Big Swing Golf - Indoor Golf Simulator Review

Have you ever wanted to travel the world and play on some of the most famous and historic golf courses which are a feature of the PGA Tour? Do you love playing Rory McIlroy’s PGA Tour Golf on the PC, PlayStation or Xbox One? Sick of swinging a controller on Wii Sports, and do you wish you could hit a real golf ball instead of using a keyboard or controller?

If your answer is yes to any of these questions well it is now possible to do it all at Big Swing Golf.

Located at Drummond Golf in Penrith, Big Swing Golf features five Full Swing Golf Simulators that blur the golfing lines of virtual reality and reality using the latest state of the art technology, allowing you to play a round of golf without any impact from the weather or wasting precious time looking for that lost ball in the rough. These golfing simulators are so accurate and detailed that even some of the biggest names in professional golf like Tiger Woods, Jason Day and Jordan Spieth have put their names to endorsing the product and utilising the technology to improve their game.

How do these Golf Simulators work?

There are three main sensors that the Simulator utilises in order to determine the direction, speed and distance of your ball, once it has made contact with your golf club.

The first main sensor is the Ion2 High Speed Camera which is located above where the ball is placed, this camera picks up your club head speed, club head path, club face angle as well as back spin, side spin and spin axis.

After you hit the ball, it then travels through two infrared light wave tracks which measure the ball speed, launch angle and direction all at the speed of light before hitting the screen which then displays the flight of the ball as it soars through the air to where it lands.

Within a few seconds of the ball coming to rest, all of the information picked up from the sensor is displayed on the screen before loading onto your next shot.

I am by no means anywhere close to being pro golfer, although at times I wish I was, my time only allows for 18 holes once a fortnight with the occasional trip to the driving range in between. With nothing planned last weekend my mate and I decided to visit the Big Swing Golf in Penrith and hit a few balls.

After we arrived, Nathan who is one of the owners of Big Swing Golf in Penrith, set up the driving range on screen explaining the simulator set up, and after a few shots to warm up, it became quite clear how accurate the golf simulator is and how much fun this would be. Much like the real world my golf shots were going left and right but the information available afterwards was mind blowing. Once the ball had come to rest, the screen displays a tonne of information from ball flight, spin, angle the club struck the ball, speed of the club face, the list goes on and on and the information could be taken on board to improve on the next shot. There were a few times I deliberately tried to hit a bad shot and it was picked up accurately by the sensors.

Once we had enough of the driving range and a few shots under my belt I decided to travel to the home of golf and play the famous Old Course of St. Andrews.  There are over 93 different golf course to choose from, all of which are accurate representations of their real world counterparts including two courses from Australia, Royal Melbourne and New South Wales Golf Club.

Standing on the first tee at St. Andrews was surprisingly an accurate with the detailed look of the clubhouse and hotel in the distance it was very close in comparison to when I was there a few years ago on holiday. Each hole is played as you would a normal round of golf, even down to putting, which was the hardest part of play. During putting an arrow displays the line to the hole and depending how accurately you putt towards the arrow with the correct speed the ball should go in (well in theory anyway).  The majority of the times the ball would stop short or be just off line, however this is where the cheats can be used. Gimmes were set to 2.5 metres (where if the ball stops within that distance to the hole the next shot is automatically in the hole), wind speed can be adjusted, and the playing surface can be set to accurate to accommodate for the rough and bunkers (sand traps) or if you want you can set it up to play every shot from a fairway lie.

Whilst you may expect all this to be expensive, it is only $20 per half hour which between two players is rather cheap compared to playing a full game of 18 holes on the real golf course. Most 18 holes will take around an hour and half on average to complete

Big Swing Golf is virtual golf, but you use your own clubs and ball, (if you don’t have your own there are clubs available to hire) and with the difficulty set to your style of play the Simulator can accommodates for all golfing skill levels. They have weekly competitions on Tuesdays and Wednesday nights, coaching lessons and challenge golf as well. If you love your golf as well as looking for something different to enjoy your game, then Big Swing Golf is worth a hit.

Big Swing Golf is located at Unit 4/233 Mulgoa Road Penrith and there are other locations in Sydney and Victoria. For more information visit www.bigswinggolf.com.au

Aussie Gamers Express