Britehouse, a division of Dimension Data, has created a bold, agile application that will be used to track, keep score, and record images for a World Record attempt at The Longest Hole Mongolia Adventure. 1 country, 1 golfer, 1 caddie, 82 days, 1850km, Par 14, 000 and 1 extreme charity golf adventure.
When you think of Mongolia, you don’t automatically think about golf. Better known for its vast stretches of land and sky, it’s not where you would expect avid golfer, Adam Rolston, and South African adventurer, Ron Rutland, to attempt a World Record and raise funds for Laureus Sport for Good.
But that’s precisely where the pair will be taking on The Longest Hole, turning the country into one giant golf course for 82 days and playing the entire route as a single golf hole. Not only has the European Tour, the Sunshine Tour, and the Mongolian Golfing Association officially endorsed the journey, but the European Tour has recognising their tee off zone as an official ‘golf hole’.
Britehouse, a division of Dimension Data, has been tasked with overcoming the challenge of very little real data and telemetry that usually accompanies these kinds of endeavours and instead give Adam and Ron the ability to capture this incredible experience for their supporters, giving them a more realistic feel for their relentless pace.
Britehouse brought in a creative team of interns, with no knowledge of infrastructure, who used ASP.NET MVC framework on Visual Studio 2017 and the latest in Microsoft Azure Cloud Services to build an agile, robust mobile app and website. The two digital innovations use GPS, satellite, social media, and gamification functionality to record and track every shot, including penalty shots for lost balls (estimated 400), keep score, and upload photos to social media in a data and user-friendly way.
“We’ll be playing the entire route as one single golf hole, and completely within the spirit and laws of the game, which means teeing off at the start, playing the ball as it lies all the way, and putting out at the end. And thanks to the very clever folks at Dimension Data, every shot, including penalty shots for lost balls etc (estimated at 400!) will be recorded via GPS on an especially developed app on Adam’s phone, and sent live to our website at www.thelongesthole.com – the estimated par by the way is 14,000,” says Ron.
This innovative digital offering brings the pair’s 1 850km expedition with an estimated par of 14 000 to life. Organisations and individuals are even offered the opportunity to sponsor a ball, and through the website, sponsors will be notified when their ball is played, post photos to social media of its first shot, and track its GPS position for the duration of its play. The app also includes a leaderboard competition to see which ball/sponsor has achieved the longest distance, which will be updated for sponsors to keep track of.
Both Britehouse and Dimension Data are sponsoring a ball each, and welcome people and companies to join the adventure by sponsoring a ball of their own for $100 per ball. All donations will go to Laureus Sport for Good and if you would like to learn more about Ron and Adam’s extreme charity golf adventure, track their journey, and purchase a ball, please visit the website.