European Tour 2016 - Dubai

First topic message reminder :

robo,
As said before, Stewart as at a week ago had the most owgr points in 2016 of Scots not called Laird & Knox. Certainly Knox's choice is nowhere near as indefensible as it might seem at first glance.

robopz wrote:I read somewhere else there's gonna be night golf on the Euro Tour next year? Anyone here see any confirmation of that?

The course for the Turkish Airlines Open is fully floodlit........only one in Europe.....

I would love to play floodlit golf for a full round.

I'm never wrong wrote:

robopz wrote:I can't be 100% sure, but I'm like 99.9% that Stuart is shooting with a Nikon D5 at 21mp. I pulled one of his images off the ET site to try to check the camera meta data, but it had been stripped.  However, the full frame largest resolution images he has up for Getty have pixel dimensions of 5588 x 3712 which I'm pretty sure is unique to that particular line of Nikon cameras.

Thanks Robo. Those pixel dimensions exactly match a Nikon D5. (Out of my budget range) Just done a little research and there are ways to use that camera with mirror lock up or Live View so it is silent. Cheers.

For even the hobbyist... it's not so much about the bodies,  it's all about lenses (which get really expensive really fast). Problem is Canon and Nikon lenses aren't interchangeable, so once you start down one road, you're pretty much committed to it.  I'm a Canon guy and IMO the sweet spot camera for the lower budget hobbyist these days is their EOS 7D Mark II. It's 20mp with 1080 HD video.  But if you can afford it the 5D-Mark IV is so sweet.

IMO the BETTER way to cover stills and video is save up for a Mark IV... shoot your stills and capture great video... and pull grabs out of that video thats plenty good for 98% of what you'd ever need it for.  BUT... stick with the GoPro for most your primary video needs. You don't have the controls with it... but it's so freeking quick and easy to use, people actually USE it instead of just leaving it in the case.

I will say this much though... if you do the research.... you'd be surprised at how many Hollywood TV productions and even cinema quality films are being done with tricked up 5D Mark II-IV's bodies... the 1080 video of the II's and III's is fine for standard HD which is the current broadcast standard and it's up-res'ed for cinema.  Pretty slick. One of my sons runs a rental outfit for the trade out there, and they have something like 30 5D's, with most of them out all the time. I think the point is, if the Canon camera body is good enough for capturing video for THEM... then it DAMN sure is for the rest of us.

Below is a 5D body tricked out all with all the "Hollywood" bells and whistles....

Better look out for the off-topic police gentlemen.

super_realist wrote:Better look out for the off-topic police gentlemen.

oh... Should we switch to politics or religion to be more in keeping with the "on topic" standards of this forum?

Robo

Neat info on the world of photography, thanks.

You got any shots from over the years that you think are interesting and that you would be willing to share on here?

Yeah... I'm in the process of redoing my archives and if I run across some good stuff I'll post it.  I own most the golf work I did from 2003-2006, but don't have rights (or even possession of most all it thereafter. And by 2009-10 I had moved to mostly editing anyway.  Ask me again first of the year...

Mac.. I did have these on my laptop.... This is from one of those Legend's deals from a few years ago.... one of my last paid assignments in golf...

Mac... and I have this one laying around... It was from John Daly's Champions Tour debut...[url=https://servimg.com/view/18259553/13]

Did you even experience the wrath of Poulter?

Jack and Trevino not looking too happy about being paired with Player.

McLaren wrote:Did you even experience the wrath of Poulter?

No but I experienced the wrath of DL3 one time... and it wasn't even me... but he was convinced it was. And just to be clear... YES... I've make the click at the wrong time mistake. I always got away with it though as it didn't cause any issues. The only time I got "in trouble" was with that one incident with DL3 at a Tour Championship... I guess it was payback for times I was guilty...

McLaren wrote:Jack and Trevino not looking too happy about being paired with Player.  

That was actually supposed to be "The Big 3". Palmer was on site, but got ill the day before and couldn't play and went home.... so they moved up Trevino to play with Gary and Jack. Arnie would never play in another one of those things again....

robopz wrote:Mac... and I have this one laying around... It was from John Daly's Champions Tour debut...[url=https://servimg.com/view/18259553/13]

Robo, I think your camera has a serious chroma issue...

pedro wrote:
Robo, I think your camera has a serious chroma issue...

nah.... I just did a quick ccc on my laptop which isn't calibrated. On my tablet they look a blown out, but I just wanted to get something up quick.

So you're telling me Daly actually wears this?

Yeah... He wears it. And I can't believe I'm gonna say this... But it looks a lot better in person than it does in photo or on TV... At least this particular outfit did. Not something I'd be caught dead in... But works for him, or at least maybe I'm used to it... :-)

So just catching up, Ian Poulter had a moan because a camera man was trying to film him, and was maybe a little bit noisey. Do these players not realise that the camera man is basically one of the most important people out there. No camera man, no filming, no filming no Tv, no Tv no sponsors, no sponsors no money, no money no ferraris and massive houses for average professional golfers.

A day in the life of Ian Poulter. (It's only a couple of minutes long as they had to leave out the bits where he's a d!ck...)

http://www.europeantour.com/europeantour/season=2017/tournamentid=2016098/news/newsid=317334.html

From what I could garner, the cameraman was running behind him whilst he was playing his shot. Seems more legitimate to have a moan than someone simply moving in the background like a lot of golfers complain about.

Saying that, I'm keen on golfers witholding complaints about noise and disturbances as an excuse for bad shots. Time they just got on with it, although the thought of some American anus shouting "mash potatoes" at the top of your backswing would be distracting.

Surely if he could hear the camera man running, he just waits for him to stop running then plays his shot. It sound slike a convenient excuse for a bad shot by a struggling player.

beninho wrote:So just catching up, Ian Poulter had a moan because a camera man was trying to film him, and was maybe a little bit noisey. Do these players not realise that the camera man is basically one of the most important people out there. No camera man, no filming, no filming no Tv, no Tv no sponsors, no sponsors no money, no money no ferraris and massive houses for average professional golfers.

You can't just say it's one thing. They all help each other. No golfers>no tournaments>nothing for photographers to take pictures of>no job for cameraman. How about all the times he's probably given time to photographers that you don't hear about?

At least he didn't get the photographer ejected like Tiger has on a couple of occasions.

Poulter should give all cameramen royalties from sales of his clothing line.

super_realist wrote:I would love to play floodlit golf for a full round.

Mate of mine played the course in Turkey at night. Said it was fun to begin with, but got a bit annoying after a few holes. Harder to follow the ball

No Open de Espana on the 2017 ET schedule.

I would've thought Pelley would find a way to subsidise this but maybe spooked by its date the week before The Players . . . . .

At least one other tournament to be announced Kwini. (Could be the TBC shown on the schedule). Plus there is a gap opposite the Shell Houston Open, but whether players will want to hop back from the Match Play and then back for the Masters......
Although the Fench Open not one of the Rolex series, 4 big tournaments from then to the Open.

Following up on Kwini's post... Euro Tour finally got the balance of their 2017 schedule announced....

3 "kinda old, kinda new" Tournaments return. Open de Portugal is back, an event in Sicily, plus Sergio Garcia is moving on to the Andulucia Valderrama for his Foundation event.

NO Spanish Open on the calendar, the Thailand event is gone, as is Mauritus. As of now it appears the King's Cup or Fiji is no longer on the schedule either.  Euro Tour says they're going to add one more to bring the total to 48. for the season.

EDIT: The schedule below has been updated with a few corrections... plus I've started a new Schedule Post where I will post updates as they become available.... Also, not sure how OWGR will number the weeks in 2017, but if necessary I will adjust the Week number to correspond to OWGR week #'s

http://www.europeantour.com/index.html

Here's a side by side schedule of the PGAT, Euro, LPGA, WEB & Champions Tours....

robo,
Love the coordinated calendar - back to the days we used to get wall-hangings like that from the golf magazines!

Are the PGA Tour and the webbers a bit out of sync for the week of Sept 10th?
Or are the Bills playing an appetizer for the Super Bowl and the rest of the country comes to a halt as a result? Strange.

kwinigolfer wrote:robo,
Love the coordinated calendar - back to the days we used to get wall-hangings like that from the golf magazines!

Are the PGA Tour and the webbers a bit out of sync for the week of Sept 10th?
Or are the Bills playing an appetizer for the Super Bowl and the rest of the country comes to a halt as a result? Strange.

Thanks.... this impetus of this was from GPB who sent me a schedule last year, which I have expanded a bit.

And yes... the Sept 10th week is a bit odd.... I wouldn't be surprised to see a change on the Webbie schedule in that regard.

After just his first few months, it wasn't hard to see what a breath of fresh air Keith Pelley was for the European Tour. Even though he's had a few "shoot from the hips" missteps (like the failed Asian Tour merger), he still continues to move the ET forward.

Pelley's job first and foremost is to provide playing opportunities and to maximize purses for his players. And now he's starting to show some real progress in that department. While the Rolex series does create an even deeper chasim between the "have's" and "have not's" on the Tour it does add significantly to the purses which should (hopefully) entice at least some of the marquee name Euro double dippers to stay home a little more often.

Regardless of how you calculate it, and estimating purses for the events where purses are yet to be revealed, it appears as though the total purse increase this year will be above 10% to somewhere in the range of USD $209 mil from USD $191 mil. And that's using the same currency exchange rates as last year. But since the new Rolex series purses are in U.S. dollars (as are most the other big co-sanctions), when you factor in the recent strength of the $ vs the other currencies on the ET... the currency adjusted gain for the players based outside the U.S. is significantly more (in the 13% range). Of course currency exchange rates are a double edge sword as the pendulum swings both ways.

Bottom line... I still think Pelley is a little too bombastic at times, (like saying he doesn't care what his members think about night golf, he's doing it anyway). And IMO he's a little too quick to announce things before he has his i's dotted and t's crossed (ET/Asia merger).

But on this new schedule... all that can be said is WELL DONE. He's definitely got things going in the right direction.

One other thing on the new ET Schedule.... which may or may not be a good thing. It was widely reported that it was Thai golf interests that in effect scuttled the ET's efforts to merge/absorb the Asian Tour. And this year BOTH Thailand events have been removed from the ET schedule (the Thailand Classic and King's Cup). Coincidence or payback I wonder?

And one other not so good note... From PD... The European Tour's OWGR total points from it's "regular" events declined last year. Part of this was the loss of an event, but that was partially offsett by a double playing of the NedBank.  (the non-sanctioning of the WGC-Bridgestone doesn't factor into this chart)

Nosferatu ‏@VC606  
Total #OWGR points awarded on @PGATOUR & @EuropeanTour in the last 3 seasons. ET drop in 2016 mainly due to one less event in Final Series.

Only 2227 votes and last place for Willett in SPOTY. Is it just him or is golf really that unpopular in the UK at the moment?

McLaren wrote:Only 2227 votes and last place for Willett in SPOTY.  Is it just him or is golf really that unpopular in the UK at the moment?

His brother got more votes.

I would say that golfers are unpopular in the uk at the moment.

McLaren wrote:Only 2227 votes and last place for Willett in SPOTY.  Is it just him or is golf really that unpopular in the UK at the moment?

I'd say a combination of both, I know quite a few guys with kids who went to the pro am day at Wentworth this year and apparently he was an arrogant arse, wouldn't sign autographs, pose for pictures etc whereas others were more than happy to do so. OK that in itself is not going to cost him 10's of thousands of votes but he's certainly not the popular imagination capturing image of golf even to golfers.

With golf's coverage on terrestrial TV ever shrinking, it's popularity with the wider viewing public is only going one way and it's not up.

Looking at the podium places in SPOTY
1. in an Olympic year you must have a Gold medal in your pocket
2. You must have done something else worthy of note AND have a heart tugging story

Taking nothing away from Brownlee or Skelton fair play to both of them, the former for raising the profile of triathlon and brotherly love and the latter for never giving up, coming back from a broken neck and at the age of 58, Great stuff

30 years ago winning a gold medal would have made any contender a virtual shoe in for a spoty, these days we have multi-medal winning successfully defending Olympic champions who cannot even get a podium place...amazing really

I was a little disappointed to read that Tiger didn't get the overseas award after his fine finish at the hero.

SPOTY is the Miss Congeniality of sports, where the fat chick always wins.

JAS wrote:
With golf's coverage on terrestrial TV ever shrinking, it's popularity with the wider viewing public is only going one way and it's not up.

I'd be interested to know if dressage in on the up as it seems to be the only 'sport' left on terrestrial TV...

pedro wrote:

JAS wrote:
With golf's coverage on terrestrial TV ever shrinking, it's popularity with the wider viewing public is only going one way and it's not up.

I'd be interested to know if dressage in on the up as it seems to be the only 'sport' left on terrestrial TV...

Nonsense, I was watching the Scottish snooker open only the other day.

Is snooker really a spectator sport?

Anybody watching the dart world championships? Pretty impressive they can turn a pub sport for old depraved tattooed fat men into a popular spectator event of this magnitude.

Pedro

Without the tattoos doesn't that also describe golfers?

A few tattoed golfers Mac, I see Rickie Fowler now seems to be sporting at least one. Bubba apparently leading the tatt count . . . . . .

kwinigolfer wrote:Bubba apparently leading the tatt count . . . . . .

Bubba probably has the Confederate flag tattooed all over him...

Danny Willett is most definitely not the needle in Britain.

http://www.geoffshackelford.com/homepage/2016/12/18/danny-willett-just-isnt-a-big-deal-to-the-british-public.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

Obviously I know who Andy Murray is, and I recognize Mo Farah as a Track Star, but I have no idea who the others on the list are.

Yeah it's a bit of a sorry list, also taking into account that Murray hasn't actually got a personality.

Most of them are Olympians of one sort or another GPB, and considering the quality of their performances, not altogether surprising they'd be nominated. A bit shocking that Chris Foome always seem to get overlooked . . . . . . . .

Danny Willett has not exactly done anything to validate his Masters win (not that he needs to in the eyes of golf fans); hopefully that'll change.

kwinigolfer wrote:Most of them are Olympians of one sort or another GPB, and considering the quality of their performances, not altogether surprising they'd be nominated. A bit shocking that Chris Foome always seem to get overlooked . . . . . . . .

Danny Willett has not exactly done anything to validate his Masters win (not that he needs to in the eyes of golf fans); hopefully that'll change.

Danny ought to hire his brother has his Public Relations Rep!