Centerville’s Yankee Trace had one of its best years in 2016

Credit: TREMAYNE HOGUE/STAFF

Credit: TREMAYNE HOGUE/STAFF

As the Dayton-area golf market shrinks — with the closing of Weatherwax in Middletown and Sugarcreek’s Rollandia scheduled to transform into a residential area — Centerville’s Yankee Trace golf course is thriving despite the setbacks of its contemporaries.

“I think it comes down to: You’ve got to have a great location—which we do. Montgomery County has a large golf population, which helps. What helps separate us from a lot of the other courses is that the city of Centerville built this property,” Steve Marino said. “They went the extra mile.”

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Marino, Yankee Trace’s PGA head professional, attributes the course’s 2016 attendance to a variety of factors, including weather and location. Those combined factors allowed Yankee to have over 54,250 total rounds of golf in 2016, up slightly from last year’s 54,181.

Through September, Yankee Trace generated $2.8 million in revenue, putting it ahead of 2015, when it generated $3.5 million, which includes alcohol and food sales from the dining hall.

Projected revenues have allowed the city to lower rates at Yankee for 2017, including a $100 reduction for their mid-day annual membership.

Monday through Thursday and weekends and holidays will see a $1 reduction in price in 2017 for adults playing 18 holes, moving to $36 per person Monday through Friday and $46 for weekends and holidays.

Friday, which used to be considered in weekend rates, will now have it’s own base rate. Eighteen holes for adults will start at $41 and $30 for juniors (ages 17 and under).

The nine-hole option for Fridays will be $21 for adults and $17 for juniors.

Annual mid-day memberships are also decreased to $995, down from $1,095.

“Setting the rates are so important,” Marino said. “We want to give everybody nice value for their money, but we’re also considering prices on a nice day.”

Marino says the revenues for Yankee Trace in 2016 could be the second or third highest since the course opened in 1995.

Jeff Oldham, a Bellbrook resident, says while he has played at other courses like Pipestone and Beavercreek, he prefers Yankee Trace because of its “country club atmosphere.”

“They take care of this course. They’re great with manicuring it, everything is nice. It’s just nice,” Oldham said.

Yankee Trace offers a 27-hole course, with a nine-hole option. The addition of their nine-hole course, which greatly reduces the amount of time spent golfing, has been a large part of why they’ve been successful, according to Marino.

“We opened that third nine in 2003 and it ended up being one of the best things we did,” Marino said. “That’s just like having an extra course.”

The nine-hole option has also seen an increase in rounds this year, jumping from 15,207 rounds in 2015, to 15,980 in 2016, due mostly to the increase in league play, according to Marino.

The combination of warm weather, and a great golf course in a good location isn’t the perfect recipe for a successful course, as some locations in Dayton can attest. While Centerville has seen their course enjoy one of their best years ever, eight courses in the Miami Valley have closed since 2012, with Rollandia scheduled to be the ninth.

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Rollandia is closing due to Schottenstein Real Estate buying the property from the owners with plans of developing the land into a senior/assisted living community.

The closures leave about 100 courses operating in the 14-county territory served by the Miami Valley Golf Association.

Steve Jurick, executive director at MVGA, reports a steadily declining number of rounds played since 2012 as well, with an 11 percent decrease in rounds played—for 2016—from their eight year average of 177,000 rounds.

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