Interview With Chris Pierce Director of Golf Hermitage Golf Course By Brian Weis

Interview With Chris Pierce Director of Golf Hermitage Golf Course

A Light Hearted Golf Q & A Interview

By Brian Weis

Below is an interview with Chris Pierce, the Director of Golf at Hermitage Golf Course. The following are a few traditional and non traditional golf centric questions that I love to ask influential people in the golf industry.

Can you provide our readers a brief biography?
Chris Pierce was born in Nashville and raised in a suburb of the city, Hermitage, very close to HGC. He prepped at a private school in the same vicinity. After college, he tried his hand at mini tours in the southern United States for a few years before joining HGC full time in 2012.

He has one brother, Jay, and in his spare time he trades out his golf clubs for a football and assists in coaching a local high school football team.

Chris and his wife, Catlyn, a speech pathologist, live just outside Nashville with their children Ivy and Tucker, and their dog, Wrigley.

When did you start golfing and who introduced you to the game?

I started golfing at 19 and my father introduced me to the game.

My father won a driver from a golf scramble at Hermitage Golf Course. My dad, my brother and I took the new club out to a driving range to try it out and try as I might, I couldn't get it airborne. I got teased mercilessly and it became my personal quest to become better than them. Which I succeeded in doing.

What is your current home course?
Hermitage Golf Course

To date, what is your proudest golf accomplishment?
Starting the junior league at Hermitage Golf in 2012 is my proudest accomplishment. We had a handful of kids sign up that year and it's now grown to the seventh ranked program in the country and largest in the state of Tennessee.

What is your biggest golf pet peeve on or off the course?
People who are inconsiderate.

What is your favorite club in your bag and why?
My driver - so I can hit bombs

What is your favorite golf destination?
Scotland

What course is on your bucket list that you have not played yet?
I've got three on my bucket list: St Andrews, Pebble Beach and Augusta

If you woke up tomorrow and could play one course you played before, where would you play?
Cascata in Las Vegas

If you could change one aspect, rule or thing about golf, what would it be and why?
I have two things I would change. The mindset that you need to play round of golf in 4.5 hours, and that you have to be in a foursome.

Dream foursome (living)?
I would love to play with Tiger Woods, Rory McElroy and Jon Ramm.

Dream foursome (living or dead)?
Burt Reynolds, John Wayne, Sam Sneed

Favorite 19th hole drink?
Old fashioned.

18 Rapid Fire, Off The Cuff Questions

1) Hitting Long Drive OR Sinking Long Putt?
Sinking long putt

2) Having Round of Life OR Hole in One?
Hole in one

3) Golfing at the crack of dawn OR twilight?
twilight

4) Hit a power fade OR power draw?
power fade

5) Beverage cart OR halfway house?
halfway house

6) Bathroom OR bushes?
bathroom

7) Hot dog OR wrap?
wrap

8) Around the green, being in sand OR thick rough?
around the green, being in sand

9) Walking OR riding?
walking

10) Do you carry traditional 3 iron OR hybrid?
hybrid

11) Do you prefer long par 3 OR long par 5?
long par 5

12) Pants OR Shorts?
shorts

13) Palmer OR Nicklaus?
Palmer

14) Beatles OR Elvis?
Beatles

15) Play for fun OR play for money?
Play for money

16) Bump and run OR flop shot?
Flop shot

17) Lay up OR gamble?
gamble

18) 18 holes OR 36?
36

Revised: 02/21/2023 - Article Viewed 2,932 Times - View Course Profile

About: Brian Weis

Brian Weis is the mastermind behind GolfTrips.com, a vast network of golf travel and directory sites covering everything from the rolling fairways of Wisconsin to the sunbaked desert layouts of Arizona. If there’s a golf destination worth visiting, chances are, Brian has written about it, played it, or at the very least, found a way to justify a "business trip" there.

As a card-carrying member of the Golf Writers Association of America (GWAA), International Network of Golf (ING), Golf Travel Writers of America (GTWA), International Golf Travel Writers Association (IGTWA), and The Society of Hickory Golfers (SoHG), Brian has the credentials to prove that talking about golf is his full-time job. In 2016, his peers even handed him The Shaheen Cup, a prestigious award in golf travel writing—essentially the Masters green jacket for guys who don’t hit the range but still know where the best 19th holes are.

Brian’s love for golf goes way back. As a kid, he competed in junior and high school golf, only to realize that his dreams of a college golf scholarship had about the same odds as a 30-handicap making a hole-in-one. Instead, he took the more practical route—working on the West Bend Country Club grounds crew to fund his University of Wisconsin education. Little did he know that mowing greens and fixing divots would one day lead to a career writing about the best courses on the planet.

In 2004, Brian turned his golf passion into a business, launching GolfWisconsin.com. Three years later, he expanded his vision, and GolfTrips.com was born—a one-stop shop for golf travel junkies looking for their next tee time. Today, his empire spans all 50 states, and 20+ international destinations.

On the course, Brian is a weekend warrior who oscillates between a 5 and 9 handicap, depending on how much he's been traveling (or how generous he’s feeling with his scorecard). His signature move" A high, soft fade that his playing partners affectionately (or not-so-affectionately) call "The Weis Slice." But when he catches one clean, his 300+ yard drives remind everyone that while he may write about golf for a living, he can still send a ball into the next zip code with the best of them.

Whether he’s hunting down the best public courses, digging up hidden gems, or simply outdriving his buddies, Brian Weis is living proof that golf is more than a game—it’s a way of life.