CBS first aired a drone tracer shot on the 6th hole during Saturday's coverage.
The PGA Tour introduced moving drone tracer technology to CBS's telecast at the Travelers Championship in Connecticut this past weekend, but viewers likely won’t see the tech again until the FedExCup Playoffs in August.
For now, the tour is concentrating the new technology on its Signature or other elevated events, such as the playoffs, which begin on August 15 at the FedEx St. Jude Championship in Memphis. The drone tracer tech is not expected to appear at this week’s Rocket Mortgage Classic or other tour events before the playoffs. In addition to the playoffs on NBC, the technology is expected to feature at the Presidents Cup at Royal Montreal in September.
Tracking technology provider Bolt6 is the vendor that delivers the shot from the drone to the on-site production trucks. At TPC River Highlands, CBS had the ability to use the tracer on eight holes: the 6th, 7th, 9th, 12th, 13th, 16th, 17th, and 18th. The network chose not to use it on the first five holes due to the leaders not being there during its broadcast window.
CBS aired the first tracer as Tom Kim played the 6th hole on Saturday and utilized it several more times throughout the weekend, including during the playoff between Kim and Scottie Scheffler.
LIV Golf first introduced a drone tracer to its telecasts last October at the league’s team championship in Miami and has been utilizing it on 2-3 holes per round this year. The difference on CBS this past weekend was that its drone was moving while delivering the shot.
“Doing it while moving is quite a challenging technical hurdle to clear,” said James Japhet, the chief commercial officer for Bolt6.
Bolt6 has been working on the tour’s ShotLink platform for about 18 months, Japhet said, while the idea of adding a moving drone tracer to the broadcasts has been in development for around six months.
“There’s a ton you could do with the drone itself in terms of different ways to tell stories, what golfers are trying to do, what they have done, or what they should be doing,” Japhet said.