Golf 2.0 - A blueprint for a better game

Fergus Bisset describes a hypothetical world in which GM is given a blank sheet of paper and the opportunity to design golf from scratch. Is the finished product any different?

- Fergus Bisset

Golf has been played on these isles for at least 550 years. There’s a reason for its longevity – it’s a fantastic sport. But, like anything growing to a ripe old age, golf has developed its idiosyncrasies over the centuries. Changing society and culture have influenced the game over a long time and, although we relish golf’s rich history, there are elements of the sport, embedded over years, that don’t quite align with today’s world.

While in lockdown waiting to get back on the course, the Golf Monthly team put its heads together and pondered the question: if we had a blank canvas and could design golf from scratch, what would the sport look like? Here, we consider our ‘Golf 2.0’.

First of all, it should be noted that we (as you would expect) like golf a great deal, so would change little with regards the fundamentals of the game. The objective of hitting a ball from one point to another, eventually finding the bottom of a small cup, would remain. What we’re really considering here are the ancillary elements of golf –the playing fields, the formats and the attitudes within the sport. What courses would Golf 2.0 be played on? How would it be played at different levels? And what would we do to make the sport popular?

Golf courses

Over the centuries, the golf courses in the UK and Ireland have evolved from rudimentary routes between two points to manicured, sculpted layouts on links, park and heath.

The path to the current standard for a course was hugely influenced by early pioneers like Old Tom Morris, who carved out holes through the natural terrain at Prestwick – just 12 of them at first. St Andrews had 22, which became 18... which became the norm. In the modern world where time is precious, 18 holes is simply too time-consuming for many people.