UNF student Steve Rabinowitz checks out the new PGA Tour interactive kiosks yesterday. The kiosks are linked to a computer system that provides real-time leaderboards, location of players on the course and statistics. -- Trisha L. Siddens/special

Kiosks give fans a new view of event

By Garry Smits
Times-Union sports writer

For years, the media covering PGA Tour events has benefited from a computer system that provides real-time leaderboards, locations of players on the course and statistics.

Fans at The Players Championship this week will finally get the benefit of that technology.

The Tour has installed 30 interactive kiosks around the course that will provide information through a touch-screen system and a connection to ShotLink, the Tour's new tournament-tracking program.

Half of the kiosks will be outdoors on the course, and the other half will be located inside areas such as the clubhouse and corporate and fan tents.

Developed by the Event Hospitality Network, a Colorado-based company, the kiosks will provide one key service to fans: a course locator that will give them the hole that a group or individual player is on at the time.

"That's one of the features we think fans will appreciate as much as anything," said Craig Peters, the Tour's director of new media. "Now, someone on one part of the course can find out immediately what hole Tiger Woods is playing."

Before the kiosks were installed, fans more or less had to guess at a player's location by consulting tee times.

In addition to other information such as the updated money list, player biographies and season statistics, the kiosks also will provide video highlights of the day's action, with about a two-hour lag.

For instance, video of the leader hitting a good shot at about 10 a.m. will be available around noon, with commentary from pgatour.com and PGA Tour Radio analysts. There also will be video highlights of the previous week's event.

"Eventually, we will be able to cut that time down even further," Peters said.

The kiosks located outdoors will be encased in metal and weather-proofed. Peters said the housing would protect the computer and its inner workings well.

"If someone knocked them over, I think they would hold up," he said of the $5,000 units.

The kiosks eventually will come into use at other PGA Tour events.

Staff writer Garry Smits can be reached at (904) 359-4362 or via e-mail at gsmits@jacksonville.com.

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