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This is the first in a trilogy of posts regarding golf handicaps. This post will look at UK handicaps, followed by a post on US handicaps, with finally a comparison of the two, plus a study on the playing and handicap habits of golfers within the club of which I am a member.
Golf Handicaps in the UK are administered by a group called CONGU, and clubs administer their players handicaps based on the rules of the CONGU system.
Each course is given a Standard Scratch Score (SSS), which is normally very close to the par of the course. However for example, some par 70 golf courses are harder than others, so there may well be 2 courses, both with a par of 70, but one of them has a SSS of 68 while the other has an SSS of 72.When a competition is played, a Competition Scratch Score (CSS) is calculated, by looking at the percentage of players that score SSS + 2 or better, as a percentage of the whole field. The aim of this is to take account of easy or difficult playing conditions. However, it doesn’t take into account the field overall having a good or bad day, it presumes that any changes to overall scoring is a direct effect of the conditions.
If you shoot a net score below the CSS of the day, then your handicap will be cut a certain amount for each shot under the CSS. If your net score is equal to, or slightly above the CSS of the day (the buffer zone), your handicap doesn’t change. If your net score is above your buffer zone limit then your handicap will go up by 0.1.The amount your handicap is reduced by, and how many shots are in your buffer zone, depend on your handicap, as the table below illustrates;
The closer you get to scratch, the harder it is to get cut. From my current point of 3.2, I would have to shoot 17 consecutive rounds of level par (on the basis that the CSS remains the same as the SSS) to reach scratch.
There are several things wrong with the UK handicapping system, a few of them I’ll detail below;
- Because the CSS is calculated based on the results of all competitors in the competition, you don’t know for certain what your handicap is adjusted to until the results are published.
- There are boundaries between handicap categories, and the system can be quite uneven close to these boundaries. I know of several people who rarely get lower than 5.2, but never higher than 5.9. They can cope easily with a buffer zone of 2 above the CSS, and a reduction of 0.2 per shot below the CSS, but struggle when this buffer zone is reduced to 1 and they only get reduced by 0.1 per shot below the CSS.
- Only competition rounds are included, a lot of golfers submit only 3 or so competition cards per year. This means that their handicap doesn’t reflect their current playing ability. This doesn’t affect me so much as I’ll play in every competition going, however there are a lot of people who don’t play in many, if any competitions. This point deserves its own topic, which I’ll be writing about in the next week or so.
- The system rewards inconsistency. Imagine two 7 handicappers, playing 2 rounds where the CSS in both rounds is 71. Player A scores 75 net 68 (handicap reduced by 0.6) and 85 net 78 (increased by 0.1). Player B scores 78 net 71 (no change), and 79 net 72 (no change). Player B has scored better, and more consistently, over the two rounds, and their handicap has remained the same. Player A has scored worse than Player B but has had their handicap reduced by 0.5.
The system in the UK is definitely not ideal, however it’s unlikely to change dramatically in the near future so I suppose everyone will just have to continue with the status quo. As we’ll see shortly, other handicapping systems aren’t ideal either, and there doesn’t seem to be a global group that can come up with a solution suitable for everyone.
More information about the UK handicapping system can be found at the CONGU website.
Today I took a half day from work and went to Mizuno’s National Fitting Centre in New Malden. It’s a free service provided for people looking for a new set of clubs, which is a very good service of Mizuno, as they could easily charge £50 upwards for the service.
I went in and was invited to hit balls for 15 minutes or so with my own 6 iron to warm up, then we used various tools to analyse different measurements.
One that can be decided without hitting a ball is the length of the club. This is done by standing up straight with arms at sides, measuring the knuckle to floor distance and plotting it against a chart. I came out absolutely standard.
Attaching a device to the shaft of a 6 iron and hitting a few balls gave quite a few readings. The first was an average (and very consistent for each shot) swing speed of 82mph. I was quite surprised and pleased by how fast this was, my dad was recently measured and came out with 68mph, tour pros are in the region of 90-95mph.
Shaft flex, and transition (from backswing to downswing), were both right in the middle, indicating that my tempo is neither slow nor fast. Very pleased with this.
Release timing; very early. Basically, I break my wrists too early, which causes a loss of power. I’ve tried breaking my wrists later, but I find I can’t control the ball so well, in fact most of the time I don’t know where it’s going.
These readings gave recommended shafts, and I then hit several balls with each of the shafts. I was surprised by the difference in results that different shafts gave. Shaft 1 gave an average distance of 161.6 yards, compared with 144.5yds with Shaft 2 and 148.3yds with Shaft 3. That is quite a big difference. Shafts 2 and 3 also had much less ball speed and way more side spin. Shaft 2, which had a lighter shaft, gave a ridiculous amount of side spin which would have given me a huge slice.
Having decided on the shaft, we then checked the lie of the club at impact, and to my surprise it much pretty much in the middle of the club. Another pleasing result.
After all was said and done, we settled on standard length, standard loft, standard lie, with stiff shafts. With the results being so standard, these could have been bought off the shelf, however I feel a lot more confident knowing that the clubs I get will absolutely fit my swing and body shape.
I also decided to take their Fli-Hi 3 iron, which is not quite a 3-iron, not quite a hybrid, more like a driving iron. I only hit about 10 balls with it but it felt absolutely fantastic.
Overall, it was a very enlightening experience. It was very thorough, I learnt that I hit the ball differently from how I thought I did, and although it wasn’t a lesson, the data it provided has given me some hints on what I need to work on. One thing I was astounded by was the difference between range balls and real golf balls. I previously knew that range balls weren’t as good, but to hit 2 shots in succession, one with a range ball and then one with a real ball, the difference in ball flight was absolutely astonishing. I would recommended everyone to be custom fit for irons, if you are going to play many hundreds of rounds with these clubs, it makes sense to get ones that are right for you.
In other news, I did get the “call” (email actually) from the Craws Nest Tassie, I made it into the tournament, all I have to do now is phone them, pay the £185 entry fee, and book my practice round time.
Also, when I was at the golf club today, it looks like it’s still going to be a while longer before I’m able to start talking about actually playing golf. The photo left shows the 18th, 9th and 7th greens. I think that all this snow may make the course a lot better when it comes to summer, it’s a bit annoying for all those people who are desperate to play in January though.
5pm on a Monday in January may not jump out to many people as being a major point of the golfing year, but it was for several hundred people today, as that’s when the entry form to the Craw’s Nest Tassie went live on the Carnoustie Links website.
It was first played in 1927, and the current format involves;
2 rounds of strokeplay, 1 round on the Championship course and 1 on the Burnside course. The top 64 gross scores go on to play knockout matchplay for the Tassie on the Championship course, and the top 64 nett scores who don’t qualify for the Tassie play knockout matchplay for the Maulesbank trophy on the Burnside course. Those who don’t qualify for either can still play in consolation events during the first two days of matchplay.
Having not played in the tournament before, I was unsure how it would work when the website went live, so I made sure I had all the relevant details ready, golf club address, bank details, inside leg measurement. At 4.55pm I could see that the website was slowing down considerably with all the traffic on it; last year the 351st and last entry was submitted at 5.07pm. I know a group of people who play in this tournament every year, they arrange a conference call for the website going live so that anyone with technical issues can shout and someone else will cover the man down, you can’t afford to have a computer crash or you’ve no chance of getting in this tournament. Sure enough at 5pm exactly a refresh of the webpage, and after about 30 seconds the entry form appeared.
I was surprised at the lack of information required, all they want to know at this stage is name, address, email & phone, golf club and handicap. They will then contact all the entrants in the next 5 days to let them know whether they got in on time or not. I actually pressed submit twice (I don’t recall it but I must have as I got 2 confirmation emails), I hope there isn’t some bizarre rule disqualifying anyone who submitted multiple entries. It was an accident, honest! My first confirmation email was timed at 5.02pm, so I’ll be absolutely astounded if 351 people pressed submit before me.
The entry fee is…… well…. I don’t actually know what the entry fee is, as it doesn’t say anywhere on the website or the entry form, although I believe it is in the region of £180. I’ll find out when I get ‘the call’. A practice round is also granted on the Sunday, before the first strokeplay round on the Monday. This means that a finalist in the Tassie can play 8 rounds on Carnoustie Championship course and 1 round on Carnoustie Burnside course within a week. Bearing in mind a visitor round on the Championship course (if you are lucky enough to get a tee-time) is £130, this can represent excellent value, notwithstanding the £500 voucher that the winner receives.
The tournament is played in September, and although there are a lot of good players playing in it (15 players of scratch or better in 2008, and 12 in 2009), the mean average handicap of all entrants in the last 2 years has been 7.65 and 7.73. Goodness knows what I’ll be playing off in September, no worse than 3 I will confidently state, but even off 3 I would definitely be looking to be in the top 64 scratch scores and get at least one matchplay round over the Championship course, although as usual I’ll be trying to make it as many rounds as possible.
I did something yesterday that I never thought would happen – I bought some dumbbells.
Reading various books recently has made me realise that the best players, as well as being technically very good, are all very strong as well.
As I see it, to hit a long, straight golf ball, you need 3 main things; technique, timing, and strength. Timing is a pre-requisite, without it you will not a hit a long, straight ball. Of the other two, if they were an exam marked out of 100 I would put the available marks at 80 technique and 20 strength.
I weigh 9 ½ stone (133lb), and am as skinny as a rake. At the moment I would say that my technique is sitting at 70 out of the 80, and my strength is at about 8 of 20. On that rough measurement I can probably hit a ball at 78% of my capability. At the moment I can carry a driver 240 yards on a good day, in summer it will roll another 30 yards or so and end up about 270 yards. That is an accurate distance, based on actual shots using known distances. Most people will add 20-30 yards when asked how far they carry the ball, this blog is about being honest, 240 is my carry on a good drive, no more, no less. If I can increase my strength to 15 out of 20 then I should be able to add about 22 yards in total onto a driver, and that’s before my coach starts work on the final 10 marks of the technique aspect. Carrying the ball 262 yards instead of 240 yards will make a massive difference. Going on the basis that I get the same 30 yards of roll it gives me a total distance of 292 instead of 270. It will give me wedges into greens instead of 8 irons, and 6 irons instead of 4 irons. It’s pretty much a 2-club difference right down the scale. Hitting a shorter iron means I’ve got a better chance of getting it close to the flag, which in turn gives me a better chance of sinking birdie putts, and so on and so on. The phrase ‘drive for show, putt for dough’ is probably the most accurate golf statement ever made, so I’m not suggesting that if everyone builds up the right muscles they will hit the ball like a dream, as if they aren’t scoring well of the technique side of the golf shot exam you can get 20 out of 20 for strength and still not hit it any distance at all.
The main things I’m working on are bicep curls, tricep curls, and shoulder presses, as well as good old fashioned press-ups. I did it for the first time last night and definitely felt like I’d been lifting weights afterwards. It is over a decade since some of the muscles I exercised had felt any sort of labour coming their way.
Something I need to be aware of is that by building up muscle it doesn’t upset my technique or timing, there’s no point in being stronger if it is counter-balanced by not having the same rhythm as before. I’ll be working on that one with my coach.
One thing I did notice was that my left side is especially weak, especially the tricep. I wonder if there is any bad shot caused by having one side stronger than the other? I’m right handed and my bad shot is a hook, I’d like to think there is some sort of logic that says if your right side is more powerful then it can cause a hook, as the right shoulder and arm turn in too quickly. It’s something that sounds as if it could be true but almost certainly isn’t. If anyone knows any different please let me know.
Anyway, another 6 inches of snow fell today, so there won’t be any golf for a while, so looks like the weights will be seeing a bit more action over the next few weeks.
Went out this afternoon and hit my first golf balls of the year.
It was an inauspicious start, with my first tee shot being a good strike before taking a sharp bounce left and going in a stream. Things picked up after a few holes and I got warmed up and finished with 5 consecutive pars. Overall I was surprised with how well I hit my irons.
However, the scoring was irrelevant today, as the course was virtually unplayable.
This became apparent when I hit a beautiful 8 iron on the 3rd hole, which pitched pin high and 4 foot left of the hole. It then bounced 40 foot into the air off of the frozen green, and its 2nd bounce was 20 yards past the hole off the back of the green.
So I cut my game short, and retreated to the practice nets to hit 70 balls, at least I didn’t have to worry about where they were going to end up.
Below is a picture of a bunker on the 5th hole, it’s full of ice and is a good representation of what the course was like.
It’s made me think that for the next few months I need to get scoring out of my head, and concentrate on just hitting the ball well. The short game is virtually impossible to practice on frozen ground, so I’m going to concentrate on my irons in the practice nets until the ground thaws. Only then can I work on the chipping and putting, instead of trying to practice chips that will only come in handy in the Siberian Open.
Anyone can get a hole in one, regardless of ability. I haven’t had one yet by the way, despite hitting the flag on numerous occasions without the ball feeling the necessity to drop into the hole. One thing that I think requires a lot more skill, and I’ve always wanted to do, is complete a round of golf without dropping a shot. I’ve had about 10 rounds of level par or better in the last 18 months, but every one of them contained a bogey or worse. Annoyingly, in 2 of them the only dropped shot I had was my nemesis - the 3-putt. Even the 2 course records in my local club both contain at least one dropped shot.
I was set a challenge a couple of months ago of calculating odds of playing a round without dropping a shot, and after a few hours of calculations I came up with some figures that I believe stand up to close scrutiny.
Before I tell you these odds, there are a few things that need to be pointed out.
There are two major variables in this calculation; the course and the ability of the player.
A par 72 course made up of 18 x 300 yard par 4s is going to be fairly easy to go round in without dropping a shot. Conversely, a course like Carnoustie, with it’s 470 yard par 4s and 246 yard par 3s is going to be incredibly difficult to go round in without dropping a shot. In fact, writing that last sentence inspired me to check the 2007 Open Championship results from Carnoustie, and there were only 8 out of 452 rounds played without a dropped shot – and that was the best players in the world and Carnoustie being fairly calm. (For reference, the 8 rounds were S. Garcia (round 3), H. Mahan (round 4), S. Stricker (round 3), P. Edberg (round 3), Z. Johnson (round 3), M. Calcavecchia (round 2), V. Singh (round 3), R McIlroy (round 1)).
The ability of the player is another key aspect. It’s fairly straightforward to assume that a scratch player has a much better chance of going around without dropping a shot than a 10 handicapper has.
The course I have used for calculating these odds in my home course, as it’s the only course that I have suitable data for. It is just over 6,500 yards, has 6 par 4s over 400 yards long (including a 467 yard beast), a 201 yard par 3, and a 556 yard par 5. The par and SSS are both 71. In terms of the “average” UK course, I would say that it is slightly harder than average.
From the database that I keep which details every score for every hole since I started playing this course 3 years ago, I’ve split my rounds up by the handicap I had at the time of playing, and for each hole on the course looked at how many times I got par or better. I’m in a good starting position as I have played lots of rounds off of each handicap from 8 down to 3.
So that leaves me with a list values for each handicap (e.g. of my rounds as a 3 handicapper, hole 1 = 69% chance of par or better, hole 2 = 69% chance of par or better, hole 3 = 86% chance of par or better, and so on). Multiplying the values for all 18 holes gives me an overall percentage of getting par or better for each handicap. I’ve then rounded the figure for each handicap to take account of statistical anomalies.
Using these specific points meant that I could plot them on a graph, and find the formula for the curve that passes closest to all of these points.
The formula that best fitted these points was 146.34*(1.89229*POWER(x)), where x is the handicap. It gave an exponential graph as shown below;
Looking at the lower end of the scale in more focus, the graph is as below; 
Using this curve and transposing the formula back to handicaps, the final odds are as follows;
Handicap Odds
-4 10/1
-3 21/1
-2 40/1
-1 76/1
0 145/1
1 276/1
2 523/1
3 991/1
4 1875/1
5 3550/1
6 6718/1
7 12713/1
8 24058/1
9 45526/1
10 86149/1
I am absolutely confident that these odds are as accurate as can possibly be generated at this moment in time. I’ve done lots of research, both in work and socially, and these figures stack up as much as any numbers I’ve ever calculated in the past. There are other variables that need to be borne in mind when looking at these odds. These include, but are not limited to;
Weather conditions; most of the rounds on my database were in fairly good conditions
Tees used; my rounds are almost all from the back tees, if I played from the forward tees more often then the odds would reduce as the course would be easier
Par variance; I have gone on the basis that I am an ‘average’ player. Not in terms of ability, but in terms of how often I drop shots. For example, a player may go round in 3 over par, but that could include 17 pars and a triple bogey. Another player may also go round in 3 over par, but has had 6 birdies, 3 pars, and 9 bogeys. Player 1 has scored par or better on 17 holes, player 2 has only scored par or better on 9 holes. I believe that I am somewhere in the middle, and am therefore a representative example.
Realistic handicap; We all know that there are “good” 5 handicappers and “bad” 5 handicappers, this study is based on a realistic handicap, if your handicap is not realistic of your playing ability then these odds are not going to be accurate. This is a whole separate subject in its own right, and something I plan to write more about, including the inadequacies of the UK handicapping system, in more depth over the coming months.
So looking at the resultant odds, at the moment I have a 991/1 chance of completing 18 holes on my home course without dropping a shot. If I can get down to scratch then I reduce that to 145/1. Although not being a thing that is generally celebrated, I’d be much happier if I could frame a scorecard that contained no dropped shots than I would if I had a scorecard with a 1 on it.
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