[Matthew Hunt]

I’ve had a Idea (that has probably to been invented) to impartially asses the hardness of Hole for the scratch Golfer. I’ve tried it out and it work very well for Pars 4 + 5 but not so much Par 3's.

First you take the length of hole in yards and divide by 200 and add 2 shots and you have the "Raw Score"

Then you add or take away parts of shots for the following Criteria:

Category 1: (+0.2: Really Hard, +0.1:Quite hard, 0: Average, -0.1: Quite easy, - 0.2 Very easy)

Fairway width (Wide is Easy, Narrow is Hard)
Prevailing Head/Tail Winds (Tail is easy, Head is Hard)
Cross Winds (None is easy, Strong is hard)
Up/Down Hill (Down is easy, Up is Hard)
Hazards (None or Easy is easy, Lots and Severe is Hard)
Green Complex (Flat is easy, Unduling is Hard)


Category 2: (+0.1: hard, 0: Average, -0.1: easy)

Rough (Light is easy, Severe is Hard)
Dogleg (None is easy, A large one is Hard)
Force Carries (None is easy, A large one is Hard)
Imitating (Not at all is easy, Really is Hard)
Side hill lies (Light is easy, Severe is Hard)

I can sense the impending barrage of critics, but this is to let us on GCA.com to compare how hard a hole is, like the Doak scale lets us compare courses.

Examples of well known holes will follow later:

Note: I have decided to be really modest and name it after myself Any better names will be used!

[Matthew Hunt]

RCD #9

486= 4.4 shots

Category 1:

Fairway width -0.1
Prevailing Head/Tail Winds +0.2
Cross Winds 0
Up/Down Hill -0.2
Hazards 0
Green Complex +0.1


Category 2:

Rough +0.1
Dogleg 0
Force Carries +0.1
Imitating +0.1
Side hill lies 0

RCD #9 off Championship tees = 4.7 Shots

[Eric Franzen]

Hmm... so an downhill approach with plenty of tail wind to a small green is considered as easy?

[Joe Hancock]

I'll start...not because I'm smartest....

IF my best golfin' bud and I are equally matched, but he plays a draw and I play a fade....and we play a course better suited for a fade....will his "ranking" of difficulty be the same as mine?

Joe

BTW, I love those first two sentences.....  

[Matthew Hunt]

Eric and Joe

This is meant to calulate a average of golfer not a single golfer. And a small green is Severe!

[Matthew Hunt]

RCD #18

555y= 4.7 shots

Category 1:

Fairway width +0.1
Prevailing Head/Tail Winds +0.1
Cross Winds 0
Up/Down Hill 0
Hazards 0
Green Complex +0.1


Category 2:

Rough +0.1
Dogleg +0.1
Force Carries -0.1
Imitating 0
Side hill lies 0

RCD #18 off Championship tees = 5.1 Shots

[David_Elvins]

Category 2: (+0.1: hard, 0: Average, -0.1: easy)

Rough (Light is easy, Severe is Hard)
Dogleg (None is easy, A large one is Hard)
Force Carries (None is easy, A large one is Hard)
Imitating (Not at all is easy, Really is Hard)
Side hill lies (Light is easy, Severe is Hard)

Are you saying a MacDonald/Raynor template hole is harder to play than a non-template hole?

[Jim Nugent]

I don't have any sense for how well your scale works.  But I'm impressed with your thinking process.  Encourage you to keep it up!  

The Masters keeps a running scoring average of every hole during the tournament.  If you can rate the holes at ANGC, that will give you an idea of how accurate your scale is for the world's best players at that course.  You might want to throw in an overall weather factor, as that can dramatically change scores.  

You could also get an overall test of your scale by looking at the average score, on courses you know well, during tournaments.  RCD must hold tournaments for scratch players.  Rate the entire course with your scale, and then see how that compares with the average score scratch players have their during events.  

[Doug Siebert]

Its an interesting idea but you really need to work on which items are in what categories and the relative magnitudes.  Plus some items depend on other items.

For example, I think fairway width should be multiplier to whatever other factors await you if you miss the fairway.  Heavy rough, OB, water, and thick trees become bigger problems the narrower the fairway.  If the rough is light, I don't particularly care if you make the fairways 5 yards wide.  Put OB stakes on both sides (or its more frequently seen equivalent, thick brush/trees where you'll never find your ball) and suddenly even a 50 yard wide fairway often doesn't seem big enough.

[Adrian_Stiff]

I don't have any sense for how well your scale works.  But I'm impressed with your thinking process.  Encourage you to keep it up!  

The Masters keeps a running scoring average of every hole during the tournament.  If you can rate the holes at ANGC, that will give you an idea of how accurate your scale is for the world's best players at that course.  You might want to throw in an overall weather factor, as that can dramatically change scores.  

You could also get an overall test of your scale by looking at the average score, on courses you know well, during tournaments.  RCD must hold tournaments for scratch players.  Rate the entire course with your scale, and then see how that compares with the average score scratch players have their during events.  

I am amazed at Matthews ability to communicate considering he is so young, his posts are very enjoyable, with tweaking your idea/scale makes sense.

[Brad Tufts]

I wonder if any of this compares to the rating criteria in each state in the US.  Ironically enough, no one has ever spelled that out to me, though I do know that slope is the "bogey" rating over the scratch rating.

I've never seen the system for how many shots/fractions of a shot are added for a forced carry, etc. for either the scratch or bogey player.

[Matthew Hunt]

I don't have any sense for how well your scale works.  But I'm impressed with your thinking process.  Encourage you to keep it up!  

The Masters keeps a running scoring average of every hole during the tournament.  If you can rate the holes at ANGC, that will give you an idea of how accurate your scale is for the world's best players at that course.  You might want to throw in an overall weather factor, as that can dramatically change scores.  

You could also get an overall test of your scale by looking at the average score, on courses you know well, during tournaments.  RCD must hold tournaments for scratch players.  Rate the entire course with your scale, and then see how that compares with the average score scratch players have their during events.  

My golf club runs a scratch competion off the Championship Tees every year. I used 9+18 as holes as these are the ones I remember the score average for. They compare as follows:

Hole:Tournament:My Scale

9     5.10           4.40        
18   5.55           4.70        

The tournement Scores were a lot higher but his could due to the fact that it was played by "Good" golfers not "scratch" players. Also it was played in rain and gales.

[Matthew Hunt]

Does anyone have any Ideas to rate par 3's?

[Cassandra Burns]

Does anyone have any Ideas to rate par 3's?

I'm game!  Let's start 3 for the baseline.  For every 25 yards +/- 200, add or subtract .1 strokes.  Weighting factors would include green size and undulation (they really should be different categories, because they have very different effects on the kind of shot you end up with), followed by winds, blindness, hazards, and elevation change.  For the par 3, it really is mostly about the green complex for the scratch golfer.  Play with the numbers and see what you come up with!

[Matthew Hunt]

Does anyone have any Ideas to rate par 3's?

I'm game!  Let's start 3 for the baseline.  For every 25 yards +/- 200, add or subtract .1 strokes.  Weighting factors would include green size and undulation (they really should be different categories, because they have very different effects on the kind of shot you end up with), followed by winds, blindness, hazards, and elevation change.  For the par 3, it really is mostly about the green complex for the scratch golfer.  Play with the numbers and see what you come up with!

Thanks Cassandra

Does anyone know how wind affects par 3 play because a tailwind makes it hard to stop the ball.

[Powell Arms]

Does anyone have any Ideas to rate par 3's?

To a large extent, wouldnt the rating for a par three be a subset of the rating system for a par 4?  That is, if my drive finds the fairway on a par 4, I'm essentially playing three shots to hole-out.

In looking at it this way, it might appear that the rating system you intially describe places a disproportiate emphasis on the tee ball.  Interesting to consider when we also consider the entire U-groove rationale and that driving distance, and not accuracy, drives success on the PGA Tour.

[Matthew Hunt]

This is the modifed scale:
Par 4s+5

First you take the length of hole in yards and divide by 200 and add 2 shots and you have the "Raw Score"

Then you add or take away parts of shots for the following Criteria:

Category 1: (+0.2: Really Hard, +0.1:Quite hard, 0: Average, -0.1: Quite easy, - 0.2 Very easy)

Fairway width (Wide is Easy, Narrow is Hard)
Prevailing Head/Tail Winds (Tail is easy, Head is Hard)
Cross Winds (None is easy, Strong is hard)
Up/Down Hill (Down is easy, Up is Hard)
Hazards (None or Easy is easy, Lots and Severe is Hard)
Green Complex (Flat is easy, Unduling is Hard)
Green Size (Big is easy, Small is Hard)
Rough (Light is easy, Severe is Hard)

Category 2: (+0.1: hard, 0: Average, -0.1: easy)

Dogleg (None is easy, A large one is Hard)
Imitating (Not at all is easy, Really is Hard)
Side hill lies (Light is easy, Severe is Hard)
Green Speed(Fast is Hard, Slow is easy)

Par 3s

Start 3 for the baseline.  For every 25 yards +/- 200, add or subtract 0.1 strokes.
Then you add or take away parts of shots for the following Criteria:

Category 1: (+0.2: Really Hard, +0.1:Quite hard, 0: Average, -0.1: Quite easy, - 0.2 Very easy)

Winds(None is easy, Strong is hard)
Up/Down Hill (Down is easy, Up is Hard)
Green Complex (Flat is easy, Unduling is Hard)
Green Size (Big is easy, Small is Hard)

Category 2: (+0.1: hard, 0: Average, -0.1: easy)

Hazards (None or Easy is easy, Lots and Severe is Hard)
Imitating (Not at all is easy, Really is Hard)
Rough (Light is easy, Severe is Hard)
Green Speed(Fast is Hard, Slow is easy)


For Boegyers(18 hcp)

Par 4s+5

First you take the length of hole in yards and divide by 130 and add 2 shots and you have the "Raw Score"

Then you add or take away parts of shots for the following Criteria:

Category 1: (+0.2: Really Hard, +0.1:Quite hard, 0: Average, -0.1: Quite easy, - 0.2 Very easy)

Fairway width (Wide is Easy, Narrow is Hard)
Prevailing Head/Tail Winds (Tail is easy, Head is Hard)
Cross Winds (None is easy, Strong is hard)
Up/Down Hill (Down is easy, Up is Hard)
Hazards (None or Easy is easy, Lots and Severe is Hard)
Green Complex (Flat is easy, Unduling is Hard)
Green Size (Big is easy, Small is Hard)
Green Speed(Fast is Hard, Slow is easy)
Rough (Light is easy, Severe is Hard)
Forced Carries (None is easy, A large one is Hard)
Imitating (Not at all is easy, Really is Hard)


Category 2: (+0.1: hard, 0: Average, -0.1: easy)

Dogleg (None is easy, A large one is Hard)
Side hill lies (Light is easy, Severe is Hard)

Par 3s

Start 4 for the baseline.  For every 25 yards +/- 200, add or subtract 0.1 strokes.
Then you add or take away parts of shots for the following Criteria:

Category 1: (+0.2: Really Hard, +0.1:Quite hard, 0: Average, -0.1: Quite easy, - 0.2 Very easy)

Winds(None is easy, Strong is hard)
Up/Down Hill (Down is easy, Up is Hard)
Hazards (None or Easy is easy, Lots and Severe is Hard)
Green Complex (Flat is easy, Unduling is Hard)
Green Speed(Fast is Hard, Slow is easy)
Green Size (Big is easy, Small is Hard)
Rough (Light is easy, Severe is Hard)


Category 2: (+0.1: hard, 0: Average, -0.1: easy)

Force Carries (None is easy, A large one is Hard)
Imitating (Not at all is easy, Really is Hard)
Side hill lies if Green Missed(Light is easy, Severe is Hard)

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