding for it. I think sometime last summer, Sean Scott Brooks, PNW golfer, took a trip out there with with Ryan, the owner of Wildwood. 1:02:29 This is like a weird like the all the must play circles are are overlapping here. So PNW golfer, former guest Ryan, who owns Wildwood. Like I think, I think our first official must play golf course that we ever reviewed. And then I know another influencer went out with them, Faden Fairway. 1:02:47 His name is Tyler, I believe. They were out there and I remember seeing a lot of the merch. Ryan's obviously a big merch guy being over at Wildwood. So he was posting pictures of, he's a big branding guy as well. So he was posting pictures of all of the branding and I was immediately enamored by the windsock. 1:03:03 I thought that that was like the coolest thing ever. Just a very different feel than what you are so used to. Like everyone is used to like the same two to three types of of flag pins that you'll usually see. So there's a, you know, it's, it's I'm a sucker for something that jumps out that is not of the norm pin flags. 1:03:27 I, it was, it was a, it was a subtle joke. Sorry, Rev. We love the other Rev. They actually knew at the end of the year they had an auction, charity auction. They actually auctioned off the wind socks from each hole. 1:03:43 I tried to get 18 but got out bid. What smashed my bid? I don't know what do you what, what, what did you bid, what, what, what number was north of that? I yeah, 'cause they like, I don't, I think they probably regretted it. They put it on their social media, like if you want to bid, just message us and we'll bid for you. 1:04:00 Oh, no. And so I was like trying to go back and forth with them, like, hey, I'll go up to this. If I can't get 18, I'll take whatever else. I think they just fell behind. I I said I'd go up to like 250 bucks and I think 18. I don't think they told me what it went, but it went. They were like, you weren't close. 1:04:17 Oh wow, I can imagine. I can imagine that that they're pretty. They're pretty cool. Like it's a really cool. It's also a really cool piece to like hang in your office or whatever 'cause it's like, what? Why do you have a win? Why do you have a win stock in your office? And you're like, actually it's a golf course flag. 1:04:34 Yeah. I am having AII have to close the website 'cause I just keep scrolling through all of the different merch things that they have being enamored by that. OK, Let's jump into the third test that you want to talk about here. Brett. What are we looking at? 1:04:51 We got to talk about some of the golf holes, right? Like that's why we've talked about it's a golf forward facility. So let's talk about some golf holes. OK, so we're, I think we're talking question 5, the buzzworthy test, right? Are there multiple holes worth talking about? Does this course have more than one hole that a group would want to immediately go play again? 1:05:11 Take it away. And I think my previous comment about the owner saying there's some fun shots out there. If you want to hit two of them, feel free that there's, you know, they know what they got. So I yeah, there's it's probably more a question of what holes don't you remember? 1:05:27 And it's the ones you might be just purging from your memory because you played them poorly. The first one that really sticks out. Hole one is super fun. They start you off with a par 5. I mentioned that that 250 mark, it's 210 yards wide, shared fairway with 18 plays up the hill. 1:05:43 Just kind of your first taste if you it's got a a choice off the bat, if you kind of this is consistent throughout the course. The course's teeth comes from space and just playing with your vision in different ways. 2 the wind and then three, the hills and undulation that you're going to combat. 1:06:01 So right off the bat you have, you know, you can take a more aggressive line that'll get you. You know, if you could clear 250 and it might be into the wind over ravine and catch the right side of that fairway, you'll have an angle to go at that green. And two, you can stay, there's fairway all the way to the left and kind of you can play over to eighteenths fairway and it'll be safe kind of from the T box, but you're going to be playing way back across a kind of berm to get back onto 1's fairway and you're going to have less visibility as you go into the green. 1:06:29 So that that hole to start is just like this great kind of entrance for what you're about to encounter for the rest of the round. One of my favorite holes, and it seems like the architects that in that kind of community and golf's favorite holes is hole 3. And it has this feature that they call the baranca, which I don't know if I've ever heard used anywhere else in golf or life for that matter. 1:06:52 That's the green, right? No. So the Branca or what they refer to this, I think, unless I'm misinterpreting, is this like it kind of, I describe it to people, it's like if you imagine a like stream bed kind of winding through and has like tall grass and Reed sort of kind of plants on the side, take away the water and put like lowly maintained fairway grass in the middle. 1:07:15 And that's what the Branca is. So if you look at whole 3 on land and you'll see it, there's like this winding patch of like dark grass down the left center of the fairway. And it's this like drainage ditch that they kind of say on the yardage book. Like we do our best to maintain it, but it's kind of a hazard area that you have to play out of. 1:07:33 Then on both sides of it is probably, I don't know, 18 inch tall grass and this thing runs right up to the left side of the green. I actually had avoided it to date until this last round and I actually had a chip shot that I had to play from out of the baranca over the grass and then it was immediately onto the green at a near flag. 1:07:51 So it's kind of like a weird short sighted situation out of a baranca. So that hole often captivates a lot of people. And if there's probably some good publicity about that hole out there, fried egg and those sorts of publications have covered it. But just a really setting the beautiful hole again off the tee. 1:08:09 The bunkers on the right said I think about 200 yards and they just are visually imposing, but they're actually the correct line for your tee shot as over the bunkers there's fairway that kind of opens up behind it and get you in position A for the green. So it's just a really fun strategic hole, unique features to it, and just a real kind of hole That is the essence of what the Gulf at Land Man is like. 1:08:34 A baranca is a steep sided ravine, goalie or gorge of varying width and depth. Common in golf courses in Southern California like LACC, Riviera, Wilshire, etcetera. I don't, I don't think we have. So I don't think we have any Barancas down in San Diego. 1:08:49 I haven't seen one of those before yet. It's it's exactly like what you described in the picture I'm looking at right now. That's so cool though, I love that. It's a very cool, unique feature I haven't seen. I mean, I've seen like, you know, ravines and ditches and stuff like that, but even out of the Sandhills, that sort of element I haven't seen at those golf courses. 1:09:08 Yeah, I love holes that make you like, Pete Dye does this really well where he puts some danger out there and it shouldn't be a problem. But for whatever reason, it's all you can think about and it shapes how you play the hole. 1:09:26 It's like he gets in your head and you're like, is this Branca necessarily? Like maybe I'm one of the shots? It might be, I don't know. But it's like if that was missing, this hole would be kind of straightforward. But now that's out there in your head. And so you're just like, you're thinking about your club choice, or maybe I need to do this instead and it takes you out of your typical flow. 1:09:48 I kind of like that about some holes. Yeah, it's like. It's go ahead, Brett. Go ahead, DJ. No, I was just thinking about it in terms of like, if it was just any other patch of rough, you'd be like, OK, it's whatever, I'm just hitting out of rough here. But like, it's just dialed up just enough to have you be worried about trying to stay out of it because, you know, it could really ruin a hole. 1:10:08 And like, you're not going to probably lose a ball in it, but like, it's definitely going to add 1 to 2 strokes on a hole. Yes, yeah. And if you end up in it, it's definitely going to change how you play it. I think the cool thing about it too is a lot of these features often like in a fairway, are kind of captive to there. 1:10:25 This one actually runs all the way up, runs greenside. Like, I mean, it's like the first cut off of the fringe and then it's to the barranca and you're like in it. It's like a greenside bunker almost for the green. Yeah, there's a course up here in Scottsdale called Dove Valley that has a lot of washes, like, you know, rocky sand washes that go across the fairways. 1:10:48 And there's this one home particular in this par four that it doesn't it should not be an issue whatsoever. And other holes have the wash, right. But at the edge of the wash they put this stupid like cinder block wall. And so it's just enough blocks high. 1:11:05 It's only like two or three blocks high to where you think to yourself, if I go into that wash, I am fucked, excuse my language. You're going to have to hit sideways, backwards. And so you wind up taking a lot less club because you do not want to be against that cinder block wall. 1:11:22 And I think that they put that there, but it does make you think a little differently. Is it is it a cinder block wall or is it like pavers? No, it's like blocks, like a wall blocks you would see in a residential home that they just put and then they put the grass starting on that and it goes up to. The green, yeah, I remember when I played Seven Canyons, there's a hole at 7 canyons like that where it's like, oh, if you go on like the whole right side of the hole, like the greens elevated. 1:11:45 And it's not elevated by grass, it's elevated by literal blocks on a on a wall. So it's like if you come up short on that side, unless you have a 72° club in your bag, you're you're you're punching back out into the fairway to hit a shot into the grid. 1:12:01 Yeah, yeah. OK, Well, I think that about covers it for land man. But Brett, I want to leave a little bit of room open for you to talk about bird darts. Obviously we are huge proponents of bird darts. We probably know everything that's going on and maybe if you're an avid must play listener, you've probably heard us talk about bird darts a ton. 1:12:21 But in case someone is uninformed or this is their first exposure 'cause they came in because of landmen, tell us about bird darts, where they can find you, what you've got going on. Give us the give us the full spiel. It's. Probably easier, I should say, to show than tell. 1:12:37 The Bird darts. Premium golf Tees in a cigarette style pack just meant to be fun. This is kind of my me scratching my sports itch. It was, it's a side hustle for me. I started it out of purely of passion, had a fun idea, had some people I really enjoyed working with kind of get on board with it. 1:12:57 And it's kind of really grown on me. And so we are just doing the golf Tees right now. We also do custom runs of those packs. And so it's kind of as a corporate giveaway item or we are running some for courses, whether they have an event they want to do sell them out of their pro shop as part of their brand experience and how they're kind of marketing to their clientele. 1:13:18 We're looking to kind of meet people at that point because, you know, we're I'm out to make this a communal game to find my community in this, you know, have some fun building and kind of making decisions around my own business. And this has been a really good fit for me. 1:13:33 And it seems like a good fit for the golf industry too, because it's been well received and it's eating up a lot of my free time. You you also do a a decent amount of collabs with like other brands as well, right 'cause you'll do Co branding on the whole package. They don't just like slap a logo on it or on the T and then call it a day, right? 1:13:52 Yeah, correct. I'll give these guys a shout out 'cause they Lincoln Country Club Swing Fest actually started today. They were my first Co branded order and so we actually, I do swap out logos here. I can do barcodes on the side, but it's a full white labeled products specific to whatever brand. 1:14:10 And for my bigger brands and partners, I've done a full redesign of the package and just kind of say, hey, let's make this even more specific to what you're trying to do and accomplish. So yeah, it's been a fun platform to kind of take around and just network behind, meet people and kind of work my way into the golf industry. 1:14:28 I was previously in basketball, so it's been familiar but different in a good way to like, just refreshing to have it back. Sports is interesting like that 'cause you can definitely parallel like a lot of the other things that you have from previous sports that you've played into golf, But nothing, nothing weirdly like captures people like let nothing weirdly also captures people like golf does where it's like no one has ever, no one has ever played one game of basketball been like, yes, I am all the way in People play one round of golf and they're like, yes, this is my personality now like. 1:15:03 Yeah, you see the bug, you know, Yeah. Other sports. Don't have a bug like it. Yeah. And just the breadth of the community in golf, I think especially anymore, is insane. It touches people in all walks of life from all over the world and but captivates us all in the same way, which is kind of the awesome commonality we have with it. 1:15:24 Yeah. Yeah. So also go ahead, Sean. No, you go ahead. No, I'm going to talk about bird darts a little bit more, so go ahead if. You. Oh, yeah. That's what I want you to do. I want you to talk more about bird darts. I'd love to. I'm a huge fan and I love to pull them out, put them up in the little slot in the cart in the front. 1:15:43 And if I'm playing as a single and I have a guy next to me, I've had this happen twice now where the guy goes, hey, would you just mind smoking those? So like that, like a further away, like just not in the cart. And I'm, and I, I like to sometimes just flip it open and pull out of tea with my mouth. 1:16:01 Just show them. I love it. It's such a cool, like, you know, hey man, these actually aren't cigarettes and they show them that, which is also what I do sometimes when I have it, I put it there and I grab it and I, let's say I have something in my hand like my phone because I want to film something. I just pull one out with my mouth, kind of like a cig. 1:16:17 It feels natural, yeah. And then the other question I had for you was, I get this all the time and I didn't know the answer until I looked it up, but the height of your TS because you have a standard height that you make the TS right? I do. They are right at manufacturing's in millimeters, but they are right around the two and 3/4 inch. 1:16:36 So it's a standard height. TI have plans to launch a tall T version of that, so it'll be the three and 1/4 inch T hopefully before the end of the year. Gotcha. OK. I think I like the two, three quarter. 1:16:51 I think it's the perfect, you know, height. But the guy that I was playing with, he asked 'cause he has TS that he has a little line drawn and it he knows that's the exact like depth he wants to put the T for his driver. Do you do that in any custom orders? 1:17:07 Can you put like a line on the on the T? Or does he have a line? No, I know. Can you change it like can you ask? Can you if you? Were to do a Co grain, could you specify? For sure. Yeah, teas are fully customizable. I don't have any of my branding on it. My kind of default design to people is the same striping as mine. 1:17:26 It just kind of maximizes the space for the brand is kind of what went around that thought. But yeah, it's fully customizable. I've worked some kind of more classic designs with different stripings and stuff throughout the whole kind of length of the tea. So yeah, fully customizable. 1:17:44 Cool. OK, nice. Excellent. So also, Brett, where can people buy them at? Great question. Bird darts.com is my website. I probably should have led with that. Amazon is also. We're on Amazon. We are a prime product so you can get your free 2 day shipping with bird darts. 1:18:03 I've had people get them same day even now. So Yep those are the best ways to find us. Instagram is just at bird darts. TikTok is my other channel also just bird darts. So yeah, get out there, swing away. Yeah, they, they come in, you can buy singles, 4 packs and then you can buy I believe a carton of 10, correct. 1:18:27 Correct. Yeah. So singles, 4 packs and the 10 packs are all available. Custom orders start at a minimum of 300 packs. Good to know, good to know for people. So I think that about covers it. I think we got it all off the board. 1:18:42 Yeah, Brett, this was incredible. Like I've this has been a this has been a long time coming. This is, it's like I said, it's, it's always cool, Brett. And I've talked about it where, you know, he is the unofficial first sponsor. I think you're I think you are the first person whoever sent us anything. 1:19:00 So that's it's kind of cool to like, I'm not saying that we're buttoning this up because this is not the end of all of this, but it is cool to at least like close this first portion of the chapter, right? Yeah, a nice next step kind of in front of us now. Now we actually need to get together and play golf, right? 1:19:16 Like we're all doing the stuff for. So I mean, ultimately that's our goal with level select. I know, I think we're on, I think this is our fifth episode of Level Select so far. But the ultimate goal here is that at some point we are going to go out and play this round with the people who we've had these podcasts with. 1:19:33 And then have you come back on? And then we can actually put it through the full must play Test and then see, you know, maybe Sean and I fail it. Maybe Sean and I fail the Iverson Test and we hated the range, you know, maybe it's too quirky for us. So. Well, there's one test that's going to be sorry, there's one test that's going to be tough, which is how easy it is to get the tee time on this. 1:19:53 Yeah. Pretty tough. Yeah, that's gonna be, that's gonna be the ultimate. That's gonna be the ultimate is how far in advance do we have to try and plan this trip to make sure that we have a tee time for it and then that nothing else comes up in the time before any of this? 1:20:10 So obviously stay tuned to Must Play. We really want to try and at least connect on this at some point and get out to Nebraska. Maybe if we don't do Landman, we do something else. We'll see. I know Brett's got some other courses that he really wanted to talk about. That he absolutely loves that we've heard nothing but good things about. 1:20:28 But as always, if you're watching on YouTube, don't forget to like, comment, subscribe, maybe even turn a bell on if you want to know when we drop new episodes. And if you're listening or watching on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, don't forget to rate, level, select and subscribe for more upcoming and future episodes. 1:20:46 Guys, appreciate it. Thank you again, Brett, and we'll talk to you next time when we unlock a new level. © 2025 Spotify AB Legal Privacy Cookies