Trackman Launches NEXT Golf Tour Season 3

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Trackman Launches NEXT Golf Tour Season 3

2024-11-08 00:22 Last Updated At：00:30

HØRSHOLM, Denmark--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nov 7, 2024--

In today’s golf world, where exploding purses and made-for-TV spectacles benefit players who are already superstars, the NEXT Golf Tour offers a sharp contrast: This is a place for grinders chasing their pro golf dreams, competing on the same courses anyone can play at any Trackman-powered indoor golf center.

This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20241107805869/en/

Following an exciting sophomore season last winter, Trackman has announced the return of the NEXT Golf Tour for Season 3. Round 1 tees off on December 11, with sign-ups opening on Nov. 27 at NEXTGolfTour.com.

“NEXT is a tour for the many, not the few,” said Klaus Eldrup-Jørgensen, Trackman co-founder and CEO. “The world’s best players will always have a place to compete, and compete for a lot of money. Our goal has always been to help up-and-coming players earn the money they need to keep chasing that dream. We are thrilled that players are using the NEXT platform to go on to bigger and better things.”

Virtual golf. Real money.

Last season, NEXT paid out more than $1.2 million, with 11 players earning at least $20K — led by Jordan Weber, who earned $90,319 and invitations to four tour events in Europe this past summer.

“The NEXT Golf Tour changed my life,” Weber said. “It not only revitalized my professional golf career, but also provided me the best opportunity I’ve ever had to compete at a high level. I can’t wait for Season 3 to get started.”

The purse for Rounds 1–3 starts at $100,000. With a full 1,000-player field, the purse will climb to $200,000, including a cool $30,000 for the winner.

Side games payouts total $20,000 in Rounds 1–3, including $3,000 for closest-to-pin (aggregate), $1,750 for closest-to-pin on each par-3 hole, and $2,500 for both men’s and women’s longest drive. Two $2,000 prizes will be awarded after each round to Social Media Standouts — the top videos submitted by players as voted by followers on Instagram. One $1,000 prize will be awarded to the player who hits the Shot of the Round, as selected by the NEXT Golf Tour media team.

To encourage more women to join NEXT, the top five female finishers in Rounds 1–3 will share $15,000 in bonuses, on top of any stroke play earnings.

How it works

Season 3 of the NEXT Golf Tour consists of three full-field rounds (up to 1,000 players) followed by a Season Finale featuring the top 100 qualifiers. Each round is 18 holes of stroke play on a select Trackman virtual golf course. Rounds can be played in any Trackman simulator worldwide.

Once again, men and women compete straight-up from different tee boxes, and all players with a handicap of 3.4 or better are encouraged to join.

The entry fee remains at $130 (including 25 percent Danish VAT and a small handling fee) per round. $100 of each entry fee is added to the purse, so the more players in the field, the greater the payouts. The top 30 percent of the field in Rounds 1–3 will receive a paycheck.

Popular in-round "side games" — including multiple closest-to-pin competitions and longest drive for both men and women — continue to offer significant earning potential.

Players record their rounds using the NEXT Recorder app (available for iOS and Android) and video is uploaded to the live leaderboard after each hole, allowing fans to follow every shot from every player in near-real time.

“We are very proud of what NEXT has become and where we are headed,” Eldrup-Jørgensen said. “Our technology is changing the way people look at the indoor game, and the early success of NEXT has shown that competitive indoor golf is here to stay.”

What’s new for Season 3

To create an even better experience for both players and followers, the NEXT Golf Tour made a few changes for the upcoming season:

“Even though we are already in Season 3, NEXT is just getting started,” Eldrup-Jørgensen said. “We will keep working, we will keep learning and growing, and we will maintain a very high standard for the NEXT player and fan experience.

“The journey continues — see you on the virtual fairways!”

To learn more about the NEXT Golf Tour, including the Season 3 schedule, rules and entry details, visit NEXTGolfTour.com. Questions? Please contact Bernd Larsen Linde, Trackman VP of Marketing, at bll@trackman.com.

ABOUT TRACKMAN

Every player — from beginners to professionals to legends of the game — is driven by the desire to get better. So are we. It’s at the core of everything we do. For more than 20 years, Trackman has been the leading developer of radar tracking technology for use in golf performance analysis and entertainment. From the iconic Trackman 4 to the indoor-optimized Trackman iO to our powerful Trackman Range solution, we create products that make it more efficient, more engaging and more fun for golfers to practice, play and improve. Coaches, equipment manufacturers, clubfitters, entrepreneurs and golf organizations worldwide rely on Trackman for the dynamic tools, data and support they need to succeed. Because the journey to better never ends, and it’s never made alone. TRACKMAN. FOR A BETTER GAME.

FBI says driver in New Orleans rampage acted alone, was '100%' inspired by Islamic State group

2025-01-03 02:37 Last Updated At：02:42

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — The U.S. Army veteran who drove a pickup truck into a crowd of New Year’s revelers acted alone, the FBI said Thursday, reversing its position from a day earlier that he likely worked with others in the deadly attack that officials said was inspired by the Islamic State group.

The FBI also revealed that the driver, Shamsud-Din Jabbar, a U.S. citizen from Texas, posted five videos on his Facebook account in the hours before the attack in which he proclaimed his support for the militant group and previewed the violence that he would soon unleash in the city's famed French Quarter district.

“This was an act of terrorism. It was premeditated and an evil act,” said Christopher Raia, the deputy assistant director of the FBI's counterterrorism division, calling Jabbar “100% inspired” by the Islamic State.

The attack killed 14 revelers, along with Jabbar, who was fatally shot in a firefight with police after steering his speeding truck around a barricade and plowing into the crowd.

It was the deadliest IS-inspired assault on U.S. soil in years, laying bare what federal officials have warned is a resurgent international terrorism threat. That threat is emerging as the FBI and other agencies brace for dramatic leadership upheaval after President-elect Donald Trump's administration takes office.

Seeking to assuage concerns about any broader plots, Raia stressed that there was no indication of a connection between the New Orleans attack and a Tesla Cybertruck explosion Wednesday outside Trump’s Las Vegas hotel.

The FBI continued to hunt for clues, but said that 24 hours into its investigation, it was now confident that the 42-year-old Jabbar was not aided by anyone else in the attack, which killed an 18-year-old aspiring nurse, a father of two and a former Princeton University football star.

Officials have reviewed surveillance video showing people standing near an improvised explosive device that Jabbar placed in a cooler along the city's Bourbon Street, where the attack occurred, but authorities “do not believe at this point these people are involved ... in any way,” Raia said.

Investigators were also trying to understand more about Jabbar's path to radicalization, which they say culminated with him picking up a rented truck in Houston on Dec. 30 and driving it to New Orleans the following night.

The FBI recovered a black Islamic State flag from his rented pickup and reviewed five videos posted to Facebook, including one in which he said he originally planned to harm his family and friends, but was concerned that news headlines would not focus on the “war between the believers and the disbelievers,” Raia said. He also left a last will and testament, the FBI said.

Jabbar joined the Army in 2007, serving on active duty in human resources and information technology and deploying to Afghanistan from 2009 to 2010, the service said. He transferred to the Army Reserve in 2015 and left in 2020 with the rank of staff sergeant.

Abdur-Rahim Jabbar, Jabbar's younger brother, told The Associated Press on Thursday that it “doesn’t feel real” that his brother could have done this.

“I never would have thought it’d be him,” he said. “It’s completely unlike him.”

He said that his brother had been isolated in the last few years, but that he had also been in touch with him and he didn’t see any signs of radicalization.

“It’s completely contradictory to who he was and how his family and his friends know him,” he said.

In New Orleans on Thursday, a still-reeling city inched back toward normal operations. Authorities finished processing the scene early in the morning, removing the last of the bodies, and Bourbon Street was set to reopen at some point later in the day, according to an official familiar with the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity to the AP.

The Sugar Bowl college football game between Notre Dame and Georgia, initially set for Wednesday night and postponed by a day in the interest of national security, was still on for Thursday. The city planned to host the Super Bowl next month.

“This is one of the safest places on earth," Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry said. "It doesn’t mean that nothing can't happen.”

Tucker reported from Washington, and Mustian reported from Black Mountain, North Carolina. Associated Press reporters Stephen Smith, Chevel Johnson and Brett Martel in New Orleans; Jeff Martin in Atlanta; Alanna Durkin Richer, Tara Copp and Zeke Miller in Washington; Darlene Superville in New Castle, Delaware; Colleen Long in West Palm Beach, Florida; and Michael R. Sisak in New York contributed to this report.