Kids' Play for Grown-Ups

Description

In an effort to make golf less ‘intimidating’ to new adult golfers, we have started using the same instructional formats and games we use for teaching junior golfers in our weekly clinics. Combining the brightly colored cones, stakes, noodles, and whatnot with the challenging games used to teach each skill, our ‘adults’ become competitive kids again. Even changing the language – drills to games, matches to challenges – seems to have made a difference in the mindset of the new golfers.

Implementation

Since starting this new format and the increased popularity, we added a summer session of five clinics to the normal schedule and we’ve had to cap the number of participants each week due to space restrictions. Residual affect: we saw an increase in first time players in our couples events resulting in three of the four events being sell-outs, the number of players in our weekly 9 hole ladies group has doubled, and we have seen multiple ‘golf games’ started with ladies playing together away from the clinics. By removing the ‘scary’ formal aspects of game, our ladies are much more excited about learning and playing the game!!