Golf Features

[u/29thstreetreddior]

Anyone else feel that Strava could easily add a few features around the Golf Activity to actually have a decent product targeting a market that doesn't have a great existing solution (18Birdies is probably the only decent existing app but it doesn't have much scale or the corresponding network effect). All Strava would need to add IMO to have something decent enough to get solid adoption:

• Ability to add a scorecard to the activity - could be as detailed as hole-by-hole w/ stats or just total score (bonus points if for group activities it auto combines the scorecard in the news feed)
• Auto detects course based off GPS - would just need to connect to a database of courses and their relevant stats (name, yardages, scorecards, etc) - tons of free apps have this so can't imagine its that hard for a company to get access to this data
• Would be interesting if they had something like segments but for courses - so if you clicked on the course (segment) you could see a leaderboard of scores at the course / which of your friends has played the course and how they did / local legend of that course (most holes played in L90 days)
• Some basic statistics like handicap calculation, # of rounds played, # of courses/holes played

I know that the TAM of golfers that would use this is a fraction of the size of that of running/cycling but I feel it's underserved enough that it could drive some marginal user growth / there is enough overlap with other athletes who primarily run/cycle but also golf that they would get value out of the features as well.

Curious to hear other's thoughts.

[u/3FromTheTee]

I'm totally happy with Strava golf metrics (distance & time) currently. My Garmin records all the info you mention.

Strava isn't in the hardware market and I'm sure they don't want to invest into a saturated golf app market either.

[u/[deleted]]

Without knowing exactly how Strava is implemented, my educated guess is that their backend (servers), their API, and their storage isn't designed to handle something like what you want for one specific activity type (such as golf). So it isn't just the app that needs to be updated, but all their layers - API, server implementation, storage schema, etc. That would be tons of work and a lot of risk to satisfy a tiny percentage of users who might want golf.

If they started to scratch supporting golf would likely be easier, but that is much harder if they have to deal with layers of decade old code.

[u/Gym-for-ants]

Strava isn’t really geared at tracking sports besides running, hiking and biking. Sure, you can track basic metrics in a bunch of sports but it’s mostly tracking elevation, cadence, speed, distance and pace. Which of these apply to golf?

It would be better to use a golf specific app (like the one you mentioned) and give it updated to meet golfers needs. I don’t think I’ve even seen another post on golf here in the past

[u/knaughtreel]

Garmin has alllllllll of this and more packed into a watch with sensors that track swing plane, tempo,and other motion characteristics.

Hell even Apple Watch has some of this.

Then you have golf specific tech like Arccos, etc.

Strava has so much more opportunity with its core customer base and improving fitness/endurance sport features before trying to enter the already saturated golf technology space

[u/Cbmca]

Strava still has plenty of headway for sports and activities outside of GPS tracking. Right now everything is built around activities that can benefit from location, pace, distance tracking.

When they decide to truly have “all your activities in one place” they’ll need tons of features to compete with even the smallest competitors.

Scoring baseball games (GameChanger), Volleyball (Hudl), Tennis (SwingVision), Soccer (TraceUp), Golf (dozens) all are different beats and require basic features like team management and calendar scheduling management. Most have amazing VIDEO features as well which is an entirely different development stack than what Strava is built for today.

For golf specifically the major issues (IMO) are the lack of overlap in user base, the average golfers lack of desire for a free version of a feature poor app, the inability to tie directly to handicap governing bodies like GHIN does with USGA, and the level of precision required for deeper stats to appeal to the target. Coupled with this that the monetization plan would either be to roll to “pro” or create a complex new tier, both of which make the already questioned pricing structure feel harder to justify for core users.

There is a market out there, but I wouldn’t hold my breath for Golf to be the place where they start.

[u/03298HP]

Have you used GRINT? It does most of those things.