While indoor golf may never replace the real thing, virtual golf is growing like crazy. Drastic improvement in the physics and graphics for Golf Simulators has led to an indoor experience that rivals—and in some ways, exceeds—the outdoor game.
Denmark-based TrackMan has long provided professional golfers, coaches, and equipment makers around the world with superior tracking and data insights to help them improve. Pair that same top-of-the-line tracking and radar technology with a state-of-the-art physics and graphics engine and the result is a technology that has come close to rivaling the excitement and accuracy of golfing outdoors.
The technology has gotten so good that TrackMan believes you can assess a player’s golfing ability, competitiveness, and potential to succeed outdoors by having them compete virtually. The European Tour Event Organizers agree, and for the first time, the winner of a virtual tournament will get the opportunity to prove themselves at the game’s highest level.
TrackMan has partnered with the ECCO Tour, a professional golf tour in the Nordics, to offer a series of three virtual tournaments. The ECCO Tour Virtual Spring Series consists of three individual stroke play events with each score contributing to an order of merit leaderboard. The top player across the three events will receive a coveted spot to the European Tour’s Made in HimmerLand Event in May. If that wasn’t motivation enough, the top three players will receive invitations to European Challenge Tour events.
Hundreds of players have signed up to compete in the event, and it isn’t just would-be professionals eager for their big break. The series is also open to top-ranked amateur players, with the best-performing amateur receiving a spot in the Challenge Tour’s ‘Made in Esbjerg’ event. To compete, all the player needs is access to a TrackMan at any commercial or residential simulator, worldwide.
Flemming Astrup, ECCO Tour’s CEO, says that the “ECCO Tour strives to come up with initiatives to develop the game of golf, but also to find new ways to make it possible for our members to compete all year round. We also know how hard the last 12 months have been for players and we are therefore excited to announce our Virtual Series. We are all missing the feeling of tournament golf, and I really hope that the ECCO Tour Virtual Series – By Made in HimmerLand can help fill the void and provide our players and fans with some excitement and entertainment across the three weeks in March.”
TrackMan has been at the forefront of innovation through merging technology with golf. Simulators promise to grow the game by lowering the barriers of entry to play. You no longer need privileged access to courses and practice facilities, and faster playing times make the game more accessible to new golfers.
This fall, TrackMan is planning a series of indoor tournaments open to golfers of all skill levels. Using your “TrackMan handicap” (based on an algorithm similar to the World Golf Handicap System) you will be able to compete and win prizes, from any TrackMan simulator, anywhere in the world.
Klaus Eldrup-Jørgensen, TrackMan’s co-founder and CEO, is excited about what lies ahead. “We try to think across the traditional boundaries that exist in golf. Virtual golf is enabling the golf community to grow significantly” says Eldrup- Jørgensen. “We are doing things that have never been done. This is changing the game, and we’re just getting started.” With backing from heavyweight industry partners, growing enthusiasm for their products, and cutting-edge hardware and software, there is little doubt that TrackMan will continue to innovate. Who knows where the next Tiger Woods will be discovered—they might even come from your local sim.