What’s Your Lowest Round of Golf?

[DaveP043]

69 (-2) at Talamore, about 10 years ago.  I've shot -2 two more times, I think, both 70 at my home club.  One of those was in a 36 hole stroke play tournament.

[Bucki1968]

65. Actually made a 7 on a par 5 during that round. Turned in 30, birdied number 10, thinking course record and hit it out of bounds! 

[klineka]

7 hours ago, pganapathy said:

Never understood the obsession with the number of strokes. 

I've never understood the obsession with score relative to par. The point of the game is to get around the course in the lowest number of shots, has nothing to do with par.

7 hours ago, pganapathy said:

So, a 75 on a par 72 is better than a 74 on a par 70 course 🤷‍♀️

That statement only holds true if the par 72 course is significantly longer/more difficult than the par 70 course.

Shooting a 74 on a par 70 course that is 6,500 yards is (most likely) better than a 75 on a par 72 course that is 6,000 yards. The person that shot the 74 covered an additional 500 yards and did so in one less stroke. 

[IowaGreg]

84 - against my father who shot an 87 that day.  Only time I EVER beat him before cancer took him 2 yrs later.

Edited December 19, 2019 by IowaGreg

[dalejbrass]

-4 (68)

[phillyk]

I've had 2 rounds at 64.

[NM Golf]

1 hour ago, klineka said:

I've never understood the obsession with score relative to par. The point of the game is to get around the course in the lowest number of shots, has nothing to do with par.

That statement only holds true if the par 72 course is significantly longer/more difficult than the par 70 course.

Shooting a 74 on a par 70 course that is 6,500 yards is (most likely) better than a 75 on a par 72 course that is 6,000 yards. The person that shot the 74 covered an additional 500 yards and did so in one less stroke. 

Comparing your score against the course rating would be the best way to assess your score. Par is just a number, the course rating gauges the overall difficulty of a course. That's why GHIN and the new World Golf handicap system use your score compared to the course rating to determine your handicap.

Ive shot 65 three times and all three came from different course ratings. Two of them came from the same course but different sets of tees where one came from a different course. Two of the course ratings were slightly under 70, but one was from tees rated at 72.2. That's technically the best round I've ever shot because it had a difference of 7.2.

Edited December 19, 2019 by NM Golf

[DeadMan]

71 - even par - for me. 

[Groucho Valentine]

As far numbers go, Ive shot 64 a handful of times. One of those was a -8 on a par 72. I remember that one because was my lowest score ever in relation to par. But I haven't broken 67 in number on any relation to par in a very long time. 

[jetsknicks1]

83 at Ocala National. Started with 5 consecutive pars.

[Sandy Divot]

71 on a 72. Par, birdie, and 16 straight pars.

[p1n9183]

65 (-7) at my home course. 6500 yards (71.2 rating). 2 years ago. 

[Darkfrog]

My lowest ever score is an 81. Usually my scores are in the 87-91 range.

I ended up playing out of my mind with three birdies, including a 50+ foot putt, and a chip in. If it weren't for one complete disaster of a hole, I might have broken 80.

[pganapathy]

5 hours ago, klineka said:

I've never understood the obsession with score relative to par. The point of the game is to get around the course in the lowest number of shots, has nothing to do with par.

That statement only holds true if the par 72 course is significantly longer/more difficult than the par 70 course.

Shooting a 74 on a par 70 course that is 6,500 yards is (most likely) better than a 75 on a par 72 course that is 6,000 yards. The person that shot the 74 covered an additional 500 yards and did so in one less stroke. 

Taking this to an extreme, would you be happy scoring say 70 on a executive par 3 only course.

Par is all about judging how difficult the course is.  Length is not the only factor that decides this.  A par 5 can be 500 or 600 yards long.  A par 3 can be 80 or 200 yards long.  You can have a lower par but yet a longer course.

Like somebody posted earlier, he shot a 58 on a par 60 course.  Would you then say he is better than most pros, with the best pro score being a 58 or 59 on a round.  By your argument, the total score is all that matters.

[dagolfer18]

24 minutes ago, pganapathy said:

Taking this to an extreme, would you be happy scoring say 70 on a executive par 3 only course.

Par is all about judging how difficult the course is.  Length is not the only factor that decides this.  A par 5 can be 500 or 600 yards long.  A par 3 can be 80 or 200 yards long.  You can have a lower par but yet a longer course.

Like somebody posted earlier, he shot a 58 on a par 60 course.  Would you then say he is better than most pros, with the best pro score being a 58 or 59 on a round.  By your argument, the total score is all that matters.

Relative to par is probably the winner. You can’t say you’re better than most pros if you shoot 58 or 59 on an 18-hole par-3 course, because that’s over par. However, shooting the same number on, say, a regulation par-72 course is amazing because that’s making birdie on a lot of the holes, not factoring in any bogeys. It’s all about what course you’re playing, and the difficulty of the course. 

Edited December 19, 2019 by dagolfer18

[pganapathy]

22 minutes ago, dagolfer18 said:

Relative to par is probably the winner. You can’t say you’re better than most pros if you shoot 58 or 59 on an 18-hole par-3 course, because that’s over par. However, shooting the same number on, say, a regulation par-72 course is amazing because that’s making birdie on a lot of the holes, not factoring in any bogeys. It’s all about what course you’re playing, and the difficulty of the course. 

My point exactly, but @klineka seems to disagree.  Anyway, that is why I feel this title thread should include a net score, rather than a gross score.

 

6 hours ago, klineka said:

I've never understood the obsession with score relative to par. The point of the game is to get around the course in the lowest number of shots, has nothing to do with par.

That statement only holds true if the par 72 course is significantly longer/more difficult than the par 70 course.

Shooting a 74 on a par 70 course that is 6,500 yards is (most likely) better than a 75 on a par 72 course that is 6,000 yards. The person that shot the 74 covered an additional 500 yards and did so in one less stroke. 

 

[klineka]

1 hour ago, pganapathy said:

Taking this to an extreme, would you be happy scoring say 70 on a executive par 3 only course.

No because that course is going to be very short, like 2,500 yards. Regardless of what "par" is, the point is to cover that 2,500 yards in as few strokes as possible. If the course was 2,500 yards and they were all listed as par 4s and you birdied half of them, would you brag that you shot 9 under par? I'd hope not.

1 hour ago, pganapathy said:

Par is all about judging how difficult the course is.  Length is not the only factor that decides this.  A par 5 can be 500 or 600 yards long.  A par 3 can be 80 or 200 yards long. 

You contradict yourself here. First you state that par is used for judging how difficult the course is, then you describe two examples of holes that are 100+ yards shorter/longer than one another. Surely the 500 yard hole will play easier than the 600 yard hole and the 80 yard hole will play easier than the 200 yard hole, yet they have the same par. If par is such a good indicator of how hard a hole is, shouldn't par be different on a 500yd hole compared to a 600yd hole? 

1 hour ago, pganapathy said:

You can have a lower par but yet a longer course.

Exactly, which makes par irrelevant, and is the exact situation I described earlier...

7 hours ago, klineka said:

Shooting a 74 on a par 70 course that is 6,500 yards is (most likely) better than a 75 on a par 72 course that is 6,000 yards. The person that shot the 74 covered an additional 500 yards and did so in one less stroke. 

Shooting the 75 on the 6,000 yd course means you shot 3 strokes over par and took 75 strokes to cover 6,000 yards. Shooting a 74 on the 6,500 yd course means you shot 4 strokes over par (which is worse than shooting 3 over par according to you) yet you covered 6,500 yards in only 74 strokes.

1 hour ago, pganapathy said:

Like somebody posted earlier, he shot a 58 on a par 60 course.  Would you then say he is better than most pros, with the best pro score being a 58 or 59 on a round.  By your argument, the total score is all that matters.

Total score on the same exact course from the same tee box is all that matters. It's silly to compare a 58 on a 3,000 yard course to a 58 on a 7,200 yard course. 

53 minutes ago, dagolfer18 said:

You can’t say you’re better than most pros if you shoot 58 or 59 on an 18-hole par-3 course, because that’s over par. However, shooting the same number on, say, a regulation par-72 course is amazing 

That's not comparing apples to apples though. That's comparing a score from a 3,000 yard course to a score on a 6,000-7,000+ yard course. 

If every single course suddenly removed what par was from every hole, the point of the game of golf would not change. The point would still be to get the ball in the each hole in as few strokes as possible.

[Buckeyebowman]

Shot a 69 on a par 72 course from the tips, way back in the day when I could actually play this game! 

5 hours ago, pganapathy said:

My point exactly, but @klineka seems to disagree.  Anyway, that is why I feel this title thread should include a net score, rather than a gross score.

 

 

That's a point, but I'd have no idea what my net would be, since I had no idea what my handicap was at the time. But, I don't figure it would be much different, since I shot right around par all the time! This was 40+ years ago.