Pace of Play on Golf Courses

[Bill_Yates]

JKM,
Let me answer your question.

1. Pace of play is a very complex issue (though most people don't think so)and the major responsibility for improving and managiing the pace of play rests on the professional staff and not on the backs of the players as most people believe. Your job is to manage the course in such a way as to deliver the highest quality product (playing experience) to the largest number of customers (every starting time of the day). 

2. This is a very difficult job that requires knowledge and insights of the specific causes of slow play on your course; knowledge that is based on hard facts not suppositions.  And it demands a trained and motivated staff with the tools to know precisely what they are seeing when out on the course and how and when to take action.

3. As you can see by the three previous pages of posts, everyone has an opinion, but nobody has any facts regarding what the pace should be on your course, why it is not what it should be, and what corrective actions you should take.

Note: Doug, in the post above, has just given up, and I'm afraid so have many players. 

The pace of play can be greatly improved.  I have seen it happen on well over 100 courses.  The successes come when management teams look beyond themselves for professional help, don't guess at solutions, and don't give up.

[Doug Siebert]

Shivas,

I think your "rebate card" idea has merit, but I would recommend a couple changes.  The size of the rebates needs to be aligned with the price of the course.  On a $20/round course, a $10 deposit is fine.  On a $200/round course it needs to be a lot more.  Maybe not $100, but I'd say $50.  Because to be honest, people who are willing to pay $200 for a round of golf aren't going to care about $10, they'll just mentally include it in the amount they pay and not care about their pace of play.

Second, I think you could get more course operators to try it if it wasn't redeemable for greens fees, but was redeemable in the pro shop and bar.  If the courses I played had something like that I'd use it when I buy something at the turn, and I'd probably buy my Titleists at the inflated pro shop prices instead of from a discount golf store even though they'd cost me $15 a dozen more because they'd be "free".

OK, not really, I know that's not true since my dad's a PhD in Econ and he'd flip a fit if I saw me writing something like that, but that's how most people's minds work.  And absent anything else to spend the money on at the course I'd at least spend it on something I'd be buying anyway since I'd have to use it up by the end of the year.

I still think its iffy whether it would work because you can't make the rebates big enough to effect self-important people with more money than sense who'd figure any amount into the cost of playing at the speed they want to play rather than getting "hurried".  Which is why I still think you need to keep the option of kicking people off the course as a last resort.  If no amount of carrots will result in the desired behavior, eventually you have to bring out the stick!

[Doug Siebert]

Dave--I think that often times us in the business try to enfore a policy, its just not as stringent as I would like. Plus, sometimes rangers on the course do not do what they need to do. Today, we had issues on the course, our ranger was out, we radio him every so often. We radio him once, he says everything is fine, then we come back 10 minutes later and his words were "its a f$#%ng disaster." So, how does it go from everything's fine to a disaster in 10 minutes?? It doesn't, he just wasn't paying attention.
--We (in the business) just do a poor job of puting in a reasonable pace, enforcing that pace, and making people leave if need be. Its just poeple being too scared to really enforce something.

Sounds to me like that's a management/training problem with the rangers.  How do you hire your rangers, who are you hiring and what is their compensation?  Around here they are mostly retired guys who do it in exchange for free golf (maybe they are paid minimum wage type salaries as well, dunno if paying them in free golf only would be permitted by the IRS)  If hypothetically, better rangers doing their job right could get things moving well enough that a course could go from 10 to 9 minutes between tee times, they could afford a lot more for rangers.  But even if you keep the tee times the same, if you believe that better pace of play would increase your business paying extra for better rangers would be worth it.

That assumes that paying rangers more would result in better ones, I have no idea if that's true, but at some point extra money is going to draw in better qualified people or at least people who will do whatever you tell them in order to keep the cushy job with the fat salary

[Richard Boult]

After many years in the software industry, I finally learned to "embrace chaos" instead of fighting and resisting it... After letting slow play piss me off a few too many times and subsequently ruining those rounds, I've now learned to "embrace waiting"... although I long for faster rounds, and many here have shared some great ideas to enable them, I'm not going to hold my breath waiting to see courses "embrace faster play"... instead I'm trying to find constructive ways to enjoy every round - even the marathons.

[Richard Boult]

I think the most effective single idea presented so far is the one where you get rewarded for finishing in a specified time by getting preferential early tee times on upcoming weekends... gradually filling early weekend tee sheets with those of us with fast twitch muscles and A-type personalities!  Back of the bus for those methodical, ball-loosing, slow-walking, yardage-walking, sometimes clueless others.

[Jim_Kennedy]

The 'industry' should be thankful for people like Bill Yates who actively pursue finding solutions to the slow play issue.
Educating the player is a component, but that is not part of the issue that can be immediately addressed( the snails are already out on the course), whereas management can make the difference when it is needed, i.e. the here and now. And as Bill says, it is always a course specific issue even though some remedies may be useful in different situations.

We're lucky at Hotchkiss, we mainly experience slow play and back-ups only on Sunday afternoons when the course is populated by recreational players. If someone playing at this time comes in complaining they've been held up, we let them know about all the other times when they won't. They learn to show up when it's less crowded, or stop complaining.

Some friends played a course that had a policy of giving two slow play warnings, but a third visit from the ranger was accompanied by a 'rain check' for nine holes which could be used later on that same day.
At another course they played, the rangers checked times at every few tees, and would escort laggards ahead to the 150 yd. markers and have them play in from there. Both of these policies were known ahead of time.

I think the most effective systems will always leave an impression with players that you are regulating the flow of the course, and not trying to regulate their experience or their mode of playing.

[Joe Bausch]

Is alcohol a factor at some courses where slow play happens regularly on a typical summer Saturday or Sunday afternoon?  Just a thought.

[Bill_Yates]

Jim,
You hit on one of my core beliefs and strategies.  By focusing on the management team, I am working with those who are there day-after-day, who have a financially vested interest in providing a consistent high-quality product and who I can work with on the course and let them see first hand that what they do has a direct impact on the pace of play.

Of course focusing on the players is critical, but that happens only after we get the management team trained and equipped with the tools to know what they are seeing on the course and the skills to address the problems.

What can I say - it works!

[Steve_ Shaffer]

Instead of packing the course with 7 or 8 minute tee times, I think 10 minute tee times would work wonders for improving play at most public courses on weekends. I think Bill Yates interview here should be required reading for golf course managers.

[John Moore II]

JKM,
Let me answer your question.

1. Pace of play is a very complex issue (though most people don't think so)and the major responsibility for improving and managiing the pace of play rests on the professional staff and not on the backs of the players as most people believe. Your job is to manage the course in such a way as to deliver the highest quality product (playing experience) to the largest number of customers (every starting time of the day). 

2. This is a very difficult job that requires knowledge and insights of the specific causes of slow play on your course; knowledge that is based on hard facts not suppositions.  And it demands a trained and motivated staff with the tools to know precisely what they are seeing when out on the course and how and when to take action.

3. As you can see by the three previous pages of posts, everyone has an opinion, but nobody has any facts regarding what the pace should be on your course, why it is not what it should be, and what corrective actions you should take.

Note: Doug, in the post above, has just given up, and I'm afraid so have many players. 

The pace of play can be greatly improved.  I have seen it happen on well over 100 courses.  The successes come when management teams look beyond themselves for professional help, don't guess at solutions, and don't give up.

Bill--I agree with what you say here. I will say flat out that the burden of policing slow play rests on my shoulders. I feel like some clubs try to enforce slow play, however, the pace they enforce is unduly slow to begin with (IMHO) and once a group gets even a little slower than that, its a real nightmare. The management team is without a doubt the key group to focus on when trying to combat slow play. I think that many times, management can't see the problem, or don't want to see it.

--I also feel that people on the course can do a part as well. I, personally, have nothing against telling people to get a move on. I will tell them on tee boxes and anywhere else that I think they're playing slow and holding me up, I don't care.

[Garland Bayley]

Subject beaten to death in countless threads. It's sometimes slower than you would like ........ get over it, the World isn't perfect.

We need a thread about the joys of spending the day playing golf or something.

Doug

Back in the day, the joys of spending the day playing golf meant 54 holes in 7 and 1/2 hours. That would be the typical foursome (2-ball) in the UK.

Forgive us if we aren't enjoying 5-6 hours for 18 holes on CCFADs.

[Mike Golden]

in 1984, on a Sunday morning at 9:15 AM, I played Gleneagles Queens with 3 others, all walking, in 3 hours and 15 minutes.  We were not playing alternate shot or a match and no one felt like they were being rushed.

I fail to understand how American golf can be so slow except that it is the expectation.  A 4 hour round on a weekend morning is fine given the amount of rounds being played but why it has to be 5 boggles my mind.  I'd rather read a book than be on a golf course for 5 hours standing around.

[Jim_Kennedy]

Back in the day, the joys of spending the day playing golf meant 54 holes in 7 and 1/2 hours. That would be the typical foursome (2-ball) in the UK.
Forgive us if we aren't enjoying 5-6 hours for 18 holes on CCFADs.-G Bayley

No one who's out to play golf enjoys 5 hour rounds. Look for a place that  suits your pace, and unless your name is Tom Huckaby(sorry Tom) you ought to be able to find one.

[Bill_Yates]

JKM,
I think you are right on.  However, I believe the reason that Professionals and Rangers choose "not to see the problem," is precisely because they really don't know the cause of the slowing (they think they do, ie players playing slowly) and they also have no cure even if they knew what caused the play to be slow.  So, why should they acknowledge a problem over which they are powerless to correct?  They don't!

For the most part, golf course management teams are not equipped with the knowledge or tools to really diagnose a "slow play" problem and fix it, just as everyday players are incapable of curing their own swing flaws.  They haven't been trained and equipped to do so.

Mike Gordon,
I had the good fortune to work with Russell Smith and his great staff at Gleneagles.  Perhaps that helped a wee bit.   They wanted round time CONSISTENCY.  And if you think about it, that's all any management team and players really want because that translates into predictability - quality.

[John Moore II]

Bill--I skimmed through the interview with you on this site. I noticed that you helped to write the USGA pace manual. Do you feel this manual is used in the way you intended? I feel that the pace ratings of courses are not accurate in practice, at least from my point of view. Many courses around Pinehurst are pace rated for over 4 hours 15 minutes, with some being as high was 4 hrs 30 minutes. I feel these are both extremely high numbers, as I see golfers play (at least some of) these courses every day in around 3 hours. Please give us your thoughts on this, how can the 'number' and reality of play be so far off??

[Michael Ryan]

Pace of play has been on my mind a lot lately, as I have struggled with it in just about every recent game I have had.  I grew up at a small 9 hole private facility in upstate NY and the club basically policed it themselves. 

As I now am playing the muni facilities of CT, I simply am astounded by the pace of play, and how long it takes to get around a golf course.  I often blame the usual suspects, most golfers riding and not knowing how to properly share a cart, players playing from tees that are too far for their skill level, etc.  Lately I have been keying on something I'm noticing from my friends that are learning the game as well as complete strangers that I'm paired with, the amount of time it takes on the greens. 

Growing up, as a group approached the green and say one person had hit the green in regulation and three people had missed, I would suspect that across most handicap ranges, you would see average pitch or chip shots that would allow the four players to then putt with their next shots.  As they move to putting, you may have players 30, 20, 15, and 8 feet respectively (30 footer from the player who hit in reg, the last three distances from the pitch or chip shots).  The person with 8 feet left would watch the three players putt and either make, or miss close and tap in, or miss in the 3 to 4 foot range and mark.  He/she would then putt from 8 feet.  Lately, I feel like I'm the guy with the 30 footer after hitting the green in regulation and I'm amazed at watching pitch and chip shots zinging over greens, chuncking into bunkers, etc.  Getting all four players onto the surface seems to have been extended tremendously.  On the times where I may be the 8 footer waiting for 3 other players to putt from a distance, I'm astounded at how many players are leaving it 10 feet short, or blowing it 10 feet or more past. 

As a young player, I started to establish a routine of when to start really focusing on the shot at hand, and I would do so when one or more of the players were playing their shots, thinking that I'll be next based on a properly played shot from the others.  In the last few years, the amount of times I have been getting ready to putt only to have to back off while my playing partners go back and forth is mind boggling.  I realize that this is rampant and I think has a huge impact on the pace of play.

When I hear a group on the first tee making bets and there are individual bets involved, I cringe, knowing that players are not going to be picking up and that they are going to be grinding over double bogey efforts. 

I have only played 2 rounds in Ireland and 1 in Scotland, but just from those rounds, I can tell I was born in the wrong country, as I think this is something that is reached epidemic proportions in the US....

One footnote, somewhere in the middle of the back nine, when asked if I have any tips, I simply ask, "How much time per week do you devote to working on your short game?".  I have yet to hear anything other than "none". 

[Tom Huckaby]

Back in the day, the joys of spending the day playing golf meant 54 holes in 7 and 1/2 hours. That would be the typical foursome (2-ball) in the UK.
Forgive us if we aren't enjoying 5-6 hours for 18 holes on CCFADs.-G Bayley

No one who's out to play golf enjoys 5 hour rounds. Look for a place that  suits your pace, and unless your name is Tom Huckaby(sorry Tom) you ought to be able to find one.

Jim is sadly correct.  There is no course near me that can be played in as fast as I like to play during the times I want to play it.  I envy those of you who have these choices.

Such is SF Bay Area golf.

BTW I like Dave Moriarty's idea here... and unbelievably, management at my beloved Santa Teresa is at least moving in this direction... check this out:

http://www.santateresagolf.com/golf/proto/santateresagolf/pacesetter/pacesetter.htm

No clue how it's working as I haven't played there this year... but I damn well registered....

TH

[Richard Choi]

I do like the idea of awarding player for quick play.

At Chambers Bay, if you are one of the first three groups out, you get a free hat if you finish your round under 4:15.

I had no problem earning my hat, but I don't think that is enough of a motivation when people are playing $170/round...

[Bill_Yates]

JKM,
The Pace Ratings were designed to represent what it "should take" to play on a course that is filled with foursomes.  So, for the first out in the morning and for sporadic play this would be too much time.  I have calculated Pace ratings from 3:57 (The Old Course) to an average of about 4:07 (in the US when carts have access to the fairways), up to 4:31 (in the US when the majority of players ride and carts are restricted to cart paths).

I know it will sound strange for me to say this, but to be used as a diagnostic tool, the Pace Ratings and individual hole "Time Pars" don't have to be perfectly accurate, they need to be consistent.  From this point of objective measurement (like the 98.6 degree "should be" human body temperature), you will have a point of reference on a hole-by-hole basis to know if your course has a fever.  And as I said earlier, knowing that, it is critical that you and your staff also know what specific prescription to write for the cure.

[Chris Cupit]

author=DMoriarty link=topic=34763.msg701380#msg701380 date=1212457635]

I missed Chris Cupit's post at first, but his approach seems to me to be somewhat similar to what I suggest.   My only point of disagreement would be with setting the acceptable round at as high as 4:10 minutes for morning play.   Why not knock it down to 4 or 3:45 as that would help play for the rest of the day?

Here is his post again.

David,

I do select my lead groups to some degree and it does seem like the guys who like to tee off at 7:00 AM also like to play fast and enjoy the rest of the day.  My lead foursome almost always is done in 3:30.  My problem is my 8:30-9:00 groups and some of the guys are older.  My course is hilly and part of the "leniency" is due to not wanting to be too harsh. 

If I can keep everyone before 10:00 at 4:10 or better, I usually have a small break and and enough of a lull such that when the 12:00 gang comes with their game they too can easily play in 4:10.  I call it a good day if I do 150 rounds and the later groups all play within 4:20.

As you know, if you have group after group you inevitabley "lose" a little time with each successive group--akin to finishing laundry and losing one sock I guess!

I am pretty vigilant and our pre 10:00 groups do make a very good effort not to lose their times on the weekends.  Also posting of the tee sheet in the locker room is second only to the past due accounts list in terms of member interest and reading!  Nothing is better than having the members come in and (good naturedly but seriously) give a slow group the business about holding up the course and the posting has it up there in black and white.

[John Moore II]

JKM,
The Pace Ratings were designed to represent what it "should take" to play on a course that is filled with foursomes.  So, for the first out in the morning and for sporadic play this would be too much time.  I have calculated Pace ratings from 3:57 (The Old Course) to an average of about 4:07 (in the US when carts have access to the fairways), up to 4:31 (in the US when the majority of players ride and carts are restricted to cart paths).

I know it will sound strange for me to say this, but to be used as a diagnostic tool, the Pace Ratings and individual hole "Time Pars" don't have to be perfectly accurate, they need to be consistent.  From this point of objective measurement (like the 98.6 degree "should be" human body temperature), you will have a point of reference on a hole-by-hole basis to know if your course has a fever.  And as I said earlier, knowing that, it is critical that you and your staff also know what specific prescription to write for the cure.

--The second sentence in the first paragraph is key to me. Bill, are you saying that if the first group can play in 3 hrs 30 minutes the next groups should in theory be able to fall in line at that same pace? And perhaps by the end of the day pace might be up to 4 hrs 15 minutes by the end of the round?

[Bill_Yates]

JKM,
It all depends on the spacing of the groups.  The closer they are together, the faster the spots for delays will begin to occur and the more places to wait there will be.  The accumulation of these individual "waits" slowly starts to build the round times until the course is fully saturated and the poor souls that tee off then are sentenced to 5 hour plus rounds.  That's precisely why everyone wants to play before 8:30 am.

Now if a course could provide a steady flow of play for every starting time of the day, they would be providing a product of consistent quality, and more starting times would be filled by replays and new customers.

As it is now, those who fight to play at 8:00 am get a higher quality experience than those who play at 11:00 and pay the same amount.  By the way, that's why GM is having such a hard time and Toyota is not. 

Slow play is a all about inconsistent quality and inconsistent value received for time and money spent.  No wonder we are losing players and GM is no longer the largest car manufacturer in the world.

[Mike Hendren]

In a game that is not growing, so long as courses continue to be delivered to the market, does demand have the upper hand?  If so, is it conceivable that in the case of public courses, there is absolutely nothing that can be done?  Customers - you can't live with 'em and you can't live without 'em.

[John Moore II]

Michael--I can actually make an arguement that the faster groups play (as long as they return) the MORE golfers you can get on a course in one day.
--First tee time: 7:00 am-10 minute tee times (no way at a public facility, but go with me, the math works either way)-5 hour pace-Dark at 8:00 pm--8 hours of tee times=196 golfers
--First tee time: 7:00 am-10 minute tee times-4 hour pace-Dark at 8 pm--9 hours of tee times=220 golfers
--At 3 hours 30 minutes you get another 12 golfers in the day

--So at a faster pace, you actually can get more golfers on the course in a given day. Over the course of the year (assuming full booking every day) you gain roughly 4000 rounds for every 30 minutes you can cut off pace of play.
--Now, don't take this as gospel, the reality isn't taken into account on those figures, but just by pure math, the gain can be fairly large is pace is improved, not to mention, customer satisfaction.
--If I could get rid of every 5 hour round golfer at my course, resort guests and all, I promise I could replace every one of them with golfers who would love to play in 4 hours or less.

[Bill_Yates]

Michael,
Have you ever gone to your favorite restaurant and had to wait for a table, or called for a reservation and been turned down for that evening or offered a table at 8:45?  Most likely you waited or took the later time. 

High quality is always in demand, in fact the demand makes the product even more valueable to the seller and to the buyer.  Course owners don't have to cave-in to a crush of players, they should deliver a more consistent product and when they do, they will fill more of their properly spaced starting times and increase their revenue