Golf Random Irritations

[sunshine]

Sorry, I just don't understand this sort of statement. Who decides that it's more relatively difficult for a scratch player than a bogey player? And how can that possibly be the case? It all just sounds like jargon to me. To my mind, any course off yellows will almost universally be easier than that same course off the whites, for any level of golfer, so for anybody to receive more shots off yellows than off whites, a mistake must have been made in the numbers.

Yeah, well tough luck cos that's the way it is

In the UK we haven't adopted the (CR - par) formula that other countries follow. This means that you might receive more shots off the yellows relative to par. It is unecessarily complicated because the UK handicap people decided to ignore par in their spreadsheets, when of course in the real world we all refer to par.

 

[PJ87]

Same at mine, but off the whites there are two par shortish 5s that are longish par 4s of the yellows.

See now that makes sense

This is same par 72 just longer off whites

Blacks 7122 yards
Whites 6633
Yellows 6187

 

[Bazzatron]

Gone from 13.8 to 19.5....in a year.

 

[IanM]

Gone from 13.8 to 19.5....in a year.

As Harvey Pennick wrote, "You need to shoot lower scores!" (sorry!)

 

[Orikoru]

Totally baffled reading these last few posts...


Who said they are?


I haven't seen you once take into account the fact that the CR for the yellows is much lower than for the whites. A differential will be lower off the yellows due to this. I can't understand how you think you get "fewer shots" from the whites.

Usually if players get more shots on one course than another you would extrapolate from that that the course is harder. Or in this case a set of tees is harder. Why else would they give you more shots?

 

[Alan Clifford]

might mean I play off the yellows more going forward I need to do the sums because I need to work out what a score would equal as a score differential.... as I do whites to get lower score diff compared (say a 90 off each would be worth a better score off whites) that could all change with this tho .. might be worth playing yellows

gross score 90
white differential = (90 - 71.8) x 113 / 111 = 18.5
yellow differential = (90 - 69.6) x 113 / 112 = 20.58

If you reckon you score the same off both tees, playing off the whites would lower your handicap.

 

[PJ87]

gross score 90
white differential = (90 - 71.8) x 113 / 111 = 18.5
yellow differential = (90 - 69.6) x 113 / 112 = 20.58

If you reckon you score the same off both tees, playing off the whites would lower your handicap.

Thanks worth sticking white

Par 3 is only one that would help tbh rest is manageable

 

[Alan Clifford]

Something I don't understand is our back 9 slope rating of 104 (yellow tees). OK, it's shorter than the front but has the longest par 4 going uphill, a par 5 that right angles around a quarry to an upside down saucer green, and a par 4 over a quarry that is of no consequence to longer hitters as the fairway opens out and flattens out, but for us lesser mortals, we just manage to get over the quarry, hit the hill and the ball goes into the quarry at the side. To my mind, the comparison between scratch and bogey players doesn't warrant a rating less than 113 - I'd say it should be above 113 by a lot.

The course ratings do indicate the back is just about as hard as the front even though it is 188 yards shorter - 33.5 compared to 34.

 

[sjw]

Usually if players get more shots on one course than another you would extrapolate from that that the course is harder. Or in this case a set of tees is harder. Why else would they give you more shots?

But no one is "getting more shots". I can't work out where anyone is getting this from, apart from the original poster, who is wrong.

 

[cliveb]

But no one is "getting more shots". I can't work out where anyone is getting this from, apart from the original poster, who is wrong.

In my experience a very significant proportion of club golfers - in fact I'd say it's an overwhelming majority - seem to think that the slope rating is a measure of how difficult a course is. I've lost count of the number of times I've tried to explain to them that it's a measure of the relative difficulty for a bogey golfer compared to a scratch player.

Perhaps if the bogey rating of courses were published as well as the CR, the scale of this misunderstanding might be reduced?

 

[Voyager EMH]

Usually if players get more shots on one course than another you would extrapolate from that that the course is harder. Or in this case a set of tees is harder. Why else would they give you more shots?

This is the very common misconception.
Players have noticed that high Slope Ratings causes their handicaps to increase and then assume that this means the course is "harder".
But high Slope Ratings causes +handicappers to have decreasing, not increasing, handicaps. This does not mean that a course with a high Slope Rating is "easier" for them.
Slope Rating represents the relative differences on the handicap scale and thus stretch that scale out or contract it. So you will "get fewer shots" or you will "get more shots" relative to those other players from course to course.

The concept of "getting shots" against a course needs to be expunged from peoples' brains.
You do not "get shots" against a course or "get shots on a course".
You "get shots" relative to other players. That is what handicaps are for.

Against a course you return a gross score. Your nett score is not recorded for handicap purposes.
Your handicap is calculated from the best 8 of your last 20 of these gross scores.
You are "getting no shots" against the course in this process. You could consider that we all are playing off scratch in this process.

(I have very little doubt that I will be scornfully castigated once again for failing to mention that the nett double bogey limit requires consideration of handicap when returning a handicap qualifying score)

 

[Orikoru]

In my experience a very significant proportion of club golfers - in fact I'd say it's an overwhelming majority - seem to think that the slope rating is a measure of how difficult a course is. I've lost count of the number of times I've tried to explain to them that it's a measure of the relative difficulty for a bogey golfer compared to a scratch player.

Perhaps if the bogey rating of courses were published as well as the CR, the scale of this misunderstanding might be reduced?

I admit to being confused by this. In layman's terms it does seem to correlate that the harder courses have higher slope ratings so I also tend to reduce it to that in my mind. Trying to establish why a course might be more relatively difficult for a bogey golfer is quite a difficult concept - generally the harder the course the more difficult it is for those who are worse at golf!

 

[Orikoru]

But no one is "getting more shots". I can't work out where anyone is getting this from, apart from the original poster, who is wrong.

Paul J said he gets an extra shot off yellows vs whites. If he got that wrong then I must have missed it.

 

[SwingsitlikeHogan]

When we play a mixed tee competition the club applies it's own CR-Par 'balancing adjustment' to the PH of those who choose to play off the Yellow (forward) tees. As it happens I find it harder to play to my PH when playing off the Yellows, and perhaps I find this because since the Balancing Adjustment is clearly the same (-2) for all handicaps it is a greater % of a lower handicappers PH. Dunno - just do.

 

[sjw]

Paul J said he gets an extra shot off yellows vs whites. If he got that wrong then I must have missed it.

It's not so much that he got it wrong, more that it didn't make any sense, as per @Voyager EMH 's post above. I don't know what Paul meant by "getting a shot".

When you calculate your handicap for the day, or get it off the board, that is the score you need to shoot over CR, not par, to "play to your handicap" (as much as that's a thing now - obviously it's not quite that simple due to the best 8 of 20 thing)

 

[sjw]

In my experience a very significant proportion of club golfers - in fact I'd say it's an overwhelming majority - seem to think that the slope rating is a measure of how difficult a course is. I've lost count of the number of times I've tried to explain to them that it's a measure of the relative difficulty for a bogey golfer compared to a scratch player.

Perhaps if the bogey rating of courses were published as well as the CR, the scale of this misunderstanding might be reduced?

I totally understand that because I've fallen into that trap myself! Slope is really only half the picture.

 

[Orikoru]

It's not so much that he got it wrong, more that it didn't make any sense, as per @Voyager EMH 's post above. I don't know what Paul meant by "getting a shot".

When you calculate your handicap for the day, or get it off the board, that is the score you need to shoot over CR, not par, to "play to your handicap" (as much as that's a thing now - obviously it's not quite that simple due to the best 8 of 20 thing)

I presume he meant he gets say, 20 shots off the yellows but only 19 off the whites.

 

[sjw]

I presume he meant he gets say, 20 shots off the yellows but only 19 off the whites.

Versus what??

 

[Orikoru]

Versus what??

Who cares? It's just odd isn't it. It's backwards.

 

[PJ87]

Versus what??

Versus before that I got the less shots off the yellows than whites.