Foot golf kicks off Boulcott upgrade
It is a good bet that you have never heard of foot golf.
Yes, it is a sport and yes it is played exactly like it sounds!
Instead of a small white ball and clubs, players have a soccer ball and use their feet to get the ball into a hole.
Boulcott’s Farm Heritage Golf Club recently introduced foot golf and manager John Freer said it had quickly taken off with 145 people recently kicking their way around the course in just one week. As with ordinary golf, players kicked of from the tee and aimed for a hole. The large holes are next to the greens and players wear sports shoes to protect the fairways.
Foot golf is one of a number of changes being made to the club, which will transform it into one of the leading courses in New Zealand.
Eight years ago, the then Hutt Golf Club began a project to merge with Boulcott to enable a new stopbank to be built. That resulted in a massive rebuilding project to create new 18-hole and six-hole courses.
The club recently received resource consent to build new clubrooms and practice facilities, which Freer said would signifi- cantly change the golfing environment.
When completed, it will have cost around $14 million and Freer said Lower Hutt would have a facility to be proud of.
A new coaching set up would feature a traditional range and short game practice facilities.
Freer said Boulcott has a lot of talented youngsters but the current coaching facilities were not ideal.
Players such as Jack Clout, Shontalia William and Erika Cui would really benefit and he predicted Boulcott would become a major force in junior golf.
The six-hole course was ideal for beginners but was also built with the intellectually disabled in mind.
Traditional golf courses with bunkers, tees from which you couldn’t see the green and uneven ground were difficult for those with mental or physical disabilities.
The six-hole course was flat, had no bunkers and a path through the middle.
Boulcott worked with the Halberg Disabilities Sports Foundation on the design and Freer said Special Olympics would get a lot of use from the course.
The new clubrooms should be finished by November 2017.