Your New WHS Index

Seve OB

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122469037#Comment_122469037

but 9 hole competition always counted towards handicap so no real difference there.

The system doesn’t calculate cuts. It calculates score differentials. Playing a really good round doesn’t necessarily mean a cut will be applied to a Handicap Index.

The system works out a score differential that keeps the SD for the 9 holes actually played consistent, so to half it would be disingenuous

bakerbhoy

WHS uses averages … that why is fuuuucked up..

Anyone heard of median…

Mush better metric…

Russman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122469448#Comment_122469448

"Playing a really good round doesn’t necessarily mean a cut will be applied to a Handicap Index."

That's exactly the part that I've had so many conversations about, particularly with older guys that I play with, my own father included. A lot of them simply cannot change their thinking away from "good round = automatic cut". I don't actually blame them tbh, after whatever number of years of CONGU, its hard to think of handicaps as something new, and to be fair the idea that two guys could shoot 35pts and one could get cut and one could get an increase is pretty off the wall for some people.

I had a situation about a month ago where an average enough score on the Saturday of 35pts got me a reduction because the worst of my counting 8 was dropping out, and coincidentally on the Sunday a better score of 36pts got me an increase because the best of my counting 8 was also dropping out. I know its done by gross scores and all that, but trying to explain it to the regular 4 ball was funny !! Actually it might have been Sunday to Saturday, but it was consecutive rounds.

Meh, I know its here to stay, but I have to admit to coming full 180 on WHS, thinking it was great at the start, but now I think its absolutely awful in an Irish golfing context.

blue note

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122466086#Comment_122466086

The course ratings being off was my main concern with WHS before it came into effect and it's proving to be a huge issue with it as far as I can see. I've no idea why they don't look at the scores and tweak the ratings based on that. At this stage we literally have millions of rounds to look at data on. Every course must have 10s of thousands. The score differential across different courses should be consistent.

For example - lets say a golfer with a handicap index of 18 on an away course (based on those millions of rounds) is expected to have an average score differential of 21. If on one course the handicap index 18 golfer over the last few years have averaged 19 and on anther they've averaged 23, then clearly the ratings are wrong. Because that same golfer on those two different courses would have a significantly different handicap. You could similarly look at away scores for golfers. If a clubs golfers away scores are better or worse than expected, there must be a problem with the ratings. Now you can try to confuse the issue by saying there's more to the calc than just looking at the average and there of course is. But the underlying truth is that you should be able to predict scores in that volume with reasonable accuracy. If clubs are out of line with expectation, they should at a minimum be looked at and more than likely adjusted.

fungie

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122472861#Comment_122472861

Why is median better in this instance? Mean would take into account the actual score differential where median wouldn't.

spacecoyote

The critical issues, ultimately, are that, 1, new golfers in most clubs are being left to the system to generate your handicap, and 2, the soft/hard caps are too high.

Whereas before, when you joined a club, you gave in 3 cards and were given an initial handicap, and it was likely somewhere in the range of 16-20 or so. It was probably tough for a new golfer, but made you work at it. Now I think most handicap secs are just letting the handicap system do its thing. So a guy who would have been given 18 starting out, now is playing off 30 for his first handicap.

Then allowing people to move from up 1 shot in a year to 5 means handicaps have stretched too quickly, and it's open to abuse.

awec

Maybe average of the your best 8 out of 20 is too wide a spread?

Average of your best 5 out of the last 20 would drag handicaps down a bit, more so for higher players who are likely to have a much wider variance between their best and their 8th best.

bakerbhoy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122475018#Comment_122475018

The median is 

less affected by outliers and skewed data

 than the mean and is usually the preferred measure of central tendency when the distribution is not symmetrical.

Russman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122475192#Comment_122475192

I think there's a lot of truth in that. The question i'm slightly conflicted over (insofar as any of this actually matters 😁!), is that the nature of WHS makes huge volatility almost necessary or an integral part of it. Introducing lower caps makes it a kind of hybrid with CONGU. Almost like "….yeah, its your average but not too much….." The whole premise of WHS is to be a measure of current form rather than CONGU which was always regarded as potential. I'm not sure they are compatible tbh.

I know ultimately the answer is we have to change our mindset, but its easier said than done !

Seve OB

I always felt there were considerable flaws with WHS. main ones being what’s just been said here, hard and soft caps to big, a tighter average would be better and no account taken of proven potential.

I have long come to the conclusion though that it is what it is and there is not a lot any of us can do about it unfortunately. I do think the powers that be need to listen to the players, maybe conduct some sort of survey for feedback. but they never did and just did their own thing when coming up with the system which was supposed to be the best bits of all the different handicap jurisdictions but in reality was just a small tweak to the USGA version.

I just accept it now for what it is.

Seve OB

from an operational point of view, in the early days we were all looking at our rounds. We knew if we had a good one dropping or even a bad one dropping, I nearly never look at my own record anymore . Just play the games and let the system do its thing. Id reckon most golfers nearly never look at their own record, and still loads haven’t a clue how it works.

i made points before about the buffer zone of the old system being a good target for a bad round. If you were close you could try grind out a score. If you were miles off hitting the buffer you could essentially give up on the round, have a bit of fun, take some mad shots on etc. With the exception of gaining 10 .1’s in a year you didn’t previously need to keep tabs on your own playing record to know if you were in buffer territory.

You can’t really do that now. a bad round now might be a good round soon so you really have to try hard every round right to the end. But you need to keep tabs on your record to know what’s dropping etc and if you are in the modern day equivalent of the old buffer zone and if you need to grind a score out.

That’s not as easy as it sounds and IMO is a contributing factor to handicaps rising (unnecessarily)

oh and another thing. The buffer was easy to calculate during a round. Now if I’m dropping a SD of 14.6 I genuinely haven’t a breeze what score I need to shoot to even match that…. And it will get worse when playing away courses

spacecoyote

I like the system...for me. But I just think its flawed for the way that Irish amateur golf works, and for the way that it's open to abuse.

The guy who won our winter league overall singles didn't shoot a round over 90 strokes for the entire winter, no score less than 35 points stableford for 14 weeks on the trot. He was given a 3 shot observation cut at end of the league

He hasn't had a round under 90 strokes since qualifying started back and he's already got at least 1 stroke back. He's an example of someone gaming the system. I don't doubt he'll have 2-3 of that cut back by the time the winter league starts back, and he'll probably start shooting the lights out again until qualifying starts back, as he's done for the prior 2-3 years

Russman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122477609#Comment_122477609

That's the thing. As you say, he'll have those shots back in no time. Observation cuts are essentially useless with the index being recalculated constantly and after 20 rounds it will have completely washed out. That could be less than 2 months for some guys.

As Seve mentioned above, I've taken the view that it is what it is, and only occasionally check my record to see if I have a counting score dropping out and what my target will be to replace it with something equal or better. Not going so well this year, I'm rapidly heading for the soft cap, might make it this weekend 😫!

spacecoyote

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122477718#Comment_122477718

Bandit 😉🤠

moycullen14

I've kinda given up on WHS at this stage. Too many fundamental problems with it:

Course ratings are way off. I know its difficult to have a one size fits all CR but some of them just defy all logic, especially links courses

WHS is supposed to reflect your current standard. How can it do this when the frequency of your submissions is not factored in? How current is current when some of your counting scores could be more than 2 years old? Maybe there should be a requirement to submit a minimum number of cards per year to keep your handicap.

Casual rounds are way too casual. I've come across people creating score cards after a round, gimme putts, you name it, things that would not be acceptable in normal competitions.

Played with a guy recently (society, admittedly) who had 61 shots! Whatever that is, it ain't golf. A par on one of the par 3s would have netted him -1! Bit tricky for a scratch golfer to match that.

Banditry: With CONGU you had to work at being a bandit, now you can be one without even trying. In the old days when you came across a 10-12 handicapper playing of 18-20, you knew he was sandbagging; today it could be because he did/didn't submit any scores.

The nett(?) result is that I'm playing in fewer competitions, just having fun playing for myself. Maybe that's no bad thing.

Seve OB

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122477609#Comment_122477609

Whatever about captains prize or something big, he would want to be one sad bastard to be handicap building to win a winter league 🤣

REFLINE1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122478050#Comment_122478050

haha i thought the same , imagine spending all of peak golf season purposively playing sh*t so you could win the fkn winter league

Ronney

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122478065#Comment_122478065

Me too. For as long as I can remember there is always high scores in Winter. Being able to place and slow greens is a bit aid to the higher handicaps.

Russman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122478065#Comment_122478065

Probably makes enough in vouchers to cover his sub for the year !

spacecoyote

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122478564#Comment_122478564

Yes, the prizes in our winter league would give someone a decent top up on their club account

Seve OB

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122478564#Comment_122478564

what club allows vouchers/comp prizes to be used as sub payments?

I don’t know if any, but if there are some, it’s not a great business model if you ask me

Russman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122478735#Comment_122478735

Yeah, its probably not ideal, but if he can use the vouchers somewhere outside of the club, he'll be saving in cash terms anyway. Supermarkets used to take the old paper GUI vouchers but I'm not sure how it all works now tbh.

Seve OB

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122478801#Comment_122478801

would have thought any club with a pro shop applies voucher amount to the winners pro shop balance. that way the money is kept in the club to help operations.

any open competition i have ever won have always given me a voucher to spend in their club shop.

i guess if a club doesn't have a pro shop, then it becomes a bit different.

spacecoyote

Yeah, in my place, unless there's an actual physical prize, it's money into your account for use in the pro-shop.

You can't pay your sub with it

DiegoWorst

Being able to put your hand on the ball in the rough during winter gives some golfers a new lease of life. In our place it is the same story every year, some guys struggle all summer, handicaps go out, as soon as non-qualifying golf comes in they're back to shooting 40+ points. I don't think there is any intent in it, some find their comfort level when there's a bit of give under the ball. It is almost as if they should have 2 handicaps, 1 for winter and 1 for summer.

bakerbhoy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122479569#Comment_122479569

Shop or bar accounts for us.

coillcam

Winter scores are hard to gauge. Placing everywhere and sometimes that's enough scope to take a tree/branch out of the equation. Tees then being brought froward too far so you're playing the wrong course or an entirely unrated course. It's easier to score and you're less penalised for going offline.

You can only hold one handicap index so some committees opt for a temporary internal comp only cut on a player. We've had plenty of guys peak significantly in the smaller winter fields but barely feature come major time in the summer.

Obviously there are outliers but in general winter golf is a wash as far as banditry goes. The prizes are smaller so bandits would be wasting their time in crap weather. It only rears it's head in the run up to the big fixtures on the calendar or some but not all interclubs.

On the other points about caps and upward movement. I'd be in favour of this tightening up so the majority of players start hitting their caps quickly. 1 year rolling is good don't get me wrong but the limits are too wide. Perhaps a fixed percentage of the low index or sliding scale by index is better. A scratch golfer going out 3 shots is huge compared to someone on an index of 25.

My thought on this is that it restricts the bandits options and most players will have a comeback where they find their mojo again anyway. Obviously there are people with injuries/illness to consider but this is already covered under whs rules. Probably means hc committees doing a little more admin work and dealing with grumbles but should keep scoring more realistic.

Russman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122483306#Comment_122483306

Very much agree with this. What would be deemed realistic scoring though ? Doesn't the very nature of WHS make good scores much more likely or even expected ? Like, if your index is an average of 8 scores, chances are you'll have beaten your index say in 4 of those scores. If someone happens to have a very good day, you can easily see how beating your handicap by several shots could be common enough, especially if you play a lot of golf and your index is generated over a couple of months. If, in theory, everyone in the field is now potentially a winner under WHS, with their index now being I suppose more "current", whereas I think before under CONGU probably at least half the field teeing it up on a Saturday had no chance, mostly from carrying a handicap that had a legacy cut from a hot round 2 years ago in it.

spacecoyote

https://online1.snapsurveys.com/interview/26c1c946-caa2-4fb7-9c32-08ffc0429983

Not being publicised much but this survey seems to be from USGA and the R&A looking for feedback on WHS.

People might be interested in sharing their opinions

PARlance

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122545314#Comment_122545314

I was a bit dubious about the authenticity of the survey but a quick search brought up confirmation from a few decent sources.

Nothing about it on the official site though which is a bit odd.