Sunday, 25th February 2007 at 8:16 am

Soft porn for golfers

Jaws slack, eyes wide, brows fevered… The Telkom Business Festival of Golf at the Vodacom World of Golf has been buzzing for the first two days, with equipment launched at the annual PGA Show making a debut appearance in South Africa, to the delight of golf afficionados across Gauteng. So what’s big this year at the festival?

Srixon won stand of the year, having set up a demo area the size of Belgium, complete with South West putting green. Taylor Made won equipment stand of the year, with a new range of drivers getting plenty of attention. Cobra introduced a new range of irons, Nike and Calloway both have new square drivers on the market - look odd, sound odd, go a mile - and Ping’s Raptures continue to get loads of attention.

Elsewhere, Top Flite’s new two-dimple ball is a hot seller, Radar Golf have a ball with a built-in radar chip to find it in thick rough, St. Francis Links (Jeff Clause’s new project) almost caused several deaths with people hitting balls off their stand into a rather porous net, and Hazard Golf Clothing’s range of extravagant golf trousers has been a major hit.

Great fun to trail through if you’re a golf fan, then - and if you’re reading this in Jo’burg on Sunday morning, then you’ve still got a day to get down and check out the industry’s latest additions. Spend the day hitting R3 000 drivers and fawning over sci-fi putters? Not many better ways to spend a Sunday.