How to UseYour Handicap When Playing Golf
There are two ways that golfers can use their handicaps in the various games that are listed in this section: Traditional Scoring, Playing Off The Low Handicap. It doesn’t really matter which system you use, just that you use it effectively and apply to whatever games you play. It will make the games more competitive, and more importantly, a heck of a lot more fun!
Traditional Scoring:
In traditional scoring each persons handicap remains unaffected. They simply take their handicap and compare it to the scorecard of the course that they will be playing. On the scorecard each hole will be ranked in toughness from 1 to 18. The hole ranked #1 is deemed to be the toughest and the hole ranked #18 is deemed to be the easiest. In the traditional scoring system a player will look at the scorecard to determine which holes they will be given strokes on. To determine their net score, a player with a 15 handicap will be able to take one stroke off of their score on every hole except the 16th, 17th, and 18th ranked holes. A player with a 2 handicap will not get be able to take any strokes off of their score expect on the 1st and 2nd ranked holes. Hence if a player with a 2 handicap and a player with a 15 handicap both bogey the 4th ranked hole, the player with the 2 handicap will be stuck with the bogey but the player with the 15 handicap will be able to take a stroke off of their score and their net score will now be a par. In this example the player with the higher handicap wins that hole.
The biggest confusion in handicaps comes when a player has a handicap higher than eighteen. Since there are only eighteen holes to be ranked some players think that they simply get credit for 18 strokes only and will have to suck-it-up for the rest. That is not the case and in actual fact it is quite easy to calculate strokes for players above an 18 handicap. Lets take a look a player with a 25 handicap. They will receive one stroke off their score per hole. But if no further strokes are taken off their score their will be a seven stroke difference between their net score and their handicap (25 – 18 strokes = 7). To adjust for this, the 25 handicap player, in addition to getting one stroke off on every hole, will also receive a further one stroke off for any holes ranked #7 or tougher. In other words on the holes ranked #1 - #7 the 25 handicap player will get 2 strokes off their score. On all the other holes they will receive only one stroke off their score.
Playing Off the Low Handicap:
In this system every player’s handicap is compared and the lowest person’s handicap is subtracted from everyone else to determine exactly how many strokes each player will get for the round and on which holes he/she will get those strokes.
Using this system for a sample foursome the following handicapping would be determined: Bill is a 5 handicap, John is a 20 handicap, Mike is a 10 handicap and Patrick is a 13 handicap. Since Bill is the lowest handicap his handicap will be deducted from everyone else’s handicap to give them a new number. John will become a 15, Mike will become a 5 and Patrick will become an 8. As a result John will receive one stroke on all of the holes ranked #1 - 15. Mike will receive one stroke on all holes ranked #1 – 5. Patrick will receive one stroke on all holes ranked #1 – 8. Since Bill is the lowest handicap of the foursome he will receive no strokes off his game and his handicap effectively becomes 0. |
Looking to add a little spice to your next round of golf (without having to dress in loud clothes)? Straight scoring is always good but there is nothing like standing over a five foot put on the eighteenth to win the beer and the bragging rights in the clubhouse! Here are just some of the great games you and your “foresome” can play to really get the juices flowing and the good natured ribbing flying the next time you are out on the links!