Stableford - A ladies game?

[19th]

Stableford, in my opinion,is more suited to ladies as it can be difficult, with the lack of strength of some, to, say, escape from heavy rough without losing a number of shots and it therefore offers them the completion of a competitive round.

But, we have male players who come into the clubhouse, stick their chest out and say I won with 40 points and I'm off 11 and I even had two 'bloobs'.
Guess what, I played in the same comp and had 39 points and I'm also off 11 BUT my gross score was 83 and the winners was 93!!!
How can someone be better with a gross 93 than I am with a gross 83??

Bloody 'bloobs'! In a medal round they would be 9's or NR's...how can you have a proper reflective score with bloody 'bloobs' on your card?

CONGO has a lot to answer for! Maximum net double bogey indeed!!


(I feel better now)

 

[USER1999]

Don't like stableford comps, so rarely enter. Prefer strokeplay. But, I am happy to have my handicap adjusted in a stroke play comp based on my stableford score.

Why would sex make any difference?

My club don't have many stablefords, mainly stroke play.

 

[MashieNiblick]

I know what you mean, Stableford is artificial but then so is handicap golf. I imagine the scratch player feels exactly the same when an 11 handicaper wins with a gross 78 and he's shot 68. Who is the better player in that scenario?

At the end of the day it's just fun and it gives more people a chance to win, keeps more people interested for longer (a bad couple of holes early on doesn't put you out of it) speeds up play (theoretically - as people should pick up) and offers a variation from medal play (e.g. you can go for putts/chips that are for a point). At our place we have a few and it's very unlikely the winner will have any blobs. Personaly I don't have a problem with it.

 

[Robobum]

Stableford is fine, it keeps everyone interested to a certain degree especially when you have a wide range of h'caps and abilities.

I wouldn't class it as "proper" golf though. Are there any other sports where you can ignore the bad parts of your game?? A football stableford where you ignore the opposition scoring??

Can I also check on exactly what a "bloob" is please??

 

[The_LHC]

Stableford, in my opinion,is more suited to ladies as it can be difficult, with the lack of strength of some, to, say, escape from heavy rough without losing a number of shots and it therefore offers them the completion of a competitive round.

But, we have male players who come into the clubhouse, stick their chest out and say I won with 40 points and I'm off 11 and I even had two 'bloobs'.
Guess what, I played in the same comp and had 39 points and I'm also off 11 BUT my gross score was 83 and the winners was 93!!!
How can someone be better with a gross 93 than I am with a gross 83??

My maths might be very bad, but by my rough calculation, someone playing off 11, to score 40 points off 16 holes, would have to have shot approximately gross 63 for those 16 holes (or roughly -1 to a par of 72). To therefore end up with 93 shots gross would require them to have averaged 15 on the two holes they didn't score on. That seems somewhat unlikely. If the two blobbed holes are par 4s then they need at most to take 7s to fail to score (6 if they don't get a shot), that would give them gross 77, even a pair of 10s would give them gross 83 (your score). This is all assuming a par of 72 of course. I can't actually envisage the kind of card that would allow an 11 handicapper to score 40 points with a gross score of 93, unless there were a number of gross eagles to counteract the blobs.

In fact you must have done a similar thing to get your 39 points, 83 gross on a par 72 should get you 36 points playing off 11, so you've picked up 3 points from somewhere without it bringing your gross score down by the same amount.

As a case in point, my round last week, par 71, I shot 79, 8 over, I'm playing off 14 and had a score of 41, +6 to my handicap and I scored 7s on the last two par 4s, so they blobbed. To get that 41 points I had to birdie FIVE holes, so you must have had 6 or 7 birdies. But if you did that, how did you score 83, given that the implication of your comment about blobs is that you didn't have any, which means double bogeys at worst. The only way I can see your score working out is if the par is 75?

Like I said my maths might be way off here though.

Either way I'd like to see both those cards. I suspect one or perhaps both of you, is mistaken in the details.

Bloody 'bloobs'! In a medal round they would be 9's or NR's...how can you have a proper reflective score with bloody 'bloobs' on your card?

FFS, it's BLOBS!

CONGO has a lot to answer for! Maximum net double bogey indeed!!

Not sure the Democratic Republic of Congo have got anything to do with it. Slaughtering gorillas perhaps, but the Stapleford scoring system, no.

(I feel better now)

I wouldn't.

Anyway, the point you're missing is that the format was specifically devised so that one (or two) bad holes don't render the round meaningless, as they do in a medal. Everybody can have a disaster, if every round was medal most people would end up walking off the course as soon as they had a bad hole. Well most of the people who are interested in winning, which is pretty much everybody, in my experience, whether they like to admit it or not.

 

[MashieNiblick]

Robobum, I've never been a tennis player but I understand you can win at tennis despite winning fewer points/games if all your bad tennis is in one set. E.g. 0-6, 6-4, 6-4.

Personally I think stroke play golf is one of the purest sports, every shot counts and no disputes about whether the ball is in hole! It's one of the reasons I think it is such a great game.

I assume a bloob, is what we call a blob at our place - no points.

 

[richart]

A bloob is a cross between a blob and a boob. Know which one i would rather see.

 

[Screwback]

Stableford

Its a chance to play golf get a handicap cut and have a nightmare hole....my word what a terrible situation to be in dont like it play it like a medal. I do that anyway.

If you get tripped up in football you get a free kick if you get in dreadful position in a stableford your not out the game you just dont get the points.

Medal Play

Its a chance to play golf get a handicap cut you cant have a night mare hole.

Its a chance to play golf and get a cut in both - whats the problem???

 

[HawkeyeMS]

Mate, unless your course has a par of more than 72 you played to or worse than your h'cap and still got a cut. That wouldn't happen in medal. Winning for me is getting a cut and s'ford allows me to get cut with a couple of bad holes - everyones a winner

 

[stevek1969]

Have to disagree with the OP here as i think its a game that keeps everyone involved,if you have a bad hole well your still in the game.During the season my club has 2 Stableford comps and the rest stroke play but during the winter its a stableford comp everyweek.

Its a way of making golf more enjoyable IMO, I mean in strokeplay whats the chances of a high handicapper winning the scratch comp pretty slim i would think it gives those guys the chance to compete.

 

[toonarmy]

Not sure the Democratic Republic of Congo have got anything to do with it. Slaughtering gorillas perhaps, but the Stapleford scoring system, no.

You see, the thing with picking someone up on a mistake (e.g. Congo instead of CONGU) is that you really need to make sure that you're bang on yourself...

...and I think the internal genocide and harbouring of the Hutu militia responsible for the Rwandan genocide are probably a bit more noteworthy than offing a few silverbacks.

 

[USER1999]

CONGO has a lot to answer for! Maximum net double bogey indeed!!

Not sure the Democratic Republic of Congo have got anything to do with it. Slaughtering gorillas perhaps, but the Stapleford scoring system, no.


[/QUOTE]

FFS It's Stableford not Stapleford?

 

[GB72]

At my club if you are looking to win a stableford comp then you really cannot afford blobs or bad holes. The winner is pretty much always in the 40 points range and so I need to put in a good round irrespective and play under my handicap to stand a chance. OK, a really, really bad hole is not going to totally kill my card in the same way as it would a medal but aside from that the sort of score that I need to put in to be challenging for a prize is pretty much the same whether in a medal or a stableford.

 

[chrisd]

Let's be honest, most golf clubs run a variety of different competitions during the year. This tends to keep happy the players who don't enter medals because they know they will have a couple of really high scoring holes and when things are not going well will put a card in in the 90's. Stableford and medal are not going to make any difference to handicapping as the system knocks any high scoring hole back to a double bogey anyway, so, its just a way of offering a different format - I know that there could be a significant difference in total gross scores with two players off the same h/cap where one completely mares a hole, but you accept that when yopu chhose to enter the competition and after all is said and done, most of the serious competitions are played in medal format at most clubs.


Chris

 

[The_LHC]

Not sure the Democratic Republic of Congo have got anything to do with it. Slaughtering gorillas perhaps, but the Stapleford scoring system, no.

You see, the thing with picking someone up on a mistake (e.g. Congo instead of CONGU) is that you really need to make sure that you're bang on yourself...

WOOT!

...and I think the internal genocide and harbouring of the Hutu militia responsible for the Rwandan genocide are probably a bit more noteworthy than offing a few silverbacks.

Well you might think that, I couldn't possibly comment. Actually that's a lie, I don't like humans, as a rule, ugly brutish things but gorillas are all fluffy and that, ahhh cute!

 

[The_LHC]

CONGO has a lot to answer for! Maximum net double bogey indeed!!

Not sure the Democratic Republic of Congo have got anything to do with it. Slaughtering gorillas perhaps, but the Stapleford scoring system, no.

FFS It's Stableford not Stapleford?

[/QUOTE]

TWO FOR ONE!!! HE'S ON FIRE!!!

I blame Barnstable...

 

[JustOne]

Stableford is OK if you compare your scores to those of a similar h/cap and see how you got on. I don't care how many points a 28 h/capper got, or whether the guy off +1 shot a 64.

More to the point I worry about how well I was hitting the ball and whwther or not I 3-putted every green. Go play and see if you score enough points to win, that's about it.

 

[Leftie]

Back to the OP.

Medal, stableford, bogie, Texas scramble, greensomes, foursomes, etc, etc. They are all different formats - if you don't like a particular format, don't play it!

Simples

 

[The_LHC]

Back to the OP.

Boring!

Medal, stableford, bogie, Texas scramble, greensomes, foursomes, etc, etc. They are all different formats - if you don't like a particular format, don't play it!

Well yes, that went through my mind more than once whilst chiseling out my original reply, although I can understand the frustration if, like most clubs I know, only a "monthly" medal is played.

 

[19th]

LHC .. your maths are probably correct BUT I am a Gemini, entitled to exaggerate, so I just made up numbers to illustrate the anomaly.

CONGU ..oops, sorry!

I do play stableford and all the other varieties of scoring but I seem to see, on this forum, that points make prizes and whilst it is a fun game where you can forget your bad holes, I do feel medal play reflects the real ability of a player.