New World Handicap System

[Colin L]

> @Roadking2003 said:

> > @"Colin L" said:

> > Am I right then in thinking that the commercial interest rests on the vanity of golfers who want to kid themselves they are better than they really are by matching their scores against an unrealistic par figure, or is that too harsh?

>

> I don't know where all of this "par is set in the USA for commercial reasons" is coming from.

>

> I've played almost 400 courses in 16 countries around the world and my observation is that par is set using the same method in every country. Par for men is the same regardless of which tees we play. And that's exactly like it is in Scotland, Spain, Ireland, etc.

>

> So, no. There is no vanity par for golfers who want to kid themselves.....

 

It's not exactly the same in Scotland, as I have been saying; nor is it the same in England as Newby has been saying. I've just run through the scorecards of a few Scottish courses - far too few to be a significant sample. I've noticed some which have the same men's par off different tees but in each case the yardage of every hole is within the recommended parameters and others where the pars differ.

 

As an example, you might be interested in the courses at Gleneagles, which I have chosen at random without any thought of reminding you of the events of September 2014 or September 2019 which were staged there.

 

**The King's Course**: 3 sets of men's tees -Pars of 71, 70 and 68. 2 sets of women's tees - Pars of 75 and 71.

On the other hand, the **Queen's Course** has two sets of men's tees with the same par, but all holes are within the parameters. Similarly with the 2 sets of women's tees.

 

Differences are mostly caused by Par 5s on the longer course changing to Par 4s on the shorter ones but not exclusively. One of the differences between my club's tees is that our first hole Is a Par 4 for men off the white, yellow and red tees and a Par 3 off the blue.

 

[HatsForBats]

> @"Colin L" said:

> > @Roadking2003 said:

> > > @"Colin L" said:

> > > Am I right then in thinking that the commercial interest rests on the vanity of golfers who want to kid themselves they are better than they really are by matching their scores against an unrealistic par figure, or is that too harsh?

> >

> > I don't know where all of this "par is set in the USA for commercial reasons" is coming from.

> >

> > I've played almost 400 courses in 16 countries around the world and my observation is that par is set using the same method in every country. Par for men is the same regardless of which tees we play. And that's exactly like it is in Scotland, Spain, Ireland, etc.

> >

> > So, no. There is no vanity par for golfers who want to kid themselves.....

>

> It's not exactly the same in Scotland, as I have been saying; nor is it the same in England as Newby has been saying.

 

In looking at Scorecards on the internet I see what you are saying. There are plenty of courses where the Par is the same but also plenty where it is not. Could you post a copy of the scorecard for your course so that we can see the distance/par differences hole by hole?

[jlbos83]

I have to educate myself (or decide that I don't need to know what's under the hood). I always kind of got why par wasn't part of the calculations before, and it made sense to me. Though I guess for net double bogey to make sense, par needs to find its way in somewhere.

 

It feels much more complicated, but maybe I just have not read enough. Hopefully it just turns out to be invisible. I just wonder about the impact for the average public course that is trying to provide a basic, yet decent course for regular folks to play getting hit with some added requirements. If par has to change, the golf association isn't going to be paying for the new signs and scorecards. etc.

[HatsForBats]

> @Roadking2003 said:

>

> As an example, you might be interested in the courses at Gleneagles, which I have chosen at random without any thought of reminding you of the events of September 2014 or September 2019 which were staged there.

>

> **The King's Course**: 3 sets of men's tees -Pars of 71, 70 and 68.

 

I don't think that Par 68 would fly here in the states. I can't see our seniors, or others for that matter, wanting to play those Yellow Tee's with 14 par 4's and 4 par 3's. Personally I usually try to avoid courses that only have 2 par 5's. A course with none I don't think I would even consider playing unless it was an executive course. Though I can understand if it is how you are used to things it would not seem odd in the slightest.

 

6,066 yards also seems a little much for many of our seniors but maybe that course plays shorter than the yardage? Or do older players just not play those courses or do they just suck it up playing a course that is too long for their distance capabilities?

 

 

 

 

[DaveLeeNC]

If they just change par per the guidelines, then on Pinehurst No. 5 green tee golfers (5685 yards) will be playing a 420 yard par 4 and golfers with an Index of 14.2 or less will only be able to record a 6 on that hole. > @HatsForBats said:

> > @Roadking2003 said:

> >

> > As an example, you might be interested in the courses at Gleneagles, which I have chosen at random without any thought of reminding you of the events of September 2014 or September 2019 which were staged there.

> >

> > **The King's Course**: 3 sets of men's tees -Pars of 71, 70 and 68.

>

> I don't think that Par 68 would fly here in the states. I can't see our seniors, or others for that matter, wanting to play those Yellow Tee's with 14 par 4's and 4 par 3's. Personally I usually try to avoid courses that only have 2 par 5's. A course with none I don't think I would even consider playing unless it was an executive course. Though I can understand if it is how you are used to things it would not seem odd in the slightest.

>

> 6,066 yards also seems a little much for many of our seniors but maybe that course plays shorter than the yardage? Or do older players just not play those courses or do they just suck it up playing a course that is too long for their distance capabilities?

>

>

>

>

>

 

H4B - that is an interesting scorecard. But it is supposed to be a SCOREcard. Where do the scores go? Serious question, BTW.

 

It is interesting that there is only one set of hole handicaps that are shared between the men and ladies. I am used to seeing a separate table for the women (even though there are ladies' ratings for some of the longer tees where some of the stronger lady golfers play). Without a separate set of hole handicaps for each teebox and gender, there will always be some inconsistencies in there somewhere, IMHO.

 

dave

[DaveLeeNC]

Has anybody heard anything about the course ratings being used to generate hole handicaps from the rating data? It seems a natural.

 

dave

[Sawgrass]

> @DaveLeeNC said:

> Has anybody heard anything about the course ratings being used to generate hole handicaps from the rating data? It seems a natural.

>

> dave

 

If what I was told about hole-by-hole score input being (presumably) required by my golf association, it would seem that theY would offer the raw data to clubs to adjust hole allocations. In fact, this may be the most reliable resource available.

[DaveLeeNC]

> @Sawgrass said:

> > @DaveLeeNC said:

> > Has anybody heard anything about the course ratings being used to generate hole handicaps from the rating data? It seems a natural.

> >

> > dave

>

> If what I was told about hole-by-hole score input being (presumably) required by my golf association, it would seem that theY would offer the raw data to clubs to adjust hole allocations. In fact, this may be the most reliable resource available.

 

One thing that they could easily do would be to generate unique hole handicaps for each tee for each gender. With the new NDB rule that would make a lot of sense, but would tend to turn scorecards into the fine print on your rental car contract -)

 

dave

[Colin L]

> @DaveLeeNC said:

> If they just change par per the guidelines, then on Pinehurst No. 5 green tee golfers (5685 yards) will be playing a 420 yard par 4 and golfers with an Index of 14.2 or less will only be able to record a 6 on that hole. > @HatsForBats said:

> > > @Roadking2003 said:

> > >

> > > As an example, you might be interested in the courses at Gleneagles, which I have chosen at random without any thought of reminding you of the events of September 2014 or September 2019 which were staged there.

> > >

> > > **The King's Course**: 3 sets of men's tees -Pars of 71, 70 and 68.

> >

> > I don't think that Par 68 would fly here in the states. I can't see our seniors, or others for that matter, wanting to play those Yellow Tee's with 14 par 4's and 4 par 3's. Personally I usually try to avoid courses that only have 2 par 5's. A course with none I don't think I would even consider playing unless it was an executive course. Though I can understand if it is how you are used to things it would not seem odd in the slightest.

> >

> > 6,066 yards also seems a little much for many of our seniors but maybe that course plays shorter than the yardage? Or do older players just not play those courses or do they just suck it up playing a course that is too long for their distance capabilities?

> >

> >

> >

> >

> >

>

> H4B - that is an interesting scorecard. But it is supposed to be a SCOREcard. Where do the scores go? Serious question, BTW.

>

> It is interesting that there is only one set of hole handicaps that are shared between the men and ladies. I am used to seeing a separate table for the women (even though there are ladies' ratings for some of the longer tees where some of the stronger lady golfers play). Without a separate set of hole handicaps for each teebox and gender, there will always be some inconsistencies in there somewhere, IMHO.

>

> dave

 

The green and red courses must be the ones rated for women. As you see the yardage is less than the yellow but the par goes up to 75.

 

I see the point about no places for scores. I just called it a scorecard but it might be more accurately called a chart.

[DaveLeeNC]

Colin, here in the US you would typically see ratings for men and women on the Yellow, Green, and Red tees (but not always) for those distances.

 

It would be interesting to know what a scorecard looks like and just exactly what does the starter typically hand out to a foursome on that course. And thanks for the details.

 

dave

[Colin L]

Here as requested is a table of my club's yardages and hole Pars.. As you'll see, the 1 stroke difference between the pars of the white and yellow courses comes from the 16th which is a Par 5 off the white and Par 4 off the yellow. The 4 stroke difference between the pars of the white and blue course comes from the 1st which is Par 3 off the blue and Par 4 off the white, and from the 2nd, 15th and 16th which are Par 4s off the blue.

 

 

 

[Newby]

> @Sawgrass said:

 

>

> If what I was told about hole-by-hole score input being (presumably) required by my golf association, it would seem that theY would offer the raw data to clubs to adjust hole allocations. In fact, this may be the most reliable resource available.

 

This is available in from the CONGU system software providers. It is/was used to produce relative hole difficulty for when the stoke index is/was based solely on relative difficulty and can/could be edited to give the information for different handicap bands

[Augster]

> @"Colin L" said:

> Here as requested is a table of my club's yardages and hole Pars.. As you'll see, the 1 stroke difference between the pars of the white and yellow courses comes from the 16th which is a Par 5 off the white and Par 4 off the yellow. The 4 stroke difference between the pars of the white and blue course comes from the 1st which is Par 3 off the blue and Par 4 off the white, and from the 2nd, 15th and 16th which are Par 4s off the blue.

>

>

>

>

 

If that course was in the US, the tee boxes off the blue would be PRISTINE because nobody would play them. The yardage is fine for a senior tee, it’s almost 400 yards longer than our senior tees. But ours is a “par 71”. Nobody here is playing a par 66. Pish posh. Lol. :)

[ThinkingPlus]

> @Augster said:

> > @"Colin L" said:

> > Here as requested is a table of my club's yardages and hole Pars.. As you'll see, the 1 stroke difference between the pars of the white and yellow courses comes from the 16th which is a Par 5 off the white and Par 4 off the yellow. The 4 stroke difference between the pars of the white and blue course comes from the 1st which is Par 3 off the blue and Par 4 off the white, and from the 2nd, 15th and 16th which are Par 4s off the blue.

> >

> >

> >

> >

>

> If that course was in the US, the tee boxes off the blue would be PRISTINE because nobody would play them. The yardage is fine for a senior tee, it’s almost 400 yards longer than our senior tees. But ours is a “par 71”. Nobody here is playing a par 66. Pish posh. Lol. :)

 

Actually the blue tees are the hardest. The SSS is a stroke above par.

[Roadking2003]

> @"Colin L" said:

> > @Roadking2003 said:

> > > @"Colin L" said:

> > > Am I right then in thinking that the commercial interest rests on the vanity of golfers who want to kid themselves they are better than they really are by matching their scores against an unrealistic par figure, or is that too harsh?

> >

> > I don't know where all of this "par is set in the USA for commercial reasons" is coming from.

> >

> > I've played almost 400 courses in 16 countries around the world and my observation is that par is set using the same method in every country. Par for men is the same regardless of which tees we play. And that's exactly like it is in Scotland, Spain, Ireland, etc.

> >

> > So, no. There is no vanity par for golfers who want to kid themselves.....

>

> It's not exactly the same in Scotland, as I have been saying; nor is it the same in England as Newby has been saying. I've just run through the scorecards of a few Scottish courses - far too few to be a significant sample. I've noticed some which have the same men's par off different tees but in each case the yardage of every hole is within the recommended parameters and others where the pars differ.

>

> As an example, you might be interested in the courses at Gleneagles, which I have chosen at random without any thought of reminding you of the events of September 2014 or September 2019 which were staged there.

>

> **The King's Course**: 3 sets of men's tees -Pars of 71, 70 and 68. 2 sets of women's tees - Pars of 75 and 71.

> On the other hand, the **Queen's Course** has two sets of men's tees with the same par, but all holes are within the parameters. Similarly with the 2 sets of women's tees.

>

> Differences are mostly caused by Par 5s on the longer course changing to Par 4s on the shorter ones but not exclusively. One of the differences between my club's tees is that our first hole Is a Par 4 for men off the white, yellow and red tees and a Par 3 off the blue.

>

 

I just checked a couple of courses. The Old Course and Old Head. Par is the same for all tees.

[rogolf]

> @Roadking2003 said:

> > @"Colin L" said:

> > > @Roadking2003 said:

> > > > @"Colin L" said:

> > > > Am I right then in thinking that the commercial interest rests on the vanity of golfers who want to kid themselves they are better than they really are by matching their scores against an unrealistic par figure, or is that too harsh?

> > >

> > > I don't know where all of this "par is set in the USA for commercial reasons" is coming from.

> > >

> > > I've played almost 400 courses in 16 countries around the world and my observation is that par is set using the same method in every country. Par for men is the same regardless of which tees we play. And that's exactly like it is in Scotland, Spain, Ireland, etc.

> > >

> > > So, no. There is no vanity par for golfers who want to kid themselves.....

> >

> > It's not exactly the same in Scotland, as I have been saying; nor is it the same in England as Newby has been saying. I've just run through the scorecards of a few Scottish courses - far too few to be a significant sample. I've noticed some which have the same men's par off different tees but in each case the yardage of every hole is within the recommended parameters and others where the pars differ.

> >

> > As an example, you might be interested in the courses at Gleneagles, which I have chosen at random without any thought of reminding you of the events of September 2014 or September 2019 which were staged there.

> >

> > **The King's Course**: 3 sets of men's tees -Pars of 71, 70 and 68. 2 sets of women's tees - Pars of 75 and 71.

> > On the other hand, the **Queen's Course** has two sets of men's tees with the same par, but all holes are within the parameters. Similarly with the 2 sets of women's tees.

> >

> > Differences are mostly caused by Par 5s on the longer course changing to Par 4s on the shorter ones but not exclusively. One of the differences between my club's tees is that our first hole Is a Par 4 for men off the white, yellow and red tees and a Par 3 off the blue.

> >

>

> I just checked a couple of courses. The Old Course and Old Head. Par is the same for all tees.

 

Yes, the Old Course has white and yellow tees (6700 and 6400 yards), they are both ('all") par 72. What are you trying to say about it?

[Colin L]

> @Roadking2003 said:

> > @"Colin L" said:

> > > @Roadking2003 said:

> > > > @"Colin L" said:

> > > > Am I right then in thinking that the commercial interest rests on the vanity of golfers who want to kid themselves they are better than they really are by matching their scores against an unrealistic par figure, or is that too harsh?

> > >

> > > I don't know where all of this "par is set in the USA for commercial reasons" is coming from.

> > >

> > > I've played almost 400 courses in 16 countries around the world and my observation is that par is set using the same method in every country. Par for men is the same regardless of which tees we play. And that's exactly like it is in Scotland, Spain, Ireland, etc.

> > >

> > > So, no. There is no vanity par for golfers who want to kid themselves.....

> >

> > It's not exactly the same in Scotland, as I have been saying; nor is it the same in England as Newby has been saying. I've just run through the scorecards of a few Scottish courses - far too few to be a significant sample. I've noticed some which have the same men's par off different tees but in each case the yardage of every hole is within the recommended parameters and others where the pars differ.

> >

> > As an example, you might be interested in the courses at Gleneagles, which I have chosen at random without any thought of reminding you of the events of September 2014 or September 2019 which were staged there.

> >

> > **The King's Course**: 3 sets of men's tees -Pars of 71, 70 and 68. 2 sets of women's tees - Pars of 75 and 71.

> > On the other hand, the **Queen's Course** has two sets of men's tees with the same par, but all holes are within the parameters. Similarly with the 2 sets of women's tees.

> >

> > Differences are mostly caused by Par 5s on the longer course changing to Par 4s on the shorter ones but not exclusively. One of the differences between my club's tees is that our first hole Is a Par 4 for men off the white, yellow and red tees and a Par 3 off the blue.

> >

>

> I just checked a couple of courses. The Old Course and Old Head. Par is the same for all tees.

 

Yes, the Old Course was one of the ones I mention above where the two sets of tees have the same par **but**. where the par of all the holes of the shorter course conform with the recommended yardage range for that par. What got me interested was that I was getting the clear idea that American courses will regularly have one par for all sets of tees even where that meant on some sets the par of a hole did not conform to the USGA guidelines for par. I would like to think, but don't know and unfortunately don't have the time to look into that you would not find many if any Scottish courses where that happened. It's not something I've particularly thought of before but just taken for granted that par will be specific to each set of tees , bearing in mind that each different colour of tee denotes a discrete golf course.

[Newby]

Because the CONGU and EGA measures for par overlap it is easier for a club to specify the par as the same for all tee colours.

But the USGA has no overlap. So if one hole is 470 yards off one colour it is a par 4 and if it is 471 off another colour, that must be a par 5 according to the USGA.

 

Under CONGU & EGA either colour could be par 4 or par 5.

[DaveLeeNC]

> @Augster said:

> > @"Colin L" said:

> > Here as requested is a table of my club's yardages and hole Pars.. As you'll see, the 1 stroke difference between the pars of the white and yellow courses comes from the 16th which is a Par 5 off the white and Par 4 off the yellow. The 4 stroke difference between the pars of the white and blue course comes from the 1st which is Par 3 off the blue and Par 4 off the white, and from the 2nd, 15th and 16th which are Par 4s off the blue.

> >

> >

> >

> >

>

> If that course was in the US, the tee boxes off the blue would be PRISTINE because nobody would play them. The yardage is fine for a senior tee, it’s almost 400 yards longer than our senior tees. But ours is a “par 71”. Nobody here is playing a par 66. Pish posh. Lol. :)

 

One of our courses has yardages and par that are very similar to this course - Par 70, 6089/5806/5466 yards. Keep in mind that our membership is pretty old but from a member play perspective at least half the rounds are played from the 5466 yard tees.

 

dave

[DaveLeeNC]

An interesting (to me, anyway) question is what problem is solved by this change here in the US. It does introduce a level of consistency, I suppose. But there is also a level of consistency in the current view that the back tees define the entire hole and shorter tees are just shorter versions of this same hole. Changing par is certainly going to tend to 'degrade' the 'quality of the NDB approach to max scores. A 475 yard par 5 is hardly going to rate the same 'difficulty against par' as a 440 yard par 4. But maybe in the end each set of tees will get its own hole handicap #.

 

dave

[Colin L]

> @DaveLeeNC said:

> Colin, here in the US you would typically see ratings for men and women on the Yellow, Green, and Red tees (but not always) for those distances.

>

> It would be interesting to know what a scorecard looks like and just exactly what does the starter typically hand out to a foursome on that course. And thanks for the details.

>

> dave

 

I'm travelling today but will catch up with this later. In the meantime I can say that for a singles stroke competition the starter would hand out a scorecard to each player.

[Colin L]

> @DaveLeeNC said:

> An interesting (to me, anyway) question is what problem is solved by this change here in the US. It does introduce a level of consistency, I suppose. But there is also a level of consistency in the current view that the back tees define the entire hole and shorter tees are just shorter versions of this same hole. Changing par is certainly going to tend to 'degrade' the 'quality of the NDB approach to max scores. A 475 yard par 5 is hardly going to rate the same 'difficulty against par' as a 440 yard par 4. But maybe in the end each set of tees will get its own hole handicap #.

>

> dave

 

Are you perhaps overlooking that each set of tees defines a separate course?

[Sawgrass]

> @DaveLeeNC said:

> An interesting (to me, anyway) question is what problem is solved by this change here in the US. It does introduce a level of consistency, I suppose. But there is also a level of consistency in the current view that the back tees define the entire hole and shorter tees are just shorter versions of this same hole. Changing par is certainly going to tend to 'degrade' the 'quality of the NDB approach to max scores. A 475 yard par 5 is hardly going to rate the same 'difficulty against par' as a 440 yard par 4. But maybe in the end each set of tees will get its own hole handicap #.

>

> dave

 

In terms of "problems solved" I have to say that incidental aspects of this change is that a tee's rating, which will certainly be associated with changes in par, will become a more vivid aspect of that setup. Another is that the virulent confusion caused by the old system of making an additional adjustment to handicap when competing from different tees will be extinguished.

 

Like so many things the new par numbers will be a challenge to adjust to at first, but there is solid logic behind this and I therefore trust that it will all seem natural in a short time. But the transition, particularly for those who have to lay out the grids on scorecards for printing, will be noteworthy.

[davep043]

> @Newby said:

> Because the CONGU and EGA measures for par overlap it is easier for a club to specify the par as the same for all tee colours.

> But the USGA has no overlap. So if one hole is 470 yards off one colour it is a par 4 and if it is 471 off another colour, that must be a par 5 according to the USGA.

>

> Under CONGU & EGA either colour could be par 4 or par 5.

 

Even though there's no overlap in the stated yardages, the Committee is required to consider other factors in defining par for each hole, including configuration of the ground and severity of obstacles. Its not unreasonable to have a 480-yard downhill par 4, or a 450 yard par 5 that's uphill, or has crossing hazards (bunkers or water) that limit the tee shot distance. Even so, we should probably see more variability of par based on yardage than we do in the US. It seems to me that many US courses have more sets of tees, and greater differences in yardage, than what I've seen elsewhere.

[DaveLeeNC]

> @Sawgrass said:

> > @DaveLeeNC said:

> > An interesting (to me, anyway) question is what problem is solved by this change here in the US. It does introduce a level of consistency, I suppose. But there is also a level of consistency in the current view that the back tees define the entire hole and shorter tees are just shorter versions of this same hole. Changing par is certainly going to tend to 'degrade' the 'quality of the NDB approach to max scores. A 475 yard par 5 is hardly going to rate the same 'difficulty against par' as a 440 yard par 4. But maybe in the end each set of tees will get its own hole handicap #.

> >

> > dave

>

> In terms of "problems solved" I have to say that incidental aspects of this change is that a tee's rating, which will certainly be associated with changes in par, will become a more vivid aspect of that setup. Another is that the virulent confusion caused by the old system of making an additional adjustment to handicap when competing from different tees will be extinguished.

>

> Like so many things the new par numbers will be a challenge to adjust to at first, but there is solid logic behind this and I therefore trust that it will all seem natural in a short time. But the transition, particularly for those who have to lay out the grids on scorecards for printing, will be noteworthy.

 

SG, I do believe that the changing par thing (if it happens) will RE-introduce additional changes WRT mixed tee competitions and net stroke play competitions where there will need to be a 'Par -Par' adjustment.

 

dave

[DaveLeeNC]

> @"Colin L" said:

> > @DaveLeeNC said:

> > An interesting (to me, anyway) question is what problem is solved by this change here in the US. It does introduce a level of consistency, I suppose. But there is also a level of consistency in the current view that the back tees define the entire hole and shorter tees are just shorter versions of this same hole. Changing par is certainly going to tend to 'degrade' the 'quality of the NDB approach to max scores. A 475 yard par 5 is hardly going to rate the same 'difficulty against par' as a 440 yard par 4. But maybe in the end each set of tees will get its own hole handicap #.

> >

> > dave

>

> Are you perhaps overlooking that each set of tees defines a separate course?

 

There is a 'rules specific' interpretation of that where this is correct. But in terms of how people (in the US) talk, 'a course' defines 18 specific holes and not 18 specific tees. There is no 'confusion' to be solved here in that regard.

 

dave

[KevCarter]

**My opinion**

 

Having multiple sets of tees is supposed to keep the experience fun for all levels of player, and all ages. The goal is to enable the players to reach the green in regulation figures. The yardage/par chart makes complete sense, but the course designer needs to take that into consideration when building multiple tees. I see several instances of taking a 470 yard par 5 from the standard tees, and making it a 440 yard par 4 from the front (Senior) tees. To me this is totally counter productive. The goal shouldn't be to just decrease total yardage, but to make the course more playable. I would always take that 480 yard par 5, and keep it a par 5 with a yardage inside the guidelines, perhaps 460. I would attempt to never have a par 4 of over 400 yards from the front tees.

 

It looks like I may be alone in my thinking?

[DaveLeeNC]

> @KevCarter said:

> **My opinion**

>

> Having multiple sets of tees is supposed to keep the experience fun for all levels of player, and all ages. The goal is to enable the players to reach the green in regulation figures. The yardage/par chart makes complete sense, but the course designer needs to take that into consideration when building multiple tees. I see several instances of taking a 470 yard par 5 from the standard tees, and making it a 440 yard par 4 from the front (Senior) tees. To me this is totally counter productive. The goal shouldn't be to just decrease total yardage, but to make the course more playable. I would always take that 480 yard par 5, and keep it a par 5 with a yardage inside the guidelines, perhaps 460. I would attempt to never have a par 4 of over 400 yards from the front tees.

>

> It looks like I may be alone in my thinking?

 

Kev, I kind of 'run the scoring stuff' for a bunch guys who play once a week (around 16 of them). My DOB is 1949 and I am one of the young guys. We used to play mixed tees and I was the last holdout for the 'longer' tees. We now all play at less than 6000 yards (even at par 72). I will be getting input from the group on this, but I suspect that even if the USGA changes to the new Par definitions by tee, we won't be changing our scorecards (and we play more team Stableford than anything else). None of us 'moved up' to start playing 430 yard par 4's.

 

2 of us, I guess :-)

 

dave

 

 

[Imp]

> @"Colin L" said:

> Here as requested is a table of my club's yardages and hole Pars.. As you'll see, the 1 stroke difference between the pars of the white and yellow courses comes from the 16th which is a Par 5 off the white and Par 4 off the yellow. The 4 stroke difference between the pars of the white and blue course comes from the 1st which is Par 3 off the blue and Par 4 off the white, and from the 2nd, 15th and 16th which are Par 4s off the blue.

>

>

>

>

 

Colin, are there requirements to hit off the blue (age? hdcp?) Or, can anyone play them?

 

--kC

[KevCarter]

> @DaveLeeNC said:

> > @KevCarter said:

> > **My opinion**

> >

> > Having multiple sets of tees is supposed to keep the experience fun for all levels of player, and all ages. The goal is to enable the players to reach the green in regulation figures. The yardage/par chart makes complete sense, but the course designer needs to take that into consideration when building multiple tees. I see several instances of taking a 470 yard par 5 from the standard tees, and making it a 440 yard par 4 from the front (Senior) tees. To me this is totally counter productive. The goal shouldn't be to just decrease total yardage, but to make the course more playable. I would always take that 480 yard par 5, and keep it a par 5 with a yardage inside the guidelines, perhaps 460. I would attempt to never have a par 4 of over 400 yards from the front tees.

> >

> > It looks like I may be alone in my thinking?

>

> Kev, I kind of 'run the scoring stuff' for a bunch guys who play once a week (around 16 of them). My DOB is 1949 and I am one of the young guys. We used to play mixed tees and I was the last holdout for the 'longer' tees. We now all play at less than 6000 yards (even at par 72). I will be getting input from the group on this, but I suspect that even if the USGA changes to the new Par definitions by tee, we won't be changing our scorecards (and we play more team Stableford than anything else). None of us 'moved up' to start playing 430 yard par 4's.

>

> 2 of us, I guess :-)

>

> dave

>

>

 

Thank you Dave. I was starting to think I've totally lost it. Nice to know that if I'm goofy, I'm not alone! ???