talking points New Horizons

Here are some comments made by speakers at the recent Asia Pacific Golf Summit in Bangkok, Thailand, as reported by the Bangkok Post and other sources.

Greg Norman: We have to get more players into the game and be increasingly creative in the ways to attract them. Golf has to become more accessible and affordable. It has to open up.

Gary Player: Not enough is being done to get our young to play golf, and if we do not do something radical now, the game will suffer going forward.

Hud Hinton of Troon Golf: The game is too expensive to play, too difficult to play, [and] too expensive to operate, and the pace of play is too slow.

Norman again: There's nothing to say that a golf course has to be 18 holes. Why shouldn't 12-hole courses be successful in Asia?

Player again: Something needs to be done about the golf ball. It is just going too far, and I urge the USGA and the R&A to do something quickly before these new balls make today's golf courses obsolete.