Eric Miller has heard the line “Golf is a good walk gone bad.” He also understands first-hand that golf can be addictive and agrees there’s some truth to calling his new venture a Chuck E Cheese for golfers.
“It really is; that’s a great way to put it,” he said in a recent interview.
Formally, however, Miller describes X Golf as an “indoor golf simulator, entertainment and training facility. It’s PGA approved. It’s a new technology for indoor golf. It’s the closest thing we’ll ever get to outdoor golf,” he said.
There is a PGA professional director of golf who teaches the game. There are leagues with tournaments and classes for adults and kids.
X Golf opened near the southern end of Painters Crossing on Feb. 8. There are six stations — bays — where up to six players can drive, pitch and putt, and they choose from 653vdifferent video simulated courses. They can practice or play a full 18 holes of golf without concern for rain, snow, wind or cold, and they can play a round without needing to walk for miles if their physical condition won’t let them.
Players use clubs and a real golf ball to hit against the large video screen, but the screen deadens the ball, so it doesn’t come flying back at the players. And players don’t even have to tee up the ball since the system does that in a fashion similar to an automatic ball return at a bowling alley.
As one would expect, Miller is a golfer. The idea for X Golf came to him one day when he and a friend were having coffee. He was running his father’s five MRI centers and his friends wanted to play golf. But it was in February of the year. They played anyway at a course in Ardmore and he was wishing there was a decent way to play indoors. Indoor golf at the time couldn’t handle, driving, pitching and putting, so Miller came up with X Golf.
“It’s a game-changer,” he said, “and the PGA approved it as a training facility. It puts us over the top. You can actually work on your game indoors during the cold months.”
Play is by the hour, but the hourly rate is for the bay, not per player. Peak-time cost is $55 per hour ($40 per hour off-peak), but if there are five players at the station, that breaks down to $11 per person for that peak hour or $8 per person for off-peak. X Golf also has a liquor license for its own 19th hole.
Looking ahead, Miller plans on having golf camps for kids and even working with the Special Olympics. It’s a way to “give back and grow the game.”
Peak hours are after 4 p.m. Monday through Thursday, plus all day Friday and weekends. Off-peak is before 4 p.m. Monday through Thursday.
General hours of operation are 9 a.m. to 11 p.m. Monday through Thursday, 9 a.m. to midnight on Friday, 8 a.m. to midnight on Saturday and 8 a.m. to 11 p.m. on Sunday.
For more information, visit www.xgolfgarnetvalley.com
About Rich Schwartzman
Rich Schwartzman has been reporting on events in the greater Chadds Ford area since September 2001 when he became the founding editor of The Chadds Ford Post. In April 2009 he became managing editor of ChaddsFordLive. He is also an award-winning photographer.
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