Vandals' £10k damage to course

Last week bikes made a one-metre wide trench on the course.

- SHAURYA SHAURYA Reporter

FIELDS used by a footgolf course have been left with damage upwards of £2,000 after electric bike riders “wreaked havoc” on it last week.

The Swansea Footgolf course in Blackpill was the first 18-hole foot-golf-only course in Wales, but now its owners have said that it is being repeatedly damaged by electric bike and quad bike riders.

They say around £10,000 of damage has been caused to the fields in total by the vandalism.

Rhydian Thomas, 57, and Roger Maliphant, 64 who jointly run the course say they are a family-run business and cannot afford to do repairs this frequently.

Mr Thomas said: “This course was an old 10-hole golf course. So obviously, when we converted this in 2016 to a Footgolf we had to create another eight greens to make 18.

“There were 10 original golf greens so the five they damaged were primarily the original golf greens so the better ones which are frustrating, very frustrating. So that happened a lot in January and February, we've got some footage of that.”

However, the incidents have increased in the past few months.

Mr Thomas added: “More recently there’s the electric bikers, I think they're called Sur-Ron bikes, and there’s been a gang of four of those who've been coming on the course.