You Snooze, You Lose

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.