History will be made at Pebble Beach in a variety of ways this summer. As the best women in the world descend on the iconic course for the first time at the 78th U.S. Women’s Open, every shot that’s hit will be digitally tracked and archived. The U.S. Golf Associations’ new USGA ShotCast Powered by Cisco, which utilizes the PGA Tour’s ShotLink system, will be available at both the men’s and women’s U.S. Opens.
This marks the first time ShotLink data will be available at a women’s professional event.
Fans won’t miss a moment of the action with 3D hole imagery that provides real-time radar data and shot shapes from the game’s best. Users can follow along both on the championship website and the app. While information such as clubhead speed, ball speed and smash factor are available weekly in the men’s game, such detailed data is new technology for the women.
With advanced 3D imagery, fans will even be able to change angles on a particular shot, zooming into the player’s perspective, such as measuring the undulation and slopes as players line up their putts.
Currently on the LPGA, caddies are paid to record data from their players that’s used for the KPMG Performance Insights, an analytics system that provides information such as strokes gained statistics. There is no way, however, to track how a player makes her way around the golf course or the specifics of each swing.
The USGA’s ShotCast will archive every televised shot within the feature for both championships.
The PGA Tour developed ShotLink more than 20 years ago. The system is operated by a small staff and each week on Tour, roughly 350 volunteers work to score the golf tournament. The PGA Tour estimates its annual ShotLink volunteer count at around 10,000.
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