| There’s an old joke that the only thing more boring than golf is watching it on TV. That was before the internet. Judging from the number of sites on the World Wide Web devoted to chasing the little white ball — not to mention newsgroups — you’d think that golf was a sport played solely in cyberspace and not in the great outdoors. Crank up any major search engine, and you’ll find seemingly more golf related Web sites than golfers. But don’t get teed off. Some of these sites are actually helpful, and most are absolutely free.
Amateur Golf Advisor (www.shootforpar.com/stpinfo.html) is mostly an instructional site, because everyone knows golfers are nuts about instruction, whether it comes in the form of actual lessons, books or information on Web sites.
The advice is segmented into logical fundamentals. You can click on grip, stance, balance, setup, strategy, long game, short game, etc. Each segment offers links to even more help.
The next stop (19thhole.com) isn’t what you think, but a general-purpose site combining instruction, classified ads for equipment, magazine articles, reviews of golf books, photos and even humor. There’s also a commercial side — the pro shop — where you can order all the items you might expect and some you wouldn’t.
It’s a guy thing, I know, but most golfers have a love of equipment. That’s why there’s Golfmonitor.com (www.Golfmonitor.com), which bills itself as an online buyer’s survival guide.
The site also rates 40 of the leading golf retailers, as well as reviewing new equipment and offering price comparisons as to what different sites and dealers are charging for specific gear. There is also a section designed to help golfers sell used equipment.
Besides equipment, what is the most common thing golfers are interested in? Duh! Golf courses! An excellent selection of links to sites about golf courses can be found on, of all places, Yahoo (dir.yahoo.com/Recreation/Sports/Golf/Courses_and_Clubs). And here you thought Yahoo was only good for free e-mail and sleazy personals. Here you’ll find a very comprehensive list of courses around the nation and the world that have a presence on the Web.
You can use just about any search engine to find your local course, or, you can look for state-oriented sites that list courses. For instance, typing “Golf, Washington” into the search engine Google, turned up a couple of hundred sites, but in the first page was a listing for Washington golf courses. A search in Snap turned up a similar number, but with the listing for courses and clubs as the number one return. Definitely not rocket science.
Many golfers plan family vacations at resorts that offer golf or try to find a nice hotel located in a tourist area (so that the non-golfers in the family can have fun, too). A great site for these folks is called Golf Link (www.golflink.com).
Just like it does with everything else today, the internet offers more information than you can use about golf. Just don’t waste a sunny Pacific Northwest day looking for it. Get out and do the real thing. |
