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"The International" reaches the 19th Hole

Contributed by: Michael Robinson on 2/11/2007

One of the great goals of any real estate developer it to hit a homerun for his new project.

One way is to plant a golf course into the middle of your developement. A 'Grand Slam" is to get the Professional Golf Association ("PGA") to place your golf course on "The Tour", i.e. a PGA event. Plum Creek got a "Senior Tour" for a couple of years in the early '80's. Then Jack Vickers scored a true Grand Slam with Castle Pines when he put it on the PGA tour and he deserved it.

Vickers, along with Jack Nicklaus, had come onto the valley now known as Happy Canyon about 40 years ago in a helicopter. These two admitted golf nuts flew down the original ColoradoTerritorial Road from Denver over the Daniels Park area where Kit Carson had built his last campfire in the 1860's and there, where the high plateau land suddenly dropped, they saw it.

A perfect golf course lay at their feet. Where Daniel C. Oakes had built Colorado's first sawmill, was a valley that would become a true, world class golf course. They called it Castle Pines.

Jack Vickers built Castle Pines. The new golf course community ran along Happy Canyon Road, spreading close to the new I-25 as it dipped down into Castle Rock.

At the time Vickers made this golf community come to life, Douglas County had all of 25,000 people and Castle Rock had about 4,000 residents. No one had a clue of the growth and prosperity that would ensue.

When the first tournament , called "The International", happened in 1986, the Denver Newspapers and TV channels didn't even consider Castle Rock worthy of mention in either weather, community, or news crime matters. This invisibility changed as CBS brought The International to life, "Live on CBS".

Vickers made the decision to use the Stableford system of scoring for the tournament so that an agressive golfer could leapfrog over other contestants if he took a great chance and succeeded. That's what happened many times during The International's run.

The first International that was televised opened with a helicopter flight racing over Colorado's Old Territorial Road complete with thundering buffalo then dropping down to the glorious, green golf course designed, dreamed and built by Nicklaus and Vickers. The world noticed.

Over the next years, all of Castle Rock's civic groups came forward to helpThe International grow and prosper. I was a member of the Castle Rock Chamber of Commerce, the Optimists, and the VFW in those early golf days.

I spent many long, memorable, and joyful hours in tents at The International helping make it an institution in our community. We poured a lot of beer for the fansand I learned that mixing iced tea and lemonade makes an " Arnold Palmer".

It was wonderful.

As the years went by, professional golf changed. It became dominated by large corporate sponsors, the Buick Open, etc. These corporate sponsors started gobbling up the very golfers themselves. Buick gobbled up Tiger Woods.

Since the International bumped into the Buick on the golf schedule, Tiger bowed to his sponsor and The International didn't get Tiger. Big Golf couldn't stomach the Stableford system with its unpredicability.

The " Brand Name" golfer was an investment and needed to be protected and not embarassed by some new golfer that took a chance under the Stableford rules. The Corporate Pattern of predictability must prevail. In this world, Vickers was a small fish and swimming against the tide.

This " big fish eats small fish" pattern continued until the PGA finally killed off The International, moving it to an obscure July date, between the top two major European golf events. The International would no longer be International with golfers coming from all over the world.

It was over if you had a true love of the game. Jack Vickers had the true love and this week, he ended The International Tournament, effective immediately. Good for Jack.

Golf is not a job. It is not a vocation. It is a true "amateur" sport. This word amateur comes from the latin " Amato" meaning "to love". In the past , this writer has written about the Daniels Park history where Castle Pines lays and of a Virginia couple who lived with golf and Castle Pines foremost in their lives.

The International is inextricably intertwined with golf and the lives and loves of the people who have lived it. It's a shame that the Professional Golf Association has so little love of history, has so little love of the Amato of the game, and has so little nobility to match the people that have made this game the great game it is today.

As the future progesses, sports will most likely become more and more commercial, more and more programmed and more predictable. The commercials will be as predictable as those we saw in the Super Bowl and sports life will become more and more "big bucks" and thus more predictable.

We will all yawn and another part of life will die for each and every one of us.

RIP International

Mike Robinson


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Submitted By: Michael Rule
posted on 2/13/2007 @ 6:21:48 PM
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Obviously you have a great love of the game. I worked on the "International Course" for the first few years it was around, including the first year of the tournament. One of my great thrills was seeing Arnold Palmer and talking to Jack Nicklaus as he walked form #10 green to #11 tee. But a game of amateurs? If you mean people with enough $$ to cover greens fees, etc., then maybe. In reality the Castle Pines Golf Club is the refuge of the invited rich. Let's not forget that. And Jack lost control of the development surrounding it a long time ago. And that glorious green golf course you speak of is off limits to us commoners. The true amateur sport of the masses? Give me a hoop at the playground and an old basketball anytime.
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Submitted By: John Zwick
posted on 2/13/2007 @ 4:42:40 PM
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I was never much of a golf guy but I'll miss the International. Caught it a few times and had a great time. Watching Jesper Parnevik at top form was a blast.
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Submitted By: Kevin Villegas
posted on 2/13/2007 @ 12:29:15 PM
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I'm so happy I was able to go to the International in its final year. I'll never forget being so close to the best golfers in the world that I could reach out and touch them. RIP International, indeed.
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Submitted By: Travis Henry
posted on 2/13/2007 @ 11:54:33 AM
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I remember visiting the International during the Pro-Am events. What an amazing time. It is an event that will be truly missed. Sad.
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Submitted By: Joseph Kirchmer
posted on 2/12/2007 @ 9:27:11 AM
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Thanks for the memories Michael!
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Showing 1-5 of 5 comments
CONTRIBUTOR INFORMATION

Michael Robinson

Castle Rock , CO

Michael Robinson has posted 421 stories and 29 comments since joining on 9/14/2005. Michael Robinson's average story rating is 4.35.
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