All About Handicaps

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One of the great things about golf is that it allows skilled players to compete with not-so-skilled players on a level playing field, all through the wonderful handicap system. Through the miracle of mathematics, players enter scores into a computer and presto, they get a handicap index. Then, they turn that into strokes on the score card and everyone is happy.

Sounds simple, right? Not exactly. The USGA handicap system is extremely sophisticated and complex. If you’ve ever wondered what it all means – well, I can’t tell you what all of it means, but let’s cover some of the basics and get your understanding of handicaps up to scratch (sorry for the handicap pun).

Before we get into it, I want to mention that golf handicaps are serious business. The USGA handicap manual is the final word on the subject, and it should be consulted for the latest official rules and regulations. Click here to access it online.

Handicap Index

Let’s start with the most basic concept: the Handicap Index. According to the USGA:

A “Handicap Index” is the USGA’s service mark used to indicate a measurement of a player’s potential ability on a course of standard playing difficulty. It is expressed as a number taken to one decimal place (e.g., 10.4) and is used for conversion to a Course Handicap.

This is where it all begins. This is the number that the Golf Handicap and Information Network^® (GHIN^®) system spits out every two weeks after you’ve entered at least five scores. Once you have a handicap index, then you’re portable. You can go to any other course that has been rated and compete against another player with a handicap index.

To do that, you need to convert your Handicap Index into a Course Handicap. Each course is different, so there are a couple of pieces of information that go into the computation: The USGA Course Rating and the Slope Rating

USGA Course Rating

The USGA Course Rating is defined as:

A “USGA Course Rating” is the USGA’s mark that indicates the evaluation of the playing difficulty of a course for a scratch golfer under normal course and weather conditions. It is expressed as strokes taken to one decimal place, and is based on yardage and other obstacles to the extent that they affect the scoring ability of a scratch golfer.

What that means is that the USGA has come and evaluated a particular course to gauge the difficulty. Aside from yardage and obstacles, things like effective length are calculated. For instance, the prevailing wind or relative quickness of the fairways is considered.

It’s quite a comprehensive analysis of a course.

Less well known than the USGA Course Rating is the Bogey Rating. It’s like the Course Rating, but instead gauges the relative difficulty of a course for a bogey golfer instead of a scratch player.

Slope Rating

The other piece of required course-specific information is the Slope Rating. The Slope Rating is defined as:

A “Slope Rating” is the USGA’s mark that indicates the measurement of the relative difficulty of a course for players who are not scratch golfers compared to the USGA Course Rating (e.g., compared to the difficulty of a course for scratch golfers). A Slope Rating is computed from the difference between the Bogey Rating and the USGA Course Rating. The lowest Slope Rating is 55 and the highest is 155. A golf course of standard playing difficulty has a Slope Rating of 113.

For men, the Slope Rating is computed using the following formula: 5.381 x (Bogey Rating – USGA Course Rating). For women, the formula is: 4.24 x (Bogey Rating – USGA Course Rating).

Wow! That’s a lot of work to get a handicap!

The good news is, you don’t have to do any heavy math. The Course Rating and Slope Rating are done for you ahead of time. Your handicap index is calculated through a very complex formula. Now, you just need to turn that into strokes given or gotten.

Some courses have handicap charts where you just look up the Course Handicap in a big table. The other alternative is to compute it by hand.

To do that, you simply multiply your Handicap Index by the Slope Rating and divide by 113, then round to the nearest whole number. Let’s say your Handicap Index is 10.2 and your home course has a Slope Rating of 121, as mine does. That results in a Course Handicap of 11 strokes. That means you’d get 11 strokes when competing against a scratch player.

Applying The Course Handicap

Now, all that remains is to apply your handicap to your score. If you get 11 strokes, as in the example above, then you’d get one stroke back on each of the 11 most difficult holes. If you look at your scorecard, there’s a handicap listed for each hole (one for the men and one for the ladies). These are used to order the holes by relative difficulty. On each of the holes numbered 1 through 11, you’d adjust your gross score by subtracting a stroke.

That’s it! Welcome to the level playing field.

Equitable Stroke Control

Equitable Stroke Control is a mechanism that keeps handicaps from making huge swings as a result of blow-up holes. Handicaps are supposed to be representative of potential playing ability. Even a scratch player can have a bad hole now and again with a really high score. Without some protection in place, handicaps would fluctuate too drastically.

ESC is a cap placed on how large a score you can count for handicap purposes for an individual hole. For a scratch player, no score of higher than double bogey can be counted. For instance, say that a scratch player scores a 10 on a par-four hole during a round. For handicap purposes, the score would be adjusted before entering it into the handicap system. The score for the hole would be a 6, dropping 4 strokes from the final score.

Players with higher handicaps are allowed to post scores composed of hole scores higher than double bogey. Refer to the handicap manual for a table of ESC limits.

Criticism

The USGA has put a lot of effort into developing a robust handicap system. The question you might have: is it fair?

One of the criticisms I’ve heard is that low-handicappers are at a disadvantage when playing against high-handicappers. The reasoning behind that is that for a scratch player, scores don’t vary much. On the other hand, high-handicappers are much more likely to have wide swings in scores. It might be a 95 one day and 80 the next. In competition, a high handicapper is more likely to have a “round of a lifetime” and end up with something crazy like a net 60 score. A scratch amateur is less likely to do that.

That’s part of the reason that competitions use flights, so that there are several levels of players. That ensures that there isn’t too large a gap in skill levels.

Another issue that crops up is sand bagging, where players enter purposely inflated scores in hopes of getting a higher handicap and thus undeserved strokes. This isn’t really a weakness in the handicap system, though. Like golf itself, the integrity of handicaps relies on the integrity of the players. Cheating is cheating, and sand bagging is cheating.

There’s another class of pseudo-sandbaggers: players that keep honest scores, but who don’t really try as hard, and don’t score as well, during rounds that don’t count. These players may not intend to cheat the system, but the end result is the same: an inflated handicap.

In spite of the criticisms, my personal feeling is that the handicap system does a fairly good job of leveling the playing field for players of differing ability. It’s certainly better than negotiating strokes on the first tee, or not at all.

There’s So Much More

Believe it or not, this post barely scratches the surface of the handicap system. It really is that complex and extensive. There are caveats for tournament scores versus practice scores, nine-hole scores, unacceptable scores, and so much else.

The good news is, players only really need to know a few of the concepts, and I pretty much covered those above. Play honest rounds (by the rules), keep and accurate score, enter it with ESC applied and you’re doing your part. Your Handicap Index will be as valid as it can be.

As I said at the top, refer to the USGA website for all the details about the handicap system. If you’re interested in learning more, the online reference has more information than you probably want to know. Enjoy, and remember – keep accurate scores and post them all, or else I’m not giving you any strokes (I’ll take strokes, though).

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Further Reading:

USGA Handicap Information

Golf Handicap and Information Network^® and GHIN^® are registered trademarks of the United States Golf Association.