USGA Course Rating Definitions - Need Refinement?

I think that "x.x handicap hits y distance" has a faulty assumption built in. There are scratch golfers that carry 250 with a driver and scratch golfers that carry 300 with a driver. I had mentioned it way earlier in this thread, I think that even if the average distance of scratch and bogey golfers is similar now to 30 years ago, the standard deviation is much bigger, especially on the bogey side.

I came across this: http://www.milesofgolf.com/blog/golf-clubs/vintage-vs-technology/

Some interesting stuff in there. They tested old club tech against new club tech (up to 2009) using a range of testers. Some interesting points:



Interesting that the advent of the titanium driver made such a huge impact on driving distances. And more importantly, you get *more* benefit the faster you swing (i.e. long hitters gain more distance than short hitters switching from old clubs to new ones). That goes right along with what I'm saying--if you assume that swing speeds have stayed relatively constant, the spread between a long hitter and a short hitter has gotten wider.

I agree with this. But if the USGA wanted to continue to use a base yardage idea, with the new data they would have, i'm sure there would be sort of computational program or pattern they could use to revisit the idea every 5 years and stay up with the most current data.
 
Interesting that the advent of the titanium driver made such a huge impact on driving distances. And more importantly, you get *more* benefit the faster you swing (i.e. long hitters gain more distance than short hitters switching from old clubs to new ones). That goes right along with what I'm saying--if you assume that swing speeds have stayed relatively constant, the spread between a long hitter and a short hitter has gotten wider.

I think that is an excellent point to support Canadans argument that a change is needed. A faster swinger gets much more advantage out of the max COR allowed in a driver head and as companies have learned to push that right to the edge in clubheads the gap between short hitters and long hitters is growing at a very disproportional rate. Combine that with the LONGER LONGER LONGER trend that happened for awhile in course building/setup and the short hitters are getting screwed coming and going. Back in the days of persimmon and short shafts, when the sweet spot was the size of a pencil eraser, the formula worked much better, especially when swinging out of your shoes could be so disastrous.
 
And I agree with that. However if my established handicap from 6,500 yards is a 2, and I go play a friendly game with my friends at a course that has a 7,500 yard tee, my handicap either remains a 2, or moves up to a maximum of 3 (depending on the course). I used this example yesterday. Being that I am now well outside my ability to comfortably hit greens in regulation, how is the handicap system working for me?

That would seem to be a situation where the single formula for calculation would fail. In your case being that close to scratch it would take a huge change in slope to change your factor for any given course. If your "home" course slopes say 120 you would need to go to a 142+ slope to get to a 3 and you would never get to 4.

I guess if its a friendly game I would start negotiating for strokes once the round was booked....
 
Not sure if this has been brought up somewhere in this encyclopedia's length of a topic lol Its all good :)

But what say you (or what say canadan) if they were to add the rating difference to the players HC. So if the players cap that was established form his forward tees is a 10 and those tees are rated 68 and the tourney tees are rated lets say 73 that's 5 strokes. How about him being considered a 15 for that event? Would that work and be fair to all?

I would imagine that would be much closer, however it relies on the idea that handicaps are established from a single distance to perform. Scrambling them even half and half destroys that concept.

Sorry but I'm not really following you (understanding) for what part it's destroying.
 
I again will make the argument that there are plenty of golfers whose handicap travels just fine from 6200 yards to 7000 yards. I'm in this group and so are nearly all of the single digit guys and some of the bogey golfers I know. Lets take the real life example of my friend Bob(12.2 index) who establishes his index at 6100 yards who can play to the same differential at almost any distance up to 7000 yards. He also has no problem playing to his index at a course with a high slope rating that he's never seen before. It's obvious his index is more accurate or more "real" than another 12 index player who can't play longer or strange high slope courses well. BTW, he hits it only 225 off the tee and carries 5 fairway woods/hybrids because he's hitting them almost every approach shot and par 3 on courses longer than 6500 yards. He gets up and down much better than I do from any distance inside of 50 yards with the exception of greenside bunkers. He pulls out driver on a par 3 at least once a round on my home course but hit his driver as straight as I hit a 4 iron. I witnessed him make a hole-in-one on a very tough 226 yard par 3 4 years ago with of course, his driver.

If you come up with some sort of a formula that adjusts handicaps based on distance these short hitting golfers with "real" indexes like my friend Bob, will still be at an advantage over those who can't play to their index from longer distances. It's no different that PGA Tour players that have an advantage on longer course. Some of the PGA pros don't have indexes that travel well back at 7500 yards. Golf, and especially 7000+ golf courses are not designed to be fair, they are designed to test and separate the good from the great.
 
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nothing like reviving a thread more than a year since its last post. i had a thought to start a thread, then i remembered this one and thought it was similar enough to post in here.

there are lots of members of thp with handicaps below 5.0 who post regularly, and obviously lots more of us with handicaps over 5.0. i love it when guys who are much better than i am fill in their signature with their gear. i can't help but notice how many of the lowest handicap guys around here are swinging x-stiff. so my question was going to start out with a hypothetical question. take two guys who hit the ball materially equal in accuracy, but one is materially longer throughout the bag than the other. even assuming playing the proper tees, will handicap be negatively correlated with distance? the guy who hits it farther and is more accurate is, solely from observing really low handicap golfers' bags, more likely to have a lower handicap.

tees should be the great equalizer, but i don't feel like they are. i can't think of any non-senior golfers i've met who are sub 5.0 and swing regular flex shafts. i don't know if there's anything to it, it's just an interesting observation.
 
They should use a bell curve when it comes to evaluating hazards at certain distances. You can weight trouble at 250 yards the highest but also give value to hazards at 225, 275 ect.
 
I personally think it's just more likely for a low handicap golfer to have a faster swing and need X shafts, because generally they have much better swing fundamentals and therefore don't waste as much energy as us hackers in their swings. Now admittedly this is not always true, but I'd think it's fairly common.

And no matter what kind of adjustments you make IMO, a golfer who hits it farther is going to have an advantage over one who hits it shorter, all other things being equal. And I think that's the way it should be. It's not like guys with faster serves have to stand farther away or hit to a smaller box in tennis leagues, or more powerful pitchers have to throw a heavier ball in baseball.
 
fwiw there are a ton of high cappers who can swing plenty fast.

But 2 players with equal ability in accuracy while one is longer, than the longer hitter would and should be a bit lower capped from the same tees. Simply put he will be closer on approach shots and also can hit a higher lofted club even when from the same distance. In general the shorter the club or shot, the more success so that in itself should (given both have the same accuracy ability) still translate to that longer hitter being faced with just slightly the higher success percentile of shots more often.
 
The handicap system is imperfect. However, it does a pretty good job of "equalizing" the field, so that IF USED PROPERLY, can allow golfers of all abilities to compete against each other in an equitable manner.
But, it is not perfect. And some of the assumptions are outdated, as mentioned numerous times in the original discussions.

Because I know lots of guys who have low single digit handicaps that cannot clear forced carries if they play the tips. Their handicaps are based on short yardages. And the adjustments are not sufficient for that issue.
 
fwiw there are a ton of high cappers who can swing plenty fast.

This is definitely true, but there are also a lot more high cappers who swing very slow compared to low cappers. I'd wager that the average clubhead speed for a scratch golfer is significantly higher than for a bogey golfer.
 
I think the difference would be less than you think. Ball speed difference would be much larger though.
 
I think the big determinant here is not skill when referring to distance, but genuinely accurate handicapped in total. If they have both generated their handicap from that yardage (or in the case of the longer hitter his ideal yardage) I think it's not to say that the longer player has the advantage, but rather, that the shorter hitter equally as capable despite being further away from the hole.

The original intent of this thread is to push players beyond their means, to see if their handicap or skill is diminished, because it's something I see on a regular basis at my home course. I recently had this discussion with my dad who encouraged me to play tees further back to establish a handicap this summer to quantity my realized 'skill" but I countered with the idea that my improvements in scoring on our course are well reflected by the slope/rating translations, unlike his which alter greatly between the 6,100 tees and the 6,600 tees.

That I am 100 yards further than him off each driver hole, or that my hybrid measures to or past his driver is no reflection of our compared handicaps because they've been established at that course, on specific tees.
 
nothing like reviving a thread more than a year since its last post. i had a thought to start a thread, then i remembered this one and thought it was similar enough to post in here.

there are lots of members of thp with handicaps below 5.0 who post regularly, and obviously lots more of us with handicaps over 5.0. i love it when guys who are much better than i am fill in their signature with their gear. i can't help but notice how many of the lowest handicap guys around here are swinging x-stiff. so my question was going to start out with a hypothetical question. take two guys who hit the ball materially equal in accuracy, but one is materially longer throughout the bag than the other. even assuming playing the proper tees, will handicap be negatively correlated with distance? the guy who hits it farther and is more accurate is, solely from observing really low handicap golfers' bags, more likely to have a lower handicap.

tees should be the great equalizer, but i don't feel like they are. i can't think of any non-senior golfers i've met who are sub 5.0 and swing regular flex shafts. i don't know if there's anything to it, it's just an interesting observation.

Many players who are utilizing X flex shafts do so for a reason, and it's not always speed related. I've paired my dad with X flex driver shafts before to kill spin, despite him using regular flex in his irons -- And laughably the results with X are better than R or S because of the shaft profile and reduced spin (plus his insanely mental approach to swinging). I've long gamed X in my driver and woods with the idea of killing spin, despite playing stiff in my irons only after I found a profile that supports my attack into the ball and spin rates from there. At the end of the day, while a simple fitting would often be a reflection of speed, I think it's far more complex than that.

I don't see it that much different from better players with better swings utilizing heavier wood shafts to control their launch and flighting a bit more than a lighter shaft would allow in the swing. Is the drop of 5-10 yards of carry worth the accuracy for some? I'd argue very much so if it reflects in their overall control.
 
I think the difference would be less than you think. Ball speed difference would be much larger though.

This is fair, and ultimately what determines distance so it makes sense.
 
I think the difference would be less than you think. Ball speed difference would be much larger though.
Better players will have higher "smash factors" in Trackman speak. Expected - they hit the center of the clubface (with all clubs) more often and more consistently.
 
fwiw there are a ton of high cappers who can swing plenty fast.

But 2 players with equal ability in accuracy while one is longer, than the longer hitter would and should be a bit lower capped from the same tees. Simply put he will be closer on approach shots and also can hit a higher lofted club even when from the same distance. In general the shorter the club or shot, the more success so that in itself should (given both have the same accuracy ability) still translate to that longer hitter being faced with just slightly the higher success percentile of shots more often.

in my hypothetical i'm saying they're playing the appropriate tees, so distance advantage should be relatively negated. what i'm getting at is that very low handicap golfers often play x stiff shafts. no, that's not all about speed and very much about spin and control. but a slower swinger can't maximize x enough to get around the course in a couple over par.

my point is i don't see many very low handicap golfers playing tees in the high 5k or low 6k yardage range. that's probably a function of people consistently playing the wrong tees (i'm guilty too), but you'd think someone would get it right. maybe i just find myself playing a lot of weekend warrior golf with hackers who don't take the game as seriously. i don't belong to a club, it's catch as catch can.

i think skibum has one of the better observations, that it's about effective energy transfer in skilled players vs wasted energy in the rest of us. i've played with a few top notch golfers who make the game look effortlessly easy yet hit the ball plenty far. so effective energy transfer + sweet spot contact = very good golf, then paired with x flex shafts means control.
 
Wow.. Old thread coming back to life...

I have not read the entire thread so if this is redundant... You are welcome..
I have always thought that the way HC are figured is odd.

I did a quick bit of math with some numbers.
If all things being equal.. every score used was shot on the same course.. True course hc..

Figured with the best 10 out of 20 and using the average gave a score @ 78.7 - with plus or minus StDev of 2 - so 76.7 -80.7
The same set of #'s using first standard deviation gave a score @ 82 .. with a plus or minus of 4 .. So a range of 78-86.. Stats say this is what range of scores would be shot shoot 70% of the time.

What does it mean..? No clue. I just like #'s.

If it were my choice I would use the first standard deviation. It throws out your best & your worst rounds. I feel it is more accurate to what I am going to shoot vs.what I am capable of 50% of the time.
 
Wow.. Old thread coming back to life...

I have not read the entire thread so if this is redundant... You are welcome..
I have always thought that the way HC are figured is odd.

I did a quick bit of math with some numbers.
If all things being equal.. every score used was shot on the same course.. True course hc..

Figured with the best 10 out of 20 and using the average gave a score @ 78.7 - with plus or minus StDev of 2 - so 76.7 -80.7
The same set of #'s using first standard deviation gave a score @ 82 .. with a plus or minus of 4 .. So a range of 78-86.. Stats say this is what range of scores would be shot shoot 70% of the time.

What does it mean..? No clue. I just like #'s.

If it were my choice I would use the first standard deviation. It throws out your best & your worst rounds. I feel it is more accurate to what I am going to shoot vs.what I am capable of 50% of the time.

But a HC is suppose to be your best potential. It never was designed to give you your average play but only to display your best play. There is a reason for that. Its for competition and not for self evaluation or average. It is however, how we gauge or rank ourselves against each other but only by default because its done the same way for everyone so it sort of works for that. But that's still not ones own true average evaluation. Its really only our best play and that's what needs to be evaluated when one is giving strokes to another.
 
I know it is needed but I hate the handicap system all together. Big reason I stopped bowling back in the day was the death of the scratch leagues.
 
I know it is needed but I hate the handicap system all together. Big reason I stopped bowling back in the day was the death of the scratch leagues.

I agree.. If u beat me.. U beat me.. But for the sake of parity some equalizer needs to be applied.. I just don't think the current system is it..
 
Why hate the handicap system? The goal isn't always to provide level play in large competitions. I love that I can go to my course and play against 10-20 handicaps and still give them a chance to win a beer off me... And as long as the bragging is limited to "since I beat you I'll get the next round" I think it's a great way of balancing. Otherwise no one would ever want to play a fun little money game.
 
It is great to balance things I just don't like how it leads to some interesting scores in tournaments. 15 handicaps shooting 76-75 is silly and shouldn't happen. As far as making it fair I understand that. I personally don't gamble with people I don't know. I find strokes are better negotiated between people who know each other if they are playing for decent money, no need for the handicap system in that spot.
 
Given the difference I'm seeing, a shorter hitter with say a 14 HC from the shorter tees might benefit from establishing a higher handicap from the long tees, then playing in tournaments in his age group from the shorter tees where he sees only a 1 stroke difference yet in reality may see a whopping 5 to 10 strokes net gain in a tournament round thus sandbagging the field. His rounds were all legally recorded, too. Yet we have to assume others are doing this and this may be part of the sandbagging issue.
 
It is great to balance things I just don't like how it leads to some interesting scores in tournaments. 15 handicaps shooting 76-75 is silly and shouldn't happen. As far as making it fair I understand that. I personally don't gamble with people I don't know. I find strokes are better negotiated between people who know each other if they are playing for decent money, no need for the handicap system in that spot.

15 handicaps don't shoot 3 over par. That's sandbagging and isn't really a reflection of the handicap system itself, but rather the people who utilize it.

I appreciate what you're saying, and typically speaking I opt not to play in handicapped events (unless THP is involved) because of that, but I don't think the system is broken. I stick to the people I trust and use our handicaps to have a fun competitive match with the caveat that loser buys the first round (and winner typically buys the second haha)
 
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