As a golf course superintendent, Stephen Rabideau wears many hats - agronomist, accountant, personnel manager and counselor. In 2020, he also put on the hat of amateur psychologist in an attempt to console members of his team when an event for which they had been preparing for months was cast into doubt in the early stages of the pandemic.
Rabideau and his crew at Winged Foot in Mamaroneck, New York, had been busy getting the West Course ready for the 2020 U.S. Open, when the event was put on hold and its fate uncertain, sending their collective psyche on a months-long roller coaster ride. And when it was decided the Open would be played - without fans - late into the summer from Sept. 17-20, a smaller-than-usual team was charged with providing U.S. Open conditions at the end of the season when they normally would be getting the course ready for the offseason.
"We had no idea what was going on with the Open," Rabideau said. "There was so much unknown, and there was a letdown among those on the crew.
"The Open gets moved to September, and now we have to keep the golf course perfect through the summer. That's hard. In September we're holding a U.S. Open when we're normally aerifying the golf course because it's tired."
By early March, construction of staging areas was underway. The following week, there were at least 100 more people on site as construction continued. By the third week, everything changed.
"We were two years out preparing for the Open," Rabideau said. "In December of 2019, we were building and paving roads. We put in 5,000 feet of water lines to get to the USGA's food areas. In January and February of 2020 it was so mild we worked all winter.
"Covid began ramping up, then the USGA stopped work and sent their guys home. Everything was at a standstill. We didn't know if there was going to be an Open."
New York quickly earned the reputation as being the epicenter of the virus, but Rabideau and his team were deemed essential workers.
"People were being told to stay home, because it was not safe, but we were told it was OK to come to work," he said. "We had no idea what was going on with the Open. It was confusing. Team morale was pretty bad."
A month after the world had shut down, Rabideau still did not know if there would be an Open, or whether the months of work put in by his team would all be for nothing.
"There were rumors it might move, and there were rumors that it hinged on the British Open," he said. "Everyone was fighting for the same weekend in the fall. One weekend, we were told that it was moving. That was not good.
"Motivating our guys was becoming really hard. From March, all the April and May into a week or two into June, we still had less than half a staff to maintain two top-100 golf courses, but the expectations were the same. The guys were asked to do more, all not knowing what was going on with the Open."
Finally, by July, word came that the Open would be played - in September and without fans.
"That was another letdown," he said. "That meant no family, no friends, nobody."
Whether it was the drama and uncertainty of the Open schedule, or the late summer date on the calendar, none of that prevented Rabideau and his team from providing the world's best players with Open-caliber conditions.
After winning his first major championship in September, Bryson DeChambeau called Winged Foot "an incredible test" and eight-time majors champion Tom Watson called the West Course "arguably the toughest course there is."
"The big thing was the rough," Rabideau said. "We were fertilizing and watering the rough through the summer. Then if you do that, you have to spray it. This was not an easy year. It was hot and dry, and we had to keep the greens, tees, fairways, approaches and rough perfect until fall. That is a lot. Then by September we had two hours less daylight.
"We were really busy seven days a week. Typically, we're aerifying in September. This year, we were hosting a U.S. Open instead."
