Professional Sandy Strachan and the Deer Park Golf Club youngsters (image by Rob Eyton-Jones)

New Deer Park youth drive gaining momentum

Whilst golf takes its annual sabbatical in clubs across the country, Deer Park Golf & Country Club is intensifying its efforts to build a junior section which its Pros hope will eventually become a junior academy.
By its own admission Deer Park has not had the depth of juniors expected from a club which prides itself on its family orientation. Like many golf clubs it has a lot of juniors on its books...yet only a handful play regularly.
Now, the club is taking action to redress the balance. It has halved its membership fee for eight to 13 year olds to £89, has started offering clubgolf coaching and is developing a short course for juniors.
“Kids have always been keen to play here but it was too expensive and we were becoming a feeder for other clubs,” said Sandy Strachan, who joined the Club as Head Pro from Bathgate two years ago and is leading the junior drive.
“That’s fine for getting kids into golf but we weren’t seeing the benefit. So reducing the membership has really given us the opportunity to get active and get kids in. My aim was to get the membership fee right then make a heavy push on the coaching and build a junior section.”
Deer Park’s timing has been perfect."

This year some 38,000 P5 children were introduced to the game at school through the national junior golf programme, clubgolf, the partnership between the Scottish Golf Union, the Scottish Ladies' Golfing Association, the Professional Golfers' Association, the Golf Foundation and sportscotland created as a legacy following Scotland’s successful bid to host the Ryder Cup.
Over 1400 of these children are from West Lothian making Deer Park, with its new junior focus, well placed to offer a continuation of the programme.
“We have been working with clubgolf and Active Schools to get the message out to local schools and the potential for children to come here for coaching is massive,” said Sandy, who attracted 30 children, many of them from non golfing families, to his clubgolf Stage 1 coaching course this year.
Deer Park has a significant advantage over some clubs in that its Pros, Sandy and John Murray, are leading the coaching. At just £20 for the eight week course the programme, which is subsidised by a £400 grant from the Golf Foundation, is certainly affordable and comparable to the price of coaching delivered elsewhere by volunteer coaches.
“I’m doing the teaching because I feel that by catching children straight away I can nurture them from there and make sure they are going to be good junior members,” said Sandy.
“I have got my Stage 3 qualification, as has John Murray who joined us from Turnhouse (John was one of the first Pros in Scotland to offer clubgolf Stage 3 coaching) so we can take the children right through the levels to the advanced stages.”
Sandy does not see the onset of winter and deteriorating light and weather as an obstacle in progressing his clubgolf programme. Last week he was nearing the end of the second phase of coaching for children who have been with him this season.
“I’ve realised it’s more the case that Pros don’t want to be out in the winter but the kids are keen as mustard and as long as they are well wrapped up they have a great time,” he said.
“Of course if things get really bad we have the facilities to go indoors. Winter is a quiet time so there is a great opportunity for us to get out and utilise the course.
For its first year the programme has been a success. Consistent numbers of children have turned up for coaching on Fridays and Saturdays and all the children have got better.
“These are the first group of kids who have come in from the schools and have stayed with the programme since early summer,” said Sandy. “They have all made an improvement and quite a few of them are starting to hit well.
“We are coordinating with the schools that have done clubgolf’s introductory game to get another intake of children after Christmas. There are around 20 schools in the Livingston area so the potential is large.
“We are obviously at the start but what we are working towards is to create a Deer Park Junior Academy where you we take in children from a very young age and coach them right through to Scottish level and hopefully even professional.”
Rob Eyton-Jones
clubgolf Media Manager
clubgolf website: http://www.clubgolfscotland.com/