question from architects... hole handicaps

[Mark Johnson]

Based on USGA standards, the first and last holes on a course should be between the 8th and 14th handicap holes on a course.  (so that there is less of a chance for handicaps coming into play on the last hole or sudden death.

Obviously, we can all name a ton of holes where this isn't the case.    Is this something that you even consider when designing a course?

[Tom_Doak]

I recommend handicapping for the holes when I'm finished with each course, but often the client decides to change them around a bit.

I agree totally that the 18th hole should be near the bottom of the handicapping ... it's no fair to the higher-handicap player to lose his match before he gets to use his last stroke.  The same is not true of having a stroke hole for the first hole, though.  I really have never considered that, although I wouldn't be likely to make the first hole one of the hardest holes on the course, to begin with.

[Adrian_Stiff]

I take absolutely no notice of the way the holes are positioned relative to stroke index (giving strokes). There are guidelines how strokes are given, a player receiving 6 shots should not get 2 on the trot, the index 6 and below should not be awarded to the 18th hole and the 9th hole if play could start from the 10th tee. The guidelines are for giving strokes rather than difficult holes, if you took the guidelines for difficult holes it would stop a lot of things.

[Tom Kelly]

My home club has recently changed the stroke indexes on the back of the EGU's guidelines. They now have absolutely no relation to the hardness of the holes on the course in my opinion and it really doesn't make much sense to me. It seems with all of the rules the EGU have stipulated they might as well suggest a set order to the stroke indexes for every course with the premise that it would even itself out over the round. It sounds ridiculous but would it work?

Personally I would like them to go back to simple idea of the stroke indexes being purely a rank of how hard each hole is. It is very rare that the 18th or 1st are the hardest holes courses and in the case of my home club I have never came across a situation where the stroke indexes favoured anyone in particular.

I really don't see how an architect can adopt all of the guidelines without seriously compromising the quality of the course. Common sense is surely the only way to go about it.


Not trying to hijack this thread and slightly off topic but it has always puzzled me why in matchplay shots aren't given on the holes where the lower handicap player is expected to score one less on a hole than the higher handicap, rather than on what are meant to be the hardest holes on the course where the players are often expected to score the same?

For instance if a player off 3 is playing against a player of 12 with full handicap difference I think the 12 handicap player should receive shots on stroke indexes 4 through 12 rather than 1 through 9?

Anybody else ever wondered this?

[Jon Wiggett]

One of the biggest problems for stroke index here in Europe is that it has been hijacked by the perception that it has something to do with the difficulty of the hole in comparison to the rest of the holes on the course. It is purely there to allow the alloting of strokes given in matchplay and so ensure they come in an even spread.

Jon

[Adrian_Stiff]

Jon - I remember playing a Spanish course back in 80s that had 'Handicap' and 'Stroke Index' one was for giving shots and one was for the allottment of strokes for stableford.

I suppose the problem in the UK we have is stableford, there is a lot of stableford play and its importantish to some that they get their strokes where they need them.

Primarily as you say they are for giving strokes, with idea if you give 2, they are in each half and if you give 4 they are every 4 holes, if 6 strokes every 3 holes etc.

If you are giving just 1 stroke, so on the index 1 470 yard par 4 into the wind against a similar good player bogeys are often the order of the day, a par 4 can be tough for anyone....but its not easy to do stroke index's and their are +s & -'s for every way.

[Tom_Doak]

We've discussed this subject before, and one of the problems is that stroke indices are used in different ways.

In countries where Stableford play is common [the UK and Australia], the stroke index should be correlated with the difficulty of the hole.

In a match play scenario, it's more important for the strokes to be spaced relatively evenly, and hole difficulty doesn't matter so much.  In fact, in Australia, some scorecards show a separate stroke index for medal play and match play -- and the match play one has the strokes evenly spaced out [first four given on holes 8, 12, 4 and 16], completely regardless to what sort of hole it is.  I first noticed this on a course where the #1 stroke hole was a 170 yard par 3!

In truth, for match play, it really doesn't matter where the strokes fall.  If you got a stroke on that par 3, and won that hole, you'd probably have lost the long par-4 before it that you thought the stroke hole should have been.

[Ken Moum]

One of the biggest problems for stroke index here in Europe is that it has been hijacked by the perception that it has something to do with the difficulty of the hole in comparison to the rest of the holes on the course. It is purely there to allow the alloting of strokes given in matchplay and so ensure they come in an even spread.

Jon

It's not just in Europe.

I recently was involved in convincing our general manager that a new scorecard (and a bunch of new teeing grounds) warranted doing the handicap allocations in a way that conformed to the USGA guidelines.  It was previously done almost exclusively on hole difficulty, which made the #1 handicap hole a 210-yard par three.

He read the relevant handicap manual sections and agreed.

So we got some new cards, which made our longest front-nine par five the #1 hole--and that caused the shit to hit the fan.  Since i was involved, I got accosted several times by guys who thought, as does most everyone here that #1 is the hardest hole.

I wish we'd done two versions, one for match play (which we play every Wed. night in Men's league) and one for four-ball which is one of the more common forms of competition.

Ken

[Dale Jackson]

I cannot speak to the EGU system, however, for those countries using the USGA system (most of the world now, I believe), the #1 stroke hole should be the hole where the higher handicap player most needs a stroke to gain a half in singles or four-ball match play (Note: not a win).  The USGA handicap manual gives a lot of guidance on how the hole allocations should be determined and the manual is available on-line here - http://www.usga.org/Rule-Books/Handicap-System-Manual/Handicap-Manual/

Hole allocations, under the USGA system, have nothing to do with the relative difficulty of each hole or having the holes allocated evenly through the 18 holes.

The system does allow separate allocations for match play and medal play, and after watching the confusion at my own club after implementing separate allocations, I would recommend against doing so!

[Ulrich Mayring]

Many courses here are doing handicap allocations according to statistical data, i. e. which holes play most difficult in tournaments.

And I personally think that makes sense. Say a bogey player is receiving 12 strokes in medal play. That means he needs to make par on 6 holes. It would seem equitable that those were the six easiest holes on the course.

In match play the situation becomes even more pronounced: the bogey player is receiving 12 strokes from a scratch player, meaning he needs to match him shot for shot on six holes. If those were the six most difficult holes, then the scratch player would still make par on most of them, but the bogey player likely on none, because he couldn't even reach the green in regulation with his best shot. Vice versa the bogey player would receive a stroke on a 120 yard par 3 - where the scratch player would make a lot fewer birdies than the bogey player pars.

Now, you could say that it evens out in the end: the scratch player is favored on the difficult holes, the bogey player on the easier ones. But to me it seems like a contorted affair, the match is more fun if it is equitable on every single hole and not just over the course of 18 holes.

Ulrich