ZealousGolfer.com

I am not afraid to admit that I, at times, am careless with my clubs. As a strong opponent of slow play, I frequently will take half my bag to the green (hardly an exaggeration) in order to avoid having to walk back to my bag or cart a dozen times to finish the hole. Naturally, such a strategy opens itself up to lost clubs, and can even defeat the purpose by forcing a golfer to spend 15 minutes retracing his steps looking for a sand wedge.

Thus, when Club Count Technologies was interested in a ZealousGolfer.com Review, I was pretty excited. Some background information about the company may be helpful.

Club Count is under the Cleveland Golf umbrella, but focuses on providing bags that not only provide a way to carry your sticks, but protect clubs from being lost. Naturally, their promise (found on the Club Count website_ that you will "Never Lose a Club Again" seems pretty intriguing.

Technology:

The golf bag, it seems, has a history of innovation that doesn't stack up against its peers in the golf equipment industry like the driver or irons. However, Club Count is looking to change that by taking an age-old problem and using modern technology to overcome it.

On the surface, the Club Count bag looks like any other. A sleek, black design with a nice staff bag look. It also sports a single strap with large pockets on both sides of bag. From a bird's eye view, one notices that the bag is divided into 14 slots for clubs, which actually uses a design to keep woods and irons somewhat separated. Nothing too out of the ordinary.

However, along the top of the bag, the left and right sides are flanked by small red oval-shaped lights reminiscent of Knight Rider (pictured left). These lights function as one of the safety devices that will alert a player if a club is missing, but look stylish nonetheless.

More importantly, the bag is capable of counting the number of clubs after finishing a hole through the use of electronic sensors which are found inside of the bag. Fortunately, the sensors are none of the golfer's concern, quietly protecting your sticks while you play.

Though there are 14 slots for clubs, you may be wondering if you are out of luck if you play with less than 14 during most of your rounds. Fortunately, the people at Club Count have a solution. At the start of your round, you simply open up a small half-circle shaped pocket on the front of the bag and pull out a black box with an on/off switch. After clicking "on", the box alerts the sensors and counts the number of clubs you are starting with and then demonstrates that it is finished through a flashing light on the box.

After that, you simply put the bag on the cart and head out to play. In the event that you have left a club behind, the Club Count will sense that a club is missing and send off a light, yet audible, beeping noise and then begin to flash. In regard to the noise, you don't have to worry about everyone with a mile of the green hearing you - at best, the members of your playing group will be able to make out the noise.

Just in case you missed the noise after jumping into your cart and driving off to the tee, the lights continue to flash until the club is replaced. Thus, you can save time by simply heading back to the green when you reach the tee box instead of driving back to the sand trap on number five when you leave an approach shot short in a bunker on 16.

Another notable fact about the bag's technology is that it counts club by sensing them, so does not require you to change your clubs in any way (i.e. placing stickers on them or something of that nature).

After you are finished with the round, you can simply reach back into the small pocket on the front and click the on/off button. No problem.

My Test:

Overall, I thought this bag fixed a simple problem with a simple solution. As I said before, this bag helps any golfer who is prone to leaving clubs behind by providing an easy way to identify a bag with too few clubs and then zip back to the hole to fix the problem.

Most importantly, I felt that the Club Count system of both a visual and auditory alert was a smart choice, which basically guarantees you will notice that you are missing a club when you get to the tee and reach for your driver.

The only problem I had with the bag was its weight. I suppose with a bag that requires electronic equipment to get the job done, some added weight would be necessary. Moreover, most staff bags comprised of thick material do not fit in the category as light. However, this is only an issue if you are a frequent walker like myself since the bag is definitely not so cumbersome or bulky that it would make riding in a cart or pulling it along difficult.

The lights are also found on both sides, which means that you can see them no matter which side of the cart you sit on.

Additionally, I felt that, in terms of the basic golf bag amenities (i.e. pockets), the bag was still solid. The dual large pockets on the sides of the bag give a player enough space to fit all of the necessities like an umbrella and jacket. Moreover, the large pocket for golf balls was certainly more than sufficient to carry enough to finish the round with.

Conclusion:

On the ZealousGolfer.com Review "Five Star" Scale, the Club Count bag deserves a 4.5 stars out of 5. The highlights are pretty clear - the bag did an excellent job with providing an easy solution to the problem of lost clubs. Moreover, the product was simple enough that any player could put it into action, regardless of his or her ability to use technology. The only drawback I found was the weight of the bag, which certainly makes walking with it difficult. However, players who use a cart or pullcart will surely be able to use the bag with ease.

Readers who are interested can find the bag on the Club Count website, which also includes more photos and videos of the product in use. Also worth noting, it appears that golfers can have the bag shipped for free at this time.

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