What grade is scratch?

[Roger de Coverly]

Can anyone tell me what % of amateur golf players achieve scratch, as that might be the best way to resolve this conundrum?

That American chart seemed to have it as about 0.6% which in the context of an ECF grading list is the top 60 players once the "professionals" are removed.

Here's the top 100 ENG from FIDE
http://ratings.fide.com/topfed.phtml?ina=1&country=ENG
If you ignore the top twenty or so, then 0.6% takes you down to about 2300 which is FM qualification standard.

Perhaps that's yet another way of looking at it. If you had GM/IM/FM/CM titles in Golf, what standard would you need to achieve them?

This is based on their being around 10000 players on the domestic standard play list, so top 0.6% is top 60.

[Paul McKeown]

Well, another factor that should be taken into account is the relative degree of perfectability that chess and golf permit. In chess it is unlimited. In golf, you can't beat 18 for 18 holes, and you can't do anything about the weather either. I read on some zero reliability website that Tiger Woods would have a handicap 10 better than scratch if he were to have one. That would certainly compress the upper limits of golf drastically compared to chess, despite the huge financial incentive available to the world's best golf players. If you want to make money from your hobby, play golf rather than chess, would appear to be the moral of the story.

[Alex Holowczak]

I read on some zero reliability website that Tiger Woods would have a handicap 10 better than scratch if he were to have one.

DId someone say earlier that scratch is equivalent to 6-over par?

Between 1998 and 2008, his scoring average on the PGA Tour was about 68. I guess most of the courses he plays are par-72, so that'd equate to 3-under par or 4-under par. So based on the difference between 4-under par and 6-over par, a handicap of +10 sounds about right. Of course, the PGA Tour will be playing from the Championship tees, whereas you can get to scratch by only playing off the non-Championship tees. So +10 may even be a bit conservative.

[Roger de Coverly]

The PGA have an official world ranking which has around 1400 names. Presumably that's a long way above "scratch" in standard. Although you cannot really compare it to the FIDE list without knowing the size of the respective icebergs of players beneath it. There are rather more British Isles players in the top 100 than the corresponding chess list.

http://www.officialworldgolfranking.com ... gion=world

[Alex Holowczak]

The PGA have an official world ranking which has around 1400 names. Presumably that's a long way above "scratch" in standard. Although you cannot really compare it to the FIDE list without knowing the size of the respective icebergs of players beneath it. There are rather more British Isles players in the top 100 than the corresponding chess list.

http://www.officialworldgolfranking.com ... gion=world

At the risk of being pedantic, the OWR is nothing to do with the PGA. It is results-based; they earn points depending on their finishing position in tournaments. If you miss the cut, you score 0.

[Paul McKeown]

Between 1998 and 2008, his scoring average on the PGA Tour was about 68. I guess most of the courses he plays are par-72, so that'd equate to 3-under par or 4-under par. So based on the difference between 4-under par and 6-over par, a handicap of +10 sounds about right. Of course, the PGA Tour will be playing from the Championship tees, whereas you can get to scratch by only playing off the non-Championship tees. So +10 may even be a bit conservative.

What does Tiger Woods actually score, then, on average? 68? 67? 66?

[Brian Valentine]

Of course, the PGA Tour will be playing from the Championship tees, whereas you can get to scratch by only playing off the non-Championship tees. So +10 may even be a bit conservative.

Just to throw something else into the mix- handicaps are not based on the par score for the course. They are based on Standard Scratch Score which is closely related, but not identical to par. SSS adjusts for the relative difficulty of the course (eg several holes only just qualifying for par 4). SSS varies by the tee position selected and therefore, in theory, your conservatism is unjustified.

[Paul Cooksey]

What does Tiger Woods actually score, then, on average? 68? 67? 66?

I assume you mean a few years ago

[Alex Holowczak]

Of course, the PGA Tour will be playing from the Championship tees, whereas you can get to scratch by only playing off the non-Championship tees. So +10 may even be a bit conservative.

Just to throw something else into the mix- handicaps are not based on the par score for the course. They are based on Standard Scratch Score which is closely related, but not identical to par. SSS adjusts for the relative difficulty of the course (eg several holes only just qualifying for par 4). SSS varies by the tee position selected and therefore, in theory, your conservatism is unjustified.

Fair enough; I'm happy to be corrected on that!

I did think that you could get some courses that are easier than others; I'm glad that someone thought of that before I did!

What does Tiger Woods actually score, then, on average? 68? 67? 66?

I assume you mean a few years ago

At his peak, probably something like 68 in every round on average. Since his personal problems, his average has gone up to 70. This is possibly just rustiness, and to be fair, injury. There's probably a natural variance though; he'll be more likely to score lower scores at the start of the tournament than the end, because the course is made more difficult with regard to pin placement as the week goes on.

[Paul McKeown]

Okay, actually reading what you wrote, he averages 68. A scratch player should average 78 (rather than the on the face of it score of 72). We might get somewhere with this...

[Paul McKeown]

Okay. The following site appears reasonably authoritative.

22% of golfers score 90 or better. That would be equivalent to a handicap of 12 (applying the difference of 6 strokes between actual score and the potential score that handicap represents).

50% of golfers score 100 or better. That would be equivalent to a handicap of 22.

6% of golfers score 80 or better. That would be equivalent to a handicap of 2.

Scratch represents a handicap of zero.

The world's best golfers score 68. That would be equivalent to a handicap of +10.

I'll go away and process this information now, but it is already very apparent that the golf curve is very different than the chess curve.

[Paul McKeown]

Okay, actually reading what you wrote, he averages 68. A scratch player should average 78 (rather than the on the face of it score of 72). We might get somewhere with this...

Not quite
The scratch players scores might be
71, 83, 71, 83, 71, 83.
Assuming par and standard scratch are 72, his handicap would be unchanged his average score would be 77

Explain, please? I don't understand - but that is my ignorance not your facts!

[Alex Holowczak]

One thing that this has taught me so far: When they mention on the snooker that Dennis Taylor is a low-handicap player in golf, I'll be less impressed than before!

[Paul McKeown]

Are there any Fide Masters, who also happen to be scratch golfers?

That would certainly help putting this one to bed, as they could explain the relative difficulty of both levels of achievement.

Three sources have been given:

source 1
source 2
source 3

The statistics of the first two sources seem to be in some degree of agreement, those of the third (which provide statistics in terms of actual 18 hole scores rather than handicaps) seem to provide a very different picture.

It could be that the first two are accurate and the third one inaccurate.

It could also be that the third one states an actual picture rather than a theoretical picture, or it could be that there is a sort of "blaggers, sandbaggers and braggers" effect first intimated by Paul Cooksey above, but I would have thought that some sort of ethics process would minimise that sort of thing in such a commercialised activity. One might point out that the sources are all American, and if one were to extrapolate from dubious processes used in maintaining the USCF ratings list, one might envisage all sorts of nonsense.

I suspect, however, that the fact that I don't understand the golf handicapping process correctly, is the real reason that these statistics appear to disagree.

Using source 1, scratch is approx. 210, using source 2, scratch = 202-204, using source 3, scratch is approx. 196-198.

Bob Clark, both a graded chess player and a handicapped golfer, initially proposed that scratch would equate to 180, but then admitted that that might have been a slight underestimation. This would tend to suggest to me that scratch lies towards the lower end of that range from 196 to 210.

[Roger de Coverly]

The handicapping system treats these 4 categories differently (I wont go into it)
but basically the better you are the less you handicap gets deducted for playing well, that probably also means that the lower the handicap the more accurate it is.

That one does at least have a chess analogy. In the international rating system, the K factor which determines how many points you gain or lose varies with the historical standard. So if you have ever had a rating above 2400 (IM standard), your K is 10 whilst being 15 for all other established players.