By The Golf Wire

24 April 2020

This sentiment was echoed by Dennis Rye, Director of Golf, Mizner Country Club. “Once people are allowed to play golf, there is going to be a big surge in people wanting to play.”

Moreover, despite adapting to the challenges brought about by the pandemic, the panel along with a vast majority of attendees, agreed that golf is resilient and overall successful in developing innovative plans to adapt to the post COVID-19 era.

Topics receiving strong attention by the panel and attendees, who presented questions to them during the session, included the need to provide a safe playing environment by ensuring the practice of 6 foot social distancing, having fewer touch points on and off the course, and ensuring the availability of hand sanitizers as well as implementing cashless procedures.

Another key survey named “How your course will adapt to a new and different world, post COVID-19” found that the top three priorities were providing a safer environment for players (89%), followed by finding ways to work with less touch points and resources (73%). Over 55 percent acknowledged the importance of technology at their courses and will consider using technology formats to achieve greater efficiencies at their facility in the future.

With safety and the ability to do more, with less touch points and resources being key priorities – it made sense that technology was a top 3 priority, due to its ability to improve safety and efficiency, within golf operations. Other lower priorities were the promotion of walking golf (32%) and decreasing green fees/membership fees (5%) and increasing tee time intervals (32%). 

This last item led to a hotly debated discussion of whether to increase Gap Interval times between groups of players. Commenting on this, Bodo Sieber noted the recommended safe distance between playing groups is the 6-foot social distance marker – while most courses maintain a comfortable 10-minute interval (equating to approximately 300 yards).

“This constitutes a far greater distance than what leading experts have suggested. We caution that while player safety is paramount, adding any additional time over and above this, would have little to no impact on safety, yet would have a very negative impact on course capacity, and therefore, revenue. Courses looking to increase Gap Intervals should reconsider and instead focus on maintaining and proactively managing effective intervals to ensure both a safe environment and commercial success.” 

“We’ve remained constant at 10-minute intervals and feel that that is appropriate,” said Matt Barksdale, PGA Head Professional, Pinehurst. “The most important thing is adhering to that 10 minutes at the start of each round.”

Sieber added, “Efficiency is the key to the survival and success of golf courses in the future.

Many managers have recognized they can do more with less and that technology materially aids this objective.” The panel members strongly endorsed this and cited various protocols they have been implementing including requiring golfers to self-park rather than providing valet service, having players responsible for sanitizing their carts, and providing take away meals after the round. Sieber also noted that courses with closed ranges and clubhouses should provide each group with Tagmarshal’s “Park and Play” roadmap ahead of time to visually detail the route golfers need to adhere to from their auto to the mobile check-in area to the 1st or 10th tees.

At the conclusion of the webinar, attendees were offered a specially-designed program with a six months no-payment start enabling their courses, whether private, daily-fee access, resort or municipal facilities, to benefit from the advantages of Tagmarshal’s optimization system during this critical time.

Please share these tips, articles and insights, so that as many people as possible can benefit from #SafeGolf.

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