Executive Course Slope Ratings

[Golf-Tinker]

It occurs to me that sufficient numbers of golf people experienced in rating golf courses must reside in The Villages. I wonder if they might be available to unofficially grade our executive course. Such ratings would allow tournaments (e.g., ladies day and men's day) to have something other than just scrambles. Off course, participants would have to sign up for the handicap GHIN system or The Villages golf system would have to accommodate a handicap system similar to GHIN.

Just a thought.

[chacam]

Already been done, and has been in place for several years. Our group uses it regularly to handicap our teams.

http://www.vegisgolf.com/

Similar to GHIN.

[Golf-Tinker]

I looked at and subscribed to VEGIS last year. It's better than not having any rating system, but it is not supported by The Villages and not used in any official tournaments that I know of on executive courses. When I talked to the individual who runs VEGIS, he admitted that his course ratings were based on his "gut" feel as opposed to an objective form of measurement.

[grayesun]

We're newbie Villagers and have only played a few Executive courses so far but agree with the ratings the Villages "staff" has assigned to them. For those not familiar with this 1 to 4 system, it is based purely on degree of challenge each course presents; 1 being least and 4 being most challenging. We've only played courses rated 1, 2 and 3 so far and are playing a 4 rated course tomorrow (12/19), so we'll see if we continue to agree with their grading.

[zcaveman]

It occurs to me that sufficient numbers of golf people experienced in rating golf courses must reside in The Villages. I wonder if they might be available to unofficially grade our executive course. Such ratings would allow tournaments (e.g., ladies day and men's day) to have something other than just scrambles. Off course, participants would have to sign up for the handicap GHIN system or The Villages golf system would have to accommodate a handicap system similar to GHIN.

Just a thought.

Your best chance will be to use the http://www.vegisgolf.com/ to rank your team members so you can play a handicapped format for your group. I looked at if for our group and decided that it was not worth the bother. We ended up letting age 75 and over shoot from the forward tees and the rest of us shoot from the middle tees. It bought a little equality into the group.

Besides, most of the executive golfers are not going to pay for any handicap system and the Villages golf system is never going to agree to any handicap system. Remember that these are the people that got rid of the hole handicaps on the golf score cards. The reason was that executive golf is a fun game and doesn't need handicap scoring.

[Ooper]

We're newbie Villagers and have only played a few Executive courses so far but agree with the ratings the Villages "staff" has assigned to them. For those not familiar with this 1 to 4 system, it is based purely on degree of challenge each course presents; 1 being least and 4 being most challenging. We've only played courses rated 1, 2 and 3 so far and are playing a 4 rated course tomorrow (12/19), so we'll see if we continue to agree with their grading.

IMHO, I don't believe the 1 thru 4 rating is what Golf-Tinker is talking about. The 1 thru 4 rating is just a rule of thumb on how hard the course is. I believe what G-T refers to is the slope and rating as determined by the USGA. You can read about it here: http://golf.about.com/cs/rulesofgolf/a/hfaq_determine.htm

[grayesun]

Thanks, I understand golf course slope ratings and perhaps should have started my response by indicating such...will not post with such cavalier abandon in the future. I just figured I'd mention the 1-4 system because a few Villagers we've talked to about it weren't aware of it or what it meant.