My First Round with a "Playing Condition Calculation" (PCC) Adjustment

[bkuehn1952]

I spent last week in Reunion, FL, playing the Reunion Resort courses (Nicklaus, Palmer, Watson).  One of the rounds on the Nicklaus course had a +2 PCC.  The weather was cool and windy and the course is fairly tough for players with my modest abilities.  Still, I did not expect a PCC adjustment during our stay.  I stunk out the place so my round contributed to the PCC adjustment but the score was not one of my best 8.  None of the other rounds had a PCC adjustment, including my other round at Nicklaus on Saturday when I thought the wind was stronger and the hole positions more difficult.

[Rkrider99]

A couple weeks ago, I noticed when looking at my past scoring history, that one of my rounds had a PCC of +1. Thinking back on that round, I don't remember any outstanding issues like cold or wind. I don't think I scored exceptionally either high or low.

Is there any public information on why a PCC is given on a round? Does the course know it happens? Or is it a big dark secret, they just do it.

[iacas]

It’s not about cold or wind or rain. It’s about scoring only. It’s an algorithm.

[DaveP043]

I've been interested, so I recently checked to see if we'd had any PCC applied at my home club.  With Admin access to GHIN, I can get a list of PCC for the entire state.  I found one day where we'd had a PCC of +1 applied at Stoneleigh.  So I got a report of all scores reported for the day, deleted those that weren't posted on the same day of play (they aren't included in the calculations, but DO get adjusted).  The average of (Differential-HI) was a bit over 6, if I remember right, with 17 Member scores posted, and possibly a couple of guest scores that might have counted.  I believe the average of (Diff-HI) would be around 2 to 3, so the scores were 3 to 4 over what I think would be expected, and the adjustment was a single stroke.

I don't have access to the calculation method for determining PCC, but as @iacas says, its based only on scores reported, there are no qualitative judgements made.  Not only that, but they have to be reported on the same day as you play, so please post your scores promptly.

[iacas]

Also, note that on days when a + PCC is applied, it's less likely that you'll shoot a good score that will count among your 8.

[Rkrider99]

Ok, thanks for the info. I guess I was just confused on how the WHS explained it. When course conditions or weather affect scores, then a PCC may be applied.  I guess they could have left the abnormal course conditions or weather part out, and just said if everyone is scoring higher/(lower?) on a particular day, we'll apply a PCC.

[DaveP043]

4 minutes ago, Rkrider99 said:

Ok, thanks for the info. I guess I was just confused on how the WHS explained it. When course conditions or weather affect scores, then a PCC may be applied.  I guess they could have left the abnormal course conditions or weather part out, and just said if everyone is scoring higher/(lower?) on a particular day, we'll apply a PCC.

I believe they've tried to design the calculations so that days with what I'd call a "normal" variability won't trigger an adjustment.  If everyone is just a stroke or two above "normal", no adjustment is likely.  What they want to identify are days where the variability is into the very rare range, where the variance is more likely to be due to a factor beyond just normal swings.  If you look at my example, the correction applied doesn't get the averages anywhere close to "normal", it just moves things a little closer in that direction.  

[Groucho Valentine]

Im not sure i fully understand the PCC thing, but it seems like there could be a disproportionate effect on better players. The muni i play at often is moderately easy for players of my skill level. Especially if you're handy with mid and long irons. Both courses are long (some 67-6800 yards from just the middle tees) but the fairways are cavernous. Some 50 yards wide on some holes. The group i often run with (all sub 5 handicaps) regularly shoot in the mid 70's there, and you usually have to shoot around par to win the low score pot we do. But higher handicaps shoot some high scores there because while the fairways are wide and greens fairly large - if you miss them by more than 10 yards or so you're probably reloading. You're either not going to find it or its in a hazard. 

Even though the handful of better players will shoot 75 or better there usually, higher single digit cappers (around 6-10) can really struggle there.  So if im out there shooting 75 or so alot of the time, and some 8 handicap is shooting in the high 80 or low 90s and PCC is applied, i get a benefit from it? It seems weird. 

[DaveP043]

8 minutes ago, Groucho Valentine said:

 So if im out there shooting 75 or so alot of the time, and some 8 handicap is shooting in the high 80 or low 90s and PCC is applied, i get a benefit from it? It seems weird. 

Chances are that a 8 handicap isn't shooting high 80s or 90s too often, or else he would be a 12 or 15 handicap.  And it will take more than just a couple of guys having a bad day to trigger a PCC, it will happen only if a majority of the scores posted that day are significantly higher than what would normally be expected.  That would include a 2-handicap guy shooting a hideous 79 or something like that, and I'm sure that happens along with the even par rounds.

[Club Rat]

The question I have, will it applied to all locality of courses near the course area a player will be playing, or will it be defined to a specific course only.
An example which I will question would be when only a handful of players are on the course I play and there is a thunderstorm or rain that day.
While a nearby course only a mile away did not have any weather effects on play.

[David in FL]

5 minutes ago, Club Rat said:

The question I have, will it applied to all locality of courses near the course area a player will be playing, or will it be defined to a specific course only.
An example which I will question would be when only a handful of players are on the course I play and there is a thunderstorm or rain that day.
While a nearby course only a mile away did not have any weather effects on play.

I believe it’s course specific, though @iacas can confirm.

I‘m in the same general area and played several days last week in the cold and wind and have yet to see any adjustment this year...

[DaveP043]

4 minutes ago, Club Rat said:

The question I have, will it applied to all locality of courses near the course area a player will be playing, or will it be defined to a specific course only.
An example which I will question would be when only a handful of players are on the course I play and there is a thunderstorm or rain that day.
While a nearby course only a mile away did not have any weather effects on play.

It will be calculated on a course-by-course basis.  In fact, if a club owns two courses, one course could have a PCC, and the other might not, or they could be different values.  This is logical, as things like course set-up, pin positions, green speed, fairway firmness, all can have an impact on overall scoring.  If one course is set up to play difficult, maybe with demanding pin positions for a tournament, and the other is set up easier, you would logically expect scoring to be different on the two courses, even though the weather is identical.

[Club Rat]

An other scenario which may occur?
How it will use any scoring algorithm when only one or two players are playing during poor weather conditions? 

[iacas]

36 minutes ago, Club Rat said:

An other scenario which may occur?
How it will use any scoring algorithm when only one or two players are playing during poor weather conditions? 

Not sure what you mean.

It won't. Two is not a statistically significant number of players. No PCC will be applied.

Also, if 60 people shoot horrible scores in the morning, and the weather clears and 30 people shoot normal scores in the afternoon, everyone may see an adjustment if the average is still high enough.

It's not going to be perfect, because it's just math, just an algorithm. There are lots of little pitfalls - changing weather, people not posting the same day, people not applying NDB correctly, etc. - but it's better than what we had before, which was no adjustment ever.

[DaveP043]

6 minutes ago, iacas said:

Not sure what you mean.

It won't. Two is not a statistically significant number of players. No PCC will be applied.

Also, if 60 people shoot horrible scores in the morning, and the weather clears and 30 people shoot normal scores in the afternoon, everyone may see an adjustment if the average is still high enough.

It's not going to be perfect, because it's just math, just an algorithm. There are lots of little pitfalls - changing weather, people not posting the same day, people not applying NDB correctly, etc. - but it's better than what we had before, which was no adjustment ever.

There is actually a mention in Interpretation 5.6/2 that its possible to have two different PCCs calculated, when conditions vary significantly within a single day.  I don't know the logistics, presumably the pro shop or Handicap Chair would try to identify which players played in the bad conditions, which players in the better conditions, and have GHIN run separate calculations with each set of players.

For those who want to know more, there's a lot more detail in Rule 5.6 of the Handicap Rules.

https://www.usga.org/handicapping/roh/2020-rules-of-handicapping.html

[iacas]

10 minutes ago, DaveP043 said:

There is actually a mention in Interpretation 5.6/2 that its possible to have two different PCCs calculated, when conditions vary significantly within a single day.

I suspect we may never see that, or when we do, it's for perhaps two rounds where the course setup changes or something (as they might do for a flighted event or something).

In other words, I doubt the weather one will be used very often at all, but the second bullet point in 5.6/2 may be used occasionally.

Rarely.

[bkuehn1952]

10 minutes ago, DaveP043 said:

There is actually a mention in Interpretation 5.6/2 that its possible to have two different PCCs calculated, when conditions vary significantly within a single day. ...

Yes, there is framework for two different PCC's for the same day.  At the USGA-sponsored seminar I attended, it was stated that the USGA did not plan on calculating more than one PCC a day for this year.  It could happen down the road.

[gbogey]

I thought that the "PCC" was going to be a positive aspect of the new system but if it's going to be this complicated I'm not sure that it's worth it.  Or I could just do like a buddy of mine in NJ who just wouldn't play if the wind was supposed to be more than 15 mph (I'm guessing most of my PCC is wind related).