Mike Bush, Course Manager at St. Mellion Estate in Cornwall, has been named Superintendent of the Year at the first 59club Global Service Excellence Awards.
The experienced Cornishman beat golf course superintendents from 22 countries worldwide, short-listed to ten nominees, in 59club’s first-ever global awards in front of 300 people at a glittering ceremony in the new Masters Suite at The Belfry Hotel & Resort near Birmingham, England.
Bush’s pride and joy, the world-famous Nicklaus Signature Course at St. Mellion, is one of the most breathtaking golf courses in Europe, and like all Superintendent nominees Bush and his team went through an intense data-driven assessment period involving mystery shopping and benchmarking.
In the final judging, their presentation of the Nicklaus Signature Course was measured against the world’s best golfing experiences in Denmark, Ireland, Australia, Canada, England, the USA, the UAE and Thailand.
HOMETOWN BOY
St. Mellion achieved an astonishing near-perfect score and Bush accepted the award on behalf of his team. “St. Mellion is in my blood” he said. “I’m a proud Cornishman and grew up in St. Mellion village, so I feel a deep personal connection with the estate here.
“I’m so proud to receive such a prestigious award, and I am hugely grateful to 59club for this rare accolade, but I see this as much as a win for my dedicated team and for the glorious St. Mellion landscape which we have cultivated in this corner of Cornwall, as it is a personal accomplishment.”
Bush came to St. Mellion in October 1995 after an early career in golf course construction, and subsequently supervised course preparation for a host of professional events on the European Tour and Senior Tour. He achieved BIGGA Master Greenkeeper status in 2011, and to this day is one of less than 100 people in the world to earn this status.
St. Mellion is the flagship venue for the Crown Golf group, and in 2014 Bush, whose wife Regan also works in the St. Mellion management team, expanded his role to become Group Course Manager across the collection.
After St. Mellion joined 59club in 2022, Bush won the UK & Ireland Superintendent of the Year Awards in 2023 and 2024.
59club sets industry performance benchmarks and celebrates service excellence across the world, running over 4,000 independent mystery shopper visits annually, gathering customer experience data from every revenue stream within a club’s environment and helping venues to improve their own standards by deep analysis of the results of hundreds of thousands of customer satisfaction surveys.
On Bush’s award, 59club Founder & CEO Simon Wordsworth said: “Mike’s achievement is testament to his exceptional standards, professionalism, and dedication at St. Mellion, which is one of the world’s leading golfing destinations.
“To be recognised as Global Superintendent of the Year is no small feat: it reflects not just the quality of St. Mellion’s playing surfaces and Mike’s agronomic capabilities, but also Mike’s ability to galvanise his team to deliver exemplary performance day in, day out. He is a true leader within the industry, and we are proud to celebrate his success on a global platform.”
30 YEARS OF EXCELLENCE
Jeff Chapman, Founder of Crown Golf owners Bangarra Group, said: “The world of international golf is like most global industries in that there is intense competition to be the best, but it does not always recognise the outstanding talents which are making such huge contributions to the success of the sport.
“So it is great news that Mike Bush has received this level of global recognition. As the proud owner of the world famous St. Mellion Estate where Mike has been the man responsible for producing outstanding playing conditions for nearly 30 years, I take this opportunity on behalf of all those associated with the resort to congratulate him & say ‘thanks for a job well done’”.
“You need a world-class course manager to fully realise the potential of a world-class golf course, and Mike Bush is that man at St. Mellion” said David Moon, Director of Golf at St. Mellion Estate. “He is our own multi-star Michelin chef of the golf industry, and in The Nicklaus he has his Signature dish.
“As a colleague Mike consistently helps me to raise my own game and over the last 30 years his high quality standards have been an inspiration to all staff at St. Mellion. With unrelenting commitment and passion he has nurtured not only the world-famous golf course which Jack Nicklaus created for us, but he has also supervised the elevation of our second course, The Kernow – itself a former European Tour venue – to an international standard.
“This magnificent global award is a fine validation of his achievements here. Mike sets a shining example not just for his team here at this resort, but also for his peers in the global golf industry. His work is one of the main reasons why St. Mellion is such an extraordinarily rewarding place to visit.”
