POWER PLAY golf comes to India

Power play golf come to India

Though I am not familiar with even “G” of Golf, still writing this post!! After all India is a democracy and we all have freedom of speech, unless its vituperative. So dear Readers, please read the following with a sympathetic attitude towards me!! Recently, a new version of Golf – PowerPlay Golf – was introduced in Mumbai. PowerPlay golf is just a two years old sport but promises to metamorphose the perception people currently have towards the sport – just like T20 did for Cricket (though I bet there will not be as much money involved as in Cricket). And what else, if Shilpa Shetty and Preity Zinta can rock the dias in IPL then Neha Dhupia makes sure that she is not left behind (at least here, since she has nowhere to go in Bollywood) in Signature Club Golf Championship. Yup, she is the “glamor ambassador” for this sport.

PowerPlay Golf was introduced by Peter McEvoy, leading British amateur golfer and now golf course designer and administrator, around two years back. In this shorter version of Golf, the game would be finished in just 2 hours. What a mind!! 4 days to 2 hours (actual Golf is of 4 days)?? Seems like every weekend there would be a PowerPlay Golf championship in one or the other street of India!! But 1 thing is for sure that this sport would soon be in a race to give T20 Cricket a run for money. Anyways, in this version, played over nine holes, there are two flags on each green — with bonus points on offer for golfers, who score nett birdies or better when going for the difficult Black Flags. Mr. McEvoy believes that due to a conspicuous and steady drop in Golf audience, this new version would be able to attract more people to watch Golf. The Signature Championship will be played from 26^th September to 14^th December across 30 cities in India in which around 40 clubs would be participating.

In PowerPlay Golf, players can choose to play to the easy white flag or the more difficult Skull and Crossbones black flag. If they score a birdie or better to the black flag, they earn double points. Each golfer is compelled to take exactly three PowerPlays in the first eight holes while having the option of the fourth PowerPlay on the final hole. The game was first played by 16 UK golf journalists at Playgolf Northwick Part Golf course in London on February 6, 2007. Since then the format has expanded its reach with 140 UK courses set up for the format, 14 in Australia and 30 in South Africa. David Kemp, a 3-handicap golfer from Surrey won the first ever National PowerPlay Golf Championships at Hampton Court Palace Golf Club in London on September 6, 2007. The world’s first dedicated PowerPlay Golf course, however, is currently under construction in East Kilbride, Scotland.

The sport was launched in India last week in a glittering function in Mumbai, with the damsel Dhupia in a voluptuous red dress. So lets see how many Rohit Sharma or Venugopal Rao or Manpreet Gony of Golf emerge from this tournament to match the likes of Jeev Milkha Singh and other Indian Golf greats.