Release
Understood. But having worked at this facility in an assistant professional capacity for several years, not to mention being a former member there for more than several years prior, I'm overly familiar with the average total of rounds played there this time of season, and absolutely nothing has prevented them from moving the tournament date up a week, maybe even two weeks, as there is virtually very little activity at this facility from November onward.
They average 30k rounds per year, which primarily consists of April through October play. But for whatever reason they continue to push this event to the latter part of November because of maybe 20 rounds they might otherwise lose with moving the date up a few weeks. The tournament participants would gladly pay the extra ten bucks or so to help make up the difference, if for nothing else than to enjoy more seasonable weather and better greens conditions. And I note the latter because they've traditionally made the irrational decision to do their fall aeration mid-November, in an effort to avoid loss of rounds earlier in the season.
So not only are these tournament entrants having to deal with the pressing extreme cold weather conditions, but (at least in the past anyway) they're also having to manage putting on slow, bumpy putting surfaces.
They keep doing it though because they offer great prizes and it's a fun event overall, which appeals to a lot of golfers. But it could be so much more enjoyable, and bumping the entry fee up a few bucks to account for the difference I mentioned wouldn't detract from it whatsoever.
Greens conditions and weather has historically been the two big drawbacks in their post-tournament surveys over the years. One would think they'd accept the feedback and take appropriate action, but they don't. After three years of encountering said frustrations with the tournament - my team decided to bag it altogether. Otherwise we would've most likely made it an early-November tradition.