One of golf’s most important and controversial topics of the moment is to be debated at length by leading authorities from both sides of the Atlantic during the Seminar Programme in Golf Europe 2001, the PGAE endorsed major European Golf Trade Show.
Advancing technology in the manufacture of golf clubs and golf balls is said to be rendering obsolete the design of golf courses all over the world because of tee shots, in particular, which fly ever greater distances in making many of the hazards superfluous.
On stage expressing opposing views will be Jaime-Ortiz Patià±o, the owner of the Valderrama course in southern Spain which so successfully staged the 1997 Ryder Cup, and Frank Thomas, former Technical Director of the United States Golf Association.
Seà±or Patià±o, an expert in golf course design, a devotee of the traditional courses around the world and president of the PGA of Europe, has called for golf authorities worldwide to support a ban on further advances in golf ball technology.
In contrast Frank Thomas has been enthusiastically in the forefront of these escalating advances for many years. He is firmly of the view that such progress should be encouraged to continue.
Andrà© Gorgemans, Secretary General of World Federation of Sports Goods Industries and Executive Director of World Sports Forum, will take the chair.
Golf Europe 2001 www.golf-europe.de