29/03/2018
Check out the article in the April edition of Inside Golf about GolfTag.
Perth club winning slow play battle
SLOW play is the bane of golfers and golf clubs the world over, but a Perth club has taken on the challenge and is winning the battle.
The Vine Resort Country Club has managed to reduce the time it takes to play an 18-hole competition round by 45 minutes to an average of 4 hours and 15 minutes – virtually eliminated slow play at the popular 36-hole facility.
“We were frequently getting in excess of five-hour competition rounds so we introduced a pace-of-play policy, which proved to be reasonably successful in raising members’ awareness,” said Mike Saunders, the club’s director of finance.
“Then, 12 months ago, we came up with the idea to issue playing groups with a Radio Frequency Identification Tag (RFID) that has to be swiped at four stations around the course – the first hole, ninth green, 10th green and 18th green.”
At each station the player’s time is uploaded to a website instantaneously allowing club officials to monitor the progress of players in the field – around 200 on Wednesdays and Saturdays.
Groups hit off in eight-minute intervals.
“This has been highly successful as it has allowed us to clearly identify the slow playing groups,” Saunders said.
“We then work with those players to improve their pace of play.”
The club’s aim is to ensure all players complete their round in less than four hours and 30 minutes (4:30).
Players who take more than 4:30 to complete their round receive a “polite and friendly” email from the club asking them to explain why they exceeded the time and are reminded to be conscious of the club’s pace-of-play policy.
“By issuing everybody with a tag they feel involved and engaged and connected to the pace of play,” Saunders added.
Well, it seems the tag system has positively changed the behaviour of the members.
“It is a good topic of humour in the club because after the round everybody is asking each other how long it took them to finish their round,” he said.
“And from a match committee’s point of view we are able to look at the results and identify the slow playing groups causing the problem.”
“We know that Pace of Play is a difficult task to take on because members don’t like being told they play slowly,” he added.
“We are not trying to get people to play faster. What we are trying to do is stop people from playing slowly.”
Competition golf is about keeping up with the group ahead, not in front of the group behind.
With that in mind, the Vines encourages its members to play ready-golf where possible rather than wait for their playing partners who may not be in position to play their next shot.
“These things take time for people to adjust to, but 90 per cent of players are happy to comply with ready-golf,” Saunders said. “The rest of the players are in transition mode.”
Saunders said the tag system has eliminated five-hour competition rounds.
“This is a great example of taking on an initiative,” he said.
“It is a credit to the club members who have got involved and support the initiative which has led to a successful outcome.”
Perhaps this is something other golf clubs concerned with slow play should consider introducing.
The system, according to Saunders, is very simple to use, and is a low cost solution..
In 2015, the R&A introduced a pace-of-play manual and identified slow play as the primary reason why people were not taking up the game of golf.
Meanwhile, the Director of Golf Development at St Andrews, has shown interest in the Vines’ tag system.
“He is very interested in the system and the progress we are making and has asked me to keep him appraised of progress,” Saunders said.
