OT UK Handicaps

[Richard Fisher]

The UK tradition was always that only competition rounds, in which (crucially) all putts had been holed out, counted for handicapping purposes, and NB under the WHS some clubs still insist that to play in certain competitions you MUST submit a designated number of competition cards, and not just general play scores, in order to participate. Harlech, for one, does this.


This convention is absolutely the case at the UK elite level, where the organisers of major scratch competitions with low handicap limits will scrutinise the entries and rule out entrants with a majority of general play cards in their indices.


The other tricky thing is that there is still, in reporting terms, no single UK system and the four Home Unions each have their own, slightly different ways of running the WHS and were not, until recently, able to talk to each other electronically. That is changing.


Overall I would guess that the large majority of UK rounds go ‘unrecorded’. Of the forty rounds I played with my own ball last year, four were submitted for handicap purposes. That won’t I suspect be at all atypical.

[Thomas Dai]

In the UK system you are allowed to submit a non-competition score, but in order to do so you have to declare in advance of the round that your score will be submitted and then you have to submit it. You can't start double, double and then decide not to post it. In the app, you put in that you are going to play a round for handicap purposes, then you go play, submit the score in the app together with a note about who your attester is. They then get a message from the app telling them they have to attest to that score.

Nice summary.

The attester bit is crucial.
That this doesn't seem to apply in all areas of World is a huge weakness in the WHS.
atb

[Erik J. Barzeski]

Mark, it'd be helpful if you actually read the posts before replying. And it'd also be helpful if you stopped making assumptions based on previous incorrect assumptions.

The wording and the rules are in a somewhat contradictory state right now, and so I'm not "telling" anyone anything: I'm asking, and hypothesizing about the gradual shift that may be occurring.

REQUIRED:
The WHS PDF that governs England says a player is "expected" to post "all acceptable scores." General Play is an acceptable score, and an approved format, thus, among the player's responsibilities is to post all General Play scores that otherwise meet the definition for an acceptable score (conforming equipment, etc.).

NOT REQUIRED:
The language about how you "can" post a General Play or a "social" score is ambiguous at best, leading to the general questions around the current state of the rules, expectations, etc.

Do you deny that there's a conflict in the way the rules are written in these two parts? Or is it just the history of not having had to or even been allowed to post casual play scores that is leading to your insistence that the language in the "required" section above (my labels) doesn't mean what it seems to pretty clearly say? Or do you acknowledge it says that, but give more weight to the ambiguous language about how you "can" post a social round score?

———————

Again, I think that the WHS is in transition in countries/associations where comp scores used to be all that you could count to a phase where it'll be much more like the U.S. has been - where the rules/expectations/requirements are that almost all scores, including casual rounds, will be posted.

Right now casual play round posting seems like it's optional because you "can" submit those scores (even though the other language says you are "expected to" submit them), but I could see in the future that language aligning more with what the USGA has said for decades.

[Erik J. Barzeski]

I talked with another person and he's suggesting that the "can" applies to the pre-registration, after which your choice is made: you must (required to) submit the score if you pre-registered, and you cannot if you did not.

In the U.S., the "registration" is almost assumed: we are expected to post all scores in which we are playing golf under the rules. I can see that as a way of understanding the seemingly contradictory language.

Previously, I don't think General Play (casual rounds) could be submitted in the UK at all, only comp rounds, no? If so, is this a transition to a system more like in the U.S., or is this the end of the line?

[Michael Felton]

I talked with another person and he's suggesting that the "can" applies to the pre-registration, after which your choice is made: you must (required to) submit the score if you pre-registered, and you cannot if you did not.

In the U.S., the "registration" is almost assumed: we are expected to post all scores in which we are playing golf under the rules. I can see that as a way of understanding the seemingly contradictory language.

Previously, I don't think General Play (casual rounds) could be submitted in the UK at all, only comp rounds, no? If so, is this a transition to a system more like in the U.S., or is this the end of the line?

The old UK system only applied rounds played in competition. There was a possibility for a club committee to change someone's handicap for general play (called Rule 19). Generally speaking this was only used for people whose ability had changed significantly for some reason - occasionally they'd apply it for a very out of character score - like a 15 handicap shooting 3 over they might bring them down an additional bit, or they'd bring someone's handicap up if they had surgery or something else that made them much worse overnight. To change someone whose handicap was in category 1 (5.4 or lower) you had to do that with the county body's review.


Under the new system, you can submit a general play score, but the powers that be want that score to be as close to competition standard as possible. I think most people in the UK are trying to get their handicap down. Playing in a competition brings its own pressure to bear and would likely have people play more conservatively than if they're just out with their buddies. By stating in advance that you are going to submit your score for handicap, you bring at least some of that pressure with you and you're much more likely to play sensibly. I think most people don't want that pressure most of the time. They just want to have fun. So they let people choose their flavor while still enabling the handicap system to do its job.


One of the other big differences between golf in the US and the UK is that most clubs in the UK are effectively semi-private. The costs of membership are MUCH more reasonable and so most people are members of clubs and those clubs typically run pretty frequent competitions. In the US, the vast majority of people don't have access to competitions unless they go out of their way to find them. It would mean that if handicaps only depended on competition rounds then it would be very difficult to get a handicap at all. Obviously that's not ideal and so the trend has been towards all scores being included.


Upshot is I highly doubt that the UK will move further towards the US system of all scores. I don't think people would want that and CONGU at least does recognize that they serve the people who play the game

[Mark Pearce]

I talked with another person and he's suggesting that the "can" applies to the pre-registration, after which your choice is made: you must (required to) submit the score if you pre-registered, and you cannot if you did not.

This is what Michael said a few posts ago.  If you declare an intent to submit a general play score then you must (or have an assumed Net 36 over score).  Also, crucially, and as Michael said, a general play score in England requires attestation by a playing partner.

[Richard Fisher]

And you have to hole all the putts. Even in a casual game among friends. Which inter alia takes longer. No gimmes permitted in General Play returns. And I think Michael’s point about the higher proportion of UK rounds being played in the context of club competitions or matches is a very important one. When it costs you $1000 per annum to belong to somewhere like Harlech, with a decent fixture list, this all looks a bit different.


Have always been a bit unclear as to whether gimmes are permitted in US or Australian General Play returns?

[Michael Felton]

And you have to hole all the putts. Even in a casual game among friends. Which inter alia takes longer. No gimmes permitted in General Play returns. And I think Michael’s point about the higher proportion of UK rounds being played in the context of club competitions or matches is a very important one. When it costs you $1000 per annum to belong to somewhere like Harlech, with a decent fixture list, this all looks a bit different.


Have always been a bit unclear as to whether gimmes are permitted in US or Australian General Play returns?

If you take gimmes in your game in the US, you count whatever your "most likely score" would be. If it was 3 feet away then you'd count that as one. If it was 15 feet, then you'd count that as 2. It all gets a bit questionable to me. What if it's 6 feet and you have them three times in a row? Do you count all of them as holed? None of them? Some blend? It's not particularly clear.

[Erik J. Barzeski]

Upshot is I highly doubt that the UK will move further towards the US system of all scores. I don't think people would want that and CONGU at least does recognize that they serve the people who play the game

That remains to be seen. I've heard both sides — that they're looking to really unify it, and include all scores so handicaps are truly "world" — and the other side that they're not going to require the same posting rules like we have in the U.S.

This is a step toward unification of the rules, but maybe it's the final step.

[Mark Pearce]

Most UK clubs have frequent competitions (at least monthly, more often pretty much weekly or even bi-weekly) during the season.  Handicaps mean something. 


To us, the US system, with estimation of scores on holes (the idea of giving yourself a six footer as Michael suggests is anathema), counting scores in rounds that don't count for anything and, worst, no attestation, is a cheat's charter.  The WHS is unpopular enough in the UK (mostly unfairly, I think).  Changing it to allow the mayhem that is US style score recording would cause it to lose all credibility.  I can't see England Golf and the other home unions going for that.

[Erik J. Barzeski]

To us, the US system

And yet, they're looking to unify the WHS. You don't like the U.S. system, but that doesn't mean the UK isn't headed there.

Changing it to allow the mayhem that is US style score recording would cause it to lose all credibility.  I can't see England Golf and the other home unions going for that.

It doesn't mean it isn't headed there after a long time. Is the accepting of casual round scores the first step of a few, or the last step? Unless someone here is on the handicap committee of the R&A or England Golf (or whatever it's called)… We'll have to wait and see.

[James Reader]

Erik


There is absolutely no way that most GB&I golfers will ever accept a requirement to post every score - regardless of what the governing body were to say. Culturally it just wouldn’t be acceptable and England Golf et al (and the R&A) know that.


On the few occasions when I’ve played with North American golfers who’ve submitted a general play score, it’s been staggering to me just how many rules of golf they’ve broken (as any one of us might do in a casual round). That just wouldn’t stand over here.

[Jim Sherma]

The GP scores are the fatal flaw of the WHS. The number of GP rounds played by the rules of golf are near zero. This, coupled with the ambiguity of peoples expectations, "most likely scores", etc. makes most handicaps useless. This is just taking human nature into account and not even accounting for people actively gaming the system in either direction. I was very disappointed when the WHS adopted the US's GP rules as opposed to the UK's pre-WHS system of only counting medal-day rounds played under the rules of golf and holing all putts.


So few people seem to be able to play to their handicaps when everyone is playing by the rules. I guess that within a tight group of players that are consistently playing with each other it kind of all works out (but would also work out without the formal handicapping system), otherwise I think it's effectively worthless.   

[Ally Mcintosh]

Erik


There is absolutely no way that most GB&I golfers will ever accept a requirement to post every score - regardless of what the governing body were to say. Culturally it just wouldn’t be acceptable and England Golf et al (and the R&A) know that.


On the few occasions when I’ve played with North American golfers who’ve submitted a general play score, it’s been staggering to me just how many rules of golf they’ve broken (as any one of us might do in a casual round). That just wouldn’t stand over here.

As per James (and Mark). It is much more likely that GB&I unions will bow out of the WHS altogether rather than move further towards General Play rounds.

[Mark Pearce]

To us, the US system

And yet, they're looking to unify the WHS. You don't like the U.S. system, but that doesn't mean the UK isn't headed there.

Changing it to allow the mayhem that is US style score recording would cause it to lose all credibility.  I can't see England Golf and the other home unions going for that.

It doesn't mean it isn't headed there after a long time. Is the accepting of casual round scores the first step of a few, or the last step? Unless someone here is on the handicap committee of the R&A or England Golf (or whatever it's called)… We'll have to wait and see.

Of course, there's always the alternative that the Us move towards the rest of the World (I know, absurd in the current environment) and require attestation and pre-election for general play, and introduce a bias towards competitive rounds.  But that would require US casual and club golfers to see golf as a sport, rather than a pastime.

[Erik J. Barzeski]

There is absolutely no way that most GB&I golfers will ever accept a requirement to post every score

You've polled the majority, or you're guessing based on how you and some people you know probably feel? And you can accurately predict how golfers will feel in the future? And, ultimately, I'm asking whether the requirement to post may be instituted, not how people will feel about it. Thanks for the jingoism.

If y'all play by the Rules of Golf, what's the issue with posting a non-comp round that follows the other guidelines of an acceptable round?

Of course, there's always the alternative that the Us move towards the rest of the World (I know, absurd in the current environment) and require attestation and pre-election for general play, and introduce a bias towards competitive rounds.  But that would require US casual and club golfers to see golf as a sport, rather than a pastime.

I spoke too soon as Mark takes the jingoism crown.     Y'all don't have the monopoly on playing by the rules, playing quickly, or treating golf like a sport. And generalizing this kind of stuff is just silly.

[Mark Pearce]

I spoke too soon as Mark takes the jingoism crown.     Y'all don't have the monopoly on playing by the rules, playing quickly, or treating golf like a sport. And generalizing this kind of stuff is just silly.

You really are quite thick, sometimes, aren't you, Erik, despite how clever you think you are?  A couple of people offer an opposite opinion to yours, based von (golfing) cultural differences, and we're jingoistic?  You might not get the irony (self-reflection not being a strength) but it really is quite extraordinary.

[Erik J. Barzeski]

You really are quite thick, sometimes, aren't you, Erik, despite how clever you think you are?

And you're perpetually insulting and a host of other things. Among your flaws… your inability to read what's written.

A couple of people offer an opposite opinion to yours

Please find the part where I said any opinions were "wrong" (opinions can't be wrong or right, just statements of fact) or even disagreed with the opinions. I only pointed out where people seem to be making assumptions, sharing anecdotes, and not considering how things might change in the future.

Here's the thing… If y'all think that a bunch of U.S. guys are putting in phony scores based on six foot gimmes and the sort (it undeniably happens, no doubt), what's it to you? How does that affect your day to day life? You'd wipe the floor with people doing that if, for example, you were required to post casual scores in the UK and people started doing similarly over there.

I don't get the outrage. It's misplaced at best, unless you're somehow offended that "Billy Bob claims he's a 5, but I've seen him play golf…" and his handicap is lower than you're "100% completely honest 9.1 index."

[James Reader]

There is absolutely no way that most GB&I golfers will ever accept a requirement to post every score

You've polled the majority, or you're guessing based on how you and some people you know probably feel? And you can accurately predict how golfers will feel in the future? And, ultimately, I'm asking whether the requirement to post may be instituted, not how people will feel about it. Thanks for the jingoism.


Wow! You asked questions about what happens in GB&I. I respond and that is somehow “jingoistic”!? Could you retract that accusation please.

[Michael Felton]

But that would require US casual and club golfers to see golf as a sport, rather than a pastime.

That was my point from earlier. The fundamental difference in golf culture between the US and the UK requires differences in the handicap system. So either they remain different or one side has to concede to the other. In my experience, belonging to two clubs in the UK with a combined about 1,500 members and from reading newspaper articles and magazine articles and just knowing how people treat the game in general, people there won't like the change. It's an ingrained aspect of the culture that your handicap is only impacted when you have a card in your hand and it matters. I know this the same way that you know that US casual and club golfers would need to see golf as a sport and not a pastime.

[Erik J. Barzeski]

Wow! You asked questions about what happens in GB&I. I respond and that is somehow “jingoistic”!? Could you retract that accusation please.

Just as soon as y'all stop acting morally superior over the rules of handicapping, as if what's done in the U.S. for decades now is just morally reprehensible and no self-respecting Englishman would be caught dead even considering posting a casual round, ha ha ha. Sure.

Otherwise, no, I won't take back a word that means "overly patriotic or nationalistic." There's probably a better word out there, as this isn't political, really… but… you seem to be just as offended by this as the idea of posting a casual round. 

I know this the same way that you know that US casual and club golfers would need to see golf as a sport and not a pastime.

There are plenty of golfers in the U.S. who see it as a sport (and plenty in the UK who see it as a pastime), and I don't think the handicap system is the determining factor there at all.

[Michael Felton]

Wow! You asked questions about what happens in GB&I. I respond and that is somehow “jingoistic”!? Could you retract that accusation please.

Just as soon as y'all stop acting morally superior over the rules of handicapping, as if what's done in the U.S. for decades now is just morally reprehensible and no self-respecting Englishman would be caught dead even considering posting a casual round, ha ha ha. Sure.

Otherwise, no, I won't take back a word that means "overly patriotic or nationalistic." There's probably a better word out there, as this isn't political, really… but… you seem to be just as offended by this as the idea of posting a casual round. 

I know this the same way that you know that US casual and club golfers would need to see golf as a sport and not a pastime.

There are plenty of golfers in the U.S. who see it as a sport (and plenty in the UK who see it as a pastime), and I don't think the handicap system is the determining factor there at all.

I don't think anyone is suggesting that one is better than the other. Just that they are different.


In the UK, most friendly games are played between friends and are most likely to be match play. People may play stroke play from time to time too, but I'd think it was not the norm. Most golfers belong to clubs that run competitions frequently through the playing season, so there are plenty of competitions available to most people. Handicaps have therefore been based on competition scores and it's been like that for at least 50 years I think. Those handicaps get used for club competitions and it's important that everyone's handicap be a fair representation of how they play in competition and they are.


The majority of golfers in the US don't belong to a club. There are events for better players run by regional golf associations and then the odd thing here and there like the Amateur Players Tour or the Golfweek Amateur Tour that have flighted events for players of varying ability. Both of those use their own handicaps from their own events for flighting purposes, not GHIN. in the metro New York area, there are perhaps 200 people who play in those two semi regularly. I know there was a golf channel one as well - not sure if that's still going - let's say 1,000 total. Other than that, I think probably 90+% of US golfers don't play in competitions at all, so they can't get a handicap unless general play scores are included. Their handicaps get used to even off matches they play against each other. For them, their handicaps should be a fair representation of how they play when they play with their friends in friendly games and they are.


To make these two different groups use the same system is going to be a big (and unwelcome) change to one or other of those groups of people and they'll make the handicaps of whoever changes not fit for purpose.


The only time that's really an issue is when you bring those two groups of golfers together (such as in elite events where handicap is used to determine eligibility). The WHS did a decent job of at least moving the underlying theme together, but the other parts are I would think too difficult. Not that I wouldn't put it past them to push something unpopular on people - lord knows it's not unprecedented.

[James Reader]

Wow! You asked questions about what happens in GB&I. I respond and that is somehow “jingoistic”!? Could you retract that accusation please.

Just as soon as y'all stop acting morally superior over the rules of handicapping, as if what's done in the U.S. for decades now is just morally reprehensible and no self-respecting Englishman would be caught dead even considering posting a casual round, ha ha ha. Sure.

Otherwise, no, I won't take back a word that means "overly patriotic or nationalistic." There's probably a better word out there, as this isn't political, really… but… you seem to be just as offended by this as the idea of posting a casual round. 

I know this the same way that you know that US casual and club golfers would need to see golf as a sport and not a pastime.

There are plenty of golfers in the U.S. who see it as a sport (and plenty in the UK who see it as a pastime), and I don't think the handicap system is the determining factor there at all.

I genuinely wasn’t expressing a view of superiority, moral or otherwise. I have no issue at all with the way things are done in the US but I know that it’s very different over here. You were the one suggesting that the rules aren’t being applied correctly in the UK.


As for “jingoistic”, rest assured that my opinion of you has absolutely nothing to do with your nationality.

[Erik J. Barzeski]

I don't think anyone is suggesting that one is better than the other. Just that they are different.

That's not how I or the others I showed this to read it. There's often a general looking down upon the U.S. system from those in the UK, Australia, etc.

In the UK, most friendly games are played between friends and are most likely to be match play.

From all I've read, that's changed quite a bit in the last 20 years, and I'd be curious to know how often that happens now as compared to a long time ago, particularly among younger golfers. I'm not saying stroke play is the majority, just that all I've seen is that it's increasing in popularity quite a bit.

I genuinely wasn’t expressing a view of superiority, moral or otherwise.

Okay, then I got it wrong, likely because of the history I mentioned just above. The U.S. system is slammed fairly regularly by those who insist that it's silly or beneath them to consider posting a casual round. I apologize. Sorry.


If you're looking for a recent example, look at Mark calling it a "cheat's charter" despite the fact that it only harms the "cheater." 

You were the one suggesting that the rules aren’t being applied correctly in the UK.

No, I was asking how people squared up the idea that the rules expect you to post all rounds… with the idea that you "can" pre-register to post a casual round. It's not the clearest language.

[James Reader]

I appreciate the apology Erik. Thank you.

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