Golf at $11 per Swing
Posted: Wed Nov 01, 2017 12:15 pmSo, my golf buddy enthusiastically signed us up for a golf thing at the local ball park, which happens to be the Atlanta Braves new home - SunTrust Park. Stadium Links is an outfit that goes around the country and sets up major stadiums as a nine-hole golf course, sort of. The playing field is covered with psuedo greens that have circles around each flag. All around the stadium, nine tee boxes (astroturf) are installed at various places in the stands, including the upper deck. The idea is that you hit a golf ball towards the designated target flag for that hole and you're scored on how close you get to the flag. There are actually holes at the flags and if you get the ball in the hole, it counts as a hole in one (an eagle, in golf parlance). Inside the circle is a birdie; anywhere else on the green is par; anywhere else on the playing field is a bogey; and out of the park is a double bogie.
Sounded cool, so the four of us headed out this past Sunday. And cool it was - frigid, actually. Atlanta's first cold spell of the season had set in. Plus, it was windy. No matter, we're troopers.
However, as cool as it was to hit golf balls onto a major league ball field, I kind of felt ripped off. The price per person was $100 and you were given only nine balls - one per hole. That works out to about $11 per shot, which is pretty steep. It also makes for a poor experience because the setup is not really one you encounter on a real golf course. For one, the elevation change - especially from the cheap seats - is huge, much more than what you'd see with a real course and you're only provided horizontal distances to the flag. That greatly affects what club you should hit (there were Mizuno brand clubs at each tee box - you didn't have to bring your own). Also, unlike here, golf balls don't tend to take huge bounces when they hit the green and they don't roll as far. So, everyone's first shot was a bit of test to see what would happen. We didn't score very well. A more satisfying setup might be to allow players either two balls per hole and score the best shot or maybe provide a number of extra balls you could use at any time. So, for example, you could hit a few practice shots on the first tee to see how the ball reacts to the field.
Anyway, been there, done that. The new stadium is nice, although the old one (Turner Field) was also nice and didn't need to be replaced (it's actually now Georgia State University's stadium).
Sounded cool, so the four of us headed out this past Sunday. And cool it was - frigid, actually. Atlanta's first cold spell of the season had set in. Plus, it was windy. No matter, we're troopers.
However, as cool as it was to hit golf balls onto a major league ball field, I kind of felt ripped off. The price per person was $100 and you were given only nine balls - one per hole. That works out to about $11 per shot, which is pretty steep. It also makes for a poor experience because the setup is not really one you encounter on a real golf course. For one, the elevation change - especially from the cheap seats - is huge, much more than what you'd see with a real course and you're only provided horizontal distances to the flag. That greatly affects what club you should hit (there were Mizuno brand clubs at each tee box - you didn't have to bring your own). Also, unlike here, golf balls don't tend to take huge bounces when they hit the green and they don't roll as far. So, everyone's first shot was a bit of test to see what would happen. We didn't score very well. A more satisfying setup might be to allow players either two balls per hole and score the best shot or maybe provide a number of extra balls you could use at any time. So, for example, you could hit a few practice shots on the first tee to see how the ball reacts to the field.
Anyway, been there, done that. The new stadium is nice, although the old one (Turner Field) was also nice and didn't need to be replaced (it's actually now Georgia State University's stadium).
