Head out into the regional areas of Australia and you will find that the local PGA Professional carries with them an extra sense of connection between the game and the local community.
They are the font of knowledge, the friendly face and the facilitator of all the golf needs for long-time players and those picking up the game for the very first time.
It is that community connection and familiarity with golfers that was the major appeal as Tyler Marotti neared the end of his traineeship at Leongatha Golf Club, south-east of Melbourne.
The circumstances of 2020 made the golf club a critical outlet for physical activity and social interaction and highlighted to Marotti the various functions the golf club serves for the people of Leongatha.
“I’ve always liked being around golf clubs and around golf and as I started to go through the PGA Membership Pathway Program and worked at the golf club more consistently I liked the idea more of becoming a club professional and teaching and playing with the members,” Marotti says.
“I very much like the coaching and member engagement aspect of the job.
“Being from a country town and at a country golf club everyone is quite friendly, you can have a joke with the members and actually become quite good friends with a lot of them.
“I really enjoy that social side and then the teaching side as well, being hands on, playing in the comp with the members, giving them lessons, chatting and getting to know them.”
A baseballer growing up in Melbourne, Marotti moved to Korumburra in South Gippsland at the age of 13 and when he couldn’t find a baseball club to join was introduced to golf.
By his final year of high school he was so enamoured with the game and wanted to make it his career, and took steps towards undertaking the PGA’s Membership Pathway Program.
Unable to find a position after first passing the playing test, in 2017 Marotti was offered a traineeship under Josh Hall at Leongatha Golf Club just 20 minutes down the road.
After completing his third and final year in 2019 – and with Hall taking up the position of General Manager at Lonsdale Golf Club – Marotti went from understudy to playing the lead overnight.
“There are certainly things that I hadn’t done before that I needed to learn but for the most part I’d been doing a lot of the required aspects of the job,” Marotti says of his sudden promotion to the role as Head Professional.
“Josh had taught me and shown me how to do a lot of those aspects during my time so I felt ready to jump straight into it, especially for those everyday aspects of running the golf side of the club.”
The golf boom experienced over the past 12 months has seen Leongatha attract more than 100 new members to now sit at 750 in a town of just under 6,000 people.
Thanks to PGA Membership Pathway Program, Marotti has been armed with the knowledge and skillset to accelerate through the ranks and redefine his role as Golf Operations Manager, as he embarks on hiring more staff to help find new ways to keep the community connected to the golf club even in the deepest throes of winter.
The club has invested in building an indoor teaching facility that will enable Marotti not only to provide coaching all-year round in any weather but also offer a club fitting service that members have not had easy access to in the past.
“The members are always keen to try the new clubs when we host fitting days but we’ve never really had the ability to fit them and get the right golf clubs in their hands,” says Marotti, who is improving his own education in fitting technologies such as FlightScope and TrackMan to provide the complete service to members.
“That has been really well received straight away.
“The indoor coaching facility has only been up and running for a few weeks but now we can provide lessons and fittings no matter how bad the weather gets and there is still something happening at the golf club.”
