FARMINGDALE, NY – SEPTEMBER 24: Kira Dixon and Carson Daly on stage with the teams during the Opening Ceremony before the 2025 Ryder Cup at Bethpage State Park on Wednesday, September 24, 2025 in Farmingdale, New York. (Photo by Scott Taetsch/PGA of America via Getty Images)
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The Ryder Cup’s toughest battle takes place in the shadows, as organizers choreograph the movement of fans and VIPs around New York’s famous public golf course.
Unlike most sporting events, golf fans don’t just park their butts in the grandstands and only leave their perch to grab a bite from the concessions or do their business.
Spectators—known in golf circles as galleries—rarely stay put. Golf fans tend to be on the move, following players they admire as they tee off, hit approach shots and ponder putts. It’s essentially an outdoor art museum with roped off fairways where Scheffler and McIlroy are the masterpieces in motion.
Add lanyard-only zones and wristband-restricted hospitality tents, and the result is a five-ring logistical circus.
This year at Bethpage Black, President Trump’s Friday visit adds another wrinkle—beefed-up security blanketing the first tee, 18th green and clubhouse.
Jennifer Brisman, a veteran planner of high-profile live events and CEO of VOW— a tech platform built to streamline VIP and guest management at major sports and entertainment events ranging from Saturday Night Live and the Tony Awards to the Professional Fighters League—likens big tournaments like this to managing a myriad of “events within the event.”
“It’s kind of like being on an airplane,” she said. “Everyone’s moving in the same direction, but you’ve got first class, business class and coach,” and yet every group has priority access entitlement, making guest flow management a delicate high-wire act.
TURNBERRY, SCOTLAND – JULY 26: U.S. President Donald Trump plays golf at Trump Turnberry golf course on July 26, 2025 in Turnberry, Scotland. U.S. President Donald Trump is visiting his Trump Turnberry golf course, as well as Trump International Golf Links in Aberdeenshire, during a brief visit to Scotland from July 26 to 29. (Photo by Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)
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A presidential appearance only compounds the challenge. Brisman noted that Trump’s presence adds “an insane amount of security” to what is already one of the most complex events in golf, adding traffic, tighter bag checks and extra time needed for fans and VIPs to pass through screening. “So, people have to think twice, women specifically about handbags and what they are bringing in and leave time for extra questioning to get to where they have to be going,” she said.
Brisman, whose guest-management platform recently closed a $2.5 million seed round led by KB Partners, said another curveball is simply making sure everyone knows who’s who. “You want everyone to know who they are, but not everyone does by sight,” she explained adding that’s where arrival alerts and secure communications become critical, so security, handlers and staff are all in the know the moment a VIP arrives.
“VOW has an arrival alert akin to ‘the eagle has landed,’ Brisman said. It’s very nice because in platform you can do that ahead of the game as opposed to being on clear comms, going to a channel for VIP arrivals and alerts.”
“And obviously for the case of even higher profile people, they are on their own communications channels that are locked down and secure, but for the average VIP, CEO, or board of director, we do let those streamline to people in the know to handle the domino effect of what needs to happen when that key person arrives.”
While event planners juggle layers of added complexity—from TSA-style screening to priority arrival identification minutia—the players themselves aren’t sweating the logistics. U.S. captain Keegan Bradley said he’s “deeply honored that the President of the United States is going to come support our team,” adding that having a sitting president on site at Bethpage is “absolutely incredible.”
Fans hoping to maximize Friday should arrive early. Bag checks and security will tack on delays before anyone sees a tee shot. Gates open at 5 A.M. ET, well before sunrise. And while the matches won’t wait, fans might—just ask tennis watchers, who definitely still remember the half-empty seats at the beginning of the Trump attended U.S. Open men’s final when security lines ground entry to a crawl. Though the President’s expected afternoon arrival is timed to avoid a repeat of those U.S. Open crowd delays.