44 tri-state golfer | Spring 2023 Talamore Country Club members are truly lucky. They have full access to the family of clubs including the Talamore Country Club in Ambler, Applecross Country Club in Downingtown with the area’s only Jack Nicklaus design, and the Talamore Golf Resort and Mid South Club in the Pinehurst, N.C. area. Each facility boasts an array of awesome amenities like the five–acre short game practice area at Talamore, the indoor and outdoor resort-style pools and fitness center at Applecross, the onsite Talamore Golf Villas at Talamore Golf Resort, and the Arnold Palmer Signature Course at Mid South Club. The Talamore family of clubs stands among the top private clubs in the tristate area with the luxuries it delivers to its members and thanks to a successful rollout at the end of 2022, Talamore has added yet another benefit to each of the four family clubs: a practice range equipped with Toptracer technology. As of publication, Talamore and Applecross were the first and only private clubs in the Philadelphia area to add Toptracer to its range. “It’s cutting edge,” said Talamore Country Club General Manager Andy Watters. “We’re the first private club in Philadelphia and one of the first private clubs in the country to have technology like this on their range. I think 5 to 10 years from now it might become a standard thing but I think we’re on the frontline of something that will become standard to most facilities.” Toptracer bills itself as the No. 1 range technology in golf and with good reason. If you’ve watched golf on T.V. for the last 20 years, you’re undoubtedly familiar with Toptracer technology and the benefit it provides viewers at home in allowing them to track the flight of the golf ball. The Toptracer benefits for its users on the practice range are boundless. Each facility under the Talamore umbrella features a collection of covered bays equipped with a touchscreen monitor. Users can create a free account and sign in to have Toptracer track and store their data or simply use Toptracer as a guest. In addition, users can download the free Toptracer Range app and access the Toptracer technology from anywhere on the range tee including the covered bays. Both Toptracer and the covered bays, which also include high-top tables and chairs, are a great improvement at Talamore. The club performed some inhouse tree clearing and hardscaping to provide the needed expansion. “It fits right in,” said Watters. “Obviously you know it’s different but it doesn’t look like an add-on or something out of character. It really fits in nicely with what we have. We’re boxed in for space, unfortunately. There’s just no easy way to expand or extend the range. You’ve got hole one on the left, 18 on the right so we can’t go left or right and then we’ve got homes on the back end but we dressed up an area of the club that wasn’t our shining star as best we could.” Those electing to use the bays and monitors have immediate access to a multitude of enticing options. Many elect to use the “Warm Up” feature, which tracks every golf shot and provides key data points such as total distance, carry distance, ball speed, launch angle, and height. Nearly all of those features are also accessible via the free app. For those looking for more fun, Toptracer Range also includes Virtual Golf, which offers simulated play on prestigious courses like Pebble Beach and St. Andrews, as well as closest to the pin and long drive contests, a points game based on accuracy and distance, an approach challenge to test your scoring irons skills, and a Go Fish game geared towards junior golfers. Toptracer30 is a new addition that provides golfers with a comprehensive assessment of their game. Golfers are asked to hit 30 balls using a variety of clubs after which Toptracer provides personalized data highlighting strengths and areas of improvement. Players’ Toptracer30 scores are also entered onto a leaderboard so they can see where they stack up against friends and fellow club members and the strokes gained methodology, the “most frequently used statistical measurement on professional tours,” allows players to track their progress over time. Toptracer clearly can make practice more meaningful and more enjoyable for all. “Our members might have been a little skeptical about it at first,” said Applecross Country Club General Manager John Harte. “I think they thought it was more of a gimmicky thing, but for our first year of having it, I think a lot of them have warmed up to it and have found that it really aids in their practice habits.” “We held a few events up there last season and we’re doing more this season,” added Harte. “We’re trying to get them GOLF COURSE NEWS By Nate Oxman, Contributing Writer Talamore Adds Toptracer To Its Family Of Clubs Applecross Country Club
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