Benefits of Walking the Golf Course

There are many benefits of walking when you golf.

Four primary benefits are the following:

• Physical – You  burn almost twice as many calories as you would riding in a cart

• Scoring – You shoot better scores than those who are riding in a cart

• Social – You have a much better opportunity to interact with all of your playing partners

• Experience – You can fully enjoy the natural beauty of the course from tee to green

Please click on each benefit to find more information.

The benefits of walking are not limited to the golfer, they extend to the golf course and the surrounding environment.

A walking golfer has much less impact on the turf than a golf cart, which is evident any time you play in the rain because you can see where carts have ripped up swaths of grass that will take months to mend.

If a golf course or club is walking only, then there is the added benefit of saving expenses on building and maintaining cart paths, while also significantly improving the aesthetics of the course.

Cart paths are little more than a long scar on the landscape that disrupt natural sightlines, create artificial man made obstacles and negatively influence an architects ability to freely route the course. A cart path free course is a blank canvas, while the necessity to accomodate cart paths is restrictive to the architect as an artist.

Many contend that the costs of building and maintaining cart paths are outweighed by the revenue that is generated from cart rentals.

I think this is bogus, and I think that golf courses have a huge opportunity in front of them to benefit from a movement towards walking only golf.

Carts bring in revenue, but the turf, cart path and golf cart maintenance costs erode that revenue to a point where it would be advantageous for courses to rent motorized push carts.

Electronic push carts are cheaper to purchase and maintain than motorized carts which is great for the golf course, while also providing the walking golfer with a means of walking eighteen without having to carry his or her bag.

Being a walking golfer is much better for the golfer, the golf course, the bottom line and the environment.

Note: This article was originally published on The Walking Golfer in 2009.