2024 Changes to the World Handicap System (WHS)

[iacas]

1 hour ago, gbogey said:

What it also says is that according to the USGA your average differential is your handicap X 104% +2.4. Seems a tad high in my experience. 

Most people average about 3 over their index.*

On average, 16 of your last 20 scores are above your index, after all.

* (Low single digit indexes are closer to 2, higher handicaps are > 3… so the 104% does that a bit.)

[DeadMan]

I was discussing this with @iacas yesterday. I was playing in a tournament that was organized through GolfGenuis as 2 9-hole tournaments. When the tournament posted the scores, it posted as two 9-hole scores:

If you combine those scores for a 77, here is what should have posted:

I can and will get this fixed (the net on my handicap was using the 5.8 differential instead of the 4.3, which has a .2 impact on my handicap, so not a huge difference). 

That said, I do feel like the handicap system should automatically combine 9-hole scores on the same day. There's no time where a 9-hole score is waiting to be combined. I guess there's an argument about whether playing 2 9-hole rounds in the same day is the same as one 18-hole round, but it's probably close enough. I am guessing the USGA/WHS folks have a reason for not combining scores on the same day, but I haven't seen it publicly.

This really isn't a big deal - this is an edge case from by (likely user-error with) GolfGenius.

[gbogey]

26 minutes ago, DeadMan said:

I was discussing this with @iacas yesterday. I was playing in a tournament that was organized through GolfGenuis as 2 9-hole tournaments. When the tournament posted the scores, it posted as two 9-hole scores:

Interesting post - I was actually thinking about this during a round recently as I considered changing tees at the turn, but one reason I didn't was that I assumed that GHIN would treat it as two scores.  

[iacas]

35 minutes ago, DeadMan said:

That said, I do feel like the handicap system should automatically combine 9-hole scores on the same day. There's no time where a 9-hole score is waiting to be combined. I guess there's an argument about whether playing 2 9-hole rounds in the same day is the same as one 18-hole round, but it's probably close enough. I am guessing the USGA/WHS folks have a reason for not combining scores on the same day, but I haven't seen it publicly.

As I said, if you play two separate nine-hole courses in a day, they shouldn't be combined, IMO. Let's say you play nine holes in the morning, and then play another nine somewhere else in the afternoon. Or, what if you play the same nine holes twice? Also, what if you accidentally put a nine-hole score on the wrong date - it's auto-combined and you're stuck?

So, no, I disagree that nine holes played the same day should be auto-combined.

The solution was for them to choose the proper course that had the two nines you play and post it as an 18-hole round. That said, if they were truly two nine-hole rounds… I don't know that they did the wrong thing here. I don't think I picked up on that last night.

Either way, your AGA or the administrator of your club (your GHIN club) can make an adjustment/change.

5 minutes ago, gbogey said:

Interesting post - I was actually thinking about this during a round recently as I considered changing tees at the turn, but one reason I didn't was that I assumed that GHIN would treat it as two scores.  

You can manually enter a score with the Course Rating and Slope.

https://www.ghin.com/post-score/total/post/manual-course

Look for "Manually Post Score" or similar wording, typically at the bottom of the "course lookup" screen.

[DeadMan]

23 minutes ago, iacas said:

Or, what if you play the same nine holes twice?

Actually, this brought up a question for me. How are we supposed to handle posting scores at 9-hole courses where they are set up so you play the same 9 twice for 18-hole rounds? Based on the one 9-hole course I know of near me, it looks like there's an option to post as 18, but it's using two different tees for front and back. If you played 18 holes there from the same tee, it looks like the only option is to enter 2 9-hole scores.

23 minutes ago, iacas said:

Also, what if you accidentally put a nine-hole score on the wrong date - it's auto-combined and you're stuck?

You fix it the same way you do if you have any other type of user error with GHIN.

23 minutes ago, iacas said:

Let's say you play nine holes in the morning, and then play another nine somewhere else in the afternoon.

This is the scenario where I'd agree that it might make sense to post as 2 separate 9-hole rounds. I am still curious of the reasoning for not combining 9-hole scores on the same day.

23 minutes ago, iacas said:

That said, if they were truly two nine-hole rounds… I don't know that they did the wrong thing here. I don't think I picked up on that last night.

We turned directly from 9 onto the next 9. So we played 18 holes in a row like a usual round. I don't think any concerns from the 9 hole rule would apply here, and it's always been posted as an 18 hole round. We did change format from fourball to individual match play, so maybe that is enough? I don't know the answer to that. Without looking at the rules of handicapping, to me it seems like it should be an 18 hole round. But then I looked at the rules of handicapping (specifically 2.1a and that chart), and maybe they should be posted as two 9 hole rounds because of the format change. I'm not 100% sure. 

Edited September 10 by DeadMan

[iacas]

1 hour ago, DeadMan said:

Actually, this brought up a question for me. How are we supposed to handle posting scores at 9-hole courses where they are set up so you play the same 9 twice for 18-hole rounds? Based on the one 9-hole course I know of near me, it looks like there's an option to post as 18, but it's using two different tees for front and back. If you played 18 holes there from the same tee, it looks like the only option is to enter 2 9-hole scores.

Correct. The "front" and "back" of those courses often have slightly different ratings/slope.

1 hour ago, DeadMan said:

You fix it the same way you do if you have any other type of user error with GHIN.

My point was that you would have to FIX it, and most people may not notice. I disagree that auto-merging two nine-hole rounds in a day is the way to go.

1 hour ago, DeadMan said:

This is the scenario where I'd agree that it might make sense to post as 2 separate 9-hole rounds. I am still curious of the reasoning for not combining 9-hole scores on the same day.

Because it's often not an 18-hole round. And they don't know when you played, what you did in between, etc.

The way it is now is easiest:

• If you play an 18-hole round, post it as 18.
• If you play a nine-hole round, post it as 9.
• If you play another round later, post it as another 9.

1 hour ago, DeadMan said:

We turned directly from 9 onto the next 9. So we played 18 holes in a row like a usual round. I don't think any concerns from the 9 hole rule would apply here, and it's always been posted as an 18 hole round.

Then, sure, post it as 18 using the proper "course" from the 27 holes.

1 hour ago, DeadMan said:

We did change format from fourball to individual match play, so maybe that is enough?

Nah. 18 is fine. The chart just shows approved forms of play (specifically, for example, no scrambles).