The Oaks Course has its new pro in Gary Miller.

Miller is leaving Reynolds Plantation, one of the most famous courses in the country to join the Oaks Course as a head professional.

“It gets me obviously a head professional position. That’s not the only thing, but it gives you that title where I can run the whole golf operation whether it’s my shot people below me or the cart staff below them,” Miller said. “It gives Nancy [Schultz] and Dick [Schultz] trust in me to run their whole operation – that’s a big deal. It makes me feel good that they trust me enough to bring me in to run their whole operation when they’re not around and keep everything going as they would like it.”

Miller is from Athens, Georgia. He lived there with his wife, Ginger Miller and two kids. Miller has been in the golf business off and on for 20 years.

He stopped for a while after he got married, then he realized how much he missed it and got back into it in 2002 where he worked at the Port Arnor Country Club until it was bought out by Reynolds Plantation.

“The last 12 years have been a really strong part of my golf career. I received my Class A PGA membership in 2007,” Miller said.

“This is kind of a different character than what I came from. It’ll be nice to be able to take step back,” Miller said. “This is kind of like a golf course that I grew up on, a public course in town. I kind of have a warm place in the heart for it.”

Miller has competed in some professional events throughout his career through the PGA of America, which is the national PGA. In 2012 he competed in Monterey, California. Last year competed in a national event in West Palm Beach, Florida.

Miller started the job on Friday, but he wants to bring the excellent customer service he provided at Reynolds to the Oaks Course.

“I think a strong point here that I would bring would be my customer service, which I picked up with my time at Reynolds,” Miller said. “Obviously that’s a big resort down there that’s known throughout the country. I think my expertise in that will definitely help them out here. These customers will feel like they’re welcome every time they come to the Oaks.”

“I would love to leave the imprint hopefully like I just left it at Reynolds,” Miller said. “With the membership, and even the daily customers that come in, they may be coming in like, ‘Where did Gary go? I loved him being out with us.’ I love to get out and play golf with the members or any of the customers.”

Miller said that he is a very outgoing person, and that his key component is his customer service. He added that customers will see him out and about on the course and in the shop.

As far as instructing goes, Miller believes the key to teaching others is patience.

“In this game, for the instructing, you gotta have patience,” Miller said. “You can watch professionals on TV and they hit it really, really well, but they’re gonna have their bad shots. You’ve got to be able to work around that to get to your next shot and not be fuming mad when you hit that next shot, because obviously that will affect that shot.”

“I always think one of the keys to golf is patience, you gotta have a lot of patience. There is skill involved, but you gotta work on your game as well,” Miller said. “Everybody says once they take it up (golf) that, ‘It’s harder than it looks.”