GOLF : Monitoring Group Uses a Pilot Program to Wage War on Slow Play

A foursome dawdles on the 16th green at Encino Golf Course so long that the players need an overnight camping permit to putt out.

Sound familiar? Slow play has been all too familiar at busy San Fernando Valley municipal golf courses this summer.

But there’s a solution.

The men in the bright yellow shirts from Go Golf have arrived to speed things up. Cruising the links in their yellow and blue motor carts, they are on the lookout for duffers who take 20 practice swings or search hours for a lost ball.

All slow golfers are not under siege, however. The program, sponsored by the Department of Recreation and Parks, has been instituted at the Rancho Park, Wilson and Encino golf courses only.

“They have their job cut out for them, to keep play moving and spot bottlenecks,” said Al Goldfarb, public relations director for the Department of Recreation and Parks.

The Go Golf program is modeled after a program in Denver, in which flagrantly slow golfers are asked to leave the course. The Los Angeles version of Go Golf is not as harsh, however.

Course marshals cruise the three sites 12 hours a day, seven days a week looking for violators of course rules. Violators will be warned or asked to speed up play.

Common violations of speedy play include:

Too much talking on the tee.

Excessive practice swings.

Marking the ball for foot-long putts.

Filling out score cards on the putting green.

The goal of Go Golf is that 18 holes be completed in four hours, 30 minutes, or less. To help golfers speed up play, a clock has been posted at the first hole of the three courses and signs at every third hole post the average time required to play that many holes.

“Most golfers seem to like it, they’re always checking their time to see how they are doing,” Goldfarb said. “But there are some golfers who are very belligerent who don’t like being hurried if they feel it’s not justified.”