Realistically, since caddies already measure the course and distances from landmarks by pacing it out, or by the use of a laser, there is not too much in it for the paid elite. For caddies though, a GPS can make the gathering of such information in advance eminently simpler.
The main argument in favour of the use of a GPS is that since the professional players at the top end of the sport are provided with this information by their caddie, why shouldn’t we week-end, handicap practitioners ‘benefit’ from a similar degree of assistance?
One answer is that not everyone believes it is for the good of the sport. But then, I well remember back in what now seems another life, when not everybody in football thought the new-fangled floodlights would benefit the sport… or that substitutes should be allowed. (And AS for penalty shoot-outs… well, words failed many of the old stick-in-the-muds.) Now, of course, by giving the thumbs up to the GPS, golf has taken on board a level of technology that has its source up in outer space where a positive plethora of orbiting, extra-terrestrial eyes are circumnavigating the globe and relaying their ‘location’ messages to any golf course that chooses to pick them up. Talk about ‘new technology’!
This particular version has its roots in the twelve billion dollar defence strategy launched in 1978 by the United States Defence Department and is still managed and maintained by them.There are 24 orbiting satellites 12,000 miles above the earth travelling at speeds in excess of 5,000 mph and transmitting signals at 186,000 mph, the speed of light, all computed so that any receiver on earth can ‘see’ at least four of them at any one time.
Get your head around that, if you can, and link it up to golf. When you consider that Harry Vardon’s name is used to this day because he decided a century or more ago that it was a good idea to overlap the left forefinger with right little finger to create the Vardon Grip, you get a clue to the enormity of the advances brought about by GPS.
Right out in front of this latest techno-revolution is a company called Elumina Iberica who market the World No.1 ProLink system and who, since joining the PGAs of Europe as Corporate Partners in the latter half of 2005, have been inundated with requests to have ProLink installed. The major attraction to clubs and resorts is not simply that it tells players how far it is to the green. It does so much more than that. When all the GPS receivers are linked to a control panel in the course manager’s office they flood the place with information right down to what the guy teeing off on the 16th intends to have for his tea!
During tournaments of any description, each player sends his hole-by-hole score back to the office to an up-to-the-minute scoreboard… those who are playing slowly are instantly identified… indeed, the total ‘population’ of the course and every player’s whereabouts is available instantly. Imagine the benefits for those who administer the course, especially at busy times, if they can find out at the flick of switch how many people are on the course at any one time, which groups are off the pace of play, which parts of the course are most likely to create hold-ups, and what the demands might be on catering. The club or resort’s entire admin system is thereby sent into orbit, along with those eyes in the sky.
Anyone out on the course can order his pint of amber nectar and his bacon and egg sandwich via his GPS system and the catering staff will know, down to a few minutes, what time he or she will arrive to consume it. I don’t know about you, dear reader, but even in an age when one can communicate to anywhere in the world, from anywhere, in an instant, even when on the move, either verbally, by text or by e-mail via a mobile telephone, all this still fills me with a sense of awe. Then, as if the systems needed a bonus, there is an on-screen advertising dimension as an income stream that will be sourced and administered by Elumina Iberica, along with an easy-payment system.
Unsurprisingly the response to Elumina’s GPS in their distribution area covering Europe and theMiddle-east is similar to its impact in the USA where it quickly became the market leader. Leading clubs and resorts too numerous to list here are now either using the system, awaiting installation or are in discussions.
More and more pay-as-you-play resorts will follow suit, that is as certain as it is that the satellites will continue to relentlessly encircle the earth and tell more and more of us, on screen, exactly where we are and where to find our destination. As Angela Catlin, of the Elumina team puts it : “We are now the ultimate company across Europe and the middle-east for both buggy and hand-held operations.” As this technical revolution unavoidably gains pace, most of us probably have a little voice in our heads asking whether real golf is not about walking the course, carrying our clubs, restricting the march of technology and judging club selection by experience and instinct. The same ‘little voice’ would then have to ask whether we could survive any longer without a mobile telephone, a computer and an Ipod. I can well recall a school teacher ordering me never to use a biro, because only a pen and ink would be acceptable for school work. The fact is that, love it or hate it, new technology is having a major affect on the sport for all of us forever. So let’s not forget that those founding fathers whom we only see in good old fashioned sepia pictures, were responsible for the greatest ‘invention’ of all: GOLF. It was a modern, ‘new-fangled game’ at the time, no doubt….
