How often in a year should you play to your handicap?

[Essex_Stu]

Play better than my handicap 9 times out of 10 but have been busy with the winter league for 8 sundays and swindle on every saturday since November so have been a bit slack with comps. Spoke to my pro today after he regripped my clubs and he was telling me that Im going to be cut if I dont enter a comp by April. Best I get my arse in gear. With some putting practice and short game lesson an 85 is very possible as I shot 95 on saturday with 7 3 putts and 3 duffed chips. Im not a bandit as I genuinley want to get cut more than win any comps so a supplementary may be in order this weekend to help me on my way to achieve this years target.

 

[rosecott]

Spoke to my pro today after he regripped my clubs and he was telling me that Im going to be cut if I dont enter a comp by April.

What has your Pro got to do with running handicaps?

 

[bobmac]

What has your Pro got to do with running handicaps?

Nothing I would imagine

 

[Billysboots]

Your handicap is supposed to reflect what you are capable of, not what you normally do - so it should represent your best scores. You're supposed to play to your handicap about 20% to 25% of the time. If you're matching handicap more frequently, then your handicap is too high

Probably one of the more sensible posts under this thread!

My understanding is, and always has been, that the "average" club golfer will play to handicap only four times every year in qualifiers. The difficulty obviously starts with the definition of "average", but if you accept you play 12 qualifiers a year then you can expect to play to handicap 33% of the time.

For the one or two posters who seem to disagree and suggest that you will go up 0.1 every time you fail to play to your handicap, and that if the above figures were true then everyone's handicap would be on the rise, that is precisely what the buffer is for!!

 

[Billysboots]

Play better than my handicap 9 times out of 10 but have been busy with the winter league for 8 sundays and swindle on every saturday since November so have been a bit slack with comps. Spoke to my pro today after he regripped my clubs and he was telling me that Im going to be cut if I dont enter a comp by April. Best I get my arse in gear. With some putting practice and short game lesson an 85 is very possible as I shot 95 on saturday with 7 3 putts and 3 duffed chips. Im not a bandit as I genuinley want to get cut more than win any comps so a supplementary may be in order this weekend to help me on my way to achieve this years target.

Sorry if you feel I am picking on you, but if you are capable of shooting 85 off a 28 handicap then you perhaps need to re-assess your opinion of whether or not you are taking everyone else for a bit of a ride!! If you genuinely play better than your handicap 9 times out of 10 then there is not a single golfer anywhere who would say you are anything other than a bandit!

I often hear the same excuse for not getting cut - "I never play well in comps", or "I'm too busy to play qualifiers" - if you were to play in our society and shoot 15 under your handicap you would be very, very unpopular.

 

[Region3]

Oh dear Oh dear, what a lot of opinions. I have come to the conclusion that 4o points in stableford is OK as long as your first instinct is to apologize for unbelievably good fortune on that particular round.
The whole issue is blurred by a myriad of factors not least of which is honesty and followed closely by honour.

So do you think that 40pts shouldn't be acheivable if a handicap were correct?
Apologies if I'm reading your post wrong.

Regarding the 4 times a year quote. I really don't see how anyone can say that when one person might play 10 qualifiers and another person play in 40.

Another question for the forum...
How long do you think it should take for a handicap to settle after a period of improvement, if for example a player improved his all round game by 3 shots?

 

[Essex_Stu]

Sorry if you feel I am picking on you, but if you are capable of shooting 85 off a 28 handicap then you perhaps need to re-assess your opinion of whether or not you are taking everyone else for a bit of a ride!! If you genuinely play better than your handicap 9 times out of 10 then there is not a single golfer anywhere who would say you are anything other than a bandit!

I often hear the same excuse for not getting cut - "I never play well in comps", or "I'm too busy to play qualifiers" - if you were to play in our society and shoot 15 under your handicap you would be very, very unpopular.

I play to 23 in my swindle and that is week in and week out. Cut out the 3 putts and an 85 is possible. I hate my 28 handicap and really do want to get it down. Next comp is Sunday Stableford but I have a grandparents golden wedding anniversary so will have to wait until the week after.

 

[Essex_Stu]

Nothing I would imagine

Plenty. Handicap secertary left and our pro took on the roll as he is directly employed by the club. Money saving option I would guess?

 

[Pro_V_wan_kenobi]

So do you think that 40pts shouldn't be acheivable if a handicap were correct?
Apologies if I'm reading your post wrong.

Regarding the 4 times a year quote. I really don't see how anyone can say that when one person might play 10 qualifiers and another person play in 40.

Another question for the forum...
How long do you think it should take for a handicap to settle after a period of improvement, if for example a player improved his all round game by 3 shots?

No No No ... I am sorry if I have offended anyone. 40 points is always possible, I have done it myself off 3/4 handicap, my point is it should be a score that we all chase but very rarely achieve (like Doris Harrison at school, oh boy, she was … Sorry my mind wandered for a moment). Yes what I meant was. Forty points is not a realistic consistent return, It is a moment of elation, a pinnacle of you own personal golfing excellence, the dogs b*******, the berries, they think it’s all over etc etc. If you keep doing it and are not handing in the cards in the hope of being cut, then my friend you are a BANDIT.

 

[rosecott]

Plenty. Handicap secertary left and our pro took on the roll as he is directly employed by the club. Money saving option I would guess?

To administer the handicapping system, the club must "appoint a handicap committee, comprised of a minimum of 3 persons, the majority of whom must be members".

 

[Essex_Stu]

To administer the handicapping system, the club must "appoint a handicap committee, comprised of a minimum of 3 persons, the majority of whom must be members".

There may be a committee but I know our pro deals with the cuts after comps etc. Ill see if I can big out the email from the club about it. I do enter my personal scorecards online so I dont hide my scores.

 

[rosecott]

There may be a committee but I know our pro deals with the cuts after comps etc. Ill see if I can big out the email from the club about it. I do enter my personal scorecards online so I dont hide my scores.

These personal scorecards you are posting online - why not register them in advance as Supplementaries? That way your handicap should come down.

 

[Foxholer]

To administer the handicapping system, the club must "appoint a handicap committee, comprised of a minimum of 3 persons, the majority of whom must be members".

Not actually any change from previous situation, unless Handicap Secretary was a member fulfilling the 'majority' clause.

I'd certainly encourage Supplementary Rounds to be used. Congu have dropped the limit on the number of these, so it's possible to make every round a counting one.

 

[rosecott]

Not actually any change from previous situation, unless Handicap Secretary was a member fulfilling the 'majority' clause.

My point was that the poster's statement implied that the Pro was solely deciding on handicap adjustments which is totally against CONGU rules.
He also stated "he was telling me that Im going to be cut if I dont enter a comp by April". Again what would EGU/CONGU make of that statement?

 

[Foxholer]

My point was that the poster's statement implied that the Pro was solely deciding on handicap adjustments which is totally against CONGU rules.
He also stated "he was telling me that Im going to be cut if I dont enter a comp by April". Again what would EGU/CONGU make of that statement?

As I posted, if the Pro was taking over the role of Handicap Secretary, the implicaion would also have been that the Handicap Secretary was previously the sole arbiter .

I suspect that what Stu meant that Pro dealt with the recording of scores and publication of results, including automatic handicap adjustments.

The Club should be conducting an Annual Review before March 1 to identify anomolies from previous year and that would also be the appropriate time to bring up known anomolies like Sti's, as results in Sunday League would actually qualify - whereas the 'Personal Scores' would not.

Here's a link to the Guidelines to to Clause 23 (the old Rule 19).

http://www.englishgolfunion.org/page.aspx?sitesectionid=138&sitesectiontitle=Guide+to+General+Play+%26+Annual+Review

Does seem to be time for a GPA, possibly even covered by the 'allocated at inappropriate level' one as well.

Think Pro might have been prompting to 'let the system do its job' but perhaps use of Supplementaries might be a better way - as a huge score in a comp probably wouldn't go down well with a good percentage of members. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be happy playing Sunday League matches against someone who scores better than 'cap 9 times out of 10. I'd blame whoever was in charge of handicaps, if they were aware, rather than the player though.