\n\t\t\t\tLaolao Bay Golf & Resort a day after Typhoon Soudelor hit Saipan. (Contributed Photo)\n\n\t\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n\u201cWe erected and re-planted about 95 percent of the trees in the entrance. And it took us a week just to clear the road going inside the golf resort,\u201d said Laolao golf course operations manager Tony Satur.<\/p>\n
\u201cOn both golf courses, 80 percent of the trees were uprooted. That\u2019s why our crew is still working to plant them again and replace the ones that need to be replaced,\u201d added the CNMI Sports Hall of Famer.<\/p>\n
The golf range, near the hotel, was the first to open two days after the typhoon.<\/p>\n
Satur said the east course, considered Laolao\u2019s signature course with its layout along Saipan\u2019s cliffs in Kagman, opened its nine holes after a week.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe opened only nine holes. There\u2019s still debris on the course, which added to the difficulty in the layout, but it is playable. We opened the full 18 holes a few days after\u201d said Satur.<\/p>\n
The west course\u2019s first nine holes was cleared of debris one-and-a-half weeks after and before the end of August the entire golf and resort was fully operational.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s still some cleaning up to do. But the course is ready and playable. The conditions of the east and west courses are now back to normal,\u201d Satur said.<\/p>\n
An average of 80 golfers play in both courses during weekdays and it shoots to more than 100 every weekends.<\/p>\n
Laolao Bay Golf & Resort acting human resources manager Pina Magofna said being closed for a month cost management a huge amount of money. \u201cLaolao lost about $350,000 in revenues after Soudelor. That\u2019s including the hotel, golf course, and the restaurant.\u201d<\/p>\n
The entire golf and resort, located in the east side of Kagman, was a land used for grazing by cattle farmers before.<\/p>\n
Japan\u2019s Shimizu Corp. turned the land into a golf and resort in the mid 1990s tapping golf legend Greg Norman to design a 36-hole course.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Laolao Bay Golf & Resort was the first to resume full operations a few weeks…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":211650,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[7343,7344,7345,6333],"class_list":["post-211641","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-greg-norman","tag-pina-magofna","tag-shimizu-corp","tag-typhoon-soudelor"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/211641","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=211641"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/211641\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/211650"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=211641"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=211641"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=211641"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}