Juniors in Mens Comps

[didsbury_duffer]

I would be interested to hear your thoughts on this subject.

We have a rule that allows Juniors under 18 to enter the main Saturday comps. They only pay a £1 entry fee, and they can only win a special Junior prize of £20 if they are amongst the prizewinners. They cannot win any of the main prizes, or trophies or board prizes. The main reason for our rule is that Juniors can be rapidly improving golfers, whose handicap may not always be indicative of their ability.

What happens at your courses, lads and lasses?

 

[Liverbirdie]

Don't quote me on this but for some or all comps cat 1 and cat 2 are ok in the men's comps, but not cat 3 and 4.

Prizemoney may also change if a junior wins.

 

[moogie]

Juniors with a handicap of 18 or under can play in all men's comps.
Pay entry fee.
But can't enter or win sweep money, can't be seen to encourage minors to gamble.

 

[ScienceBoy]

I would be interested to hear your thoughts on this subject.

We have a rule that allows Juniors under 18 to enter the main Saturday comps. They only pay a £1 entry fee, and they can only win a special Junior prize of £20 if they are amongst the prizewinners. They cannot win any of the main prizes, or trophies or board prizes. The main reason for our rule is that Juniors can be rapidly improving golfers, whose handicap may not always be indicative of their ability.

What happens at your courses, lads and lasses?

Seems fair, IMO there should be an entry fee only option for adults too, reduced cost but can't win a prize. Sorely needed in these tight times!

 

[fundy]

Seems fair, IMO there should be an entry fee only option for adults too, reduced cost but can't win a prize. Sorely needed in these tight times!

are you serious? if you cant afford £3 to enter the comp then so be it

 

[Siren]

Im not sure we have an age limit, one of our Juniors won our main Matchplay board comp when he was 15.

 

[ScienceBoy]

are you serious? if you cant afford £3 to enter the comp then so be it

It's less about the money for one but for all over a season.

I'm all for opening things up for those who either prefer not to gamble, don't want to enter for prizes or just want to keep spending down.

If it can be offered to juniors its surely not much of a stretch, it will decrease pot size however and possibly complications around money distribution.

 

[Hobbit]

Juniors can enter all comps at my place, as can ladies. That said, the comp sheet rarely fills up past 1pm. Previous place, men only on the sheet till a few days before, then juniors could add their name.

 

[patricks148]

We have a junior who reg wins mens club comps including the club champs this year, he pays his fee and goes out and shoots the lights out most of the time. He 's reg shooting gross scores in the 60's and our CSS is 73.

Oh and he's almost +4 at the moment.

No one at the club has any issues about this as he's a really great lad, and works hard on his game, in fact i would say 100% of the members are very proud of him

 

[Deleted member 1147]

We have a rule that handicap of 19 or under for normal weekly comp's, 10 and under for board comp's. But they pay the same amount to enter as the adults.
Seems fair to me.

 

[Deleted member 16999]

Unfortunately at ours they have there own Comps as do the ladies, One won the Captains Day a few years ago and was refused first prize as they had a seperate prize for the Juniors!!
Think it's terrible but when questioned it seems to come down to them not paying the same fees as "grown ups"..........sad, very sad.
We do however have a very active Junior Section that works.

 

[swasterix]

Our club championship has just been won by a 15 year old, shooting a 67 and 70 respectively.

makes you sick haha!

 

[duncan mackie]

personally I feel that the whole concept of a 'junior' golfer is wrong in this context.

once they have the competence to obtain a full CONGU handicap they are a golfer - it's that simple.

any issues around fast improving are for the handicap committee, and ESRs have to a large extent handled this well (they do what a good handicap committee should be doing!). We also found that the active juniors submit supplemental cards during the holiday periods because the only bragging rights are how low - not how many wins.

we also run Q comps all the year so we don't see a huge junior hit to the spring events.

any discussions about prize money suggest that somethings a little out of kilter to me - golf shouldn't be about prize money at all.

 

[Deleted member 16999]

personally I feel that the whole concept of a 'junior' golfer is wrong in this context.

once they have the competence to obtain a full CONGU handicap they are a golfer - it's that simple.

any issues around fast improving are for the handicap committee, and ESRs have to a large extent handled this well (they do what a good handicap committee should be doing!). We also found that the active juniors submit supplemental cards during the holiday periods because the only bragging rights are how low - not how many wins.

we also run Q comps all the year so we don't see a huge junior hit to the spring events.

any discussions about prize money suggest that somethings a little out of kilter to me - golf shouldn't be about prize money at all.

Fully agree, Golf should be about ability not age or gender, the issue or jealousy imo comes from the fact the Juniors pay a fraction of a full membership and therefore some believe they should not have the same rights, I always tend to counteract this argument by mentioning reduced Senior fees.

 

[duncan mackie]

Fully agree, Golf should be about ability not age or gender, the issue or jealousy imo comes from the fact the Juniors pay a fraction of a full membership and therefore some believe they should not have the same rights, I always tend to counteract this argument by mentioning reduced Senior fees.

we don't have reduced senior fees - just about everyone else gets a reduction up to the age of 35, but definitely not the seniors (or ladies)

 

[3puttmaster]

I've seen both the good and the bad on this particular subject.

My present club allows juniors to enter all club competitions, in fact it encourages it which is great in my book. I was encouraged to play in the competitions and represent the club in matches when I was a junior golfer and loved it so it is a massive positive as far as I'm concerned.

However, my previous club was the total opposite. It was the most divisive subject which always cropped up time and time again. I cringe when I think back to some of the absurd arguments that ensued after competitions when juniors won or did well. Grown men (and some women) giving juniors stick was common place. It came to a crescendo at an AGM where a vote was taken on banning juniors from entering main club competitions.........it succeeded! Absurd and totally short-sighted in my view and I'm glad to be away from it at a far more forward thinking and encouraging club.

 

[jamielaing]

I was one of the active juniors at my club- competing in the junior championship and playing for the junior team. We were actively encouraged to enter gents comps once we were in the team as this gave us more competition experience. I think this later changed to if you were a cat 2 golfer. For me, this gives juniors an incentive to get their handicap down and compete for the team places. Juniors also had weekly medals during the summer holidays. Juniors were unable to compete in the club championships as there is a junior championship for them. We had team matches against the gents team and really this gave the juniors a feeling that they belong within the club.

Now a lot of that has fallen away and the junior section is very poor. We have an A and B junior championship where the 2 players in each section get automatic qualification to the final. Our junior team has 2 players under 10 handicaps and 2 under 24. The others have the introductory handicaps our club gives juniors which are over 28.

The same members that moan about juniors being allowed to play in competitions are the ones that moan that the junior team gets beaten all the time and that the section is embarrassing. It is time to embrace the juniors, involve them in fun events such as texas scrambles and stop trying to restrict their access.

Additionally, there are clubs that try to stop the juniors being involved in club competitions. But when they have a good junior playing off of 1 or 2 they are desperate to have them in their gents team. Stinks of hypocrisy!

 

[Lord Tyrion]

My previous club didn't allow juniors to play in comps until they were over 15. Even then it was begrudged. Any decent junior in the area therefore went elsewhere. Ironically they had a very good section until 13-14 at which point the good juniors with adult h/c were blocked and so left. I tried pointing this out to the club but they would not have it. They didn't want juniors scooping up trophies. Arrgghhhhhhh. I left, took my son and joined a club where juniors are welcomed.

As long as you have an adult CONGU handicap, and that is necessary, you should be able to play in any comp. If you don't allow that then don't moan when your club only has old men playing there and worry about where your new members are going to come from when the old blokes are dying off.

 

[Doon frae Troon]

My previous club didn't allow juniors to play in comps until they were over 15. Even then it was begrudged. Any decent junior in the area therefore went elsewhere. Ironically they had a very good section until 13-14 at which point the good juniors with adult h/c were blocked and so left. I tried pointing this out to the club but they would not have it. They didn't want juniors scooping up trophies. Arrgghhhhhhh. I left, took my son and joined a club where juniors are welcomed. ............

Disgraceful, short sighted, selfish actions by that club.
They should hang their heads in shame.

If you are old enough you are good enough.
At my old club David Howell was one of four very good youngsters aged between 14 and 16, all playing between 2 to 4 handicap.
Imagine NOT letting them play in the Club Championship.

 

[ScienceBoy]

Disgraceful, short sighted, selfish actions by that club.
They should hang their heads in shame..

I am pretty much for anything that promotes inclusivity, I see looking back at my first post I did not strip out a bit I did not wholly agree with, at the time I hardly noticed but this thread as brought up some great points.

For inclusivity the reduced fees are a good thing but juniors should not be excluded from the trophies themselves. No reason not to keep the gambling to the adults though, I certainly would opt out of that if I could!

The 28/18 handicap debate did take a moment in my head to mull over, but it came down to the fact that anyone with a 28 handicap can rapidly improve, regardless of age! Once you have an adult handicap you should be eligible as an adult would be.