By: Rob Harris

For those of you who don’t yet appreciate the Zen of shouldering your bag and hoofing it around the course, I offer different encouragement to the same result–an article authored by Attorney Robert D. Lang, of the New York firm D’Amato & Lynch, LLP, entitled A Good Ride Spoiled: Legal Liability and Golf Carts, recently published in the Marquette Sports Law Review.

Attorney Lang cites a study published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine which found that “an estimated 147,696 injuries involving individuals as young as 2 months old to 96 years old were treated in emergency rooms in the United States for golf cart-related injuries” from 1990-2006.

Attorney Lang shares details of a sufficient number of these accidents to motivate the most hardened of riders to purchase a lightweight bag, put on a comfortable pair of shoes and stride from the parking lot to the first tee and beyond.

My personal favorite–for no meaningful reason other than it occurred at my home course–is the sad story of a women whose cart struck a tree at the Yale golf course when the brakes allegedly malfunctioned.  Massey v. Brueden Corp., No. CV030479151S, 2005 WL 2082987, at *1 (Conn. Super. Ct. Aug. 9, 2005).

Easy case, right? Wrong. The plaintiff’s suit against the golf cart manufacturer, who she claimed had failed to appropriately maintain the cart, was dismissed when she was unable to identify the allegedly malfunctioning vehicle.  Damn lineups.

As Attorney Lang  notes, “there is danger and risk of serious personal injuries, as accidents involving golf carts are frequent … It is only a short step from the golf course to the courts when this type of litigation is concerned. The array of potential defendants includes the driver of vehicles, the manufacturers of the golf carts, those responsible for maintaining the golf carts, and the owners of the golf courses.”

So, don’t get hurt. Stay out of court. Don’t embarrass yourself trying to pick the offending cart out of a lineup. Take a walk, even for a few holes.