Golf Technique – Art or Science

Golf Technique – Art or Science For me, one of the best things about playing golf is that it gives me time to unwind and let my mind wander a bit. Conversely, that can also be the worst thing about golf – especially if you’ve just had a bad hole!

The other day I was thinking about golf technique and the question I ended up wondering about is still bugging me – Will A Robot Ever Beat A Human At Golf?

What led me to ponder this was when I was faced with a completely straight putt of around 10 feet to win a hole.

I figured if I could swing the club down a perfectly straight line and keep the face square – with the right pace it would be easy. And that is when I wondered if a robot might ever beat a human at golf? It would have been so simple for a machine in theory. We will get back to this question later!

The Evolution of Hamburg Golf Technique Golf technique has changed over the years, most dramatically in putting technique. If you track down some of the ‘Shells Wonderful World Of Golf’ videos which featured the top golf pros from the 60′s and 70′s you’ll be amazed how golf technique and in particular putting technique have evolved. Differences between then and now include –    

Feet together ‘Open’ stance (feet not aligned parallel to the target line) No rocking of the shouders Very ‘wristy’ action to control the pace

In other words, the golf technique was very much art with a lot of feelings involved.

Now let’s compare that to modern golf putting technique –    

Feet shoulder-width apart Shoulders, hips, and feet aligned parallel to the target line The putting stroke is a rocking of the shoulders No wrist action is involved in the putting stroke at all.

As you can see – putting is very much becoming more of a science than an art, although there are many elements that are still more art than science such as –  Reading greens  Assessing conditions that will affect your putts such as wind and weather  Judging pace And what about the golf swing it? If you look back to the 60′s and 70′s you’ll see all manner of different golf swings, but in the modern era, all the top professionals (with the possible exception of Jim Furyk) have basically similar swings. A lot of this is due to technology which allows professionals to analyze their swings on computers – this technology simply wasn’t available to the golf stars before the 60′s – which makes their abilities all the more amazing…

So let’s get back to my original question: Will A Robot Ever Beat A Human At Golf?

Recent research shows that the autonomous golf-playing microrobot (AGPMR) is an excellent platform for developing educational and entertaining robots because golf is a sport that requires sophisticated intelligence, planning, and strategies in order to win the game.

The AGPMR is capable of putting. Putting, just like any other skill in golf, requires good control.

The robot developed plays golf triumphantly, navigates the playing field, avoids obstacles, and seeks the target through the use of a camera vision system. Colour object detection techniques are used for the vision system which is capable of distinguishing and differentiating the ball, the hole, and the robot regardless of different lighting conditions.

In the future, it will be more challenging for scientists to develop a real humanoid robot that will play golf using its arms and legs to walk to navigate the golf course.Well, in addition to this if scientists could build a robot that could make adjustments to take account of such things as   

Lie Wind Temperature Altitude

Then I really do think a robot could actually beat a human at golf for a number of reasons including the ability to repeat the same swing over and over again.

But the main reason I think a robot could beat a human is that they would be totally unaffected by pressure – they simply wouldn’t care if they had a putt to lose a hole or win the US Masters!

It’s quite plausible that over the next 40 years robots will replace most human jobs and we will be witnessing human robots’ golf competitions (the question is would anyone apart from scientists want to watch them?). But until then we need to work on perfecting our techniques and Maurice Campbell, our Top Golf Pro teaches us exactly that – How To Perfect Your Putting Techniques!