Southern California's No. 1 Golf Source
SITE
SEARCH
GOLF RESOURCE GUIDE:
Par for the Course
|
||||
 Tom Barber at his namesake practice center (PHOTO: Eddie Meeks). For old time’s sake, I’d like to do it again. But I can’t. Like many other stand-alone driving ranges in Southern California, it isn’t there anymore. But places to hit striped balls are out there if you know where to look — I found a pleasant surprise at the Tom Barber Golf Center in Moorpark. Barber opened his facility in 2000 with a promise to be “the best range in North America.” While that’s a subjective claim, he does have a nifty new device called the PowerTee. “I’ve thought about automated tees for a long time, but every time I’d go to see some in operation, half of them were broken,” Barber said. “But these are fantastic.” I recently gave PowerTee a test run. After dispensing my range balls into a hopper at the back of the hitting mat, the first ball ascends from below. “The secret is in the tee height, which can be adjusted automatically to four different heights” Barber said. Available at 50 of the 76 hitting stalls, PowerTee saves you from bending your back and allows you to maintain your grip between shots. After the ball ascends, the tee drops back into the ground, which is nice. Only after you swing does the system deliver another ball. The Golf Center’s 10-acre hitting area is lit for night practice and the landing area is all artificial turf. There are hills, bunkers and water hazards to simulate the idea of actually playing a hole. There’s also a grass practice green and two bunkers. “Tom’s facility consistently lands in our top 100 golf ranges in America,” said Steve Di Costanzo, president of the Golf Range of America Association. There are an estimated 2,000 stand-alone ranges in the United States, but Di Costanzo said “there’s been a single-digit net loss of facilities in the last five years, with operators cashing out when the land prices were high.” Nonetheless, nearly 30 stand-alone practice ranges still remain throughout the Southland, including the Long Beach Golf Learning Center in the L.A. area, Island’s Golf Center in Anaheim, and San Diego’s Stadium Golf Center. Two of the Southland’s newest ranges also are worth checking out. The Mid-Hill Golf Center in Norco, which opened 16 months ago, used to be a dairy farm operated by the Slegers family. The 15-acre parcel is made up of river-bottom land and is a flood plain, “so it’s not suitable for building,” Jason Slegers said. “My grandfather and our family are recreational golfers, so we decided to open a golf range,” he said. The range, which features all grass tees, is “doing well,” said Slegers, who is optimistic about the future. At the Primus Golf Academy in Wildomar, you won’t find any grass, trees or sky. That’s because the digital and virtual range is set up indoors. The golf simulators at Primus allow people to beat the heat while playing one of 67 golf courses, such as Pebble Beach, in about 90 minutes for $15 an hour. Each bay is wired with V-Tech equipment that measures ball speed, direction and flight, among other variables. The opening of these facilities suggests the stand-alone range concept is still alive, a sentiment I felt as I walked the width of the range at the Tom Barber Golf Center. I watched golfers fill buckets with balls and head to an open tee. There were good swings and bad swings, and customers included moms, dads and kids. I heard people talking to themselves, and I watched them get more balls, determined to fix their swing. Because the truth is, you never own your golf swing, you just rent it. And when you lose it, as Ben Hogan said, “you find it in the dirt.” So head to the nearest range and start digging. Eric Tracy is also known as The Mulligan Man. He can be reached at Eric@TheMulliganMan.com. |
||||
RSS SubscribeReaders Feedback:
That's more than senbsile! That's a great post!
| Comment at 9/29/2011 |
l1XwAW , [url=http://tslyhwgvtkal.com/]tslyhwgvtkal[/url], [link=http://blfxpbdrlnzh.com/]blfxpbdrlnzh[/link], http://ojiwbpatgrrh.com/
| Comment at 10/2/2011 |
UVqzU9 , [url=http://vlpxeqfpnftn.com/]vlpxeqfpnftn[/url], [link=http://gwlgqgtcoeov.com/]gwlgqgtcoeov[/link], http://vplidmmvrojx.com/
| Comment at 10/5/2011 |
