PGA West Challenges Golfers To Speed Up Their Game

PGA West hosted the first annual “Fast and Furious Golf Challenge” over the weekend. The tournament is the first of its kind and showcases sustainable practices.

The event held at La Quinta Resort & Club and PGA West offered a rare opportunity to play in the most natural environs, with hard, uber fast Scotland-like golf conditions. Following two days of intensive qualifying rounds, players participated in a fast-paced Golf Channel vs. Golf Digest Championship on the PGA WEST Greg Norman Course.

To conserve water, and ready courses for reseeding, PGA WEST staff stopped watering the courses, rendering them ultra hard ? and ultra fast. The courses played and looked like traditional Scottish links, with definition and targets of both brown and green. ?This is the way the game of golf was meant to be played, with the turf in its natural state,? said Bill Shaw, director of golf for La Quinta Resort & Club and PGA WEST.

In addition to the fast course, players signed a proclamation of pace requiring them to finish their round under four hours or be disqualified. “We are the first organization to have a proclamation pledge that every player that played in this event and tournament today, had to finish in under four hours or they were disqualified,” said PGA West Executive Director Michael Kelly. “We think that people can have fun, playing golf in under four hours and we need to do that in order to speed the game up and get more participation.”