STAYING AHEAD!
Having joined the team at Dreamland Golf Club in March, one of my main responsibilities is to continue and lead the development of Golf in Baku, Azerbaijan. As a previous non golf country, golf interest has grown quickly, thanks to a fantastic team of professionals putting the necessary building blocks in place. Now in its third year of operations, the Academy team is constantly setting new goals as a means to develop the business and increase participation in the sport.  So far this year there have been a number additions and innovative ideas to further improve what is already a top class facility. 
INSPIRE
With world class facilities, players have a luxurious welcome to golf and all they could wish for. Our recent enhancements have created a great buzz around the driving range and inspired more interest from new players.
SNAG (STARTING NEW AT GOLF) Innovation
To further support the growth of junior golf development, the Academy team at Dreamland recently unveiled a SNAG target wall featuring Disney characters and football goal posts. This idea complements both the SNAG and bouncy castles offering beginner golfers a unique and fun experience in which to be introduced to the game. Our junior members have already given it big thumbs up, and we look forward to including it as part of the Academies summer camp and future stars programmes.
Networking!
Throughout the season the team has been on the road visiting various events in the city to deliver fun golfing activities to help introduce the game to the wider public. Such examples have included:
H.R.H The Queen’s Birthday Party - Invited by the British Embassy to attend the Queens annual Birthday celebrations, we offered the use of our mobile putting green guests to try a fun putting competition.  The event was a great success with many guests parking their strawberries and cream for a chance to win the prize of a golf lesson. 
“Rock The Golf” with Hard Rock Café – Baku, a Sunday afternoon was well spent as our Pro’s and national team juniors visited Hard Rock Café. Our indoor SNAG games offered further entertainment to their family brunch concept. With parents and kids trying golf for the first time we generated several new players for our summer program. 
Mid-Season Makeover
This last month the team have been busy enhancing our Academy facilities to provide even more for our members and visitors to enjoy. Examples of the new additions and benefits include the introduction of more fun and colourful targets and nets to the driving range. This has provided golfers the opportunity to make practice sessions both more creative and effective. In addition the academy outfield also has a Par 3 9 hole golf and foot golf course which is used weekly at off peak times. 
INFORM
Ensuring our pupils get the best tuition information at EVERY stage of the journey means we are always promoting new packages and ways to help players develop their skills.

Refurbished IMG performance and putting studios. State of the art technology in the form of Flightscope, V1 and the SAM Putting Lab provide Dreamland's Teaching Professionals with all the necessary data to analyse golfer's all round technique
New mini holes on the Academy Putting Green have been added to make practice putting sessions even more testing.
A sloping mat has been installed to assist our coaches in their explanations and demonstrations in this all important part of the game.
Our new teaching mats guide golfers wishing to focus on alignment and ball position.
Dreamland has a very unique splash zone for our kids to hit targets. With new sparkly floating balls players can attempt hitting across the unique stretch of water to one of our target greens.  
INCL UDE
Aware that many players stay with golf because of the friendships and camaraderie they enjoy, we focus a lot on making people feel included.  Many of our individual lesson programs, junior introductions or networking events offer some form of group interaction as players develop. Some of the simple ideas below have all help us create “Tribe” within the Dreamland Golf Club community. 
Summer Camp
Hard work from the Academy team saw the launch of our inaugural Junior Summer Camps. Under the watchful eye of Elshan Guliyev our Azerbijani coach and Emma Elisova players enjoyed the first two days at Dreamland Golf Club before travelling to the National Golf Club of Azerbaijan in Quba. 
Foot Golf
The 9 hole course on the Driving Range outfield has served as a great way to introduce people to golf who might not have normally been intrigued by the game.  A good example of this was when the Academy was able to showcase this new concept to approximately 160 people ranging between 16-23 years old from the European Youth Parliament convention in April.
INCREASE
Growing participation in the game, attracting new members to the academy and developing exposure on the world stage is the regarded as the final piece of the puzzle. So far in 2018 we have welcome more companies to our team building events. 
Welcome to Golf & Team Building Clinics
Our team of coaches continues to deliver our increasingly popular ‘Welcome to Golf’ clinics to various groups from Baku’s local business community. Sessions are both fun and informative with an all-important competitive element to recognize the groups stand out individuals. All participants leave with a ‘Welcome to Golf’ certificate and a good number of selfies.
In signing off we would like to acknowledge the efforts of Nabi and Huseyn who travelled to Zavidovo PGA National Russia to compete in their first international event. The week marked a huge milestone for the development of Golf in Azerbaijan as both players have progressed through Flames Golf and our own Future Stars training programs. Keep up the great work guys!

We hope you enjoyed a summary of our year so far, if we can be of any help please don’t hesitate to contact me Alex.day@dreamlandgolfclub.com  I look forward to sharing more news and innovation in the future as we continue to develop golf in the Land of Fire.

ALEX DAY
HEAD PROFESSIONAL DREAMLAND GOLF CLUB
PGA Advanced Professional
Dreamland Golf Club | +994 (0) 12 404 7 404 | reservations@dreamlandgolfclub.com |