October 18, 2009
Golf Practice-zine Newsletter for October 2009
Thanks for signing up to receive the October 2009 issue (#17) of the Newsletter. Thankfully, it's been raining the last little while so I actually got a monthly newsletter out in the month it was due. Progress. So, this month we deal with: an innovative approach to golf practice range design; celebrate golf as an Olympic sport; my failed prediction regarding the Presidents Cup; what it takes to raise a golf tour pro, and; Tiger's Money.
Here is the lineup this issue:
- The Future of Golf Practice
- Olympic Golf
- Presidents Cup Prediction - Fail
- Raising a Child to Golf Touring Pro
- Tiger's Money
Back to Contents
1. The Future of Golf Practice
Two companies have recently proposed an innovative design for a golf proactice area. Adventure Golf Services and aboutGolf (suppliers of simulators and launch monitors) announced a product they have jointly developed to bring golf practice and play to more persons, at a lower cost. A practice centre that fits in a space about the size of a tennis court.
Golf Court Proposed Design
PGA Tour simulators and launch monitors are being supplied by aboutGolf. The simulators and monitors are provided as options in the golf practice center which is targeted at municipalities and organizations with unused or under-utilized tennis courts, buildings, or vacant space.
Golf Practice Facilities - Design Options
Called TheGolfCourt™, the standard model includes:- five driving stations,
- six contoured chipping stations,
- six future sand bunker positions,
- a 1,300-square-foot contoured putting area,
- retractable safety net separators,
- an overhead ball containment net and installation
- PGA Tour Simulator (optional)
- 3Trak launch monitors (optional
Other options include:
- putting turf upgrades,
- golf course surround graphics,
- bleacher seating,
- signs and,
- a clubhouse
The “TheGolfCourt™" will help government planners, recreation administrators and entrepreneurs a new alternative to learn, practice and play golf – in a 2,700-square-foot area.
I totally agree with this approach. Traditional driving ranges and practice areas are an expensive proposition due to rising land costs. The best example I can think of in this respect is the Olympic View driving range on Vancouver Island, near Victoria. The range is arguably the best facility on the Island. Expensive land fill was imported to the site to bring level ground onto a hillside. Total cost, approximately $3.5 Million.
To make golf more affordable and accessible to a broader client-base, practice areas have to get smaller and closer to their customers. TheGolfCourt™ comes closest to this goal, in my opinion. Now, a Dave Pelz-type professional instructor can have a base of operations that attracts the non-playing public or the occasional golfer that wants to improve his/her enjoyment of the game. We have saturated the market for golf courses, we need to grow the game of golf. Now affordable, high quality practice, teaching and recreation can be had for golfers at this compact type facility.
aboutGolf (Maumee, Ohio) and Adventure Golf Services (Traverse, Michigan) presented TheGolfCourt concept to the U.S. National Recreation Parks Association annual trade show in October this year. The two companies intend that TheGolfCourt™ will be used as an amenity or a profit center by hotels, resorts, parks, condo/timeshares, senior living facilities, school systems, the military, golf pros, golf courses and driving ranges. The compact size will be a benefit in countries or cities with space limitations and where real golf courses or training facilities are logistically difficult to access.
I think TheGolfCourt™ could be the future of golf practice facilities. Opportunities to serve urban centres where space is at a premium will bring the game in reach of an attractive audience. For more information, check out the aboutgolf website.
2.Olympic Golf
Dottie Pepper had it right regarding her comments on golf in the Olympics (quoted in www.golf.com, October 12/09):
- Golf's drug-testing push finally came up positive. No way the sport would have been considered for the Olympics without the random testing now being done by both major tours.
- According to Masters champion Angel Cabrera of Argentina, there is no golf facility in or near Rio that is capable of holding a world-class event. Recession-idled golf architects everywhere are salivating, but the buzz is that Jack Nicklaus and his firm already have a plan in the works.
- How will the PGA Tour fit the Olympics into its schedule? The 2016 Games are set for Aug. 5-21, and that time frame usually contains the PGA Championship and the start of the FedEx Cup. Things can only be pushed back so far because the Ryder Cup is scheduled to take place in Minnesota that year.
- Golf in the Olympics will be a 72-hole stroke play contest, but it seems to me that a mix of individual and team stroke play would be more compelling, adding the element of group competition that gets players and fans fired up.
These are interesting items from Ms. Pepper, who is turning into a great golf broadcaster. The new golf course requirement (aside from it going to J. Nicklaus) will be an interesting addition to overall Olympic construction costs. Proximity of the course to overall Olympic venues, will be a novel factor re: site selection.
So far, the proposed format calls for 60 golfers to qualify for the men's competition based on their world rankings, with a guaranteed place for the top 15 and a limit of two players per nation after that. Based on the current rankings, the U.S. would have seven players in the field—no other country would have more than two. The projected U.S. team, which includes the world's top-three players, has amassed 3,657 world-ranking points since the beginning of 2008, dwarfing second-place Great Britain.
In 1904, the Olympics was in St.Louis and the medal was contested by a huge field of contenders. The format was match play. Canadian George Lyon was 46 years old at the time and showed remarkable stamina in winning golf by playing over twelve rounds in six days. He won the gold by defeating U.S. champion Chandler Egan 3-and-2.
Interestingly, in 2016 Mike Weir will also be 46 years old. Go Canada!
3. Presidents Cup Prediction Fail
Last month, I picked the Internationals to win the Presidents Cup. WRONG. I knew it was a long shot, but Greg Norman's team, made it competitive in the early going.
I was not surprised that Adam Scott did not help the Internationals much at 1-4. His game is improving but not enough ,sadly, to qualify for the team in my opinion.
Internationals lose: 19.5 - 14.5
- The U.S. top players played extremely well. Tiger, Mickelson, Stricker were outstanding.
- Internationals played better than most expected in teams but lost badly in singles.
- The Huge turning point, to me, was Woods-Stricker's Foursomes victory over Clark-Weir on Saturday.
- Woods right-arm showboat move after hitting his iron shot into 18 in the Clark-Weir match would have been called cocky and boorish if done by anyone else.
- Tim Clark was outstanding for the Internationals. Their MVP.
- Ryo Ishikawa was phenomenal. He had his coming out party at this event.
- U.S. disappointments: Perry 1-3, Glover 0-3-1; Cink 1-3-1
- International disappointments: Villegas 0-4; Cabrera 1-3; Scott 1-4
My two biggest errors were in underestimating the team togetherness factor and the players with the hot hand coming into the Cup. The Americans were extremely "well-bonded" and experienced in this format. They play Ryder Cup/Presidents cup every year. Second, the hot players were definitely playing their hottest coming off the FedEx Cup. Phil, Tiger and Stricker played like the three top players in the world. With those three playing their best, the U.S. is fairly unbeatable. Still, the President's Cup was every bit as entertaining as the Ryder Cup.
4. Raise Your Child to Golf Touring Pro
Got a prospective child prodigy on the golf links? You must be a proud parent. Wondering what it will take to get him/her to serious pro status?
Golf is a great game for juniors. Earl Woods mentored Tiger pretty well and you can read all about it in, "Training a Tiger" (Earl Woods with Pete Daniel, Harper Collins, 1997). But to get to the PGA Tour today, there's more to golf than having fun. Child prodigies face multiple resources with multiple options. Logistics aside, how do you as a modern parent navigate your child through a horde of next steps?
The golf.com website has a series of links that may be of use. The series is entitled How to Raise a Tour Pro. It covers:
- Groomed to be great: Starting at golf academies
- A day in the life of a golf-school kid
- Raising a Tour Pro: Case studies
- Is your kid good enough?
- The $20,000 Question: Bankrolling your child's golf career
5. Tiger's Money
Forbes Magazine, in their annual rankings of richest people (entertainers, business-persons, sports stars, etc) estimated Tiger Woods earnings to have reached $1 billion in a September 2009 issue. This is an estimate, nobody knows except Tiger and his accountant, but few doubt he is at least close.
If true, Woods would be the first athlete to earn $1 billion. Forbes guestimation states that with the $10 million bonus Woods earned winning this year's FedEx Cup title nudged him over the $1 billion mark in career earnings. Technically, the FedEx $10M is an annuity that Tiger cannot touch unitl he turns 45 and will not fully accrue for at least 20 years; nonetheless, the total bulk of Tiger's winnings is close enough.
Forbes includes earnings since before Tiger turned pro. Going into 2009, they estimate that, prize money, appearance fees, endorsements, bonuses and his golf course design business, totalled $895 million. If you add his $10.5 million in 2009 prize money, the FedEx bonus and his take so far this year from his more than $100 million in annual off-the-course earnings, Woods' career earnings are now a billion.
Only two other sports figures come close: Michael Jordan (basketball) and Michael Schumacher (Formula One) have career earnings in the hundreds of millions. They each dominated their respective sports for 15 years. Jordan was the early odds-on favourite to make the billion mark first, but Jordan earns $45 million annually now (down from a peak of $69M earlier). So, with the slowdown, Jordan is expected to hit the $billion mark in 4 or 5 years. Schumacher's total is estimated at $700 million.
Woods has been the world's highest-paid athlete since 2002. His earnings have surged in recent years as he launched a golf course design business. He currently has three courses underway that pay him more than $10 million per project. One of the courses is on hold (Dubai) as the economy has slowed down. Also, his knee surgery cost him millions in prize money as he recovered through most of 2008. Current growth may be due to pentup demand. Post Presidents Cup, he has three other tournaments plus his own Tiger Woods Challenge remaining in 2009. When he plays outside the U.S., Tiger commands an appearance fee of $3 million per event plus prize money.
Tiger lost Buick as a sponsor at the end of last year, but currently retains:
- AT&T ( on his golf bag)
- PepsiCo ( Gatorade Tiger sports drink)
- Accenture (consulting)
- Electronic Arts (computer games )
- Gillette (men's grooming)
- Upper Deck (sports playing cards)
- Nike (sports equipment)
Tiger denies that he is a billionaire. If he's not, these numbers and sponsorship deals must mean he is close. Heck, give or take a couple hundred million, why quibble? Tiger is only 33 years old. You know he's going to hit the big-B soon. Plenty of time left to start on billion #2 and billion #3 I would think.