Setting Up A Shotgun Start

[bkuehn1952]

Our club-without-real-estate runs a series of tournaments.  Our typical field is 100-120 seniors (50+).  We use a shotgun start and mostly have 4-somes.  The players range in ability from 0.0 index to 36.0, so the quality of player varies significantly.  The field is divided into 4 roughly equal size flights: A (0.0 to about 9.0), B (9.1 to about 14.0), C (14.1 to about 19.9) and D (20.0+).  The handicap index cutoffs varies depending on the makeup of the field.  The A flight plays the longer set of tees.  B & C a bit less.  D from usually the most forward tee.  So now you have a picture of this conglomeration of old farts.

The tournament directors must arrange 4-somes and assign groups to certain holes.  Many of the holes have two groups while some a single group.

Generally the tournament directors place 4 "A" players in a group, 4 "B" in a group, etc...  Some groups occasionally have a mix of A, B, C, or D.  The groups are, to my view, somewhat randomly assigned starting holes.  One might find a 4-some of "C" flight players assigned 13A, a group of "B" flight players as 14A and a group of "A" players as 14B.

Here are a couple of things upon which you can offer ideas & advice.  If you can add your thoughts as to why you make a certain suggestion, that is best:

• Which holes should have double groups, which holes a single group starting?
• Should the flights be grouped together (e.g. "A" flight fills holes 1-5) or should the flights be mixed? 
• Do you mix the "D" players with indexes around 30.0 with better players or group them together into a 4-some that will probably collectively shoot 400+ (we send some out as 3-somes when possible)?
• If you have identified certain players as being more deliberate, do they get mixed into the groups randomly?  Where would you position them, knowing the entire group moves only as fast as the slowest group?
• Any other ideas?

[Grumpter]

3 hours ago, bkuehn1952 said:

• Which holes should have double groups, which holes a single group starting?
• Should the flights be grouped together (e.g. "A" flight fills holes 1-5) or should the flights be mixed? 
• Do you mix the "D" players with indexes around 30.0 with better players or group them together into a 4-some that will probably collectively shoot 400+ (we send some out as 3-somes when possible)?
• If you have identified certain players as being more deliberate, do they get mixed into the groups randomly?  Where would you position them, knowing the entire group moves only as fast as the slowest group?
• Any other ideas?

Double groups I would think longer par 5's and par 4's.

Looking at the breakdowns I would think 2 types of grouping might be the fastest? Players are put into teams of After Death or Before Christ. ie. 2 D's with 2 A's and 2 C's with 2 B's. Might even be interesting to have an overall competition with the total score of each 4-some.

For deliberate players it might not hurt to put some thought into it but you can drive yourself crazy with that stuff. I would only put so much effort into it.

[Golfingdad]

4 hours ago, bkuehn1952 said:

Which holes should have double groups, which holes a single group starting?

 

21 minutes ago, Grumpter said:

Double groups I would think longer par 5's and par 4's.

I think it would make even more sense for the double group holes to be the holes immediately AFTER the par 5's and longest par 4's.  Those are the holes that will take the longest to finish so that means that the second group ahead should be out of the way (or nearly out of the way) by the time the first group behind them finishes that par 5.

If we just doubled up on the par 5, worse if it happened to be a reachable one, and the preceding hole was a par 3, then I could see 15 minutes into the tournament, there is a group on the par 5 green, a group in the fairway, and two groups on the tee ... with an entire hole open in front of that.

I've never organized one of these, so I may be missing something, but that's my current opinion.

As far as groupings, my father in laws club does a weekly scramble and each group is one A, one B, one C and one D.  The other option, if you wanted to have flights, could be to group the As and Bs in one (two of each per team) and the Cs and Ds together (two each per team).

[bkuehn1952]

After researching this topic a bit, it seems there is some thought to NOT doubling up the groups on holes that follow a par 3.  The idea being the 1st group on the par 3 will finish faster than a group on a par 4 or 5.  If the 1st group goes to the next hole and that hole has 2 groups to tee off, odds are they may find the 2nd group still on the tee.  So one actually puts two groups on the par 3 and if a par 5 follows, only one group on the par 5.  Seems kind of counter intuitive to have only one group on a par 5 and two on a par 3 hole.

 

[RickK]

The tournament league I play in is no where near as large as yours but we try to mix up our players and not have just low handicappers or just high handicappers in the same group.  Our idea in doing this was so that everyone eventually has a chance to play with everyone else in the league.  As far as the pairing is concerned, we do not worry if some players are playing different tees. Within the same flight, players could be playing different tees but we adjust the handicaps according to USGA handicapping rules.  

As far as doubling up, I agree that you should not double up a hole following a par 3.  In most tournaments I play in, the league or group does not decide where to double up.  That is generally done by the course staff who has far more knowledge of their course and how it should be done than most of us would.  

[gregsandiego]

12 hours ago, bkuehn1952 said:

Our club-without-real-estate runs a series of tournaments.  Our typical field is 100-120 seniors (50+).  We use a shotgun start and mostly have 4-somes.  The players range in ability from 0.0 index to 36.0, so the quality of player varies significantly.  The field is divided into 4 roughly equal size flights: A (0.0 to about 9.0), B (9.1 to about 14.0), C (14.1 to about 19.9) and D (20.0+).  The handicap index cutoffs varies depending on the makeup of the field.  The A flight plays the longer set of tees.  B & C a bit less.  D from usually the most forward tee.  So now you have a picture of this conglomeration of old farts.

The tournament directors must arrange 4-somes and assign groups to certain holes.  Many of the holes have two groups while some a single group.

Generally the tournament directors place 4 "A" players in a group, 4 "B" in a group, etc...  Some groups occasionally have a mix of A, B, C, or D.  The groups are, to my view, somewhat randomly assigned starting holes.  One might find a 4-some of "C" flight players assigned 13A, a group of "B" flight players as 14A and a group of "A" players as 14B.

Here are a couple of things upon which you can offer ideas & advice.  If you can add your thoughts as to why you make a certain suggestion, that is best:

• Which holes should have double groups, which holes a single group starting?
• Should the flights be grouped together (e.g. "A" flight fills holes 1-5) or should the flights be mixed? 
• Do you mix the "D" players with indexes around 30.0 with better players or group them together into a 4-some that will probably collectively shoot 400+ (we send some out as 3-somes when possible)?
• If you have identified certain players as being more deliberate, do they get mixed into the groups randomly?  Where would you position them, knowing the entire group moves only as fast as the slowest group?
• Any other ideas?

I've played a bunch of these for work/customers and nobody has put as much detailed analysis in as you are.

Is it really that serious? The best ball/shotguns I have played are an excuse to drink and have fun. There are usually one or two groups of ringers that win, but oh well.

What is your main goal?

 

 

 

[bkuehn1952]

7 hours ago, gregsandiego said:

I've played a bunch of these for work/customers and nobody has put as much detailed analysis in as you are.

Is it really that serious? The best ball/shotguns I have played are an excuse to drink and have fun. There are usually one or two groups of ringers that win, but oh well.

What is your main goal?

It is not a scramble.  It is a full field net tournament.  Everyone plays their ball into the hole, counts every shot and plays by the USGA Rules.  The one exception we make is a maximum of "10" on any one hole, or else some groups would be out there all day, which would mean we all would be there all day.

Our main goal is to move this mass of players around the course in under 5 hours.  If we have even one group that plays extremely slow, we can be out there 6+ hours.

[gregsandiego]

1 hour ago, bkuehn1952 said:

It is not a scramble.  It is a full field net tournament.  Everyone plays their ball into the hole, counts every shot and plays by the USGA Rules.  The one exception we make is a maximum of "10" on any one hole, or else some groups would be out there all day, which would mean we all would be there all day.

Our main goal is to move this mass of players around the course in under 5 hours.  If we have even one group that plays extremely slow, we can be out there 6+ hours.

I see!

Thank God for that. The scrambles - designed to be fast - are just the opposite as a committee forms to discuss each next shot. 

And now I understand your goal - pace of play. We need some advanced queuing theory here, but it's been years since I took that course in engineering school.

A couple thoughts:

We definitely don't want any all "D" groups because they will cause bottlenecks.

If we put all "A" players together toward the front, maybe that will help with max throughput as they race through the course. And only the slower players come in  at 5 hours +

 

 

 

[graham57]

I'm not sure I follow the logic on the holes after par 3's: in most competitions on our course, there is always a back-up on the tees of par 3's, the reason being that - on a par 4 or 5 - you generally only have to wait until the group in front has played its second shot, while on par 3's, you have to wait until they finish putting as well. For this reason, it would seem logical to double up on the holes following the par 3's. Of course, it will take longer to complete a par 4 or 5 than a par 3, but you can always have at least two groups on these holes, while you can never have more than one on a par 3.

[Golfingdad]

37 minutes ago, graham57 said:

I'm not sure I follow the logic on the holes after par 3's: in most competitions on our course, there is always a back-up on the tees of par 3's, the reason being that - on a par 4 or 5 - you generally only have to wait until the group in front has played its second shot, while on par 3's, you have to wait until they finish putting as well. For this reason, it would seem logical to double up on the holes following the par 3's. Of course, it will take longer to complete a par 4 or 5 than a par 3, but you can always have at least two groups on these holes, while you can never have more than one on a par 3.

The logic is in the bold, IMO.  Because par 5's take longer to complete, by the time group A finishes the par 5, perhaps group B on the following hole is already clear of them such that they're not waiting to tee off on their second hole.  If there are two groups lined up on the hole after a par 3, its a near 100% guarantee that group A on that par 3 will be waiting awhile on their second hole.

Granted, it could ultimately end up being irrelevant.  Enough groups and/or slow players and you're backed up in a lot of places on the course, regardless.  But there seems to be some ways to set it up so it's possible to flow smoothly.

[Dave2512]

120 golfers is manageable. A busy Saturday probably sees more than 4 golfers per hole. Shotgun is less about total  time than establishing a common finish point. Don't double stack par 3's and all should be okay, that's the way the course should play when busy anyway. 

[Fourputt]

On 5/19/2016 at 0:35 PM, bkuehn1952 said:

After researching this topic a bit, it seems there is some thought to NOT doubling up the groups on holes that follow a par 3.  The idea being the 1st group on the par 3 will finish faster than a group on a par 4 or 5.  If the 1st group goes to the next hole and that hole has 2 groups to tee off, odds are they may find the 2nd group still on the tee.  So one actually puts two groups on the par 3 and if a par 5 follows, only one group on the par 5.  Seems kind of counter intuitive to have only one group on a par 5 and two on a par 3 hole.

 

I'm not sure that there is any sure way to smooth out the flow.  When you have a mix of players and play different courses, trying to find a solution that satisfies the shortcomings of each is going to drive you to drink.  

To be honest, My Men's Club had issues with 5 hour rounds until they established their own pace of play policy, complete with penalties for noncompliance.  Now it's rare that a tournament round takes more than 4½ hours.  It only takes assessing a two stroke penalty a couple of times at the start of each season to whip the slowpokes into line.  Since the penalty is applied to the whole group unless evidence can be shown that one or two players in the group were the problem, peer pressure comes into play.  

I can be a real pain in the ass when I get stuck with a "deliberate" player.  I'll prod him every time we lose half a hole.  If I get with someone who doesn't take it seriously, I'll take my concerns straight to the committee to ensure that I don't get dinged for his inability to play on the pace.  I'm not about to get penalized for being computer paired with the wrong group.

[SavvySwede]

There are just too many things that can go wrong to plan for them all. Played in tournament where my group was 18B and the 18A group was so slow they played at a 6hr round pace for the first four holes. The organizers had us play through on the par 5 and we didn't see a soul in front of us until the last hole and manged to finish in a hair under four hours. 

[Dave2512]

So glad I am not registering for any tournaments this year. We are playing later and the earliest we can get on is 4:15 because men's club is out there for the season opener and they will use every bit of 10:00 to 4:00. I say throw them on one side and let them bump into each other all day. Gives me a headache thinking about it.

[Gator Hazard]

Could spread the misery equally by grouping groups of four as one player of each caliber so would have an A a B a C and a D player in each group. May help with knowledge of game and rulings as well because the lower cappers will be able to guide the worse players instead of a bunch of the blind leading the blonde in a good portion of groups. 

Edited May 21, 2016 by Gator Hazard

[Golfingdad]

5 minutes ago, Gator Hazard said:

Could spread the misery equally by grouping groups of four as one player of each caliber so would have an A a B a C and a D player in each group. May help with knowledge of game and rulings as well because the lower cappers will be able to guide the worse players instead of a bunch of the blind leading the blonde in a good portion of groups. 

How would it work if the group was two with brown hair and two with red hair though??

[Gator Hazard]

41 minutes ago, Golfingdad said:

How would it work if the group was two with brown hair and two with red hair though??

Back to the drawing board.....