By Elton Hayes
When Eric Handley and his wife, Meg, arrived in Centre County in 2005, the Asheville, North Carolina, natives assumed their time as residents wouldn’t span more than five years. Now, two decades later, State College has become their home.
Eric Handley serves as director of Penn State’s Suzy and Jim Broadhurst Golf Teaching and Research Center. The former North Carolina State soccer player became the founding director of the GTRC in 2009, four years after he arrived at Penn State as assistant director of the professional golf management program and internship coordinator.
The GTRC and the PGA Professional Golf Management option are attached to the university’s recreation, park, and tourism management program within the College of Health and Human Development. Handley estimates approximately 130 students are enrolled in the golf management option this semester.
“The students in our program are earning their Penn State degree while also becoming PGA professionals,” Handley says. “Our program is accredited by the PGA of America — one of 16 PGA Golf Management programs accredited by the PGA of America in the country.”
Located in the basement of Keller Building, the GTRC is equipped with cutting-edge technology and state-of-the-art equipment that is helping influence the next generation of golf’s leading professionals. At its core, Handley refers to the center as a golf-specific biomechanics laboratory. Staff from Penn State’s kinesiology department work with Handley and others in the GTRC for research.
Three 20-by-18-foot golf bays occupy real estate in the center. Handley says the program plans to expand in the next year or so.
“With our students on campus in the fall and spring semesters, we all know that the weather is not great some of that time,” Handley says. “So the need for an indoor space is pretty crucial for them to continue to work on their game and to be able to pass this national test.”
One of the bays functions as a research hub and features a full three-dimensional motion-capture system that is synced to force plates installed on the ground. With that technology, Handley and staff track the movement of the golf ball and club, along with where the ball would have traveled on a golf course, via a simulator. The full-body motion capture component tracks the movement of golfers, and the force plates on the ground account for the way golfers interact with the ground.
“We try to quantify everything that’s going on in the golf swing to help us ask questions, conduct research projects that look at golfer performance, both for that player’s performance, and also to conduct studies to help inform the teaching and coaching that’s provided in the industry and the teaching and coaching we provide in our program,” Handley says.
The two other bays at the center include one dedicated to teaching and one where club-fitting is performed. The teaching bay features two-dimensional analysis synced with force plates, while the club-fitting bay also doubles as a practice bay.
The ultimate goal of the center is to prepare the program’s students for their careers in professional golf, but others also utilize it on campus. According to Handley, members of Penn State’s women’s and men’s golf teams have visited the center for one-off sessions depending on individual needs.
Handley says the majority of the program’s students are from Pennsylvania and neighboring states — New Jersey, Massachusetts, and others in the northeast corridor. Each student is adept at the sport before they set foot on campus. An entrance requirement for the golf management option within the recreation, park, and tourism management major is to carry an established golf handicap of 12 or lower.
Before graduation from the program, students must complete five internships, allowing them to couple their educational experience with real-world professional exposure. Upon departure from Penn State, newly graduated alumni are armed with a degree, PGA membership, and years of real-world professional experience.
Over the past two decades, the Handleys have made State College fully their home. Meg is a faculty member at the Penn State College of Engineering. While the opportunity to work around some of the country’s most cutting-edge golf technology and instruction is wholly fulfilling to Eric, seeing his students excel in their various golf careers makes the past 20 years more than worth it.
“The most rewarding part is seeing our students grow when they’re here with us, and watching where their careers go,” Handley says. “We have a really tight-knit alumni group. Every year, we get invited to a couple of weddings as faculty members — I think that’s pretty unique.
“Our alumni are invested in the program and want to see it do well. They’re really proud of it. Their success is what we all really enjoy seeing the most. That’s the ultimate outcome. Show us how our alumni are doing, and that tells us how our program is doing.” T&G
Elton Hayes is a freelance writer in State College.
