We’ve seen Google Earth connected with the game of golf a number of times over the years. We’ve talked about the built-in Golf Courses layer, sites like GolfNation that make great use of Google Earth, and even fly-throughs of ideal play on each hole for some courses.
Tony Korologos at the Hooked on Golf Blog has just written a great post about how he uses Google Earth to prepare for his next round of golf. From his post, here is an example of how he looks at a hole:
From looking at the aerial imagery on Google Earth, this looks to be a tight, tree-lined hole. The hole is only 390 from the middle tees. We don’t need to hit driver here unless we are not long hitters. A tee shot of 240-250 yards will put us in a safe and fat part of the fairway. The strategy for the tee shot is a 3-wood, or a driver if your driver goes about 250 yards. I measured from the tee to the left fairway bunker and that clocks in at 266.6 yards. Once again, that 3-wood is looking good from the tee. Even if we hit it on the line of the bunker, we won’t reach the bunker, unless our 3-wood goes 266 yards.
The approach on hole #1 is fairly simple. There’s a bunker on the right, so we want to aim left, away from the bunker.
It’s a great way to preview a course, and the Google Earth editing tools (adding placemarks, paths, etc) make it easy to add notes and ideas to each hole. Check out Tony’s full post to learn more.
About Mickey Mellen
Mickey has been using Google Earth since it was released in 2005, and has created a variety of geo-related sites including Google Earth Hacks. He runs a web design firm in Marietta, GA, where he lives with his wife and two kids.
Every once in a while I will connect with a nice Tee Shot. I remember landmarks around where the ball lands and can measure the length of the drive with the measuring tool. Pretty handy.