By Russell Bennett
The Pakenham Golf Club will take on a new life this Friday night with a round of night golf to be played across the course as part of Golf Month – a nationwide celebration of the sport.
This year marks the third time night golf will have taken to the course at Pakenham, and the concept is exactly how it sounds – golf by night, with glow-in-the-dark balls and equipment.
“It’s an event we’ve run previously at another club I was at and it went over really well,” Pakenham Golf Club’s general manager and head professional, Haydn Thompson, said.
“We ran our first night golf here in 2014. It was actually on 31 October, so Halloween and it worked really well. There hadn’t been a lot of member events for quite a while here so it got a really good reaction and we filled it really quickly.
“You can have your dinner at 6pm or 6.30pm, and get on the course by 7pm to get everyone out there while it’s dusk. It’s a shotgun start so players are starting on different holes so it means that everyone gets out to their holes safely but the effect of the glow balls, glow sticks and lights that we use is obviously taking effect.”
As Thompson explains, night golf is “just a different look at golf”.
“Golf is struggling a little bit to create its own kind of Twenty20 to appeal to younger people and expose the game to a different audience,” he said.
“I think every sport is looking at how to create its own Twenty20.
“Golf has struggled a little bit with it because no matter which way you come at it, it’s still a time-consuming sport.
“This is just another way of exposing the club and to cater to different audiences.
“Within golf there has been that rivalry mentality – that it’s us versus them. But as long as golf is healthy and golf is doing well, we’ll all do well as clubs.
“If we do what we do here well enough, people will see us as an option.”
Thompson explained that golf had never had more participants, but fewer members.
“We’re trying to come at it from a different angle,” he said.
“You don’t change everything you do to suit the next generation, and you don’t stick with what you’ve always done just to suit the traditionalists – it’s a balancing act.”
Throughout the month of October, golf clubs and facilities across the country will throw open their doors and welcome people to take part in a Golf Month activity such as night golf.
Pakenham’s event this Friday night and costs $50 per player and starts at 6pm with dinner at 6.30pm and tee off from 7.45pm.
