16 SEMI L LAS F I TO The first nine holes have been seeded at LaFincaGolf Los Lagos, a new 18-hole golf course designed by Stirling &Martin in Madrid, Spain. LaFincaGolf will be a top-quality urban golf course and centrepiece of a high-end real estate residential area on the outskirts of the capital. The 550-hectare LaFincaGolf development includes luxury houses, a three-storey apartment building and a commercial centre. The golf course is being built by GTM Golf and is expected to finish in 2022. Semillas Fito is the seed supplier of the turfgrass varieties and blends for this harsh climate, which endures cold winters and very hot summers. The use of creeping bentgrass on tees, fairways and greens has been very challenging in terms of achieving sustainability and playability. For the rough, a mixture of festuca arundinacea with some poa pratensis has been chosen in order to make a very different leaf texture surface with very limited maintenance needs. The varieties selected have been rated highly by the National Turfgrass Evaluation Program (NTEP) in the USA and Sports Turf Research Institute (STRI) in the UK. Moreover, the varieties have already been used at other golf courses, showcasing the adaptability of the product as it can perform well in climates with extreme hot summers and chilly winters. For greens, we have selected Agrostis stolonífera Tour Pro, our latest release that has come through the Rutgers University programme. This variety performed well in the latest NTEP tests, showing unbeatable disease tolerance, especially to dollar spots and brown patches. Moreover, it has less maintenance needs than other elite creeping bentgrass varieties, which is why Tour Pro has been chosen for many projects around the world. The results at LaFincaGolf so far have been awesome. For more on Semillas Fito, turn to page 49 or visit www.semillasfito.com Josep Cirera, turfgrass director at Semillas Fito, explains the seed supplier’s role in the LaFincaGolf Los Lagos project in Madrid Ensuring high performance Photo: Semillas Fito
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