Playing a Round of Golf Solo

[Golfingdad]

3 hours ago, 14ledo81 said:

True.  But they would also possibly be taking a place from someone deserving.

Perhaps technically possible but, meh.  95% of the people registered for local qualifying are already "not deserving," (as in, no chance of qualifying) so if one guy managed to get in with a vanity cap or a solo round aided cap it's no skin off my back.

The other way to look at it is that if I had a 1.4 or better cap and went to sign up for local qualifying and couldn't because it was full - it's not because of that one guy, it's because I was too lazy to sign up on time.  Registration is open for a long time.

[Jeremie Boop]

2 minutes ago, 14ledo81 said:

This may be true, but there is also potentially a certain portion of people that will cheat when playing alone.

I don't need a law that says it is illegal to steal, but some do.

Technically you do need a law to tell you something is illegal, if there's no law then it can't be illegal

[Golfingdad]

2 minutes ago, Jeremie Boop said:

Technically you do need a law to tell you something is illegal, if there's no law then it can't be illegal

Lol.  Spose the word Ledo was going for was "wrong." ;)

[Valleygolfer]

7 minutes ago, 14ledo81 said:

This may be true, but there is also potentially a certain portion of people that will cheat when playing alone.

I don't need a law that says it is illegal to steal, but some do.

Well if these people cheat when playing alone, who's to stop them from going home and posting the round anyway?

[Elmer]

 

4 minutes ago, 14ledo81 said:

This may be true, but there is also potentially a certain portion of people that will cheat when playing alone.

I don't need a law that says it is illegal to steal, but some do.

There are people who will cheat when playing with others.
If I get paired with a group of strangers who dont pay attention to my score or game and sign off on my card.
How is that round any more legal than playing solo?
The entire argument for having a playing partner verify your score is based on the assumption that they care about the "integrity" of the rules and game in the 1st place.
I have played with way too many casual golfers who simply dont care about my game, nor care what I shoot.
They are just as likely to laugh at me for asking them to sign a card as they are to sign my card saying I shot a 59! 

2 minutes ago, Jeremie Boop said:

Technically you do need a law to tell you something is illegal, if there's no law then it can't be illegal

Boom!!! You sir need to drop the mic and walk away, you have won the internets for the day!!!!
Well done!

[Lihu]

34 minutes ago, Valleygolfer said:

Well if these people cheat when playing alone, who's to stop them from going home and posting the round anyway?

It's just another rule that the rule abiding people need to follow. People will always find a way to cheat a system, any system can be cheated if they feel it's worth their time and effort.

 

32 minutes ago, Elmer said:

 

There are people who will cheat when playing with others.
If I get paired with a group of strangers who dont pay attention to my score or game and sign off on my card.
How is that round any more legal than playing solo?
The entire argument for having a playing partner verify your score is based on the assumption that they care about the "integrity" of the rules and game in the 1st place.
I have played with way too many casual golfers who simply dont care about my game, nor care what I shoot.
They are just as likely to laugh at me for asking them to sign a card as they are to sign my card saying I shot a 59! 

Boom!!! You sir need to drop the mic and walk away, you have won the internets for the day!!!!
Well done!

We're not here to pass judgement on how other people play, we should simply abide by the rules ourselves if you want to post to GHIN. If you don't use GHIN, then do whatever you want.

No one is stopping you from playing something that resembles golf, but is not golf.

[Elmer]

18 minutes ago, Lihu said:

It's just another rule that the rule abiding people need to follow. People will always find a way to cheat a system, any system can be cheated if they feel it's worth their time and effort.

We're not here to pass judgement on how other people play, we should simply abide by the rules ourselves if you want to post to GHIN. If you don't use GHIN, then do whatever you want.

No one is stopping you from playing something that resembles golf, but is not golf.

I think you missed my point.
How is using an honest score played alone worth less than a 
dishonest score verified by people who don't care about your score? 

[Lihu]

5 minutes ago, Elmer said:

I think you missed my point.
How is using an honest score played alone worth less than a 
dishonest score verified by people who don't care about your score? 

It's not honest to post it because posting a solo round is against the rules.

The concept is really simple, if you want to say you play golf, you need to play by all the rules of golf.

[Golfingdad]

54 minutes ago, Elmer said:

The entire argument for having a playing partner verify your score is based on the assumption that they care about the "integrity" of the rules and game in the 1st place.

So many people against this new rule are making this assumption and I think it's dead wrong.  It's been said by me and others (the "others" first, and then I parrotted ;)) in a few threads now that this rule has nothing to do with not trusting people playing alone and everything to do with just trying to get our handicap system more in line with others around the world.

---

Consider a different example:  Player A has a good game and a 3 handicap based almost entirely off of quiet early morning 9-hole rounds that he plays by himself and in peace, and 100% by the rules.  He decides to enter a local amateur championship event but because he never plays with other people, he is not at all ready for the pressures that come along with the competition and is overwhelmed by everything, ultimately shooting a really high score.

Now, if that player spent more time playing in rounds with others, especially rounds that might be competitive one way or another, perhaps his 3 cap would be a 5 or a 6 ... but then when it eventually became a 3 a few years later, he'd be much better prepared to compete, don't you think?

Is that such a bad thing?  I don't think it is at all.

[iacas]

1 hour ago, Grumpter said:

I think you should continue to thumb your nose at the USGA and perhaps anyone that thinks you are not playing golf. You are playing the exact same game you were last year and the years before it.

No, you aren't. The Rules changed. You were playing golf under the Rules if you anchored your putter December 31, but not on January 1. Rules change.

1 hour ago, Valleygolfer said:

I can keep the handicap with GG or the multitude of other options out there. It is just that since I started keeping a USGA cap, which is the be all of tournament and local Nassaus, I have used it as my way of putting importance on a round. Knowing a round "counts," keeps me grinding.

You're just arguing for a state of mind right now. Just make the round "count" for your spreadsheet of solo rounds.

1 hour ago, Elmer said:

Playing a solo round and not being able to turn in the score effects the entire score by throwing it out as it says I am not trust worthy enough to turn in a score.

It doesn't say you're not trustworthy. It says the round does not count, and it says that before you even hit the first tee shot.

1 hour ago, Elmer said:

So you admit to being a speeder!!!!

Uh, yeah. Did you read the rest of the post? I don't justify or rationalize my speeding by 2 or 3 MPH.

1 hour ago, Elmer said:

The USGA made this rule to govern those who compete. However in doing so it now affects us weekend warriors.

Cool. Yep. If you're not competing, you don't need a handicap. And, the World Handicap thing is on the horizon. This has a lot more to do with the world than the USGA, I think.

1 hour ago, Elmer said:

Here is why I am disobediant to the solo rule:
I have pay to maintain a GHIN handicap, Part of this is because I like to keep my stats, puts, gir, fairways, driving distance, etc....

Nothing is stopping you from keeping those stats, or your "solo round handicap." It's not like GHIN tracks your putts per GIR.

1 hour ago, Elmer said:

Since I pay money to play golf, and pay money for the GHIN, who is the USGA to tell me that at the end of the day I am not a 16 handicap because I played solo and it does not count.

They're the USGA. That's who.

Seriously, what kind of a stupid point is that? You may as well say "who is the teacher to tell me I got this math problem wrong?" They're the ruling body of golf. They own and operate GHIN. They are the one group who does tell you that your round does not count, which they've done.

Undoubtedly you think that because you've paid money you get to do what you like, but I don't even need to come up with another example to show how dumb that sort of thinking is. You can come up with thousands.

1 hour ago, Elmer said:

You want to argue that my handicap is invalid when I enter a competition, fine.

No, it's invalid now.

1 hour ago, Elmer said:

But would the USGA rather I sit at home and average my own solo rounds and maintain them separately from my group rounds

Yep.

1 hour ago, Golfingdad said:

The other way to look at it is that if I had a 1.4 or better cap and went to sign up for local qualifying and couldn't because it was full - it's not because of that one guy, it's because I was too lazy to sign up on time.  Registration is open for a long time.

In your fictional theoretical thing, they did sign up on time. It was just filled with who knows how many invalid golfers.

If registration is open June 1-30th and I go to sign up on June 3rd and it's full already, I'm not "late."

[GangGreen]

10 minutes ago, Golfingdad said:

So many people against this new rule are making this assumption and I think it's dead wrong.  It's been said by me and others (the "others" first, and then I parrotted ;)) in a few threads now that this rule has nothing to do with not trusting people playing alone and everything to do with just trying to get our handicap system more in line with others around the world.

---

Consider a different example:  Player A has a good game and a 3 handicap based almost entirely off of quiet early morning 9-hole rounds that he plays by himself and in peace, and 100% by the rules.  He decides to enter a local amateur championship event but because he never plays with other people, he is not at all ready for the pressures that come along with the competition and is overwhelmed by everything, ultimately shooting a really high score.

Now, if that player spent more time playing in rounds with others, especially rounds that might be competitive one way or another, perhaps his 3 cap would be a 5 or a 6 ... but then when it eventually became a 3 a few years later, he'd be much better prepared to compete, don't you think?

Is that such a bad thing?  I don't think it is at all.

Thanks for this, I've struggled with understanding the "why" to the rule change myself and this post makes the most sense.

[Dave2512]

I don't think there are an abundance of always alone golfers. I play what could be considered quite a bit of alone golf but it's a scheduling problem not a desire to be alone. I tend to play better with others especially strangers. Men are competitive and though I don't have anything to prove I know before we start that people I encounter on the course won't score better than I do, just not a lot of single digit handicappers around. 

Not posting a bunch of alone scores won't hurt or help anyone's handicap if anything there will be less movement. I am okay with that. Even if I see a good play streak in years past I didn't experience massive trend variations. I'd have to post something way out of the norm to raise or drop more than a couple tenths. If half my rounds this year are solo and I don't post them as I have years past I'd wager that continuing the way I am, no instruction and minimal practice, I will get to the end of handicap season no more than 1 point of where I started. I'll remain static because that's where my game is at not because I can't flood ghin with scores.

[MrFlipper]

This whole "I can't post my own scores thing" is a reaction to taking away something that really hasn't been around very long. I can remember when, to get a handicap, you had to turn in an actual scorecard into a collection box, someone in the shop would post the score and you'd see the results on a printout posted where you had your handicap every two weeks. Mine was first at a muni, by the way.

When you started out the round you would just tell your playing partners that you wanted to turn in a card and and would they mind marking your score? If they said no, then you'd just tell them you'd like them to sign your scorecard anyway, at the end. I can't ever remember anyone not willing to keep score for me along with them, but I'm sure it happened some. 

If you played by yourself, you had no signed scorecard to turn in. Yeah I guess you could fake an attest signature, but no thanks.

This was only 25-30 years ago or so. This posting your own scores thing is a recent event. There is nothing saying you can't figure your own handicap on an excel spreadsheet if you have no established handicap at a men's club.

I think this is a good idea, to work towards an international handicap base. Sure folks can still cheat on their handicaps, but it's a little harder to do now, and if the basis for handicaps is for matches/competitions, then anything that makes it more legit is good. I sure know that before folks started posting their own scores, the sandbagging/vanity cap problems weren't as big a deal as they seem to be now.

At the last place I had a handicap almost all the handicapping issues started from folks posting scores themselves. It was a big enough problem that they had to ask folks to turn in cards anyway just to do random audits to verify proper scores being entered. Not saying that folks here are cheating, but I am saying it's like leaving the bank unlocked at night: not everyone will go in and take money, but a bunch will.

[Hardspoon]

7 minutes ago, MrFlipper said:

This whole "I can't post my own scores thing" is a reaction to taking away something that really hasn't been around very long. 

Exactly...it's a reaction to the change from the status quo, not a reaction to whether the system makes sense.

For anyone who is in a bowling league: imagine if they changed the rules so your handicap was based not only on your scores in that league, but the casual game you bowl with your friends on a Saturday night (or the game you bowl alone).  That'd be ridiculous.  So, every sport/ruling body/league has to define the rules in some way.

I've said this before: the problem is that, unlike bowling, people use golf handicaps for two very different purposes:

1. equalizing competitors in official competitions
2. tracking personal progress over a long period of time.

The USGA implemented a change that makes it (arguably) better for #1, and (arguably) worse for #2.  That makes perfect sense: the primary purpose of the USGA is more related to #1.

People who rely on it mostly for tracking personal progress are going to get upset, but they just need to find an alternative that is better suited for that purpose.

[Dave2512]

3 minutes ago, Hardspoon said:

I've said this before: the problem is that, unlike bowling, people use golf handicaps for two very different purposes:

1. equalizing competitors in official competitions
2. tracking personal progress over a long period of time.

The USGA implemented a change that makes it (arguably) better for #1, and (arguably) worse for #2.  That makes perfect sense: the primary purpose of the USGA is more related to #1.

People who rely on it mostly for tracking personal progress are going to get upset, but they just need to find an alternative that is better suited for that purpose.

But even as a tracker it wasn't a very good one. It seems some think it moves around more than it does. It's kind of tossing out half of what we post anyway. Posting a score just doesn't have much affect. Unless people are using GHIN to track stats, it does it but IMO the input is too tedious to make it worth given the superiority of other stuff out there (Game Golf), I don't see the problem.

The only time since I've had a handicap I was sweating posting a score is when my personal best round was set to drop off. I wasn't worried about the incoming score I was going to post and because I was too lazy to put a pencil to it I really didn't know what the impact of the weekend of scores would have. I knew whatever my 11th best differential was at the time was 8.9 and it would replace the 2.1 falling off. I posted my scores and the trend bump was just 0.4. The range of my last 20 is always around 10 strokes but posting a score here and there doesn't create much movement.

[Golfingdad]

1 hour ago, Hardspoon said:

Exactly...it's a reaction to the change from the status quo, not a reaction to whether the system makes sense.

For anyone who is in a bowling league: imagine if they changed the rules so your handicap was based not only on your scores in that league, but the casual game you bowl with your friends on a Saturday night (or the game you bowl alone).  That'd be ridiculous.  So, every sport/ruling body/league has to define the rules in some way.

I've said this before: the problem is that, unlike bowling, people use golf handicaps for two very different purposes:

1. equalizing competitors in official competitions
2. tracking personal progress over a long period of time.

The USGA implemented a change that makes it (arguably) better for #1, and (arguably) worse for #2.  That makes perfect sense: the primary purpose of the USGA is more related to #1.

People who rely on it mostly for tracking personal progress are going to get upset, but they just need to find an alternative that is better suited for that purpose.

Good post and I agree ... except that I don't think those are "unlike bowling."  Those are the exact two things I got out of my bowling handicap/average as well. 

[Golfingdad]

1 hour ago, iacas said:

If registration is open June 1-30th and I go to sign up on June 3rd and it's full already, I'm not "late."

Yeah, technically true ... however, I just peeked at a handful of qualifiers' results from this month and not all of them were full.

You're not wrong (about reporting the guy who's posting solo rounds), I'm just saying that the fact that it would allow him into these tournaments isn't really reason enough to make me care enough to report him. :)

[Grumpter]

1 hour ago, iacas said:

No, you aren't. The Rules changed. You were playing golf under the Rules if you anchored your putter December 31, but not on January 1. Rules change.

Yes, he is. Tell me what has physically changed from the way he PLAYED the game last year to this year? There is no change in the way he played or even reported. There was a change to the rules set forth by one organization that tries to govern competitive events but that is a change to the rules not the way he played the game last year or this year. 

Nowhere in the definition of Golf do I see mention of the USGA or that you have to play by the rules set forth by the USGA. They do not own Golf and as much as they would like everyone to conform to their rules you do not have to in order to play golf. You don't even have to conform to their rules in order to generate a handicap under their system. There can be ramifications for not following the rules if you play in a tournament under their rules but in my experience they won't care unless it gives you an advantage. You can vanity cap to your hearts content.