SMALL IS THE NEW BIG THING!!!

Small is big, don’t we hear about it most of the time, especially in the last few years. This simply means that things are becoming smaller, shorter, compact and what not; from electrical goods to our daily usable items, something or the other is changing every day, new feel, new technology. Probably it’s a good sign, it shows that we are evolving for better times with a much faster pace. In a time when everything is changing, how can we forget Golf. Golf has a history of being associated with the term 18, a golf course has 18 holes to play, its more than 125 acres to build and it takes around 5 hours to play 18 holes. Sounds familiar, right? Now, Golf has something more to offer, something new, something fast, something trendy and something for all.

Let's understand how golf is evolving now.

Golf is moving from 18 holes to 9 holes Golf Courses, which does mean that 18 hole courses are loosing its lustre, not at all! Like in Cricket, Twenty/20 format is trending, it doesn’t mean that test cricket and other formats don’t shine. Everything has its own value and its own demand. So, 9 Holes are becoming very popular due to various factors like, less land requirement, less development cost, less maintenance cost, takes less time to play and one can play twice to complete a 18 hole game. Golf is further not restricted to 9 holes, we have 3 and 6 hole golf courses, so a golf course can now be customized based on the land availability.

Being a Golf Course Architect, I tend to work with a lot of Real Estate Developers who are planning golf centric real estate projects. I am currently working on various types of Golf Courses and driving Ranges (Practice Facilities). Most of the short courses can be properly called par-3 courses (where the hole lengths vary from 80 yards to 180 yards), there are other short courses that contain par 4 holes and an occasional par 5. These are called Executive courses. Since most of the golf courses have adjacent real estate, we try to keep the hole distances shorter so that the safety of the residents is not compromised by reducing the probability of the golf balls flying to the adjacent properties.

There are different types for Golf Course projects, based on land availability:

• Less than 1 Acres – Mini Golf Courses or Putting Courses

• 2-3 Acres – 9 Hole Chip & Putt Golf Course

• 4-7 Acres: Driving Range (Practice Area) requires (50-100 m) Width X (200-300 m) Length with playing holes

• 8-10 Acres: Driving range with 3 playing holes

• 12-15 Acres: 6 or 9 Hole Executive Golf Course without Driving Range

• 20-25 Acres: 6 or 9 Hole Executive Golf Course with Driving Range

• 30-35 Acres: 9 Hole Golf Course without Driving Range

• 40-50 Acres: A standard 9 Hole Golf Course with Driving Range

• 65-75 Acres: An international standard 9 Hole Championship Golf Course and Driving Range

• 100 Acres and above: several formats of 18 Hole Golf Course with Driving Range
  

We have seen a combination of various formats of Golf Courses as well. An 18 Hole Golf Course also has a mini golf course, short or executive golf course which attract all levels of skill, plus both the junior and elderly players and not the least, women. (I personally feel women make a tremendous contribution to this wonderful game). Furthermore, there is a great psychological advantage of playing the Short / Executive golf course in the ego status which is attained. It's interesting to note how many players are shooting better scores in these friendly courses. The fun of playing night golf in these golf courses can not be ignored, so even if you get late from work, you still get a chance to play a quick round of golf with your friends.

Apart from the trend of new type of golf courses, there are various new playing formats being introduced to existing 18 hole courses to make them more interesting and fast to play. Like playing only 9 holes, two-pin / power play format, tee-it-forward (golfers play from the forward tees to have a quick and easy round), 3 clubs only format (putter, wedge and any iron of your choice) and you can invent your own format of play, as long you are having fun on the Golf Course.

So, plan your next round of golf with a new playing format or by playing on a new format golf course.

HOLE NINE YARDS

He designed his first golf course when he was just 16 and doesn’t know when his passion became his full-time profession. Perhaps, India’s youngest golf course developer, Ashish Vaishnava tells NIDHI MITTAL about his journey

Fancy having a golf course in your backyard? Wouldn’t it be a dream come true? It may just be possible if we go by what this young golf enthusiast and, perhaps, India’s youngest golf course developer has to say. All of 27, Ashish Vaishnava has a vision — that of making golf courses in India which are not just smaller in size but also much more affordable. And this is where the idea of mini and executive golf courses struck him. “Even cricket has evolved as a 20-20 game. Why not make golf too a shorter game? With a nine-hole golf course, as against the traditional 18, the game will become much shorter. One can be done within an hour-and-a-half as opposed to around six hours that one game of golf generally takes. Golf is a game which should become accessible to all,” says Vaishnava.

But how can golf, an elite game, be made affordable? Ashish has an answer to that too. The nine-hole course requires only 20 to 35 acres which is around 15 to 25 per cent of an 18-hole championship course of 100 to 150 acres.

“Land cost in India is sky high and this makes developing a golf course a very expensive proposition. The shorter the course, the lesser would be the land requirement. Less land cost, lower construction cost and less water consumption for greenery works like magic. It also makes it easier for beginners, women and children to enjoy the game. As it is, in today’s fast-paced world, people don’t have time for a sport which would take them half-a-day to complete,” Vaishnava says. He is, however, quick to clarify that he doesn’t want to challenge the traditional 18-hole course but wants to promote the shorter version through his design ideas. A nine-hole golf course costs around Rs 5 crore while an 18-hole one is no less than Rs 50 crore and more. At 27, with a 14-year-long golfing experience, Vaishnava developed his first golf course when he was just 16. Today, his projects includes golf course designing, construction management, driving range development, operations and maintenance.

“My father was a BSF official posted in J&K’s Baramulla district when I was in Class X. He wanted to develop a golf course there. That’s how I started off. I was fond of playing golf and decided to help him out in designing the golf course. Still a student and with no formal training in designing, it was a challenge. The Internet was yet to become accessible at that time so I read all about golf in the encyclopaedia. Golf course designing comes naturally to me and that’s why I never needed any formal training,” Vaishnava tells you. India, he says, lacks institutes providing courses in golf development and pursuing such a course from an international institute is a costly affair. A graduate in Economics from Delhi University, Vaishnava has done his schooling across India — Jammu, Tekanpur (Gwalior, the place where he picked up golf at the age of 12), Agartala, Sri Ganganagar and many other cities and towns by virtue of his father’s postings. When exactly golf turned into a passion, he doesn’t know. But he insists that his very own concepts turned his passion into profession. Till now, Vaishnava has developed three nine-hole courses — the Cambay Golf Course and the Cambay Golf Academy in Gandhinagar; the golf course for Emaar-MGF in Mohali and the Cambay Golf Resort in Jaipur. “The one in Jaipur is special because it’s an environmentally sound and revolutionary concept which is quite popular in the deserts of Arizona and California in which water utilisation is 15 per cent of a traditional course on similar space. It’s a desert golf course which has selective green areas only. Target greens and fairways provide a fair playing surface while poorly-placed shots have to be recovered from the drier rough areas,” he explains. Vaishnava tells you how affordable golf sets for as less as Rs 10,000 are available on the shelf but not many know about them. The young professional insists that all these measures of making golf more accessible are crucial especially with the game being included in the 2016 Olympics list.