What Constitutes Slow Play?

[iacas]

3 minutes ago, CrashTestDummy said:

Yes, pace of play is different for every course, but there is a pace of play that is average for a particular course. However, you keep bringing up calculations of shot time and walking time, but refuse to acknowledge or say that is irrelevant that taking more shots takes more time.

a) you're the one who keeps bringing up the calculations.
b) This is the opposite of "refusing to acknowledge"…

5 hours ago, iacas said:

Who is saying it's not? But it's not the dominant factor.

We don't need your example. We can all make up whatever example we want. Your example overlooks a lot of things, too. Namely, that two players can be preparing to hit a shot while others are hitting theirs, that there are tap-ins and pick-ups in a round, etc. And… that even though you can get to an hour with a contrived math problem… that's still only 25% of the time spent on the golf course, and the difference between the two players is 25% of that (0.25 * 0.25 = 6%).

Again, we can all do simple math, but the thing you're not getting is… it doesn't generally work that way.

That's acknowledging it and then giving it the proper weight.

3 minutes ago, CrashTestDummy said:

If all things being equal with shot time, taking more strokes takes more time, period.

Cool. All things are never equal. You keep making up examples, but they're pointless.

3 minutes ago, CrashTestDummy said:

The more strokes a player takes, the less shot time they should take to keep pace.

Which is often what happens. I've already addressed this, as have others.

3 minutes ago, CrashTestDummy said:

Not sure why you don't acknowledge that fact.

I have.

I've also said that doing simple math doesn't advance the discussion one little bit, and that we can all make up our own silly examples of… whatever.

---

You typed a lot of words there but said nothing. Added nothing.

Cool.

[jsgolfer]

1 hour ago, CrashTestDummy said:

 

Yes, pace of play is different for every course, but there is a pace of play that is average for a particular course. However, you keep bringing up calculations of shot time and walking time, but refuse to acknowledge or say that is irrelevant that taking more shots takes more time. If all things being equal with shot time, taking more strokes takes more time, period.  Shot time is shot time. The clocks starts when it is your turn to play. The more strokes a player takes, the less shot time they should take to keep pace. The more strokes a player take, the more total time it takes to play their shots if other players taking less shots have the same shot time. Not sure why you don't acknowledge that fact.  Not sure you are really concerned with improving pace of play then. 

 

We don't you need my example? Who is we? Am I debating against a gang? 😜 I'm just debating the issue. This is a forum for discussion and debate, isn't it?  Also, why do you not want my examples when you keep hounding me for examples on rules of etiquette when it is obvious what rules of etiquette that many don't know or don't follow on the golf course.  😜😂

I’m the one that brought up the math, it wasn’t @iacas. I brought it up to show that 4 hours isn’t fast. In fact 4 hours is kind of slow. 

And yes if you’re going to take 100 shots you either have to take less time to get ready and hit or get to your ball faster than the others, pick up, or you will be behind. And for the most part, I see higher handicap golfers take way less time to swing than some of the good ones I play with. 

 Again the math doesn’t matter in the long run, courses have time ratings and you should strive to beat that time, not meet it.  End of story.

[CrashTestDummy]

10 minutes ago, jsgolfer said:

I’m the one that brought up the math, it wasn’t @iacas. I brought it up to show that 4 hours isn’t fast. In fact 4 hours is kind of slow. 

And yes if you’re going to take 100 shots you either have to take less time to get ready and hit or get to your ball faster than the others, pick up, or you will be behind. And for the most part, I see higher handicap golfers take way less time to swing than some of the good ones I play with. 

 Again the math doesn’t matter in the long run, courses have time ratings and you should strive to beat that time, not meet it.  End of story.

That is exactly my point. Higher handicappers should take less time to play their shots because their "total time to play their shots" is longer. Lower handicap players are able take more time to play their shots because their "total time to play their shots" is much less than a player that takes a lot of strokes. The math does matter because it is directly related to improving pace of play. There is no way around it. Taking more shots, takes more time. So, in order to improve pace people taking more shots should decrease their shot time. Since everyone is all about pushing the pace of play faster, then that should be one of the issues that needs to be addressed. 

[iacas]

2 minutes ago, CrashTestDummy said:

That is exactly my point. Higher handicappers should take less time to play their shots because their "total time to play their shots" is longer.

J1Q: Who exactly has argued this?

Goodness, man.

Relax.

This is what I meant when I said things like "we can all do simple math."

[Ty_Webb]

37 minutes ago, CrashTestDummy said:

That is exactly my point. Higher handicappers should take less time to play their shots because their "total time to play their shots" is longer. Lower handicap players are able take more time to play their shots because their "total time to play their shots" is much less than a player that takes a lot of strokes. The math does matter because it is directly related to improving pace of play. There is no way around it. Taking more shots, takes more time. So, in order to improve pace people taking more shots should decrease their shot time. Since everyone is all about pushing the pace of play faster, then that should be one of the issues that needs to be addressed. 

Well - I think that's about face. The player who doesn't know whether his 5 iron is going 50 yards or 180 yards shouldn't be too caught up in how far he's got. Nor in what the wind is doing, nor in where the flag is on the green. They should be getting to their ball and hitting it. Someone conversely who can judge whether to hit their 5 iron 190 or 188 has a vested interest in knowing whether it's 190 or 188 and on top of that, what the carry is over a greenside bunker and how far it is to a ridge in the green etc. The better of a player you are, the more time it makes sense to spend on getting it right. All of those things "should" offset each other. The problem comes about when your 95 shooter watches one of the more deliberate PGA Tour players and figures that's how he should be playing. Then he takes way too long. Obviously that compounds the issue when they hit it a lot more times.

There is most likely a sweet spot I'd guess somewhere around 5 to 10 handicap, where you don't hit it that many more times than a tour player, but you still don't need the same level of info to hit your shots. The additional information that's valuable vs the time to collect that information vs the lower number of shots all move at different rates as handicap changes. PGA tour players are a LOT better than scratch amateurs, but they're not *that* much better that they can take double the time over their shots and still match them for time. Hence PGA tour 3-ball rounds take about 5 hours and 2-ball rounds take about 4 hours (this is roughly what I've seen when I watch the times that TV coverage ends vs the end of the tee times and they're normally pretty much spot on). 4-ball rounds would seem to take about 6 hours on that basis and even playing overcrowded municipals in New York I've never seen it take that long. PGA Tour players are SLOOOOOOOOOOOOW

To Erik's point, it's hardly breaking news that people who hit it more times need to spend less time on each shot if they want to take the same time overall. 

[StuM]

On 1/25/2024 at 6:12 AM, mailman said:

Ive had rounds of three and a half hours that have felt like marathons and five hour rounds that have felt like sprints.

I agree, if I play in 5 hours but just a steady pace and not waiting excessive feels ok but a 4 hour round where I am waiting on every tee box feels worse.  Unfortunately all too often I get the 5 hour round AND waiting on every tee which feels horrible.

 

On 1/25/2024 at 1:28 PM, Ty_Webb said:

Each thing on its own is small - a few seconds here and a few seconds there, but four people wasting 10 seconds each twice a hole works out to 24 minutes in total over a round. 

100% agree, lots of small things add up.

 

On 1/26/2024 at 6:45 PM, Missouri Swede said:

Just to play devil's advocate: I once hit a tee shot on a short par 4, it hit the cart path ... and hit it again ... and again .... and again.

That was a fluke, and if they were sober they would have known that.  

[CrashTestDummy]

1 hour ago, Ty_Webb said:

Well - I think that's about face. The player who doesn't know whether his 5 iron is going 50 yards or 180 yards shouldn't be too caught up in how far he's got. Nor in what the wind is doing, nor in where the flag is on the green. They should be getting to their ball and hitting it. Someone conversely who can judge whether to hit their 5 iron 190 or 188 has a vested interest in knowing whether it's 190 or 188 and on top of that, what the carry is over a greenside bunker and how far it is to a ridge in the green etc. The better of a player you are, the more time it makes sense to spend on getting it right. All of those things "should" offset each other. The problem comes about when your 95 shooter watches one of the more deliberate PGA Tour players and figures that's how he should be playing. Then he takes way too long. Obviously that compounds the issue when they hit it a lot more times.

There is most likely a sweet spot I'd guess somewhere around 5 to 10 handicap, where you don't hit it that many more times than a tour player, but you still don't need the same level of info to hit your shots. The additional information that's valuable vs the time to collect that information vs the lower number of shots all move at different rates as handicap changes. PGA tour players are a LOT better than scratch amateurs, but they're not *that* much better that they can take double the time over their shots and still match them for time. Hence PGA tour 3-ball rounds take about 5 hours and 2-ball rounds take about 4 hours (this is roughly what I've seen when I watch the times that TV coverage ends vs the end of the tee times and they're normally pretty much spot on). 4-ball rounds would seem to take about 6 hours on that basis and even playing overcrowded municipals in New York I've never seen it take that long. PGA Tour players are SLOOOOOOOOOOOOW

To Erik's point, it's hardly breaking news that people who hit it more times need to spend less time on each shot if they want to take the same time overall. 

Yeah, I understand the mentality of players wanting to take their time to analyze shots. The PGA tour and tournament golf is total different scenario than rounds at the golf course. The PGA players are playing golf as their job and for their livelihoods, so it is understandable they take longer to play. Yeah, it is not breaking news to me that "total shot time" takes more time and those taking more shots need to spend less time on each shot, but some here don't think that is one of the issues to improving pace of play which puzzles me and bringing that up seems to stepping on a nerve. 

[StuM]

9 hours ago, iacas said:

When I was first beginning I played significantly faster per shot than I do now because my seven iron might go 150 or it might go 15.

Thank you, you beat that problem, maybe I can.

as fir bad golfers being slower due to more shots I’ ll offer this example.  I have played Inverness Club in Toledo. OH a few times and I am a High HCp Player.  The course is a walking course and if you take more than 4:10 per round you are considered slow.  I’ve been under every time.  1 caveat, I had caddies every time which helped a little, but I still had my pre-shot routine, etc. and shot over 100 every time.

Edited February 1 by StuM

[DeadMan]

13 hours ago, Ty_Webb said:

There is most likely a sweet spot I'd guess somewhere around 5 to 10 handicap, where you don't hit it that many more times than a tour player, but you still don't need the same level of info to hit your shots.

My club tracks times for tournaments, and I can tell you from that data that you're pretty much spot on. The slowest players tend to be 2 groups: the highest handicaps, and the low handicaps. The middle group of about 5-15 handicaps are generally not problems. For the highest handicaps, they have two problems - they take more shots while still taking too much time per shot and they tend to be older and move slower in general. For the low handicaps, they tend to take a lot of time per shot. I can tell you that the golfers with the longest pre-shot routines in our club are the low handicaps. It's definitely not everybody in that group, but the slow golfers there really stand out.

I do think the lower handicaps tend to be better about the little things with slow play. I rarely see a low handicap doing things like writing down a score by the green, or not getting ready to play while others are playing. But those things don't save as much time as having a 10 second pre shot routine instead of a 30 second one.

[Lerrin]

13 hours ago, Ty_Webb said:

Well - I think that's about face. The player who doesn't know whether his 5 iron is going 50 yards or 180 yards shouldn't be too caught up in how far he's got. Nor in what the wind is doing, nor in where the flag is on the green. They should be getting to their ball and hitting it. Someone conversely who can judge whether to hit their 5 iron 190 or 188 has a vested interest in knowing whether it's 190 or 188 and on top of that, what the carry is over a greenside bunker and how far it is to a ridge in the green etc. The better of a player you are, the more time it makes sense to spend on getting it right. All of those things "should" offset each other. The problem comes about when your 95 shooter watches one of the more deliberate PGA Tour players and figures that's how he should be playing. Then he takes way too long. Obviously that compounds the issue when they hit it a lot more times.

There is most likely a sweet spot I'd guess somewhere around 5 to 10 handicap, where you don't hit it that many more times than a tour player, but you still don't need the same level of info to hit your shots. The additional information that's valuable vs the time to collect that information vs the lower number of shots all move at different rates as handicap changes. PGA tour players are a LOT better than scratch amateurs, but they're not *that* much better that they can take double the time over their shots and still match them for time. Hence PGA tour 3-ball rounds take about 5 hours and 2-ball rounds take about 4 hours (this is roughly what I've seen when I watch the times that TV coverage ends vs the end of the tee times and they're normally pretty much spot on). 4-ball rounds would seem to take about 6 hours on that basis and even playing overcrowded municipals in New York I've never seen it take that long like here in the game. PGA Tour players are SLOOOOOOOOOOOOW

To Erik's point, it's hardly breaking news that people who hit it more times need to spend less time on each shot if they want to take the same time overall. 

You make a very good point! I think it's true that PGA Tour players need to spend less time on each shot to play at the same pace as amateurs. This means they need to be more efficient in their routine and not waste time on unnecessary things.

[snapfade]

No one is talking about the double digit handicapper standing over by the woods after a 200 yard bomb with a laser rangefinder in hand taking a read on how far he wont hit it. 

[iacas]

15 hours ago, CrashTestDummy said:

but some here don't think that is one of the issues to improving pace of play

No, for the last time… that's not what anyone here has said.

It's a factor, but a pretty small one. And again, someone's pre-shot routine can be 45 seconds long… but if they start it while others are hitting their shots, it may seem that it's 10 or 12 seconds long. Aaaannnnndddd, there are fast good and bad players, and slow good and bad players. There's very little correlation there.

You continue to ignore that the top several reasons for pace of play issues are actually course setup and signage and course related.

https://amzn.to/3w0zI9C

[GolfLug]

1 hour ago, snapfade said:

No one is talking about the double digit handicapper standing over by the woods after a 200 yard bomb with a laser rangefinder in hand taking a read on how far he wont hit it. 

Nope, nope, not happening. We usually snatch their rangefinder, take all their money, beat them senseless, break all their clubs and push him them deep in to woods to give them some time to think about their illogical thought process (out of courtesy). They usually fall in line and start keeping up with rest of the group after that.

[CrashTestDummy]

2 hours ago, iacas said:

No, for the last time… that's not what anyone here has said.

It's a factor, but a pretty small one. And again, someone's pre-shot routine can be 45 seconds long… but if they start it while others are hitting their shots, it may seem that it's 10 or 12 seconds long. Aaaannnnndddd, there are fast good and bad players, and slow good and bad players. There's very little correlation there.

You continue to ignore that the top several reasons for pace of play issues are actually course setup and signage and course related.

https://amzn.to/3w0zI9C

Cool story bro. Whatever you say. "Strong opinions, held loosely." I guess that sums it up. 🤪😂

What is J1Q? You never defined that. 

 

 

 

 

Edited February 1 by CrashTestDummy

[Ty_Webb]

20 minutes ago, CrashTestDummy said:

Cool story bro. Whatever you say. "Strong opinions, held loosely." I guess that sums it up. 🤪😂

What is J1Q? You never defined that. 

 

 

 

 

I think J1Q means just one question

[boogielicious]

1 hour ago, GolfLug said:

Nope, nope, not happening. We usually snatch their rangefinder, take all their money, beat them senseless, break all their clubs and push him them deep in to woods to give them some time to think about their illogical thought process (out of courtesy). They usually fall in line and start keeping up with rest of the group after that.

You left out the part about the snakes. Gotta have snakes.

[iacas]

5 hours ago, CrashTestDummy said:

Cool story bro. Whatever you say. "Strong opinions, held loosely." I guess that sums it up. 🤪😂

I don't think you understand what it means, but whatever.

And, it's not what I say. It's what the foremost expert on pace of play says: that golfers are a tiny part of it, and that the course itself determines largely the pace of play.

He knew what he was talking about — he consulted with tons of high-end courses and the USGA/R&A and others. He was (he's now passed away) the foremost expert.

5 hours ago, CrashTestDummy said:

What is J1Q? You never defined that. 

Heaven forbid you google something.

[CrashTestDummy]

2 hours ago, iacas said:

I don't think you understand what it means, but whatever.

And, it's not what I say. It's what the foremost expert on pace of play says: that golfers are a tiny part of it, and that the course itself determines largely the pace of play.

He knew what he was talking about — he consulted with tons of high-end courses and the USGA/R&A and others. He was (he's now passed away) the foremost expert.

Heaven forbid you google something.

Golfers are "a tiny part" of pace of play? 

Not sure you or your expert can say golfers are just " a tiny part of pace of play." I read your thread post "Out of Time" Bill Yates. I don't agree that golfers are a tiny part in pace of play. Then with that logic, the Pro tours, USGA, college golf, junior golf, and this thread should not be talking about any measures that golfers should be doing to speed up their shot time, or other time savings because it is just a "tiny part in pace of play".  Good luck with that. 😂

 

FYI: I did google J1Q and it showed nothing remotely related. Try it.