Handicap calculator

[Deleted member 18121]

Hi all

After the "competition drama" thread plus others I feel even less like playing in competitions, I'd rather just play with my mates on the social side.

To keep things accurate between us it would be nice to be able to track/change our handicaps maybe via an excel sheet or something, does anyone else do this? Or know of someway of doing it?

Cheers all

Adam

 

[HawkeyeMS]

Hi all

After the "competition drama" thread plus others I feel even less like playing in competitions, I'd rather just play with my mates on the social side.

To keep things accurate between us it would be nice to be able to track/change our handicaps maybe via an excel sheet or something, does anyone else do this? Or know of someway of doing it?

Cheers all

Adam

That thread is a rare occurrence in my book, I have never once encountered any issue of that kind playing in competitions. I'm not saying it doesn't go on, but don't let isolated incidents put you off.

 

[duncan mackie]

that way lies madness for players with official handicaps - the arguments about whether players should be using their official handicap or group one, what to do when someone else joins in etc etc are far worse than any drama created in competition play!

I would also add that I have seen that particular type of situation occur far more often in society days and charity events than club competitions!

 

[Deleted member 18121]

To be quite honest it wouldn't bother me if I never played in a competition again....I'm 100% happy playing socially

 

[ColchesterFC]

At the minute I use Golfshake. http://www.golfshake.com/. It's free to join and you can add mates as well. You can pay for some of the more advanced options but I've never bothered. Just input each round you play and it will track your handicap for you. I don't have an official handicap at the minute as haven't put in my 3 cards yet at my club but I thought my social handicap of 18 was wrong as I was struggling to play to it. I've got all my rounds from the last 3 years on my laptop from when I connect my GPS so I put them all into Golfshake. It calculated that my handicap should be 18.1.

 

[pbrown7582]

golf Shake will do the job for you, but as DM says its an unusual occurance in a club comp and agree the situation isfar more likely to occur on a society or charity day.

 

[GreiginFife]

The only issue I see with "unoffical" handicaps is that they very rarely represent what an official HC would be.
Quite a few times I've seen guys playing off the yellows in bounce games, using golfshake or the like showing them they are mid teens then get cards in hand (where a HC matters) and are more like upper teens in to the 20's.

If that's fine for your needs then bash on.

 

[woody69]

The only issue I see with "unoffical" handicaps is that they very rarely represent what an official HC would be.
Quite a few times I've seen guys playing off the yellows in bounce games, using golfshake or the like showing them they are mid teens then get cards in hand (where a HC matters) and are more like upper teens in to the 20's.

If that's fine for your needs then bash on.

Surely the unofficial handicap is more representative of their ability seeing as most players using such a system would be inputting every round they play instead of just the once a month medal that they occasionally miss, i.e. several months between adjustments even though they have been playing every week. More data = more accurate, no? Unless you're putting rubbish in of course... we all know what happens then.

 

[GreiginFife]

Surely the unofficial handicap is more representative of their ability seeing as most players using such a system would be inputting every round they play instead of just the once a month medal that they occasionally miss, i.e. several months between adjustments even though they have been playing every week. More data = more accurate, no? Unless you're putting rubbish in of course... we all know what happens then.

No, competition golf comes with pressures that casual play doesn't. More data does not mean more accurate. Infact more data can skew results. I'm not saying that happens in every case but it can.
Personally I take as little notice of handicaps made up of the bare minimum 3 cards as I do the unofficial ones.
The "true" handicaps are resultant of playing regular competitive golf with the pressures and nuances that it brings (as well as additional yardage and difficulty in 99.9% of cases)
If I took my last 10 bounce game scores in to consideration I would be playing off 7. Not even close to being representative of my ability when it matters.

 

[Deleted member 18121]

Thanks for help/opinion guys....I've just been mailed a spreadsheet that calculates on a stableford basis. Exactly what I was after.

cheers

Adam

 

[woody69]

No, competition golf comes with pressures that casual play doesn't. More data does not mean more accurate. Infact more data can skew results. I'm not saying that happens in every case but it can.
Personally I take as little notice of handicaps made up of the bare minimum 3 cards as I do the unofficial ones.
The "true" handicaps are resultant of playing regular competitive golf with the pressures and nuances that it brings (as well as additional yardage and difficulty in 99.9% of cases)
If I took my last 10 bounce game scores in to consideration I would be playing off 7. Not even close to being representative of my ability when it matters.

Yeah, but your ability is that you can play to be off 7. Just because you can't translate that into a comp doesn't mean it's any less accurate. Knowing you can play to 7 but have a handicap of 12 runs close to the one comp where you suddenly turn up and shoot 41 points and people call you a bandit. (not me)

I appreciate there will likely be skewed results and there isn't a practical way to implement such a system, but I personally don't buy that handicaps based on comps are more accurate than an "unofficial" one. Perhaps the whole system could just be changed so your handicap is just the number of shots over SSS you have shot ever on that course (adjusted for double bogey)

 

[rosecott]

Surely the unofficial handicap is more representative of their ability seeing as most players using such a system would be inputting every round they play instead of just the once a month medal that they occasionally miss, i.e. several months between adjustments even though they have been playing every week. More data = more accurate, no? Unless you're putting rubbish in of course... we all know what happens then.

Yeah, but your ability is that you can play to be off 7. Just because you can't translate that into a comp doesn't mean it's any less accurate. Knowing you can play to 7 but have a handicap of 12 runs close to the one comp where you suddenly turn up and shoot 41 points and people call you a bandit. (not me)

I appreciate there will likely be skewed results and there isn't a practical way to implement such a system, but I personally don't buy that handicaps based on comps are more accurate than an "unofficial" one. Perhaps the whole system could just be changed so your handicap is just the number of shots over SSS you have shot ever on that course (adjusted for double bogey)

My suspicions and reservations on unofficial handicaps is the absolute lack of any independant checking - anything the player decides to submit to Golfshake (or whatever) is accepted without question. Although players whose only handicap is via Golfshake (or whatever) will insist that they are scrupulously using it just as if it were a proper handicapping system, there are so many ways for the scores to be suspect. The nature of social rounds inevitably produce the possibilities for:

Gimmes
Loose application of the rules of golf
No application of the rules of golf
creative score counting
etc etc etc.

At least, when I play in a qualifier I know that someone else has marked and verified my score and has probably been watching me like a hawk for any of the afore-mentioned possibilities.

 

[woody69]

My suspicions and reservations on unofficial handicaps is the absolute lack of any independant checking - anything the player decides to submit to Golfshake (or whatever) is accepted without question. Although players whose only handicap is via Golfshake (or whatever) will insist that they are scrupulously using it just as if it were a proper handicapping system, there are so many ways for the scores to be suspect. The nature of social rounds inevitably produce the possibilities for:

Gimmes
Loose application of the rules of golf
No application of the rules of golf
creative score counting
etc etc etc.

At least, when I play in a qualifier I know that someone else has marked and verified my score and has probably been watching me like a hawk for any of the afore-mentioned possibilities.

Good point regarding gimmes. How often is that "easy" 2 foot putt missed? Far too often for me at least!

Not sure I agree on the others so much. I think it is very rare you get entire groups cheating or loosely applying the rules of golf. Just because it is a friendly "bounce" game with a few mates, it doesn't mean I don't apply the rules. There was a thread on here a few months ago I think about rules you let slide when playing a social game with mates and I can honestly say there isn't one, otherwise what's the point. Saying that, I appreciate that not all players have my code and you get some who might just drop a ball instead of going back to the tee (as an example).

Positives and negatives with both is all I am trying to say and I don't think someone who uses an "unofficial" handicap is likely to be significantly different to an "official" one and if they did it's not always lower or because official handicap process is far superior.

 

[Birchy]

An unofficial handicap is nothing like an official one in my view. Playing a bounce game with mates is totally different to playing in a competition.

 

[woody69]

An unofficial handicap is nothing like an official one in my view. Playing a bounce game with mates is totally different to playing in a competition.

Respectfully disagree. My "unofficial" and "official" handicaps were identical when I eventually joined a club. Of course that may not be the same for all, but we can only make these decisions based on our own experiences

 

[glynntaylor]

I brought an excellent program off eBay which uses excel. I'm a mac man so could use score saver!?!

 

[HomerJSimpson]

I can see where these unofficial handicap systems have a merit, especially for the nomad golfer who wants to get a pretty accurate account of their ability and see how they are improving or not. However I do think these are "open to interpretation" and the tendency to be lax on holing out, playing provisional or three off the tee etc still leads me to think with the best will in the world they won't ever be entirely accurate. I'd rather enter club competitions, usually randomly drawn, and know the score I enter has been verified and agreed and we've played within the confines of the rules.