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... usually impeded with various hazards on the course such as water hazards and bunkers (Golf, 2006). Each player of the game could act as a marker for another player, which means he or she would manage the scorecard. The score is usually calculated through the number of strokes done plus any penalty strokes that is incurred. Penalty strokes are not an actual stroke but rather penalties for rule violations or using several relief procedures in specific situations (Golf, 2006).
Golfing Popularity The Golf Digest, which is the leading magazine for golf enthusiasts, estimated that there are around 32000 golf courses all over the world in 2005. The countries that have the most number of golf courses relative to the total population are Scotland, New Zealand, Australia, Republic of Ireland, Northern Ireland, Canada, Wales, United States, Sweden, and England. This means that majority of these are English countries. Initially, British golf players really dominate the scene, but after the First World War, the United States already produced the greatest number of professional players (Golf, 2006). Twenty professional golf tournaments happen every year in the world.
This is usually run through the efforts of PGA and some are produced through independent tournament organizations. The role of PGA and other organizations is to arrange the event, gather sponsors, and setting up the regulations of the games. Each tour usually has members that are entitled to play for all events. There are however certain cases where non-members are invited to play with the members.
Gaining membership to an elite tour is very competitive and thus even professional golfers are unable to gain membership (Golf, 2006). The biggest tour in the world is the PGA tour. The prestige comes from the fact that most of the tours produced through the PGA has as much as 800, 000 dollars as cash prize for the first place winner. Players are always aiming for the PGA tournament because winning the tournament would really means a lot of endorsements, exemption to play to other tournaments for two years and most importantly gain the prestige of beating the best players all over the world (Golf, 2006). The second famous tour is the European Tour. This tour is also famous and attracts lots of players from other countries outside North America.
This tour is also prestigious but only ranks second in terms of prestige to PGA tours. Professional players try to maintain membership on both tours. The Japan Tour is the third largest tour in the world and attracts the best sponsors every tournament. Asian Tour is also famous in Asia, but this tour only function to sponsor European Tournament in Asia. There are four most prestigious mens tournaments: The Masters, U. S.
Open, The Open Championship or The British Open, and the PGA Championship. Players are aiming to gain as many championships in order improve their stature (Golf, 2006). Jack Nicklaus is so far the hailed greatest golfer of all time, with 18 professional championships under his name. Tiger Woods may challenge this record since he has already earned 10 professional championships before the age of thirty (Golf Tourism on fairway to success). For women, there are four major championships.
These are: The Kraft Nabisco Championship, U. S. Womens Open, LPGA Championship, and Womens British Open. In 2003, Annika Sorenstam is the first woman golfer, after fifty years, to eventually start at mens PGA tour.
The popularity of golf has indeed increased. With major players gaining significant recognition, fame and prestige across all populations, it is very important that people have sufficient knowledge on the roots of the game. This would help in increasing appreciation of the sports and eventually would lead to increase in the level of participation in this very important sport. More and more entrepreneurs are seeing the imaginative ways in marketing most of these golf tourists spots. Businessmen are seeing the enormous potential for growth that golf tourism provides. In Scotland, which is known as the Home of Golf, these places are known as one of the worlds finest courses.
Businessmen are seeing the huge potential of developing it and seeing that they can build on that reputation in order to boost their tourism industry. One of the finest Golf Clubs in Scotland, the Clubgolf initiative was launched in order to give the young people an opportunity to realize their potential and develop their inclination and interest to the game. It helps that the Clubgolf is endorsed by the Scottish Golf Union, the PGA, and the Scottish Ladies Golfing Association since that it can bring out more top-class players in the future (Golf Tourism on fairway to success). Like other world-class golf destinations, the Clubgolf has lined up its goals for the next three years. This includes introducing 50, 000 nine-year olds to Clubgolf every year in schools. This alone affords the young citizens a good upper hand in the knowledge and skills of the job.
The goal goes further as to state that it shall retain 50, 000 9 - 15 year olds in the Clubgolf programme at any given time. The Scots are stepping it up a bit further by giving training programmes and going out in the 200 Clubgolf centres so that it can bring professionalism right at the doorsteps of the citizens (Golf Tourism on fairway to success). Some of the worlds top three best golf resorts are: 1) The American Club, Wisconsin This is happens to be the Midwest's only AAA Five Diamond resort hotel with the American Club being the top golf resort destination in the United States as decided upon by the readers of Golf Magazine. Pete Dye designed and created two championship courses in both Blackwolf Run and Whistling Straits. The resort is tops in terms of its amenities to both golf playing and non-golf playing people. (Sardone, Susan Breslow). 2). Greenbrier Resort, West Virginia This is both an attraction to non-golfers and golfers because it offers advanced training to golf aficionados.
The owners have added whitewater rafting, horseback riding and balloon rides (Golf Tourism on fairway to success). 3). Williamsburg Inn, Virginia This golf resort combines history with recreation. The golf designer, Robert Trent Jones Sr. calls this the finest one he has come up with.
For example, one is transported back to the American Revolution as one strolls a re-creation of the town hall and other historic centers. Recent growth in tourism In recent years, peoples penchant for tourism and leisure consumption receives the attention of those concerned about the fate of the planet. Technological changes must be complemented by a change and corresponding modification of material wants. Human desires will still exceed the biosphere unless they shift from material to nonmaterial ends. The ability of the earth to support billions of human beings depends on whether we continue to equate consumption with fulfillment. At the same time, we need to challenge the received wisdom that consumption and leisure must be pursued regardless of its human and environmental effects a matter of national policy ion order to keep people employed.
Waste and affluence seem to go hand in hand. The better off we are as a nation, the more secure our natural resources, the more we waste. Throw away seems to be a measure of prosperity. Every social system depends on the environment. If we dont change our notion of progress, if we continue to measure it in terms of blind growth, then we will destroy every environment that makes our progress possible. (Martinson, Charles). Tourism is also said to have tangible and intangible environmental benefits, and is said to be important to the preservation of important natural, historical, cultural and heritage environments as well (The Academy of Leisure Sciences).
To cite a particular case, leisure considerations are said to have contributed substantially to the creation and maintenance of the more than 90 million acres of preserved wilderness under the 1964 Wilderness Act, noting that the wilderness areas have been allocated to preserve opportunities for primitive types of creation (The Academy of Leisure Sciences). In other places, it is easy to imagine that the increased tourism and travel to eco sites encourage the preservation of the health and cleanliness of those natural sites. Because the preservation of the natural sites are essential to the continued influx of tourists and therefore to the continued economic sustainability of the site, locals have every incentive to make sure that the environment remains untouched. In other tourism destinations such as historical cities sites of cultural importance, the same benefits of preservation and the incentive to maintain the cleanliness and safety of the environment apply.
More recent finding point to the preservation of the environment and the ecosystem have to do with the effect of tourism and environmental leisure studies on the level of awareness of the general population with regard to environmental issues around them (The Academy of Leisure Sciences). From such heightened awareness, it is easy to imagine that people then are able to make more educated responses to the environmental concerns in their localities and are able to make more positive contributions to environment preservation and maintenance. The terrorism that occurred at the Twin Towers in 2001 dampened the tourism industry in a way but that was enough to keep people from indulging in indulging in their sports like golf. People who have found their niche in their profession have the same sense of freedom, self-fulfillment, and the accomplishment of ones passions, akin to that of pursuing leisure.
They are the movers, the energizers, the uppers that the society radically needs. For them, money or wage is not the name of the game, for they have tapped the psychological core of success. They are the people who pursue leisure for its own sake. Yet, what kind of influence has it done to society as a whole when seen on a deeper angle? This and many more questions remain foremost in the minds of people when one studies the implications of recreation in our society. The golf tourist spots provide a good means of aligning mans search for leisure and excellence in his everyday life.
WORKS CITED A Definition of Play, Leisure, and Recreation. Accessed 20 April 2006 at: from web Buyer, A. (n. d. ). Leisure Illiteracy.
Accessed 20 February 2006 at: from the Florida State University Web site: web leisure. html Golf Tourism. Scotland. Accessed 20 April 2006 at: web Golf Tourism on fairway to success. Sept 16 2004.
Accessed 20 April 2006 at: web Martinson, Charles. Air Pollution Control in the flexo graphic printing industry. Accessed 20 April 2006 at: web Clive. What is Tourism? Definitions, Excerpts and Characteristics.
The Journal of Tourism Studies. Accessed 20 April 2006 at: web Sardone, Susan Breslow. Top 9 Golf Vacation Resorts to Love. Accessed 20 April 2006 at: web The Academy of Leisure Sciences.
White Paper No. 7: The Benefits of Leisure. Accessed 20 April 2006 at: < web >. Todd, Stephanie. Hibs pitching in with golf tourism centre. Accessed 20 April 2006 at: web
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Research essay sample on Pga Tour Golf Courses
