If your dad is an avid golfer, it’s hard to shop for a man that has everything a serious player needs or wants. But not to fear, Golfweek has made it easy to find something dad will love to add to his golf bag and use every time he heads out to the course.
From equipment to accessories, apparel and more, this list is all encompassing. While you may find an item or two that dad will love, check out our other lists for polos, shorts, shoes and more to help give dad the best Father’s Day ever!
New Year’s resolutions. We all make them, yet we almost all fail to keep them.
It’s time to change that. Make 2023 the year you follow through on your goals. What better place to start than on the golf course?
Here at Golfweek, we’ve put together a list of what we think are important New Year’s resolutions for your game. From increasing distance to improving short game and fitness, we’ve compiled not just what to do, but how to do it to help you achieve your goals.
Caution: double black diamond golf gifts – experts only.
We all know at least one serious golfer. If you can’t think of anyone, chances are that you’re the serious golfer in your weekend foursome.
We also know that serious golfers can be hard to shop for. That’s why we’ve taken the time to curate a list of gifts that would satisfy any serious golfer, even if they already have one of these items.
If you’re wrapping up your holiday shopping or are someone who waits until the last minute, Golfweek has you covered. We have lists for every type of golfer. From men’s apparel to new gadgets and women’s apparel to personalized items, we’ve curated some of the best golf gifts to give this holiday season.
Get better this winter without ever having to step foot on the golf course.
As the weather turns and the sun begins to set earlier each and every day, it’s time to begin making preparations to keep your golf game in prime form.
Although they seem pricey, having an at-home simulator is an investment that can pay for itself.
With the ability to hit the practice range, wedge range and even get a full 18 holes in no matter the temperature, an at-home golf simulator is a great investment for casual and serious golfers alike.
For more home-practice training aids to help keep your form without hitting the range, check out our list of at-home practice equipment from earlier this season.
We’ve got the need, the need for speed training aids.
Face it, seeing the professionals bomb their drives every single Sunday has all of us wanting to hit it farther.
While the vast majority of us won’t be hitting 300-yard drives, or even 280-yard drives, everyone has the ability to get longer. Yes, even you.
Managing expectations is a big part of golf. The same goes for gaining speed. It won’t happen overnight, but with a plan, it’s something achievable for all.
Whether it be a lack of speed, poor putting, the dreaded short game yips and shanks or whatever ails your game, Golfweek is looking out for you. We’ve curated some of the best products to get your game headed in the right direction.
Check out some of our other lists to help lower your handicap.
We occasionally recommend interesting products, services, and gaming opportunities. If you make a purchase by clicking one of the links, we may earn an affiliate fee. Golfweek operates independently, though, and this doesn’t influence our coverage.
We occasionally recommend interesting products, services, and gaming opportunities. If you make a purchase by clicking one of the links, we may earn an affiliate fee. Golfweek operates independently, though, and this doesn’t influence our coverage.
The first three parts of the Connected Golfer focused on how golfers can get more information about shots they hit during practice sessions and on the course when they play. Now, the fourth installment concentrates on how a growing number of services and technologies let players and teaching professionals communicate, share videos and work together even if they are thousands of miles apart.
In the early 2000s, Ted Sheftic, one of the most highly-regarded teaching professionals in Pennsylvania, pushed an over-sized cart next to his lesson area at Hanover Country Club in Abbottstown, Pennsylvania. It held a VHS cassette player hooked up to a small television. The cart also held a tripod and a video camera that Sheftic used to videotape his students’ swings. On sunny days, he balanced an umbrella above the screen to reduce glare.
After their lessons, Sheftic gave his students a tape of their lesson to take home and review, which was among the reasons why his lesson calendar was always packed.
Fast forward about 15 years, and shift 300 miles Northeast, and you would often see Suzy Whaley on the back of the range at TPC River Highlands in Cromwell, Connecticut. On most summer afternoons, when she was not on the road fulfilling her duties as the president of the PGA of America, she was busy teaching. It’s where you would have found me too in 2017, taking a lesson from Whaley once or twice a month, as we tried to straighten my slice and build some consistency with my irons.
After about 30 minutes of hitting balls and doing drills, she would invariably hold up an iPad and stand about 10 feet behind me as I made a swing, then show me the video clip.
“Your takeaway is getting so much better, David,” she said one afternoon while her fingers danced on the touchscreen. She drew lines on the video to show my spine angle, the shaft angle at address and the club’s face angle as I made my backswing. “Look at that. A month ago, you were nowhere close to this halfway to the top.”
Writer David Dusek captures his swing on camera.
A few days after each lesson, and with a few taps on my iPhone, I would watch those swings again on the range and review the drills Whaley wanted me to work on before our next session. We were about 30 miles apart, but class was still in session.
Once a novelty, now the norm
Sheftic was ahead of his time and using the technology of the day. Remember, the first iPhone was not released until the summer of 2007. Today, for golfers who are willing to invest in lessons and the instructors who teach them, capturing video of a golf swing, analyzing it and sharing it is simple.
On a recent episode of Barstool’s Fore Play podcast, Butch Harmon explained that several big-name PGA Tour players often send him videos of their swing and ask him for options.
“(Webb Simpson) sent me a film the other day and said, ‘I can feel the club is back inside again,'” Harmon said. “I said, ‘No, you’re too narrow. That’s why you’re in your own way.'”
Harmon does not go to Tour events every week anymore, but thanks to technology, he doesn’t have to travel to stay in touch with players who want his advice.
“With these things, it’s easy,” he said, holding up his mobile phone. “(Pros) can film their swing at any place in the world, and they can send me a film of it and I can pick up the phone or just text them right back.”
Beyond the simple camera that comes built into phones and tablets, several services and apps now allow players and coaches to take virtual lessons to the next level.
There’s an app for that
For instance, V1 Sports has been among the leaders in the software that allows golf instructors to capture video, review it and mark it up with lines, circles and other drawings while adding voiceovers to the clips. Instructors can then send the clips to their students using a V1 smartphone app. Students can review the lessons and drills, save them and refer to them any time. They can also capture video clips and send them to their coach using V1.
V1 virtual lesson technology
V1 has also recently developed an online golf academy that allows players to select an instructor then send up to eight swings for personalized evaluation and coaching advice.
The Rapsodo Mobile Launch Monitor links to a golfer’s smartphone using Bluetooth, then records a video of a golfer’s swing and adds a shot-tracer graphic. It also adds information like carry distance, apex, and ball speed to the top of the clip, which golfers can then share (along with the overlaid launch monitor data) with their instructors. Using Rapsodo’s Coach Connect feature to critique the swing, instructors can make comments, recommend drills based on what they see and more. Golfers can even buy virtual lessons with pros they have never met in person using Rapsodo.
Savvy instructors made great use of technologies like this during the summer and fall of 2020 when people flocked to golf courses and the sport boomed, but many people wanted to avoid close contact during the COVID-19 pandemic. Powered by smartphone cameras and other devices, virtual golf lessons proved to be a viable, effective way for golfers to improve.
One of the less obvious benefits of virtual golf lessons is when it is time to work with a custom fitter and get new equipment, golfers can show the fitter their most-recent lessons, and the drills they are working on should give fitters a better understanding of the player.
With today’s technology, a Connected Golfer isn’t limited to instructors who are close by, geographically. For instructors, technology is providing better ways to stay in touch with students and monitor their progress. And for fitters, it has never been easier to understand exactly what a player and coach are working on and build equipment that will help them produce better results.
The first three parts of the Connected Golfer focused on how golfers can get more information about shots they hit during practice sessions and on the course when they play. Now, the fourth installment concentrates on how a growing number of services and technologies let players and teaching professionals communicate, share videos and work together even if they are thousands of miles apart.
In the early 2000s, Ted Sheftic, one of the most highly-regarded teaching professionals in Pennsylvania, pushed an over-sized cart next to his lesson area at Hanover Country Club in Abbottstown, Pennsylvania. It held a VHS cassette player hooked up to a small television. The cart also held a tripod and a video camera that Sheftic used to videotape his students’ swings. On sunny days, he balanced an umbrella above the screen to reduce glare.
After their lessons, Sheftic gave his students a tape of their lesson to take home and review, which was among the reasons why his lesson calendar was always packed.
Fast forward about 15 years, and shift 300 miles Northeast, and you would often see Suzy Whaley on the back of the range at TPC River Highlands in Cromwell, Connecticut. On most summer afternoons, when she was not on the road fulfilling her duties as the president of the PGA of America, she was busy teaching. It’s where you would have found me too in 2017, taking a lesson from Whaley once or twice a month, as we tried to straighten my slice and build some consistency with my irons.
After about 30 minutes of hitting balls and doing drills, she would invariably hold up an iPad and stand about 10 feet behind me as I made a swing, then show me the video clip.
“Your takeaway is getting so much better, David,” she said one afternoon while her fingers danced on the touchscreen. She drew lines on the video to show my spine angle, the shaft angle at address and the club’s face angle as I made my backswing. “Look at that. A month ago, you were nowhere close to this halfway to the top.”
Writer David Dusek captures his swing on camera.
A few days after each lesson, and with a few taps on my iPhone, I would watch those swings again on the range and review the drills Whaley wanted me to work on before our next session. We were about 30 miles apart, but class was still in session.
Once a novelty, now the norm
Sheftic was ahead of his time and using the technology of the day. Remember, the first iPhone was not released until the summer of 2007. Today, for golfers who are willing to invest in lessons and the instructors who teach them, capturing video of a golf swing, analyzing it and sharing it is simple.
On a recent episode of Barstool’s Fore Play podcast, Butch Harmon explained that several big-name PGA Tour players often send him videos of their swing and ask him for options.
“(Webb Simpson) sent me a film the other day and said, ‘I can feel the club is back inside again,'” Harmon said. “I said, ‘No, you’re too narrow. That’s why you’re in your own way.'”
Harmon does not go to Tour events every week anymore, but thanks to technology, he doesn’t have to travel to stay in touch with players who want his advice.
“With these things, it’s easy,” he said, holding up his mobile phone. “(Pros) can film their swing at any place in the world, and they can send me a film of it and I can pick up the phone or just text them right back.”
Beyond the simple camera that comes built into phones and tablets, several services and apps now allow players and coaches to take virtual lessons to the next level.
There’s an app for that
For instance, V1 Sports has been among the leaders in the software that allows golf instructors to capture video, review it and mark it up with lines, circles and other drawings while adding voiceovers to the clips. Instructors can then send the clips to their students using a V1 smartphone app. Students can review the lessons and drills, save them and refer to them any time. They can also capture video clips and send them to their coach using V1.
V1 virtual lesson technology
V1 has also recently developed an online golf academy that allows players to select an instructor then send up to eight swings for personalized evaluation and coaching advice.
The Rapsodo Mobile Launch Monitor links to a golfer’s smartphone using Bluetooth, then records a video of a golfer’s swing and adds a shot-tracer graphic. It also adds information like carry distance, apex, and ball speed to the top of the clip, which golfers can then share (along with the overlaid launch monitor data) with their instructors. Using Rapsodo’s Coach Connect feature to critique the swing, instructors can make comments, recommend drills based on what they see and more. Golfers can even buy virtual lessons with pros they have never met in person using Rapsodo.
Savvy instructors made great use of technologies like this during the summer and fall of 2020 when people flocked to golf courses and the sport boomed, but many people wanted to avoid close contact during the COVID-19 pandemic. Powered by smartphone cameras and other devices, virtual golf lessons proved to be a viable, effective way for golfers to improve.
One of the less obvious benefits of virtual golf lessons is when it is time to work with a custom fitter and get new equipment, golfers can show the fitter their most-recent lessons, and the drills they are working on should give fitters a better understanding of the player.
With today’s technology, a Connected Golfer isn’t limited to instructors who are close by, geographically. For instructors, technology is providing better ways to stay in touch with students and monitor their progress. And for fitters, it has never been easier to understand exactly what a player and coach are working on and build equipment that will help them produce better results.
Portable launch monitors have changed how elite golfers train, how swing gurus teach and how club makers fit gear to meet the player needs.
In Part I of the Connected Golfer series, we introduced you to the driving ranges of the future, facilities that have installed systems like Toptracer Range and TrackMan Range. Now, learn how you can get pro-level data from your practice sessions at any facility in the world thanks to launch monitors designed specifically with club players in mind.
On February 9, there was snow on the ground in Connecticut while the fairways at the We-Ko-Pa Resort in Fort McDowell, Arizona, were emerald green. After a 30-minute frost delay that morning, the range opened under a cobalt-blue sky and the sun quickly warmed the air. The Saguaro Course, the top-ranked track on Golfweek’s “Best Courses You Can Play List: Arizona,” beckoned.
After not playing for four months, I was nervous and knew warming up could be an adventure. What was my swing going to look like? Where were these shots going?
I took a Rapsodo Mobile Launch Monitor out of a small pocket in my bag, turned it on and linked it to my iPhone using Bluetooth. Then, after setting the compact device about 8 feet behind me, I started hitting some balls.
A sand wedge went 71 yards. Another sand wedge, 94 yards. A few minutes later I switched to an 8-iron and it sailed 144 yards. Then 146, 157 and then another to 157 as I started to loosen up.
A few 6-irons, a couple of 4-hybrid shots (I always warm up with even-numbered clubs) and then the driver – 241 yards, then 250. Ok, so that’s what I’ve got today. Let’s have fun!
Launch monitors made for weekend golfers
Graphite shafts, titanium driver heads and multilayer, urethane-covered balls were all game-changing, but the development of portable launch monitors has changed how elite golfers train, how swing gurus teach and how club makers fit gear to meet the best players’ needs.
However, to get the most out of something like a TrackMan 4, a FlightScope X3 or a Foresight GC Quad, you need deep pockets and a Ph.D. in swing dynamics. Devices like those start at more than $10,000, with some devices topping $20,000.
Systems like that are not practical for weekend golfers, but several companies are now offering launch monitors designed for recreational players. Admittedly, systems like the Rapsodo Mobile Launch Monitor, FlightScope Mevo, Swing Caddie SC300 and SkyTrak Golf Simulator and Launch Monitor do not track as many things as those expensive units. For instance, they don’t provide information on the clubface at impact, the attack angle and typically can’t determine spin rates. They do, however, provide accurate, consistent information that will help any club player practice smarter, get more out of lessons and make smarter equipment decisions. In short, they can be a powerful tool for a Connected Golfer.
Rapsodo Launch Monitor
While there are subtle differences between the units, most work on the same principles. After linking with your smartphone or tablet, the launch monitors track your shots by emitting Doppler radar, which is transmitted in the direction you are hitting and reflects off the ball and back to the unit. Some models also use internal cameras, or the camera built into your smartphone or tablet, to track the ball.
Using the radar and camera information, the system’s software reveals things like ball speed, carry distance, launch angle and shot height. Some systems can also display things like angle of descent.
As technologies have advanced over the past few years, there are now several different models available that work both outside and indoors. Used indoors, launch monitors track the first few feet of your shot, then extrapolate where the ball would have flown based on its velocity, launch angle and spin rate. This allows golfers in cold-weather climates to use the systems year-round.
At this point, one question is obvious: Compared with a high-priced launch monitor system used by pros like Bryson DeChambeau, Rory McIlroy and Danielle Kang, how accurate can a unit that costs $500-$1,000 be?
Well, according to Rapsodo, its $499 unit measures ball speed within 0.8 percent of a TrackMan. The company also claims that launch angle measurements are within 1 degree and carry distance is within 1.87 percent. That’s less than 6 feet of difference for every 100 yards of carry distance.
So, for golfers who do not live near a facility with a system like Toptracer Range or TrackMan Range, these devices are revolutionary. They allow golfers to interconnect different aspects of their game easily, utilizing real data.
Rapsodo feedback
Make practice more meaningful. Launch monitors designed for club players show things like carry distance and ball speed, but several also display visual representations of your shots. Sure, the arcs and tracer patterns created on your smartphone or tablet are cool to see, but after you hit a series of shots with the same club, observing a scatter pattern of your shots can reveal a clear picture of how far you hit that club and where you tend to miss. You can see the typical severity of a slice or a hook, learn how high you are hitting different shots and with some models, discover how much roll occurs after your shots land.
Share swings and data with coaches. For years, it has been common to see pros on the PGA Tour get their caddie to capture video clips of swings with a smartphone, then email those videos to their instructor back home. Launch monitors made for recreational golfers typically have a “share” feature that makes sending shot information easy. Some models take things to another level. For example, Rapsodo allows golfers to send video clips with distance, ball speed and launch angle data, along with a tracer pattern of the shot, automatically overlaid on the video. It is a powerful way for students and instructors to reinforce what was taught in lessons and for instructors to give follow-up tips to players.
Data to share with club fitters. One of the first things a good club fitter does is examine a player’s gear and have him or her hit balls using a launch monitor to create a baseline of performance. Armed with data collected from your own launch monitor, a player can bring more information to the fitting, then use it to tell whether new clubs perform better than the gear he or she already owns. They can also tell whether dispersion patterns are tighter, shots are flying higher and compare other aspects of performance.
Having your own launch monitor is not going to transform your game overnight. It can, however, help you practice smarter, communicate with your instructor more effectively between lessons and understand your game on a deeper level. Those things, in turn, should help you improve as a player and shoot lower scores.
In the next installment of The Connected Golfer, we cover shot-tracking systems that allow you to replay every shot in your round, gather performance data about your game and discover the strengths (and weaknesses) of your game.
