Playing to or below your handicap

[Ethan]

The WHS index is the average of your best 8 or 20 scores, so likely to be between the 4th or 5th best, therefore around the 78th percentile. So you would expect around 3 or 4 times as many scores to be worse as better, and the number that are spot on is probably higher for lower handicap players who are likely to have a more consistent score range.

The main reason it is 8/20 is because winning scores are strongly influenced by variability. A 30 handicapper will occasionally shoot 10 below their handicap, whereas a 2 handicap will never do that so the pivot point for the system is set closer to the better end of the score range to reduce the impact of variability on winning scores. The old 3/4 or 7/8 of handicap had the same intent.

As to the number you expect, that depends on your optimism. I wouldn't go out if I didn't expect to play a decent round. That doesn't mean I usually actually do, though.

 

[Backsticks]

The old system was one where you were only supposed to play to it every 7 rounds or so wasn't it? It was almost aspirational. The new is supposed to be far closer to your average ability so the aim is to play to it far more often, isn't it?

I am not sure, but I didnt think that was the case. At least if your handicap is stablised, ie. not someone taking up the game with relish and handicap struggling to keep up with your rapid improvement progress, or someone who had a stable handicap and has lost interest or become part time.
I thought overall, the scoring pattern should be similar. The key difference being that the current one adapts more quickly to the above more dramatic movements in your general form. The old one could take years to catch up with a rising handicap. And could lag badly with a rapidly improving golfer if the commitee wasnt tuned in and taking additional action.
I think still odds of 7-10 rounds to equal or better (36 points lets call it). Experience in our club now we are well into the a second full season is that scoring looks more or less like it used to under UHS. Similar winning and placing scores, and similar range of handicaps doings so. Not at all experiencing the huge score some are posting about here, and that being more higher hc ceiling related than WHS. But we are not seeing them. On the other hand, while we would have some players (elderly really) in the 28-34 range they are few. Most people's handicap are still as we used to know them.

 

[cliveb]

There's been a lot of discussion about what "playing to your handicap" means. Isn't there a very simple official definition? Surely it's when your score differential is no higher than your handicap index.

For me, 5 of my last 20 rounds are in that category, so I guess that means I should expect to do it once every 4 rounds.

 

[garyinderry]

Most of my friends including myself are starting to go up now.
Many have hot runs in the past now approaching the 20th round and are not being replaced like for like.
I'd say by the end of the season we may end roughly where we started but for the time being I see increases across the board.

 

[Backsticks]

If I remember correctly, when WHS started up, an awful lot of higher handicappers saw their index go up from where their previous handicap was..
A 20 became a 22 which gave them 25 shots - numbers plucked out of the air but not unusual.
So instead of getting 20 shots they now have 25..
Also, a lot of lower handicappers got an index lower than their previous handicap so didn't get any extra shots..
A good day off 20 could produce 41/42 points - with 5 more shots that good day becomes nearer 50.
And a lower handicapper can't compete with that.

We just arent seeing that. I would say the <5 men maybe lost a shot as it seems to have happened to all of them, and not just normal variation. The 10-20 men I think little or no change. Off 12, I didnt change AT ALL for example, and have about 30 WHS cards in at this stage since beginning of last season. 20+ men maybe gained a shot, but no more. They are not hoovering up the prizes. I wonder is this more paranoia than really backed up by facts ?

 

[Lord Tyrion]

Yet for most lower handicappers, we came down with the introduction of the new system.

Have they stayed down?

 

[Imurg]

We just arent seeing that. I would say the <5 men maybe lost a shot as it seems to have happened to all of them, and not just normal variation. The 10-20 men I think little or no change. Off 12, I didnt change AT ALL for example, and have about 30 WHS cards in at this stage since beginning of last season. 20+ men maybe gained a shot, but no more. They are not hoovering up the prizes. I wonder is this more paranoia than really backed up by facts ?

Could be something to do with a Slope of 138 from the Whites.

 

[IanM]

Some folk put in more cards in one week, than others do in a year. (For countless valid reasons) So the behaviour of their scores to handicap will be very different.

In essence, if you enter enough cards, you should play to handicap more often now...

But remember. The whs handicap measures form, where pre whs it didn't. You also came down quicker than you you'd go up. Whs moves on the average of your sample. Previously shoot 5 over or 55 over, you still only went up 0.1

 

[Backsticks]

Could be something to do with a Slope of 138 from the Whites.

Slope should be the equaliser if anything. High slopes might have low men feel bad that someone off 25 is getting and extra 2 shots or whatever. But then, the stats say thats what he needs to compete fairly with the man off scratch.

 

[Deleted member 1147]

Have they stayed down?

I imagine they vary.
But for it to go from aspirational to average, and therefore expected to be played too more often, it would not seem to make sense when the handicap went down.

 

[Backsticks]

I imagine they vary.
But for it to go from aspirational to average, and therefore expected to be played too more often, it would not seem to make sense when the handicap went down.

Its still 'aspirational' as its a biased average, not a true average of the 20 rounds. (furthermore, the net two over still applies, so even some of the 12 are probably worse than the recorded differential).

 

[Imurg]

Slope should be the equaliser if anything. High slopes might have low men feel bad that someone off 25 is getting and extra 2 shots or whatever. But then, the stats say thats what he needs to compete fairly with the man off scratch.

Until the 25 has his day in the sun, shoots 11 over and ends up with 50 points..
A 5 index gets 6 shots and has to shoot 8 under gross to match it...
Much easier for a 25er to shoot 11 over than a 5er to shoot 8 under....

 

[rulefan]

Could be something to do with a Slope of 138 from the Whites.

Very likely. That suggests that it is (relatively) a particularly difficult course for high handicappers.

 

[Lord Tyrion]

I imagine they vary.
But for it to go from aspirational to average, and therefore expected to be played too more often, it would not seem to make sense when the handicap went down.

Perhaps my expectation of the percentages are wrong then ?‍

 

[Backsticks]

Until the 25 has his day in the sun, shoots 11 over and ends up with 50 points..
A 5 index gets 6 shots and has to shoot 8 under gross to match it...
Much easier for a 25er to shoot 11 over than a 5er to shoot 8 under....

In theory that can happen. But it always could.
And we dont see it. There have been a few 43,44,45. But they happened in the past too. And generally not day in the sun - more a teen with talent taking up the game and improving super rapidly.
UHS had nothing special to prevent that hypothetical situation.
Just people seem more concerned about it now than in the past. With no good reason that I can see.

 

[Imurg]

In theory that can happen. But it always could.
And we dont see it. There have been a few 43,44,45. But they happened in the past too. And generally not day in the sun - more a teen with talent taking up the game and improving super rapidly.
UHS had nothing special to prevent that hypothetical situation.
Just people seem more concerned about it now than in the past. With no good reason that I can see.

Of course they happened in the past...it's just the high handicapper has 5 more shots to play with.
Like many on here, you're falling into the trap of " because it doesn't happen in my experience, it doesn't happen at all".
It does.

 

[Backsticks]

Of course they happened in the past...it's just the high handicapper has 5 more shots to play with.
Like many on here, you're falling into the trap of " because it doesn't happen in my experience, it doesn't happen at all".
It does.

That is doesnt have to, means the system does work. What is amiss where, if, it does happen ? An incorrect slope ? A hc committee asleep at the wheel ? I dont think the problem is inherent in WHS, which I think a better and more responsive system than UCS. Which did bias towards the sclerotic of best scores, rather than fairness.

 

[clubchamp98]

There are a lot of high cappers out there now. If there are 50 in your club there is a good chance that one of them will have 'a very good day' during the week.

It’s not really the high cappers that are the main problem imo, score wise anyway.
It’s the middle cappers that now have four or more shots than they had pre WHS.
I have actually heard players say” I will have to go up a bit to give me a chance”
It used to be about getting down.
The game has changed imho ,not for the better.

 

[clubchamp98]

We just arent seeing that. I would say the <5 men maybe lost a shot as it seems to have happened to all of them, and not just normal variation. The 10-20 men I think little or no change. Off 12, I didnt change AT ALL for example, and have about 30 WHS cards in at this stage since beginning of last season. 20+ men maybe gained a shot, but no more. They are not hoovering up the prizes. I wonder is this more paranoia than really backed up by facts ?

Just like you are saying it dosnt happen at your club.
Others are telling you it does at theirs but you put it down to Paranoia!
Since WHS we have had seven sub 60 scores before WHS none in 127 yrs.
The course has a lot to do with it imo.
Horses for courses and ours is not punishing enough if you miss the fairway.
Mainly to do with pace of play they just reduce the rough to non existent.

 

[KenL]

Not that often.
My handicap index is currently 4.4.
Of my 20 last score for handicap, only 3 differentials are less than 4.4.
One 0.6 in there that was my best round of 2021.