3/4 handicap allowance; fair or unfair?

First topic message reminder :

there was an article in golf monthly about this, didn't really understand it though.

I think 3/4 handicap is unfair as it favours low handicappers.
i.e: 20 handicapper has to play of 15
4 handicapper has to play off 3

There seems to be a hell of a lot of comps at my club that is 3/4 allowance and the only thing I have ever won (fortnight ago captains night) was off full allowance which resulted in me being cut from 25 to 22.1 due to a great round of 43 pts.

My modus operandi is to have as low a handicap as possible, not to win 8 quid so I won't achieve this by having 3/4 of my handicap taken into consideration as 36 pts (par) would be based on a handicap of 17 or so, so
A. It is very unlikely that I will ever be in contention for prizes
B. get my handicap reduced by a significant level.

The congu guy says in golf monthly that all club comps should be off full handicap 9granted this is the case for medal) but I don't think I have ever played stableford at my club with full allowance.

I may be wide of the mark here and missing something, if so let me know.

N.B I would love to have a handicap of 15 or so and that is my objective for this year

Did I get it wrong guys? Pray do tell.

drive4show wrote:Rossa

what you have achieved is excellent and I'm not having a pop at you, you've show a bit of desire. I'm having a pop at all the others that can't be bothered to improve but still expect to do well in competitions :run1:

Cheers D4S, I know you weren't mate... I know what you mean, but if with full handicaps lower hc wins 55% of the time, why insist on 3/4?

The stats show that the lower handicap golfer has an advantage even off full handicap. Seems that is how it should be in order to give higher handicap golfers some incentive to improve. But why should further advantage be given by making it 3/4.

Tarka, what comps are 3/4 there are hardly any at ours, and certainly no medal comps that are 3/4

Hayston - i think it generally just works as 3/4 of the difference therefore between a +4 and a 16 instead of giving 20 shots the +4 just gives 15.

His handicap of +4 doesn't go 'up' to +3 just because that's 75% of 4

Just out of interest, what IS 3/4 of +4 in handicap terms?

tarka

I'm not having a go at anyone on a personal level and I'm all in favour of people taking up the game and doing their best to improve, as I'm sure you are doing.

My point though is this, golf competitions are COMPETITIVE events, surely the person that has worked the hardest to become the best they can should have an advantage over a beginner or someone who makes no great effort to improve?

Or to put it another way, if a 28 handicapper has a really good day, he might shoot 18-20 over par, beating his handicap by maybe 10 shots. If a scratch player has a really good day, he might beat his handicap by 2 or 3 shots. If you relate that to a singles knockout match where the scratch player is giving full allowance, that equates to him getting drubbed something like 7&6.

Hardly fair is it?

Rossa wrote:

drive4show wrote:Rossa

what you have achieved is excellent and I'm not having a pop at you, you've show a bit of desire. I'm having a pop at all the others that can't be bothered to improve but still expect to do well in competitions :run1:

Cheers D4S, I know you weren't mate... I know what you mean, but if with full handicaps lower hc wins 55% of the time, why insist on 3/4?

Cos we want to win 100% of the time!!!

D4S - are you advocating scrapping handicaps in competitions altogether?

MustPuttBetter wrote:D4S - are you advocating scrapping handicaps in competitions altogether?

Absolutely not! What I am advocating is that those that have worked harder on their games have an advantage over those that haven't.

The handicap system is one of the things that makes golf stand out from other sports.

drive4show wrote:tarka

I'm not having a go at anyone on a personal level and I'm all in favour of people taking up the game and doing their best to improve, as I'm sure you are doing.

My point though is this, golf competitions are COMPETITIVE events, surely the person that has worked the hardest to become the best they can should have an advantage over a beginner or someone who makes no great effort to improve?

Or to put it another way, if a 28 handicapper has a really good day, he might shoot 18-20 over par, beating his handicap by maybe 10 shots. If a scratch player has a really good day, he might beat his handicap by 2 or 3 shots. If you relate that to a singles knockout match where the scratch player is giving full allowance, that equates to him getting drubbed something like 7&6.

and its also not fair on somone who has a handcap around 10 when he is clearly better than that or makes no effort to be cut, picks and choses when he plays, what he shoots well in etc. Not all high handicappers are bandits and not all bandits are high handicappers

Hardly fair is it?

and its also not fair on somone who has a handcap around 10 when he is clearly better than that or makes no effort to be cut, picks and choses when he plays, what he shoots well in etc. Not all high handicappers are bandits and not all bandits are high handicappers

D4S,

That's handicap golf...

There are scratch comps and handicap comps, you seem to be advocating some sort of middle ground where handicaps are allowed its just the sqewed in favour of lower handicap golfers.

I also don't buy a (true) 28 handicap shoots 18-20 over on a really good day, he only needs to do that once in a qualifying comp and he'd drop 3.2 - 4.0 shots and take 32 to 40 comps to back back if he missed the buffer each time.

I'm not saying its impossible but its much rarer than some low handicaps make out...

Obviously you have people that never have a (true) handicap, not by some form cheating just by the virtue that they are improving... i have felt that my handicap always trails behind my ability, i'm off 15 now but i'm capable of going out and playing to 12, by the time my handicap catches up, i hope to be capable of breaking 80 and so on... but thats ok because i'm putting the work in and the practice and therefore deserve to win a few things along the way...

Hmm, whilst i do agree that those who are trying to improve should somehow be rewarded more than those who are happy with their 18 handicap, i'm not sure you should really have a half-way handicappnig system. Surely you either level it out so the 20 handicapper and the 3 hanicapper both have the same chance of winning or you ditch it full stop. I'm not entirely sure going three quarters makes much sense

Of course this brings us back to the fact that the whole point of clubs adopting a 3/4 handicap for the matchpaly stuff is because they want the lower handicappers in the later stages.
So - is it fair? No, it's not meant to be!

Rossa

People like you are the very reason for the 3/4 allowance in the first place. You are improving at a very fast rate and if you played a low handicapper off full allowance, you would probably beat him. Low handicappers have generally plateaued out at that level, it's very difficult for them to go way under handicap. They generally are steady and don't mess up too many holes which is why they win more matches, not by shooting way under their handicaps.

MustPuttBetter wrote:Hmm, whilst i do agree that those who are trying to improve should somehow be rewarded more than those who are happy with their 18 handicap, i'm not sure you should really have a half-way handicappnig system. Surely you either level it out so the 20 handicapper and the 3 hanicapper both have the same chance of winning or you ditch it full stop. I'm not entirely sure going three quarters makes much sense

Of course this brings us back to the fact that the whole point of clubs adopting a 3/4 handicap for the matchpaly stuff is because they want the lower handicappers in the later stages.
So - is it fair? No, it's not meant to be!

3/4 handicap has ALWAYS been how it is, it's only in the last couple of years that it's changed to full allowance.

D4S - i know that. I hadn't said otherwise. I'm just saying i'm not entirely sure there's any sense to it.
Mormons have been around for a long time too but i don't get them either

MustPuttBetter wrote:
Of course this brings us back to the fact that the whole point of clubs adopting a 3/4 handicap for the matchpaly stuff is because they want the lower handicappers in the later stages.
So - is it fair? No, it's not meant to be!

Apologies, your wording above implies that you thought 3/4 allowance was a new thing

One of the best things about 606v2 as opposed to 606 is that you hardly ever hear the term 'Doubles'.
You have no idea how much the remains of my teeth grate when I hear that experssion.

Started to rear it's ugly head again though.

Ok D4S,

In order for someone to get to a low handicap they must have had a very successful year or two... when they won a lot? No? The vast majority of higher handicappers are at that level because that's how good they are? Not everyone is getting cut a lot... Why chuck the baby out with the bathwater to solve the problem of a handfull of players who work hard to improve beating a lower handicap player, who may have had his time doing the same in earlier years. As has been demonstated this is the exception to the rule, so why insist on 3/4 for everyone when what you describe is a minority of cases, especially when the low guy has probably been in the position of the high guy at some point in the past.
Its a bit like drivers getting peed off with learner drivers. They forget they were in the same position once.

No apologies needed

Anyway, what are your views on Mormons?

DTW - i may have been guilty of using that term once or twice (although interestingly never in real life! Ha)
What about it upsets you so much? Just the fact that it's a bit of an Americanism?

...and the scratch guy doesn't play of scratch.... He plays off 3/4 of scratch

I think the old logic behind using 3/4 handicap was that for matchplay & indeed stablefords higher handicappers don't get punished as much for the horror holes (ok, it's loss of hole or blob but it's not ruined round as a triple/quadruple would be in a medal). Not everyone shoots exactly their handicap everytime they play there is a deviation from the handicap. The theory being that higher handicappers deviate more either way because they aren't consistent so a 3/4 allowance in matchplay was supposed to even that out.
As it turned out though, lower handicappers still tended to prevail over the piece hence the return a few years ago to full allowance in matchplay singles.
If a higher handicapper does consistently shoot better than his/her handicap then (assuming they play medals as frequently as matches) their handicap Will come down to reflect...simples. I think the ones we all detest are those that play off artificially high handicaps (play minimum medals and throw them then quite happily take their full allowance in a match)

Hmmmmmm Mormons.

I don't believe they are into casual sex? Not much use to me then really. Maybe we should put them all in a hole and shoot them, as suggested in another thread

Hee hee, this does indeed bring us back to the subject of 'easy holes' as mentioned in that other thread........

Or even a different other thread!

Rossa wrote:Ok D4S,

In order for someone to get to a low handicap they must have had a very successful year or two... when they won a lot? No? The vast majority of higher handicappers are at that level because that's how good they are? Not everyone is getting cut a lot... Why chuck the baby out with the bathwater to solve the problem of a handfull of players who work hard to improve beating a lower handicap player, who may have had his time doing the same in earlier years. As has been demonstated this is the exception to the rule, so why insist on 3/4 for everyone when what you describe is a minority of cases, especially when the low guy has probably been in the position of the high guy at some point in the past.
Its a bit like drivers getting peed off with learner drivers. They forget they were in the same position once.

Your argument is coherent and you make some very valid points. Maybe I'm just bitter and twisted after too many beatings at the hands of higher handicappers. Wish I had a £ for every time one of them has turned to me and said 'I never normally play that well'

I think the old ratio of low/high wins was about right and a good reflection on the work people put into their games. As your handicap continues to come down and you start giving shots more often than you receive them, I'm sure you'll come round to my way of thinking

D4S, ultimately when you lose to a higher handicapper you will still be walking away knowing you are the better player (unless they beat you gross which is unlikely).
So even though you might not win the match or the trophy you still have the last laugh really.

Diggers

true....but scant consolation

And the problem with the term 'doubles' is??

drive4show wrote:Diggers

true....but scant consolation

Drive,
If I had the option of winning the club championship or having a handicap of 10 tomorrow and being a better player I would take the lower handicap any day of the week.

Tarka, isn't your club championship a scratch comp? If so, take the championship offer and your handicap will come down loads as you'll have shot aprpox 15 under it per round!
Everyone's a winner!

D4S you're probably right,

As i mentioned earlier, i got knocked out of the matchplay by a high handicapper, the comp is for 18 - 28 hc... about a week after the draw i got cut to 15. so for the sake of that comp i was playing like +2, well sort of... so i've had a taste. I'm also on the brink of Div 2, 14.4 and below (now off 14.8), so i've taken great pride a few times having 'lowest gross' next to my name in a Div 3 medal even when not finishing in the top 5 or so net. Even though i didn't win, i was was the best golfer in that comp and that feels great, especially when you can take the wind out of your mates sails (who had the lowest net) by saying, "well you didn't win reeeeaally did you"

MustPuttBetter wrote:Tarka, isn't your club championship a scratch comp? If so, take the championship offer and your handicap will come down loads as you'll have shot aprpox 15 under it per round!
Everyone's a winner!

mate, i'm getting mixed up with all this stuff but i'm sure you can appreciate the sentiment :-)

Ha ha i can indeed

For clarification, i wasn't actually offering you the club championship. I don't have that power

¾ handicap allowance was used in matchplay for years because of the way handicaps were calculated in the old days. Your handicap was pretty much your last gross score minus the standard scratch score. There was no account taken of 10s and 12s on your card.

So many people were playing off handicaps which were based on a couple of disaster holes. In matchplay you would lose the hole where you had a disaster, but only that hole. The ¾ allowance was brought in to reflect the fact that on the other 16 or 17 holes you might play a lot better than your handicap, on a regular basis.

Now that handicaps are calculated by CONGU rules, then bad holes are factored out of the equation, and therefore your handicap reflects what you would score with no worse than a double bogey on any given hole.

So in recent times, first the SGU and now the EGU have decided that singles matchplay will be on the basis of full allowance, foursomes will be ½ of the combined difference, fourball ¾ of the difference. I believe greensomes are supposed to be 0.6 of the lower handicap and 0.4 of the higher handicap added together, although that hasn't been confirmed yet.

I've never heard of singles medals or stableford singles played off anything that full handicap, although sometimes limited to 18 or 24. Perhaps the ¾ allowance in singles is at clubs where they want to encourage people to play who wouldn't bother or wouldn't be allowed if there was a limit of 18.

i've never played a stroke or stableford comp in summer conditions with 3/4
handicap. singles matchplay comps used to be played of 3/4 until the stableford handicap system came in, which is apparently 'a more accurate representation'. having been knocked out of our summer singles by a 19handicapper who shot a couple under handicap, but had 8 gross pars and a birdie, i beg to differ. yes there are players playing off circa 18 hcp, that shoot steady bogey golf, but there are rather a lot of young players it seems at our club, who have perhaps only recently 'seriously' taken up golf and are posting some great scores.

personally i think these folk have been allotted incorrect handicaps, as all the committee have seen, are 3 cards with some numbers. had a committee member played with them then they would see that clearly some of these guys have the ability to shoot some great scores, and their handicap ought to reflect this. maybe its time the 28 limit was brought down to a more sensible limit of 18. certainly this would reduce the 'junior section' scores our club comps have experienced over the last few weeks. i've no problem with juniors shooting ridiculous scores in their section, but the main club ought to be protected to a certain degree by that kind of banditry [in my opinion!]

perhaps a compromise would be:

23 handicapper shoots 88 nett 65, par of 72. adjustment is made to handicap accordingly, however competitive handicap for the comp is adjusted to max limit 18, i.e. 88 nett 70. If nett 70 is good enough to win, fair enough - well done - trophy deserved. i've played quite a few opens which operate in this manner - max limit 18 handicap, but there are a few off say 23 hcp that will have a go anyway. having started off with a handicap of 23 myself i didn't find there was much difference between 23 and 18 anyway. there are two members of our group who are of a similar standard, but who play off 14 and 21, purely because of the starting handicap they were given by different committees.

If you play off a low h'cap, getting the stroke index right is imperative when it comes to giving full difference in match play. One of the reasons I gave up playing in the knock-outs was because the single stroke holes were front and back end loaded. It also doesn't help that the maximum h'cap for females is 36!

When the women's game adopted the congu system, it was effectively using a system designed for a men's h'cap limit of 24 and not 36. As no explanation was offered at the time that such a significant differential could perhaps make a difference to the outcome of a match, it can only be deduced that it never occurred to anyone to take it into consideration in the first place! Incidentally, I've read the congu myth no 7 and you will please note that it is based on stats taken only from mens' assns.

Having said that and, nowithstanding those females who deliberately keep their h'caps high in order to plunder the mixed 4somes circuit, there can be little doubt that 3/4 does favour the lower h'capper. I just think that full difference is too much the other way. Why not 5/6?

I think that in matchplay comps, 3/4 handicaps are appropriate, and full handicap difference in my view is unfair.

In all other types of stroke play comps, cant see any valid reason, why 3/4 handicaps should apply, as this only gives the low handicappers an advantage.

gael, i believe the mens limit is 28, junior boys is 36 and girls/ladies is 45!! pure mental!! 18, 27 and 36 would seem more appropriate from my limited experience. i remember when i was a junior , at the prize giving dinner one of the ladies prizes being awarded. the ladies captain explained that the competition had been won by an incredible 21 shots ... with a 94nett49. aparently she was cut 13 strokes... though another 94 would result in a nett 62.

At my club for the last few years all comp's have been off full handicap... but if you look at the stats that have been gathered by the Golf Unions then the lower handicap wins more than 50% of the time.

I can't remember the except details but it's something like lower handicap wins 58% of the time on 3/4 handicap diff versus 53% wins if full handicap is allowed.

Interesting tho' I was playing against our best golfer in the club on Monday (I lost on the 17th ......... Anyway- He is currently scratch but was +2 and he is now not entering the handicap knockouts as he is fed up giving 2 shots to folks who can easily reach par 4's in 2

GWR - I assume you mean par FIVES in two?

Even so, I think that's pretty sad reason to not play anymore. I know 25 handicappers who can reach par 5s in two ... it's the rest of their game that keeps them at 25

GWR-Golfer wrote:At my club for the last few years all comp's have been off full handicap... but if you look at the stats that have been gathered by the Golf Unions then the lower handicap wins more than 50% of the time.

I can't remember the except details but it's something like lower handicap wins 58% of the time on 3/4 handicap diff versus 53% wins if full handicap is allowed.

Interesting tho' I was playing against our best golfer in the club on Monday (I lost on the 17th ......... Anyway- He is currently scratch but was +2 and he is now not entering the handicap knockouts as he is fed up giving 2 shots to folks who can easily reach par 4's in 2

I think most low handicap players feel this way, I don't want to sound elitist or a low handicap golf snob but I just find the whole concept and playing in handicap matches boring so don't care if they get 3/4 or full, fine in a bounce game but I can't be bothered with handicap matchplay.
Hardly any low handicappers at my clubs enter the handicap knockout matchplay competitions.

Davie - I did actually mean par 4's - so they are on the green in net zero. Recently he went round in 4-under and didn't get in the prizes and he only got 0.1 taken off his handicap due to the standard scratch being adjusted upwards..... which is completely bizarre as we had 45/44/43 points being recorded yet the SSS went UP !!!

I'm with him on the standard scratch thing as I cannot understand why other people should affect my score... the SSS should not change.

OK gotcha. I misunderstood/misread what you were saying

Any decent player knows that when a high handicapper gets a whiff of winning they panic and fall to pieces.
One of the main reasons low handicap golfers mainly win handicap ko competitions.
I was giving 17 shots once and 5 down after 7 holes. I won 2/1. I always knew that I would win that match as it was a downwind first 9 holes.

GWR-Golfer wrote:Davie - I did actually mean par 4's - so they are on the green in net zero. Recently he went round in 4-under and didn't get in the prizes and he only got 0.1 taken off his handicap due to the standard scratch being adjusted upwards..... which is completely bizarre as we had 45/44/43 points being recorded yet the SSS went UP !!!

I'm with him on the standard scratch thing as I cannot understand why other people should affect my score... the SSS should not change.

Don't unfderstand the first paragraph if the player finished 4 under and CSS was higher than Par for the course then he should have lost at least .5. Can't say I fully understand CSS but it is dependent on the number of players scores relative to SSS not how many under SSS the leaders are.

Handicaps represent the relative strengths of one players game against all the others so of course other people should effect your change in handicap.

GWR-Golfer wrote:Davie - I did actually mean par 4's - so they are on the green in net zero. Recently he went round in 4-under and didn't get in the prizes and he only got 0.1 taken off his handicap due to the standard scratch being adjusted upwards..... which is completely bizarre as we had 45/44/43 points being recorded yet the SSS went UP !!!

I'm with him on the standard scratch thing as I cannot understand why other people should affect my score... the SSS should not change.

I was going to point out that this is likely to be utter rot, unless the competition CSS was 3 under par, but bluefoxgolf got there first.

In general, there is a great deal of misunderstanding of the handicap system and handicap allowances in competitions. Category 1 golfers are equally ignorant as the rest of us less talented.

The definitive piece on handicap allowances in competition was written for the USGA some years ago. This is a link to the research http://www.usga.org/Content.aspx?id=25506
As a result of this, full handicap allowance in singles matchplay became the norm, starting in the US & Mexico and eventually becoming the position here. Even taking allowance of the fact that the USGA handicapping system (Course & slope rating based) is different from ours (SSS & CSS based), there are some very interesting articles on handicapping which are well worth reading on the USGA's website. http://www.usga.org/handicapping/articles_resources/Using-Your-Handicap-Articles---Resources/

I note that in 4 ball match play the USGA now states full handicap allowance.

"Any decent player knows that when a high handicapper gets a whiff of winning they panic and fall to pieces"

Ha ha, sure they do.........

S_R...."I think most low handicap players feel this way, I don't want to sound elitist or a low handicap golf snob but I just find the whole concept and playing in handicap matches boring so don't care if they get 3/4 or full, fine in a bounce game but I can't be bothered with handicap matchplay.
Hardly any low handicappers at my clubs enter the handicap knockout matchplay competitions."

...a bit defeatist don't you think? Taking a look back through our hcp matchplay singles
2007 a 9 beat a +1 in the final
2008 a scratch beat a 4 in the final
2009 an 8 beat a 7 in the final
2010 an 11 beat another 11 in the final

Hardly fertile ground for high handicappers is it?? Incidentally I was that 9 in 2007 and the 8 in 2009. I'm not saying high handicappers can't do damage on their day but the stats tell you that more often than not, when it gets to the business end of the tournament it's predominately lower guys who contest it.

Doon the Water wrote:Any decent player knows that when a high handicapper gets a whiff of winning they panic and fall to pieces.
One of the main reasons low handicap golfers mainly win handicap ko competitions.
I was giving 17 shots once and 5 down after 7 holes. I won 2/1. I always knew that I would win that match as it was a downwind first 9 holes.

Always makes me chortle when a comment like this is followed up with a tale of a heroic win against the odds by the guy who posts it. Every time.....