Hello fellow golf people! My name is Danny and I’m thrilled to welcome you to the inaugural post of Golf Nearby Me – a place where I can talk about my passion for golf and share how I built and enjoy golf sanctuary in my home.
I started to learn how to play golf when I first started college as a way to get out of the house and spend more time with my 2 brothers and my dad. As it does for most, golf quickly became my addiction. I found that as an incredibly competitive person, it is easy to scratch that itch, so to speak, while in college. There are tons of intramural sports you can play, people consistently around for pick up games, and access to some of the top facilities and equipment in the world. Unfortunately this goes away when you enter the real world. No longer being a 10 – 21year old, I have less and less kids I can find to go play with. This is why golf has become my addiction. I just need me, my clubs, some grass (or a highly complicated launch monitor) and I can compete all day long against my fiercest competition – me.
Once I was addicted, I needed to find away to practice golf every day of the week. No, I am not training for any official competition – not close to good enough. I am just obsessed enough to want to get better and beat all my friends. Living on the east coast, the driving ranges and putting greens only offer so much for so long. This is where I became interested in the simulator world and what possibilities existed.
My own personal simulator started with a net in the backyard and tearing up my dad’s grass. Now as I home owner, I understand how hard it is to grow grass so apologies Dad for ruining your backyard.
My golf space slowly evolved from a net in the yard, to convincing my girlfriend at the time to let me put a net in our guest room when we moved in together. Once I had the net, I needed a mat. I started with $20 strips of turf that I got from a golf expo and slowly worked myself up. I also needed the simulator piece. I bought the original SkyTrak. which gave me everything I needed at a great price and combined it with The Golf Club2019 software. (Also made sure to get the SkyTrak protected cover as shanks are inevitable!)
Just about 2 years ago, when me and my now wife bought our first house together, it was understood that I needed a space for golf. Lucky for me, we have a 2 car garage and as long as I am willing to park my car outside, I can use the second half as my golf room.
The turf was slowly upgraded to a professional hitting mat, and my net (with many holes in it) was finally upgraded to an impact screen. I leveraged concepts from pre-built golf simulator studios (link) for inspiration. Add a projector in and some nice cheap green carpeting, my golf room was built as it stands today. Next steps will be to update to the new SkyTrak !
I am building this blog to talk through my experience with simulators, share my thoughts and knowledge and also engage the community to talk through anything and all things golf related. I want to share fun content, golf challenges, and helpful insight and knowledge!
If you have read this far – thank you and welcome to my page 🙂
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