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PGA Championship Day 1: Golfers, spectators dodge rain, get first look at course

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Planning for the PGA Championship took years.

Seven years ago, Quail Hollow Club president Johnny Harris signed the contract locking in his golf course as the site for the championship.

It has been a long wait for Harris and the city of Charlotte, but the gates to the championship opened on Monday morning.

Quail Hollow Club is nearly unrecognizable compared to the setup for the annual Wells Fargo Championship.

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The course was reimagined and rebuilt within the last 15 months.

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The course opened Monday for practice rounds for the field that features nearly every top 100 player on the PGA Tour, including Charlotte resident Webb Simpson.

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Golfers have been hitting balls at the driving range since just after 7 a.m.

[READ MORE: Charlotte ready for 200,000 to attend PGA Championship]

Simpson, who as a Quail Hollow Club member, knows the course better and anybody, said he is surprised at the facelift the course has gotten.

The course added more than 300 temporary structures spanning more than 600,000 square feet of temporary flooring, 6,500 bleachers were added and the front nine was overhauled.

[FAN GUIDE: 2017 PGA Championship at Quail Hollow Club]

“We've got a wonderful golf course that's tip-top and ready to go and will be one of the best golf courses they've ever played,” Harris said. “We've broken all the records for sales in every way.”

Tournament tickets sold out faster than for any other PGA Championship, and just this past weekend, the merchandise shops opened to the public.

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Channel 9 was at Quail Hollow on the opening day as PGA and club officials tried to accommodate an expected crowd of more than 200,000 spectators, nearly double the attendance of the Wells Fargo Championship.

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Channel 9 was also on the course around 5 a.m. when the rain was pouring down. Crews then frantically got the driving range prepped using blowers.

Despite the heavy rain, a PGA spokesperson said everything will go as scheduled, but the PGA will continue to monitor weather conditions on a minute-by-minute basis.

Spectators were wrapped in ponchos and holding umbrellas.

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Mike Blevins, a spectator from Virginia, said he bought some rain gear, but still doesn’t feel prepared for what may come.

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“I guess we did a bad job of looking at the forecast, so we are just going to wing it,” Blevins said. “If it gets too bad, we will just catch the Uber back to the shuttle line.”

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This is unquestionably the best field of golfers to play in Charlotte.

The Wells Fargo Championship attracts plenty of big names, including Rory McIlroy and Phil Mickelson, but virtually all of the top 100 players in the world will be competing.

Jordan Spieth is attempting to become the youngest player ever to win all four major championships.

“This has been a labor of love on my part and lots of others to bring the greatest players in the world here on a consistent basis and then the opportunity to have one of the four major championships is spectacular,” Harris said.

Damp conditions could delay tournament

Monday’s heavy downpours left their mark on the golf course.

The new rain left divots, puddles and mud streaks from golf cart tires.

Course Superintendent Keith Wood said Quail Hollow staff is doing everything it can to prepare the course for playing conditions. The staff is draining out the condensation with cooling fans to keep the course dry.

"Yeah, we are concerned about it,” Wood said. "My main concern is inside the ropes, making sure the golf course is playable.”

Under PGA rules, the damp conditions could suspend play if players can't get good teeing ground. Additional rain chances every day will likely increase the chance of slowdowns. The extra time and soggy walkways don’t have too many bothered, however.

"We knew at this point that it was a possibility,” Kevin Kash said. “So far, at least that's kept the temperature down.”

PGA officials taking safety precautions

Meteorologist John Ahrens talked to PGA officials about how the rain could affect the event and the safety plans that are in place.

"This just has a completely different feel to me, a lot more pavilions, a lot more excitement,” Randy McBride said.

More than 30,000 people will be walking around the course daily.

With grandstands and hundreds of metal barriers, just one lightning strike would be all that was needed to create a major disaster.

PGA officials want people to be on the lookout for weather warning signs on the leaderboards throughout the course.

A horn will sound when a storm is approaching.

"If he sounds the horn, the word goes out to seek shelter or evacuate property. That's what they do,” Wood said.

The storms will be all around. It may not storm specifically at Quail Hollow, but storms will be close.

Lightning can easily travel 10 miles, so that menacing threat is what officials will face on a daily basis, hoping that people here take the warning as soon as danger is close.

“I would wait a bit, maybe two hours,” Bethany Burnes said.

Uber is an option to get to tournament

Uber is one of only a few options golf fans have to get to and from the PGA Championship at Quail Hollow.

Eyewitness News anchor Blaine Tolison put it to the test on Monday.

Tolison started at the WSOC-TV studios on north Charlotte.

"So here we go. We're going to request our Uber from the WSOC-TV studios on North Tryon Street, and here it is for an UberX on a Monday, at this hour for $21.78. Confirm pickup. Alright, the clock is ticking," Tolison said as his trip got underway.

Tolison's Uber showed up within five minutes, and he kept the clock running as he made his trip to south Charlotte.

The Uber driver, William, said he expects to make good money this week.

Tolison's Uber trip cost about $20 for the 13-mile trip down I-77.

Williams said he predicts rates to surge.

The extra charge for an Uber during busy events will be at least two or three times more. That's a $40 to $60 trip.

Uber doesn't drop you off right at Quail Hollow.

You will be dropped off a mile and a half away, at the Quail Hollow Presbyterian Church.

"It took us 35 minutes to get here,” Tolison said. “Now that we're at the Uber lot, we have to take a shuttle to get to the PGA Championship."

Uber rides can't linger.

Traffic will keep moving through lanes on the lot at the corner of Park and Smithfield Church roads.

"They got, like, three or four lanes set up, so I think it's going to be a very quick process,” Uber rider Mark Pak said.

"It was a little strange with the things, but good so far, I guess. Not too busy,” Uber rider Maddie Early said.

Tolison boarded the shuttle and arrived at Quail Hollow.

"Here is the time, a little over 50 minutes here, and it is Monday, and things are only going to get busier,” Tolison said.

By Thursday, based on what Tolison found out on Monday, you might want to give yourself a few hours just to get there.

PGA Championship is a major deal for Charlotte economy

The PGA Championship isn't just a sporting event for Charlotte, it’s a huge moneymaker for the city.

The event stands to bring in millions of dollars for the state's economy.

Last year’s PGA Championship brought in around $100 million in New Jersey.

In 2015, the PGA raked in $102 million in Wisconsin.

There are about 3,500 volunteers registered, and about 2,300 of them are from the Carolinas.

“I do think this event is clearly a community event as we go forward,” Harris said. “Even with the Wells Fargo (Championship), you are going to see golf become more and more a community event, not just a Quail Hollow event and not just a golfing event.”

Protect yourself from ticket counterfeiters

The tickets to the PGA Championship at Quail Hollow Club are sold out, but officials believe fake tickets are already in circulation.

Thomas Kale has been planning for a year to attend the major event.

Unlike Kale, hundreds will try to purchase tickets this week.

“Definitely glad we planned ahead,” Kale said. “It was tough to bite the bullet so long ago because tickets were still expensive at that point.”

When consumers learn tickets are sold out, they will turn to ticket scalpers and websites, including Craigslist.

Channel 9 checked the Craigslist on Monday and four dozen PGA Championship tickets for each day were available, some priced as high as $500 for a package deal.

Better Business Bureau President Tom Bartholomy said meeting strangers for tickets has proven to be dangerous recently.

He said you could be offered fake tickets that look very real.

“Those are the two riskiest things you can do when you're buying tickets,” Batholomy said. “(With) Craigslist, there's no guarantee. They could be printing these off, which we've seen with events in the past.”

Bartholomy believes the con artists who make the counterfeit tickets are already in town for this week's event.

“Last year's Super Bowl counterfeiters did a good job of counterfeiting those tickets,” Barthlomy said. “With 200,000 people and tickets sold out for months, counterfeiters are definitely taking a look at us.”

Officials said there are safe websites on which to buy secondhand tickets, including the PGA Ticket Exchange, StubHub or PrimeSport, which all have a guarantee in place to protect the buyer.

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