ranger/club pro out of line?

[Fredguay642]

I totally agree with iacas. The ranger was just trying to speed things up. If they were that far out of position, they should've speed up. It sounds like they were warned. Plus if you are playing that slow, I bet their scores weren't that great anyway. The ranger is encharge of keeping play going. I have played a really nice course that I never play because it is expensive and there was a junior tounament that day. It was 6+ hours to play 13 holes.
Plus it sounds like the tournament was small so play was proably still open to the public. Teach the kids how to keep up.

[dansensel]

Plus if you are playing that slow, I bet their scores weren't that great anyway.

To start a whole new arguement, slow play doesn't mean bad scores. I am a horrible golfer, shooting low 100's and I can play my round much faster than some people that are single digit.

It isn't how many strokes you take, it is how much time you take between strokes.

[Parker0065]

Back to the original OP!


Another thing I noticed is you have 12 year olds playing from 6000 yds? That's going to slow things down right there.

In my sons tour the 10-12 year olds play from the front(red) tees which are usually 5200-5500 yards. Like I stated in my prior post, in the 10-12 age groups parents are allowed and encouraged to go out with the kids to help keep pace of play moving.

Most boys do a lot of growing between age 12 to 13, so by age 13 they can usually handle a +6000 yard course and keep up pace of play better.

Just my 2cents, but the more I read into your post the more I think your tournament directors could do a lot better job of bracketing age groups with which tees to play from.


For some ideas on how they could bracket it better here's a link to the NENY Junior Tour: http://neny.pga.com/index.cfm?menu=942


Good Luck!

[golfdad]

hello parker, since you have kids playing junior golf, i would assume you may understand some of the issues facing junior golf. i would run couple by you just off my head.

first of, my kids are girls, but my older one plays against and with the boys, in the 12-13 age group. she has a handicap of 3. she happens to be more proficient than most of the boys that she plays with.

usually, the pace of play is reasonable, meaning, at times, when one player lost a ball, things can get slower if the following group happens to play faster. what if 3 players lost their balls in one hole? even if they take only allowed time to search, it will be a delay right? in this case, as i have reiterated, 3 kids in the 14-15 group were ahead, and the 4 kids in the "troublesome" 12-13 group fell behind at times half a hole. to me, that means, when the kids were about to tee off, the front group just left the green. logistically speaking, it is very likely that 3 older kids should play faster than 4 younger kids over 18 holes. to me that should be a consideration when looking at the situation. playing slower or faster is relative and conditional.

second, some juniors are not that developed yet. some can shoot over 100 and it takes time to shoot over 100. you can do it as fast as you can, but still, it takes time to shoot over 100. do we give penalty to kids that takes "reasonable" amt of time to shoot over 100? you have been there, right?

assume you were there when the ranger drove over in one of you metpga events and all by himself had decided that one group in your kid's age bracket needed to play up because they were considered to be slow (heck, lets just say they were proven beyond reasonable doubt they were slow). what would you do, assuming the tour director was not near that hole at that moment and was not reachable by walkie or the ranger was so upset that he didn't even want to discuss with anyone? i am interested to hear how you would handle the situation right there, knowing full well that if the ranger has his way, there may be scoring issues later for everyone involved.

i think it is too simplistic to say well, if you play slow, the ranger has the obligation to do something about it. the issue here is what is that "something" that is appropriate. imo, it should not be that anything goes.

should the ranger drive around and find the tour director and propose the penalty to the tour director and let the director to make the final call? i am not sure if we can blame the tour director for not being there in that 2 minutes on the tenth hole when we needed him. and i am pretty sure if the ranger through the club house has found the tour director and informed him about what he was about to do, things may have developed differently.

it is much much more appropriate to give penalty or dq one group instead of making one group to play up.

ps, the age 12-13 plays around high 5 and low 6. it just happens that the tee box for that club for that age group was slightly over 6.

and to be honest, since the kids were on feet, i am not sure playing up really saved much time at all.

as i am typing this, i have been chuckling because that seinfeld soup nazi episode came to mind:)

[ctyankee]

The only thing I find questionable is the pairings. I don't know why younger kids are being slotted between older kids.

Either way, I don't see what the big deal is. Who cares if a foursome of 12-13 year olds were moved up to a shorter set of tees?

My son has been doing the MET PGA events for about five years. They're not perfect but at least they don't let young kids out on tough courses they might be overwhelmed on and they even have events set up just for the younger kids. They put the better kids out first so the play moves along pretty well. They also don't have parents out on the course - which I think is one of their best ideas.

[MiniMoe]

1/2 hole behind is not really slow play, especially when there is a threesome in front of a foursome. I don't care how old they are, a threesome is going to play faster than a foursome.... most of the time. This is junior program. They are just learning the game, so they have to be given a little slack and more importantly, they have to be given some direction. The ranger should have used the situation to teach them what is expected and how to speed up play. Instead, he gave them a lesson on "I'm bigger, your smaller, so you do what I say". What a tool.

One more thing. These are juniors... walking. It takes time. No reasonable person would ever think a 12 year old that is new to the game and shoots 100 is going to play as fast as a 18 year old that has been playing a few years and going to shoot in the upper 80's.

[golfdad]

ctyankee, i never provided the info that the 12-13 were sandwiched in between faster playing groups as you have stated. in fact, older kids played earlier. you lamented what is the big deal... well, in the scheme of things over a millinium or two, i suppose nothing is a big deal. but until we drop dead and are still able to gather an opinion over something, we voice it:)

minimoe, appreciate your consideration. as i have stated in my first post, apparently there were no regular club members playing right after this block of juniors, something that the ranger must have known since he drove around, so the juniors did not hold up the play for the all important masters of the universe...

perhaps this may serve as a reminder on humility, that we were all once juniors in something, that we fumbled, we screwed up, that we did not play by someone's rules, that we were never good enough no matter what, and when we were all ready to take on the world, we were faced with the inevitable downhill. we lose flexibility, endurance, mental sharpness but ready to teach others a lesson or two.

cheers.

[ddalet]

ok, without naming names, would like to get some comments from you guys on this.

I would have removed them from the course and competition. Slow play is a lot of what is wrong with golf today.

[Jay-Bird]

I don't think the ranger's gonna like this...

[Smiffy]

Look at this from another viewpoint.....

You are about to tee off with some friends in a threeball. You notice there is a fourball waiting to tee off behind you. Would you worry about it? No, because you would expect to pull a hole or two ahead of them fairly early in the round. They shouldn't bother you at all. In fact, if I was playing in a threeball match and didn't pull a hole or two out on the four guys behind within about 5 or 6 holes I'd know something wasn't right.
So why should this fourball be penalised or pulled up for falling behind a fourball????
Hate to say it, but if I was in a fourball and we were pulled up by a ranger for falling half a hole behind a three in front and accused of slow play, my 7 iron would likely be shoved somewhere where the sun is not going to shine.

[ctyankee]

ctyankee, i never provided the info that the 12-13 were sandwiched in between faster playing groups as you have stated. in fact, older kids played earlier. you lamented what is the big deal... well, in the scheme of things over a millinium or two, i suppose nothing is a big deal. but until we drop dead and are still able to gather an opinion over something, we voice it:)

I think we all understand that we're not solving world hunger here. I also think we all understand that there is no perfect solution to this, no matter what. Would you really want to put 12-13 year old kids on the clock? Are they even staffed for that undertaking? So, this seems to boil down to be another 'this ranger was an autocratic boob' thread.

Yes, I get your sarcasm around the 'masters of the universe comment.' But, keep in mind that not everyone supports junior golf like we do. Private courses in my neck of the woods have pulled from junior golf because of too many complaints by members. It could be that they don't think that their course should be tied up for the bulk of a day to being upset about how the kids are playing out there. Sometimes it's just a change of head professional at a course who couldn't be bothered. As a side note, my club doesn't allow members to play during that block of time so they're not out there. Also, several members volunteer their time every year to man the golf course, helping the speed of play. There are a lot of o.b. situations and lateral hazards, so this helps considerably. They even tell the kids on the first tee to ask observers what their options are if they are unsure. Many kids (and adults) are unaware of all the options available on a lateral hazard, for example.

[golfdad]

ctyankee, i acknowledge many points you have made. yes, from the club's perspective, really, there is nothing to gain from having a flock of kids going through the course: not repairing divots properly or at all, forgetting to repair ball marks, banging on the green with the putter when missing a put, etc. and, with the issue at hand, collectively playing slow because some kids simply cannot keep up. it is indeed a risk that a club has to or decides to take on when accepting a junior tourny.

i have seen rangers of all colors and shades, all over, in fact, all over the world. some are sweethearts, some can be a little up tight. but overall, i think the rangers i have come across realize it is a balance between a job to do and a job to keep. no one seems ready to stick his neck out too far. so, to see a ranger independently change the length for one group during a tourny is an eye opener:)

so, how many options are there for a lateral hazard? :):):)

[ctyankee]

Also, how many options are there for a lateral hazard? :):):)

Five (possible) options by my count.

The one that I'm always reminding guests is the option to go to the other side of a red staked hazard (if viable) and use the two club length relief from the margin of the hazard rule, with relief equidistant to the hole. At my club, one hazard on the right side of the fairway is tree lined on the right side and open on the left. Thus, rather than hitting the next shot from the tee or punching it out to the fairway from the margin of the hazard they crossed, they can simply cross to the other side and have a wide open shot to the green. It's understandable that some don't know this rule as on many golf courses, this option is not really viable. However, when (instead) they didn't cross the margin of the hazard (left or right) and thus must take relief from the point it flew directly into the hazard and they take relief in the heavy rough rather than simply move it back on line to the pin to the closely mowed fairway ... you have to wonder exactly what options they are aware of. To make matters worse, on this same hole you can fly a golf ball over the trees and cross the hazard much farther up as the pond bends big time right (from the tee box). This is where the rules can be hard to swallow. I already mentioned the trees lining the right, so unless you sprawl on the ground to see under the trees, you have no chance of seeing whether the ball entered the hazard. One year a junior golfer (who knew the rules) claimed his opponent's ball must be assumed lost as no one on the tee saw the ball go into the hazard. It would have been one thing if it could be quite reasonably assumed to have splashed or rolled into the hazard, but with heavy rough in front of the hazard, it's not a given. Thus, after a ruling, the poor kid was back on the tee hitting three - rather than with a short shot over the water to the green. So now, that's another advantage to having volunteer members on that hole (on the left too as there is water left as well) to help with these situations.

[ND Fan]

It's a kids tournament! leave em alone. If they are playing on a pace of 4 1/2 hours, no problem. If not then the tournament official needs to be contacted and he needs to define who the slow player is and penalize him/her. The pro could do this as well but, in my mind not without an official of the event's knowledge.

[ctyankee]

It's a kids tournament! leave em alone. If they are playing on a pace of 4 1/2 hours, no problem. If not then the tournament official needs to be contacted and he needs to define who the slow player is and penalize him/her. The pro could do this as well but, in my mind not without an official of the event's knowledge.

That would involve now putting the entire foursome on-the-clock. That's about the last thing I would want to see. If it's not hard enough playing with someone that is slow or having a bad day, it just got elevated because now they themselves are on the clock. With that in place, you might be affecting everyone's play. Plus, you now have officials monitoring their every shot for x number of holes. Is that what we want?

I think everyone has had the experience of playing well and being asked by a slower group to play through. And what often happens? Players rush a bit or now get intimated by people standing around watching them and now hit bad shots. Again, there is no perfect solution.