Wooing women to golf
Ashley Brooker seemed oblivious to the silver-haired men teeing up next to her on this humid North Carolina afternoon[, writes the Associated Press]. She raised a golf club over her right shoulder, swung and watched the small white ball disappear in the sun.
"You have to concentrate. When you think about other things it can mess up your swing," the 15-year-old said as the ball landed on the driving range at Pinehurst Golf Resort, bouncing beyond many of the men's hits.
On the course for the fourth time in as many days, the teenager from nearby Southern Pines is part of a surge in female interest in golf in recent years. More and more, young women are picking up the sport in high school, where the number of players increased by 1,000 last year. Some then go on to play in college, where Title IX has helped fuel a boom in women's golf programs. ...
Though women remain a relatively small part of the multibillion dollar golf market, the upward trend in female interest has caught the attention of resorts looking for new ways of attracting customers. A number of them, including Pinehurst, are courting women through gender-specific classes and programs designed to introduce golf as a fun challenge.
Women make up just 18 percent of what the National Golf Foundation defines as "core" golfers -- the 12.5 million golfers who play at least eight times a year and average 37 rounds annually. At the same time, the number of occasional female golfers -- women who play between one and seven times a year -- jumped from 2.6 million in 1997 to 4.3 million last year.
From Arizona to North Carolina, golf resorts are taking the advice offering everything from multi-day getaways that combine golf and spa time to daylong crash courses. ...
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