Why aren't there more individual stroke play tournaments?

[MidMOGolfer]

Growing up there was always a tournament to play in either school sanctioned or from the junior golf association.

 

For adults, individual stroke play events are few and far between. Why is that? I know sandbaggers are a problem when using handicaps, but can't you make the event non-handicap and pick an unknown 9 or 18 holes to base the flights on and pay out prizes accordingly.

 

I think it would help the courses bring in revenue not only from the tournaments but also from players practicing more preparing for the tournaments.

[deadsolid...shank]

Everyone wants to play scrambles anymore (at least here). Maybe people just don't want an individual number by their name up there for everyone to see.

[VNutz]

Because eventually all the better players show up and certain guys just can't keep pace and it's no fun for them. Handicapped stroke play events bring in the sandbaggers and ruin it for everybody. I much prefer stroke play events but the level of competition is simply too vast to make that work consistently, thus scrambles where you still might have issues but everybody gets a chance to go lower and have a little more fun doing so.

[Sean2]

If the average golfer has one bad hole, he is pretty much done. With match play and stableford, a golfer can have a bad hole and still be in the tournament.

[MidMOGolfer]

Because eventually all the better players show up and certain guys just can't keep pace and it's no fun for them. Handicapped stroke play events bring in the sandbaggers and ruin it for everybody. I much prefer stroke play events but the level of competition is simply too vast to make that work consistently, thus scrambles where you still might have issues but everybody gets a chance to go lower and have a little more fun doing so.

 

I see what you mean, but that's why I suggested using an unknown nine holes or 18 holes if a 36 hole event to determine flighting. This way you can't be a sandbagger while also not limiting prizes to top players.

[MidMOGolfer]

If the average golfer has one bad hole, he is pretty much done. With match play and stableford, a golfer can have a bad hole and still be in the tournament.

 

Good point, guess I should have said individual tournaments and not just stroke play. Even still I don't see many of these to play in either.

[deadsolid...shank]

If the average golfer has one bad hole, he is pretty much done. With match play and stableford, a golfer can have a bad hole and still be in the tournament.

 

Matchplay just takes too long to complete for most possible tournaments, but I do like the idea of Stableford so one really bad hole doesn't ruin the entire tournament.

[farmer]

Everyone wants to play scrambles anymore (at least here). Maybe people just don't want an individual number by their name up there for everyone to see.

When I first started playing some little tournaments, (early 70's) there was one nearly every week. One day, flighted by score, rural golf at it's best. Then 2 man partnerships took over, to be gradually replaced by 2 man scrambles, then the 3 and 4 man scrambles took over. You nailed it, people didn't want their name placed by a real score.

[deadsolid...shank]

Everyone wants to play scrambles anymore (at least here). Maybe people just don't want an individual number by their name up there for everyone to see.

When I first started playing some little tournaments, (early 70's) there was one nearly every week. One day, flighted by score, rural golf at it's best. Then 2 man partnerships took over, to be gradually replaced by 2 man scrambles, then the 3 and 4 man scrambles took over. You nailed it, people didn't want their name placed by a real score.

 

Exactly. 15-20 ago each little town's nine hole course had an "open". There was one almost every weekend The little town tournaments would draw 60-70 players while the bigger 18 hole courses would pull in 130-150. Now the small courses don't even have one and the bigger curses might draw 50. And out of those 50, probably 2/3s are low(er) handicaps.

[HatsForBats]

I was going to say why not look into your areas local golf associations but what I found in your area was not much. In my area, and some other areas that I have talked to some players about, seem to have many more events. I looked at my local associations list of events for 2017 and I stopped counting at 40 and then they have about 10 Member Play Days on top of that. I am on the subscribed list for some of the local courses and it seems like there are tournaments going on fairly frequently but those are usually team matches.

[MidMOGolfer]

Thanks for looking for me, I played with two guys earlier that told me about the Show me state amateur tour. I'm going to play in that next year.

[ntanygd760]

There is basically a gross only individual event every single week from May-August/First 2 weeks September in NE Ohio.