Different CSS for Home and Away players in Open Singles

[cloudshouter]

Our Club recently ran a Singles Open Strokeplay event.
After cards were in there were 2 CSS's shown, one for Home players and one for Away players. I never heard of that.
If it is regular conduct of an event could someone explain the thinking behind it.

For the record, Home Players CSS 68, Away players 70

Thanks.

 

[rosecott]

Our Club recently ran a Singles Open Strokeplay event.
After cards were in there were 2 CSS's shown, one for Home players and one for Away players. I never heard of that.
If it is regular conduct of an event could someone explain the thinking behind it.

For the record, Home Players CSS 68, Away players 70

Thanks.

Standard procedure. CONGU rules direct that two CSSs for Home and Away players are calculated if there 20 or more of Home and Away players.

I assume that the thinking behind it is that Away players start with a disadvantage of not being Home players and that, as a group, will not score as well as Home players. The CSSs you quote would seem to support that.

 

[jim8flog]

From Congu UHS Clause 3 Open Competitions

Home advantage is recognised as an influencing factor in most forms of sporting contest. The advantage, in the context of golf played under handicap conditions, was confirmed and quantified during an extensive investigation into the possible value of introducing Slope Rating into the CONGU®
[FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial]UHS[/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial][/FONT][/FONT]. The investigation examined the comparative scoring performance of Home players and Visitors in a wide range of Open competitions.
It was established that players competing at their home course enjoyed, on average, an advantage over visiting players of between one and two strokes.
Furthermore, an additional analysis of Open competition returns revealed that when separate
[FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial]CSS [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial][/FONT][/FONT]calculations were retrospectively carried out for ‘Home’ players as a group, and Visitors, the [FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial]CSS [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial][/FONT][/FONT]for the visiting players was frequently:
- higher than that calculated for the Home players; and
- higher than the original
[FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial]CSS [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial][/FONT][/FONT]calculated for the overall field.
Consequently by carrying out separate
[FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial]CSS [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial][/FONT][/FONT]calculations in the manner detailed in Clauses 2.1 to 2.5 above and applying the resultant [FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial]Competition Scratch Scores [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial][/FONT][/FONT]to the Home player and Visitor returns, for the purposes of handicapping, the imbalance is substantially reduced with more visiting players returning nett scores to their [FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial]Buffer Zone [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial][/FONT][/FONT]or better.
This feature of the
[FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial]UHS [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial][/FONT][/FONT]means that there is no valid reason for clubs to declare an Open competition to be [FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial]Non- Qualifying [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial][/FONT][/FONT]for fear that some players may be reluctant to enter because of a perceived concern of a handicap increase each time they compete away from their [FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial]Home Club. [/FONT][/FONT]
[FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial][/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial][/FONT][/FONT]The separate
[FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial]CSS [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Arial,Arial][FONT=Arial,Arial][/FONT][/FONT]calculations for Home players and Visitors in Open competitions is for handicap purposes only and does not impact upon the results of the competition or allocation of prizes i.e.

 

[duncan mackie]

The short version is that the numbers you quote confirm all, and any, theory.