The bubble is in place. The COVID-19 tests are ready.
Golf will resume this week, in earnest, as players arrive at Colonial Country Club in Fort Worth, Texas, for the Charles Schwab Challenge — the first PGA Tour event since the coronavirus pandemic took hold mid-March.
How will tournament organizers handle this week’s proceedings, which will be unlike any other in the history of the Tour?
Very carefully, according to Charles Schwab Challenge tournament chairman Rob Hood, who has spoken with numerous media outlets in the days leading up to the event. He and tournament director Michael Tothe have been repeating a similar script, insisting that the Tour’s testing and limitation protocols will keep everyone on site at minimum risk.
When asked if there’s a specific number of people that, if tested to be positive for COVID-19, could shut down the tournament, Hood told the crew on Golf Channel’s Morning Drive that he wasn’t sure.
“I don’t know the specific headcount at this point but there are a lot of procedures in place,” Hood said. “Everyone who comes on to property will have to be thermal screened and checked off the list. We basically have two groups of people — those that have been tested and those who have not been tested.
“The ones that are tested, of course, will be the people that are in close proximity to the players but everyone who comes on the property will be thermal screened and have to answer a list of questions, and then checked off so we know everyone who is on the golf course and we know that they’ve all been cleared.”
Since the PGA Tour shut down March 12 after the first round of the Players Championship due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Tour officials, other players, tournament directors and health experts developed a plan for the resumption of play at Colonial Country Club.
That 37-page plan details safety and health rules and guidelines for the return, including layered testing protocols and social distancing standards. Its objective is to create a safety bubble to limit as much risk as possible.
Hood said the membership at the prestigious Colonial Country Club and the entire Dallas-Fort Worth golf community have been understanding in the need to keep players isolated. That means no access for some who often pay top dollar to be given access.
“We’re ready to go,” Hood said. “I’m looking out the window now and everybody is just working hard and just excited to get started.
“We have to make sure that their health and their safety is our No. 1 priority and the membership gets it. They get it. We really had to start from scratch here.”
The field at the Schwab is the best in its history as 101 of the players have won on the PGA Tour, the most winners in a field outside of the Players Championship during the FedEx Cup era. All of the world’s top 5 will be on hand, the first time a tournament field can boast that since the Official World Ranking began in 1986.
The Charles Schwab Challenge is the first PGA Tour event since the Players Championship, which was canceled March 13 after the first round. Eleven tournaments with more than $90 million in purse money have been canceled.