SAN FRANCISCO — One of the latest sports watches from the Finnish company Suunto aims to remove a few variables from your golf game, or at least limit variables to things you can control.
While many golf electronics can keep score and estimate the distance to the pin, the Suunto G6 ($399) goes a step further by measuring the speed, tempo and rhythm of your swing.
This is vital information when you’re trying to hit the ball in the general direction of the hole, ostensibly the goal of golf. Now that I’ve tried out the G6, I have all the data I need to explain why I rarely break 90.
The silver-faced, black leather-strapped watch is easy on the eyes, though I felt it was bulky. I don’t normally wear a watch at all when I play, so it felt weird at first. It wasn’t so bad after a few early holes out on the course, however.
I choose traditional stroke play scoring over the match play and Stableford options, but it was nice to know the others were available.
Before heading to the course, I went online and downloaded its scorecard yardage and pars and then transferred that information into the watch using the Golf Manager software it comes with. That was a 15-minute task from beginning to end.
I began my golf day with a bogey on a 554-yard par 5, not a bad start for someone of my humble talents. I recorded that score into my watch and trudged on. A double-bogey on No. 2, another double on No. 3 and so on. I faithfully recorded each hole’s performance by pressing shiny silver buttons along the side of the watch. I recorded greens in regulation (4), putts per hole (averaged 2.06), everything except the total candy bar count.
When I got home I connected the watch to my laptop with the provided USB cable. The end that clips to the watch had three metal contacts to draw my data from it into the PC, a task that only took a few seconds. Then, in the “contents” pane of the Golf Manager application, my round of golf — all 95 strokes, including one lonely birdie — popped up.
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