Irish Golfer Modified local rule

Interesting. I guess any organiser is free to stipulate local rules for their competitions. I wonder does it have any bearing on any affiliations they might have ? would a club (as opposed to Irish Golfer) run foul of Golf Ireland if they introduced such a local rule ? I've no idea off the top of my head.

Yes they submit all scores back to Golf Ireland. This come in quite a few years ago, so effectively it's the same as playing an open comp.

As far as I know, official handicaps were always a condition of entry to Golf Ireland comps. The only thing that changed is they now automatically get recorded as a score on your record.

Yeah, I tend to agree with a lot of this tbh. I'm pretty much in the camp of banditry (in the sense of intentional handicap building) not being rife and it mostly being a product of what WHS is. That's not to say it doesn't exist of course, there are bad eggs everywhere. I just geninely think its way overstated at times. We had a situation 2/3 years ago where a guy won a club major, he shot either 41 or 42 pts and won by a few. I actually played with him on the day. He was a high handicapper and got all the usual (mostly) friendly ribbing about it. What nobody took into account was that he played early, the weather changed completely mid morning and only about 50 people actually returned cards. Yet the whispers were there.

I mean, lets be honest, most golfers were fairly rubbish relative to their handicap under CONGU and almost never played to it and would still only get a shot back in a year. Now, under WHS most have several shots more than they had, and their HC is more reflective of how they are actually playing. In fact, most will have beaten their handicap probably 4 times in their last 20 rounds anyway. If you have a field of 120 wildly inconsistent amateurs, almost all of whom will have beaten their handicap a few times relatively recently, chances are someone is going to shoot a very good score on a given day. I also know I'm probably very much in the minority in that opinion !!

Classics with big prizes were always a problem, and as slave alludes to, the magic pencil is undefeated.

Ohh I agree totally. When WHS was introduced I thought the theory behind it was great and it made perfect sense (I suppose I still do, in a way), but I've really come full 180 on it tbh with regard to its real world application. I think any system that has expected scores, maximum scores, assumed scores just can't be good.

Totally not ideal for Irish golf as you say. I think its much more suited to say, Florida resort golf, with fairly consistent weather/conditions etc.

I agree with the sentiment, but isn't the massive volatility just a characteristic of how WHS works and how its meant to work ? Do we just need to get our heads around your handicap not being what most of us were brought up thinking it was ? I'm not sure its possible to have the "current form" aspect of WHS and the "potential" aspect of CONGU in the one system. Personally I'd never have allowed casual golf count for handicap purposes, and if I'm honest, I would never have allowed less than 18 holes count either, but that's probably just me.

I'm a case in point, I think my low last year was 4.1 or 4.2 yet through playing absolutely awful this year (possibly from having hand surgery in the spring), I'm now 8.7 - to me, brought up on CONGU and the 1 shot limit etc., that's absolute madness. I still haven't technically hit the soft cap as the timings/dates have kept my low index just outside the 12 month window. I'll probably hit it this weeked as I've a bunch of counting scores dropping out in my next run of games and what's replacing them is pure rubbish. I know WHS allows this, but its just not right.

Especially with a lot of clubs in Ireland having basically a 7 month season of counting golf

Yeah, we were early May too. Its amazing how bad the last couple of years have been. I know from keeping stats over the years I usually average 34/35 counting rounds each year, plus a few fourballs, team events etc. My last 3 years have been 2022 - 37 rounds, 2023 - 24 rounds & 2024 - 14 counting rounds so far. We probably have about 5/6 weeks left, weather permitting, so I'll do well to hit 20 for the year.

Good discussion points on limiting the outliers and upwared drift. While 5/30 scores is clearly more restrictive it's not practical as a worldwide solution. Lots of countries have too short of a season so it's virtually impossible to make 30 scores. In 1-2 years ability can drift quite a bit, with age, injury, little practice etc. I think the goal is to try to have a more current reflection of ability. Hence the 20 and not punishing someone for a worldy 2 years ago.

I think slowing the upward drift and reducing hard/soft cap is the most practical thing for the moment. Interested to hear more discussion.

Without more details it's hard to say much. A HC committee cutting 4 shots is incredibly rare. Would love to know what was going on there.

They should change to best 8 of the last 12 months (or remain as is for those who don't have 20 counting scores in the last year)

Really ? That's interesting !!

https://www.golfmonthly.com/features/should-golfs-world-handicap-system-be-scrapped-the-arguments-for-and-against

This only really scratches at the surfce but interesting nonetheless……

Most golfers I play with most of the time are nowhere near as good as their WHS HI would suggest. In fact some of my regular partners don't beat their handicaps even once in a season. From being on our handicap committee for a few years now, I know the same is true across the majority of golfers. Most are not keen on getting a HI that would give them a realistic chance of contending for prizes. Most don't realise when they've hit soft or hard cap either. Handicap committee is expected to augment WHS with additional cuts when a golfer moves too quickly downwards WHS so I'm not surprised if competitions committees are stepping in to curtail repeat winners too. Although this appears to be very much aimed at throttling banditry.