Competition Handicaps

Every so often, we learn something new. So when checking scores in a recent medal, I found that a member who had a handicap of 28, the computer gave the player a maximum of 24 in what was an Extra Medal.

There a short discussion as to why this was, but I never realised that members who had an official handicap of 25 - 28, were never allowed to play off more than 24.

In January this year, I attended a seminar of the changes to the new handicapping system (which effectively allowed a handicap of up to 54!), and various statistics showed that by allowing a player to use their full handicap allowance, players could take on any other player.

Handicaps are there to allow a level playing field.

As a result, I have instructed Claire to alter the computer settings for the remainder of the season, starting with the Extra Medal on Sunday 7th August 2016, to allow full handicap allowance for all players up to the maximum of 28.

Unfortunately, I cannot change this for players still in the match-play, but for the 2017 season, this will include all competitions, including the match-play competitions.

I can only apologise to those players involved, as the committee are not aware of when this decision was made.

I wish you success in the remainder of the season.