Does HI need to consider age of round?

[Fat Slice]

There's a guy in our club who carries an 8.x handicap. The thing is, he plays at my level (18 hcp). So what gives? Here's his "20 most recent round" printout:

A9/109268.8/13219.9
A8/109171.3/12817.4
A6/108969.2/13217.0
A5/109370.5/13419.0
A4/109070.4/13116.9
A3/108869.6/12716.4
A2/109771.7/12722.5
AI2/108171.7/1278.3
AI12/098770.9/12914.1
A10/099468.8/13221.6
A9/098769.8/12515.5
AI7/098672.6/13411.3
TI7/099471.7/12719.8
AI7/098370.9/12910.6
A8/048272.6/1347.9
A8/048672.6/13411.3
A6/047772.6/1343.7
A6/047872.6/1344.6
A4/048472.6/1349.6
A1/048672.6/13411.3


He has a bunch of rounds from 6 years ago still holding his index down. Yes, I know, all this does is help ME in competition...but speaking to the general accuracy of handicap, should they consider date at all?

[kpaulhus]

Its the last 10 of 20....so in 6 rounds his handicap will sky rocket up. I left my club in March as a 14HI to go play other courses. I rejoined in August playing to a 8. I entered all of my scores into GHIN when I rejoined. I loved those 9 days I got to play as a 14 until the next HI revision. Now I am back down to a 7, and winning money is that much harder.

If I was you, I would be heavily over the next 6 rounds...then ease off lol

[James_Black]

Its the last 10 of 20....so in 6 rounds his handicap will sky rocket up. I left my club in March as a 14HI to go play other courses. I rejoined in August playing to a 8. I entered all of my scores into GHIN when I rejoined. I loved those 9 days I got to play as a 14 until the next HI revision. Now I am back down to a 7, and winning money is that much harder.

is that how it works in the states?

Over here you go up .1 every time you don't play to your handicap. It makes it tough to get down to a low handicap but once your down you'll be there for awhile

[MJP]

Its the last 10 of 20....so in 6 rounds his handicap will sky rocket up. I left my club in March as a 14HI to go play other courses. I rejoined in August playing to a 8. I entered all of my scores into GHIN when I rejoined. I loved those 9 days I got to play as a 14 until the next HI revision. Now I am back down to a 7, and winning money is that much harder.

It's not the last 10 that are counted toward your handicap. It's you're BEST 10 of your LAST 20. Once he posts 5 more scores all those good scores from 2004 will be erased from his handicap and he'll probably jump to a 15 or so. Maybe a little higher.

[zeg]

I don't think there's a way to do that that's good enough to be worthwhile. There are a number of strange circumstances that can make an HI misleading one way or the other, but they usually involve something strange so they don't affect a large number of people. It's rare for someone to have such a long period of time within their last 20 rounds... I think it'd take a pretty complicated system to really fix all the possible time-related problems, and I don't see that the payoff would be worth the complexity.

Plus, given that the handicap is a measure of your potential, it's not even clear that his handicap needs to change. Sure, those scores were 6 years ago, but that's still indicative of his potential as a golfer. He's got a better chance of getting back to his old ability than someone who's never played that well does to get there for the first time. If his potential really is decreasing, then his HI will catch up.

[ET-Taylor]

In america u dont have to play that consistant to be a low handicap

[ohiolefty]

It's just the last 20...period...

I'm sad because my career low round is a few rounds from going off of there. My 'cap should go up only fractionally...but it'll be sad.