As soon as a player starts to look for a lost ball, the PoP Timer comes into its own.
PoP Timer is a simple-to-use gadget which enables golfers to accurately measure the time spent looking for golf balls.
Trialled and endorsed by England Golf and golf clubs around the UK, the device ensures adherence to the three-minute rule and helps speed up the pace of play.
The device is the brainchild of inventor and company owner Patrick McGahan, who felt it was needed after seeing how inconsistently the three-minute rule was being applied.
“I had the idea originally because I was doing some marshaling in quite a big, prestigious tournament down at Royal Cinque Ports, which is my club,” he explained. “I noticed that when there was an official around and competitors were looking for their ball, the official would come over, the three-minute clock started and after three minutes they were told to move on.
“However, when there wasn’t an official there, some of the guys were taking up five, six or seven minutes, which seemed to me to be very unfair, and it was also obviously slowing up play.”
Patrick was troubled by this sense of unfairness and resolved to do something about it, which got him to thinking how best to address the issue.
“I thought, let’s try and see if we can think of a technological solution to this,” he said. “Let’s try and invent something which is cheap, durable, simple to use, and that actually just literally times how long you’re looking for the ball.”
How does the PoP Timer work?
As soon as a player starts to look for a lost ball, the PoP Timer comes into it’s own.
- Press the “start” button
- 1 minute, 1 beep
- 2 minutes, 2 beeps
- 3 minutes, 3 beeps and then continuous beeps
- Stop beeping and reset timer at any point by pressing and holding down the reset button for 2 seconds , you then get 2 beeps
From that thought process, a prototype device was created and put to the test by England Golf, as well as being used at other courses in competitions. The feedback confirmed that Patrick was definitely onto something.
“We needed to find out, actually, is this useful? Does it improve pace of play?,” he said. “England Golf were fantastic and they basically did a trial of a huge number of people up at Woodhall Spa who were given the PoP Timers in their big competitions.
“We did a trial at Royal Cinque Ports, we did trials at about three other different clubs, and the feedback led us to believe that we were onto something. We made some modifications to the prototype so it’s a much better finished product now, and the feedback was just overwhelmingly positive.”
“England Golf will continue to endorse PoP Timer wherever and whenever we can!”
– Jeremy Tomlinson,
Chief Executive at England Golf
