Blue, White, Red, or Some Other Color?

[FlyingAce]

According to my husband who has a 13hcp, moving to the forward tee box does not magically make the game easier where he can shoot even par. The distance is shorter but it still requires skills and accuracy. He gets into hazards that he didn’t know existed and has to use different clubs/strategies. He described playing from the forward tees as less challenging but not any easier. 

There is a group of 5some seniors at my club who plays regularly from the white tees, yet none of them could drive past the forward tee box. It is brutal watching and playing behind them because they don’t let anyone play through and everyone knows they should tee it forward, except them. Then after the game, they’d get drinks at the clubhouse and talk about how bad a round they just played...

[shanksalot]

There are three 18 hole courses in our area. Each has a designated senior set of tees. We also have three senior tournaments each week. They play all three at the senior tees. The youngest you can be to play in the senior tournament is 50 years old. Beyond 50 anyone can play and if you are 80 you can move down to the red tees. They play Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. Each day is a different course. They get roughly 140 seniors each day.

[Mr22putt]

5 hours ago, FlyingAce said:

There is a group of 5some seniors at my club who plays regularly from the white tees, yet none of them could drive past the forward tee box. It is brutal watching and playing behind them because they don’t let anyone play through and everyone knows they should tee it forward, except them. Then after the game, they’d get drinks at the clubhouse and talk about how bad a round they just played...

There are lots of dbag, delusional, entitled OLD clowns.....I feel your pain.

You should call the pro shop and find out when these TOOLS are playing and get out before them.

[RayG]

Play from where you want. A lot of courses have done away with "Ladies" tees. Instead, they will have 4-5 different sets of tees. Fronts might be red, gold, yellow or whatever color they choose. They'll call them "Forward" tees, or I've even seen "Junior" as a way to describe them. (Must be under 14 or something to use them)

some just haven't gotten around to the new paradigm, if only because they have thousands of scorecards already printed up with "Ladies" tee yardages. 

[Double Mocha Man]

Teal, navy, sand, white and light blue.  Tee blocks on a nearby course.  Nary a red block in there.

When I design my own course there will be:

• Jade: 
• Olive: 
• Scarlett: ...
• Violet: ...
• Russet: ...
• Rose: ...
• Ebony:   

Eh, or maybe I'll just have conch shells and coconuts as tee markers... forward and back... just two tees.

[phan52]

On 10/21/2019 at 9:44 AM, RetiredOldMan said:

 

There are no Senior Tees designated as such. My golfing buddies say, "Red is for the  Women." Men's tees are White and Champion tees are Blue. 

 

We have five sets of tees and we got rid of the designations like "Senior" and "Women" about 5 years ago. They range from 6900 yards to 5150. Most players play from the 6500 yard tees, as they are traditionally the "Mens" tee, but more and more are playing the 6200 yard tees. It is more fun for us seniors and still quite the challenge, and is actually the length that the "mens" tee was for years until we built the 6900 yard tees about 15 years ago. So what used to be the tips (6500) evolved into the "mens" tee. Mind you, the course is over 100 years old, so 6200 yards was quite the challenge back in the day (still is for me). The Pro Tour used to play at my course for years and were playing it at 6500 yards as recently as the 70's. The women used to play at 5600 yards but have settled into playing it at 5150, where it still has a 71.1 rating and a 130 slope for them.They initially didn't want to do it because they called them the "junior" tees, but that has gone away. 

Just go with the colors and avoid designations. 

[Double Mocha Man]

Take this with a grain of salt.

Ideas for tees: 

- Savvy tees, understands the meaning of life, ego in check = Up tees. 

- Normalacy tees, I don't hit the drives 220 yards but I can still dream = Middle tees. 

- Stupid tees, I can't break 80 but I'll be turning pro by next year = Back tees.

Edited October 22, 2019 by Double Mocha Man
Clarification

[Bonvivant]

Pick that yardage that you like to play would be my advice. My round on Sunday was played on a nice public course where they had 4 tees, which I had never played before. We played from the 2nd to back (happened to be greens at 6500 yards), even though me and @topoftheline89 should have been playing 1 up from there (grays at 6100 yards) all because we were playing with someone else (a stranger that commented that he normally played the back tees {7000 yards}, although I am not sure that is right for him either because he struggled from where we were). It made for quite a miserable scoring round for both of us (the extra 400 yards wouldn't have helped us that much but some).

For reference my good drives end up 230-245 yards total distance and my preferred tees are anywhere from 5000-6300 yards. As soon as I get over that 6300 mark I can almost guarantee that I will not be breaking 100, and that is where it stops being as much fun for me. I still enjoyed the round, but when you look at the score card afterward and have to adjust more than 5 strokes for ESC it really is discouraging and doesn't make you want to play that course again.

TLDR: Enjoy your round of golf, and if the tees that you are playing prohibit you from doing that, tee it forward.

[Osnola]

Being a senior golfer, I generally look to play the tees that are between 5700 and 6000 yards. That’s what I am comfortable with. 

[RickK]

At the club I belong to we have Blue tees (7101), White tee (6529), Gold (6029), Red (5504) and recently added a marker at the beginning edge of every fairway which is Orange.  Don't know the yardage on that just yet.  That tee box is being used by beginners, ladies at their discretion and agreement amongst their playing partners and men who are over 80 years old.  

Now...if you play in the Men's Golf Association (MGA), they normally play from the White tees.  However, if you play in the MGA and you are over 70yrs old, you are allowed to play from the Gold tees but you give up 2 strokes doing so.  It is optional to do that.

If you play in the Senior Men's Golf Association (SMGA), they normally play the Gold tees.  But, if you are over 70, you are allowed to play from the Red tees and you give up 2 strokes.  And, if you are over 80, you can play the Orange tees and you give up only 2 strokes or the same as you would give up by just moving up to the Red tees.  Moving up in any case is optional. 

I can't really say how the Ladies play.  Have yet to get to play in their group but we do have 2 ladies that play with the SMGA from time to time.  Both of them can beat most of the seniors on any given day.

I think the only time the MGA uses the Blue tees is during the Club Championship and only if you are in the Championship flight.  

 

[boogielicious]

21 hours ago, FlyingAce said:

According to my husband who has a 13hcp, moving to the forward tee box does not magically make the game easier where he can shoot even par. The distance is shorter but it still requires skills and accuracy. He gets into hazards that he didn’t know existed and has to use different clubs/strategies. He described playing from the forward tees as less challenging but not any easier. 

There is a group of 5some seniors at my club who plays regularly from the white tees, yet none of them could drive past the forward tee box. It is brutal watching and playing behind them because they don’t let anyone play through and everyone knows they should tee it forward, except them. Then after the game, they’d get drinks at the clubhouse and talk about how bad a round they just played...

It makes it different, which can be fun and challenging. I have a friend who is a 2 HC and when we play, he plays my tees which are the 6000-6300 tees. He ends up having to use other clubs off the tee than he is used to. We played a course two weeks ago and on the front 9 I shot a 39 and he a 38, which means I beat him by 5 on that side net. He struggled with club selection off the tee.

[CharlieB]

Wow! I only hit my driver 170 and my 5H 110. It looks like I should take up miniature golf. I play the gold tee’s (5700 yards) and normally shoot low 90’s to 100.

I do spend 90% of my practice within 30 yards of the pin.

Edited October 24, 2019 by CharlieB

[leftybutnotPM]

On 10/22/2019 at 10:45 AM, David in FL said:

I don’t understand what that has to do with the subject of this thread...

It has to do with the fact that you don't aways have a choice of tees. In my case never in 45 years of golf.

[chilepepper]

You can play any color tee you want in casual play. Your handicap if you keep one is adjusted accordingly. I look at total yardages for each tee and choose one that I know isn’t a ridiculous length for my game. 

In tournaments you play the assigned tees. In foursome comps you go with the majority

[DrMJG]

The two courses I primarily play call the so called women's tees as simply Forward.  Simply a third choice.  

And, at my age and given my somewhat handicapped body, I play the forward tees, regardless of the designation.

Heck, I became aware of a young woman in the foursome I was assigned to join, who played from the Champion tees and out drove everybody, including me at the Forwards and, in the end made the rest of us look like really bad hacks (instead of the mere old hack I consider myself.)

Get rid of any sex reference in how one names the tees.

[iacas]

2 hours ago, DrMJG said:

Get rid of any sex reference in how one names the tees.

We're getting there, slowly but surely.

[David in FL]

8 hours ago, leftybutnotPM said:

It has to do with the fact that you don't aways have a choice of tees. In my case never in 45 years of golf.

Interesting. I’ve been playing golf for over 50 years, all over the world, and I can’t remember even one time when I didn’t have a choice of tees.

[leftybutnotPM]

4 hours ago, David in FL said:

Interesting. I’ve been playing golf for over 50 years, all over the world, and I can’t remember even one time when I didn’t have a choice of tees.

I play competition golf twice  a week. Put simply, you play off the men's tees. We have what are called "social tees' but these are for people who aren't really golfers - people just having a hit when competitions are not on. 

You will find that in Australia, most members play a competition on Saturdays. Midweek and Sunday competitions are available. You never get a choice of tee. That's my point about handicaps - they account for the fact that not everyone is going for greens in regulation because they don't have the length. Heaven help the ego of a player who chooses tees that give him a mid or short iron into every par 4 and 3, thinking that he is an 80 shooter, when he plays off the men's tees on a decent course.

Not saying I don't like the idea of different tees, but the way an 80 year old competes with a 24 year old is with handicap - not a head start on every hole.

Edited October 26, 2019 by leftybutnotPM