Ryder Cup comes to MSP
 

It's next weekend, to be held at Hazeltine National Golf Club in Chaska, about 20-25 miles southwest of Minneapolis.

At least one European team player arrived yesterday afternoon, through CLT so I assume it was AA or BA/AA. The American team was reported to have arrived into MSP last night around 9 pm.

The airport is expected to be extremely busy during the next week with about 60,000 people expected for the Ryder Cup. However, they claim they're prepared and will even use all TSA security lines.

The airport has a special PGA Lounge, which is said to be open to all. It looks nice on local TV news, but I can't determine where it's located. There are a bunch of simulated golf things, I think meant to represent holes on the Hazeltine course.

Hotels are also extremely full and expensive, with some ordinary rooms downtown selling for $800 per night. I'm guessing that restaurant reservations will be impossible and bars will be packed, especially downtown, around the airport, and in hotels in Edina, Bloomington, Eden Prairie, Richfield, etc.

Traffic is expected to be bad. There's a whole fleet of official vehicles parked at the Sheraton Bloomington along I-494 west of the airport. They're all matching
grey Mercedes cars and SUVs. Spectators will park elsewhere and take shuttles to the course, although some of these parking lots were flooded by heavy rains.

Allow lots of extra time or avoid MSP if you can until this is over.

It is next to the Escape Lounge. Access is the stairway to the left of the Ike's C/D host stand. You can't access via the stairs to the Escape Lounge.

I assume the PGA lounge is the one that's above the entrance to the E gates.

Was there just lots of empty space up there?

BTW, I imagine they're charging a fee for the general flying public to use the PGA lounge. Does anyone know how much?

The PGA facility has been there quite a while, at least a year. It wasn't created because of the Ryder Cup. However, I didn't realize till now that it served food; I thought it was just some kind of putting green.

It used to be a hallway. Prior to remodel of the space above Ike's, one could go up there to relax. They had chairs and couches. The hallway on both sides of the mall connected to that space so you could do a nice loop walk upsairs if you wanted to.

The PGA lounge has been there a while (it isn't specific for the Ryder Cup).
http://www.pgamsp.com/

I flew ORD-MSP yesterday afternoon on UA. Didn't spot any players or officials on my flight, but there was a group of 12 Scots who had flown Aer Lingus from DUB-ORD and were connecting. Talked with one and they were Ryder Cup tourists. One of them was even wearing a kilt.

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Thanks..
Obscure2k
Delta Moderator

Three weeks ago, I booked a business trip flying into MSP Wednesday and leaving Friday. The flight was expensive, but nothing much more than what I'm used to seeing out of MEM. The hotels, however..... wow! The Westin wanted over $800 per night for a standard room. Luckily, the ABA has great bar association rates with SPG, and I was able to get a room at Hotel Ivy in downtown MSP for between $200-$300 night. Never stayed there, but I'm sure it will be nice --- especially at the price compared to every place else I looked.

I'm even a huge golf fan, so how I didn't connect this event going on during my trip until late last week baffles me. Hopefully I can make it out to the course at some point! While I've flown through MSP many, many times, I've never actually left the airport and spent any time in the city other than the Mall of America many years ago as a teenager with my family.

The Ivy is indeed lovely and you have a good rate for a weekday. Weekends can sometimes be cheap when there's nothing happening downtown.

Were you trying to get into the Westin downtown or the Westin Edina Galleria? I suspect that the latter might be housing Ryder Cup officials as its sister hotel, the Sheraton at Bloomington, seems to be housing star folders as well as high level volunteers for the event. The two properties have the same outstanding GM.

If you have trouble getting a restaurant reservation due to all the Ryder Cup people, the Ivy's restaurant is quite good and the front desk should be able to manage to get a reservation for a hotel guest. They also serve good food in the bar and IIRC you can order from either the restaurant menu or the bar menu. In fact, their room service is surprisingly quite reasonable for the price and quality.

If you do decide to go to Hazeltine, be warned that taxi fare down to there from downtown is likely to be about $75, depending of course on traffic conditions. It's a long haul from the far southwestern corner of the circular highway I-494.

Two weeks ago I looked to book a Hilton property near Blaine, Minnesota, for a customer visit on September 22nd. I was shocked to see every hotel for a 30-mile radius all sold out. In all my years of traveling I have never seen that. Not knowing what was going on I phoned one of the properties to see if they had any "secret" rooms, and the lady laughed at me and told me about the Ryder Cup coming the following week. I finally ended up in a Marriott property about 30 miles away. Poor timing on my part to say the least.

I became a member of the PGA MSP Lounge last week. Great little gem on the second level above Ike's Restaurant .... You can still purchase Ryder Hazeltine clothing and accessories in their shop. We were in MSP airport during the Ryder Cup and thought it was well done.

The PGA MSP has full food/beverage plus simulated golf or putting green.

My MSP business trip was smack dap during the Ryder Cup and yes the hotels were packed but well organized, we did see some major players and saw MSP at its best. How I found the PGA MSP Member Lounge was due to their kiosk on my concourse. The manager Ryan was so cordial and gave directions to the upper level area. He followed up with an email, we did my membership over the phone and impressed with all the amenities. They have a Facebook Page.