Drones Can Help Simulate Any Golf Course

from bostonglobe.com

The first time Jim Day played Martindale Country Club — the simulated version, not the real course, which he purchased in 2009 — he thought he saw something that looked oddly familiar as the round reached the signature par-3 ninth hole. Off in the distance, near the unmistakable clubhouse, was a car parked in the lot. It was Day’s car, or at least a computer-generated model that clearly resembled Day’s ride.

As Day was learning, it’s one of the surprisingly impressive aspects of the simulation experience being offered by a Maine-based company, which is using the latest technology, including drones, to digitize any course in a month’s time. How detailed and realistic, you ask? Enough where a course’s logo is visible on the tee markers, landmarks are duplicated to an exact specification, and even a parked car can be quickly ID’d.

Members and visitors to Martindale now have two options if they’d like to play the semi-private course located in Auburn, Maine. If the weather is nice enough, they can head outside to the first tee and let ’er rip. If it’s not, they can “play” the 6,538-yard, par-71 track on one of three indoor simulators that Day purchased last year from P3, which just might be on to something big, especially in the Northeast, with its frustratingly abbreviated golf season.

“I thought it would be great for my member players to be able to play Martindale yearrround,” Day said. “People were amazed at the detail, and how accurate things were, like the rolling of the ball. This is a 1921 course, and there’s a lot of natural undulation. They’d hit their drive, and they’d say, ‘Yep, that’s where it goes.’ It looks great, and it plays great.”

The minds behind P3 — specifically principal owner Les Otten, development director Barclay Layman, and marketing/sales director Kevin Rosenberg — had a light bulb moment 18 months ago. Successful players in the golf simulator business for 10 years, Otten and his team began asking a simple question: Can this be localized, and if so, how well?

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