It’s all about the course. Is it?

[Thomas Dai]

Rankings and ratings often give courses a score or points for the course.
But conditioning in particular always seems to play a big part and conditioning and maintenance are usually a function of crew size/maintenance budget.
So what would a course comparison listing be like if the score or number of points a course received were divided by the main season crew size?
A course with a 10 score, but with 20 crew, would get a score of 0.5
A course with a score of say 5 but with only 5 crew would get a score of 1, so would further up the listing.


Thoughts?
Atb

[jeffwarne]

Rankings and ratings often give courses a score or points for the course.
But conditioning in particular always seems to play a big part and conditioning and maintenance are usually a function of crew size/maintenance budget.
So what would a course comparison listing be like if the score or number of points a course received were divided by the main season crew size?
A course with a 10 score, but with 20 crew, would get a score of 0.5
A course with a score of say 5 but with only 5 crew would get a score of 1, so would further up the listing.


Thoughts?
Atb

Let's see..
Goat Hill at 6 with 1/2 person crew...hmmmm...


Speaking of Goats, do we count livestock?
What happenes to Southerndown, Brora , Mulranny?

the best conditioned courses I play overseas I usually see one person heading out to mow greesn as we're finishing-though lately I see more striping and irrigation

[Thomas Dai]

Rankings and ratings often give courses a score or points for the course.
But conditioning in particular always seems to play a big part and conditioning and maintenance are usually a function of crew size/maintenance budget.
So what would a course comparison listing be like if the score or number of points a course received were divided by the main season crew size?
A course with a 10 score, but with 20 crew, would get a score of 0.5
A course with a score of say 5 but with only 5 crew would get a score of 1, so would further up the listing.
Thoughts?
Atb

Let's see..
Goat Hill at 6 with 1/2 person crew...hmmmm...
Speaking of Goats, do we count livestock?

What happenes to Southerndown, Brora , Mulranny?
the best conditioned courses I play overseas I usually see one person heading out to mow greesn as we're finishing-though lately I see more striping and irrigation

Livestock definitely don’t count in the re-calculation!


For Southerndown, Brora, Mulranny, Pennard, Clyne, Kington, Welshpool, Yelverton, Tavistock, Cleeve Cloud, Minchinhampton Old and their animal grazed brothers and sisters the ratings go sky high.
Westward Ho! gets to hold The Open and the folks at TOC buy livestock, the price of which rises rapidly as golf clubs seek to recover their positions in the new rankings!
And they all live happily ever after.
Atb

[Peter Pallotta]

ATB

a bit off topic, but it brings to mind that, despite reading about 'ideal maintenance melds' and courses 'being in good nick', I've hardly ever been able to separate out the architecture from how it's being presented; indeed, I've hardly ever even tried to separate the two. Partly that's out of an unconscious assumption that the course (in the super's eyes) is being maintained in a way that best serves the architecture; and partly it's because as a public course golfer I know that, in any event, beggars can't be choosers. And it still surprises and impresses me that some here can see/understand/appreciate the architecture so well that they can then determine what most and best (maintenance wise) brings the challenges and choices and interest inherent in that architecture to the fore.

[Mike Hendren]

Having learned the game on 9 un-irrigated fairways in the South that were mowed twice weekly, greens that might be mowed every other day and bunkers that were raked semi-annually I've never assigned much weight to conditioning. As a former rater I rarely let that criterion factor in my final rating of a course.


Average conditioning can bring out the architecture as much as pristine conditioning most of the time.


A great office building is a great building even if the janitorial staff fails to show up in the evening.

[John Kavanaugh]

To correlate this to the road construction business. It's not how many people it takes to fix a road that matters, it's how many get in your way on your path in life. A smooth road ain't worth the oil it takes to build it if you can't enjoy the ride.


That being said during one round of golf last year I was interrupted by maintenance workers 37 times. That is excessive and why autonomous maintenance is in our future.

[jeffwarne]

That being said during one round of golf last year I was interrupted by maintenance workers 37 times. That is excessive and why autonomous maintenance is in our future.

I still remember when they announced at my club growing up that you had to sign in before play-which meant waiting for the pro shop to open.
Many rounds as a kid i had completed before I saw the first greens crew worker.Dew was a cool way to learn how to read break.