Denver Botanic Gardens proves fitting place for CGA to cultivate for golf as it hosts annual Women’s Golf Summit; 55 women’s clubs from around Colorado attend event
By Gary Baines – 3/1/2025
As the CGA’s point person in organizing and conducting the association’s annual Women’s Golf Summit, Erin Gangloff spends much time and effort on making the event a success.
But despite the considerable work that goes into the event — which took place on Saturday at the Denver Botanic Gardens — Gangloff said “it’s actually one of my favorite days.
“We want to get more women in the game. So when you have a room of 140 women, it’s great. Even though I’m working, I do enjoy it because there’s kind of a natural vibe from seeing their excitement. Also, getting to meet the members that we hear from so we can put a face to who is on the other side of the phone” is fun.
And the CGA’s chief marketing officer hopes some of those in attendance feel the event is a favorite of theirs too. But whatever the case, the common denominator for those who come to activities like the Women’s Summit is that they love golf.
“It’s great to be outside, it’s great to hang out,” noted Denver native Khadija Haynes, a CGA board member who was attending her third Women’s Summit. “It’s a good game and it meets people wherever they are.”
All in all, there’s some fitting symmetry in hosting the Women’s Golf Summit on the eve of spring at the Denver Botanic Gardens.
After all, the event and the venue are focused largely on growth, and March is certainly an appropriate time of year to concentrate on such things.
About 140 people attended Saturday’s Women’s Summit.
All of it took shape on a Saturday when golfers almost couldn’t help but think about playing their beloved game as the temperature reached the mid-60s. About 140 people — all but a smattering of them women — whet their appetite for the season by attending a variety of informational and educational sessions. They heard about how to improve their game and some of the opportunities available; the many benefits of golf; the rules of the game; sharing worthwhile ideas through a club roundtable; some fitness tips and even tournament management. On top of everything, there was some exploration of the role golf courses can — and do — play in environmental stewardship in urban areas.
And, beyond that, there was the not-to-be-forgotten social aspects of getting together with other people who also relish the game of golf.
Among those on hand Saturday were a cross section of women, with 55 clubs from across the state represented, including 26 club presidents, 15 Tournament chairpeople and nine Handicap chairs.
“It’s just a cool way to get women together and help get them excited for playing for the year,” said instructor and MSU Denver women’s golf coach Stef Ferguson, who helped lead instructing and fitness sessions — the latter with her MSU players — on Saturday. “Maybe give them a couple of things they can work on and help their game.”
Elena King, the founder of ExperienceGolf who teaches at CGA-owned CommonGround Golf Course (along with Ferguson), teamed with Ferguson for the “Is Your Game in a Pickle” session.
“It’s exciting to get everybody going,” King said. “The weather is starting to turn. It’s always good to give people something to start to plan. Without that plan, we don’t know what we’re doing. We like to make it fun and get people excited.”
Summit attendees go through a stretching routine with the MSU Denver women’s golf team.
Saturday marked the sixth in-person Women’s Summit since the CGA has hosted the event in the wake of its 2018 integration with the CWGA, which previously conducted the CWGA Annual Meeting. The 2021 and ’22 Women’s Summits were strictly virtual events given Covid-19 safety concerns. The last three years have been back to in-person, but Saturday’s was the first of those without a virtual option.
“We were all in person this year,” Gangloff said. “We did that so ladies could connect and learn from each other. That was probably the biggest part of today. We had wonderful speakers to do that, but it’s that moment where they get to sit and chit chat and hear about (for example, how someone deals with) pace of play at their course, or what’s a cool tournament to do. So I think this was another fun year.”
The event, which lasted about 4 1/2 hours overall, was held at the Botanic Gardens for the third consecutive year. The Gardens have partnered with the CGA in recent years on the aforementioned environmental stewardship at CommonGround Golf Course, located at the site of the former Lowry Air Force Base straddling Aurora and Denver.
Dr. Rebecca Hufft from the Denver Botanic Gardens speaks of a partnership with the CGA at CommonGround Golf Course.
The partnership took shape in large part due to former CGA president Joe McCleary, who now serves as chief business officer for the association. McCleary is a former superintendent at Saddle Rock Golf Course and once a president of the Rocky Mountain Golf Course Superintendents Association. The goal of the partnership is to enhance the habitat for pollinators in the non-playing areas at CommonGround. As Dr. Rebecca Hufft, associate director of applied conservation at the Denver Botanic Gardens, noted in her Women’s Golf Summit keynote speech, golf courses are often the largest open spaces in urban areas. And, indeed, when including the wetlands to the west of the course, CommonGround features over 330 acres of open space.
The work of Hufft — along with CommonGround director of agronomy Mitch Savage, McCleary, CGA intern and current Evans Scholar Georgia Meysman-Sharpe, among others — has included seeding some aerated native areas on the property, which can produce some colorful flowers in addition to other vegetation.
“The vision of this project is to be a demonstration site to develop best practices so that other golf courses (can potentially benefit by doing something similar) — not just in the state but around the country,” Hufft said in her “Conservation of Golf Courses: Thinking Outside the Box” presentation. “That’s really the goal here. That was from the outset. … Our ultimate goal is to have best practices and strategies (for others to implement).”
Asked her favorite part of Saturday’s Summit, Gangloff said, “I really enjoyed having Becky here. That was a long time coming for us. We talked every year that we wanted to have somebody from the Gardens, and Becky was the perfect person. Her connection with us has been phenomenal. And with Georgia, who will have her second internship (linked to the Botanic Gardens) this summer, it shows you what golf can do.”
CGA COO Ashley Harrell leads a Rules of Golf session on Saturday.
Most of the Botanics-related work at CommonGround has been centered on areas near the 14th, 15th and 18th holes.
“What we try to do is re-wild some of our urban spaces,” Hufft said. “It won’t be exactly like some of our unmanaged spaces, but it can still be really good habitat that can support a lot of wildlife and human beings.”
Meanwhile, many of Saturday’s attendees particularly enjoyed interacting with women from other clubs as they exchanged ideas that have worked well in running events during the season. Also, just socializing in general.
It’s interesting “learning from folks who are in clubs from other parts of the state,” Haynes said. “At our table we had some women from Colorado Springs, from Perry Park (in Larkspur). To be able to connect with people across the state is a good thing.”
Overall regarding the Summit, Haynes said, “I think in some ways it’s a reality check and a confidence boost. You’re not as bad as you think you are (as a player) — or at least you’re in good company in being bad. And if you want to be great, there are people available to make you better. If you like where you’re at, there are people who are right where you are you can go golf with and just be happy.”
All in all, especially with the calendar flipping to March, the Women’s Summit proved a welcome indicator that things are close to gearing up, golf-wise, in Colorado.
“Because winter kind of just drags on here in Colorado, it gives everyone excitement that we are close to having opening day,” Gangloff said. “I think it works well because it gets everybody’s excitement up. It also helps people to start thinking about really cool ideas like how to recruit new members, how to retain our members. What can we do? It’s just perfect timing. Everybody is tired of winter and they’re ready to be back together and they’re ready to be out on the course.”
Notable: The CGA has two women’s practice clinics currently scheduled, and plans to add about four others in the near future. Those now set are May 10 at Overland Park in Denver and June 28 at EagleVail in Avon. … Also planned for 2025 are 10 Member Play Days, which are both for men and women. To check the lineup, CLICK HERE. … Competition-wise, Gangloff noted the opportunity for women’s leagues to hold Doubles Golf competitions, which involve two-player teams competing in a scramble format. Jack Nicklaus hosts a Doubles Golf championship on a national level to culminate the year’s competition. … The Women’s Golf Summit falls in the midst of the CGA Season Kickoff Silent Auction, which runs Feb. 27 through March 15 at 4 p.m. The auction benefits CGA junior player development programs across Colorado — such as the Solich Caddie & Leadership Academy, Youth on Course, Golf in Schools and others. As of Saturday evening, it had already raised more than $7,000. To find out more about the Silent Auction — or to bid, CLICK HERE. … During lunch, a roll call of award winners and honorees scrolled on the screen, including the CGA Women’s Players of the Year (Ashley Kozlowski, Kristine Franklin and Ashleigh Wilson), the CGA Volunteer of the Year (Sandy Schnitzer), Women’s Club of the Year (Hiwan) and the Jim Topliff Rules Official of the Year Award (Laura Robinson). … CGA director of finance Debbie Kolb, who has worked for the CGA/CWGA since 2016, is planning to retire at the end of March. Gangloff noted Kolb’s impending departure and she received a warm sendoff from those in attendance at the club roundtable.
CGA director of finance Debbie Kolb, who will retire at the end of March, receives a round of applause on Saturday.
About the Writer: Gary Baines has covered golf in Colorado continuously since 1983. He was a sports writer at the Daily Camera newspaper in Boulder, then the sports editor there, and has written regularly for ColoradoGolf.org since 2009. The University of Colorado Evans Scholar alum was inducted into the Colorado Golf Hall of Fame in 2022. He owns and operates ColoradoGolfJournal.com