Five years on, the World Handicap System is still anything but universally accepted in Great Britain & Ireland.
The first set of findings from our biggest ever survey on the controversial calculator shows opinion remains divided.
But while many of you are far from glowing in your assessment of WHS, lots of you are also positive about it – despite what you might see on social media.
At the start of the year, we asked you to complete a questionnaire shared across our daily email newsletter and our social media channels.
A total of 3,390 of you responded, giving us detailed insights into how club golfers really feel about the way handicaps are calculated.
Over the next few days, we’ll break down the data revealing what you told us about trust in the World Handicap System and whether you think its fair, as well as your thoughts general play scores, manipulation, and if you believe it truly reflects ability.
But on the big question, “How do you feel about WHS?” What did you tell us?
8.9% of you reported you are very positive about the system, while a further 34.9% said you are mostly positive about WHS. 28% of you revealed you are neutral, while more than one in four of you are either mostly negative (20.7%) or very negative (7.5%).
On The NCG Golf Podcast, Tom Irwin and I discussed the result. “One thing you could say is you’ll always have a chunk of club members who are neutral about handicap systems because they just don’t care,” he said.
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“But we are five years into something that was announced with great fanfare, which was a big change, and it’s causing upheaval and takes time and money to roll out, and you’re not getting majority positive feedback.
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“That’s a bit of a problem, isn’t it? Because there is obviously a minority who are unhappy with it. It’s hard to dissect how much of that unhappiness is an emotional reaction and how much of it is a rational exaction.
“How much of what they are portraying about it being a cheat’s charter, high handicappers winning competitions, and the dumbing down of golf is a fact, and how much of it is just saying, ‘I don’t like it’.”
With governing bodies looking for crumbs of comfort in a GB&I environment seen as an outlier in terms of the fierce reaction to WHS, the figures do not suggest that most respondents hate the system.
But they are a mixed bag and there is still a significant minority that are still not persuaded about WHS five years in.
In our next piece, we’ll reveal what you said about how the system compares with CONGU and whether you would support a move back to the old arrangements.
Now have your say on the World Handicap System
What do you think? Are you surprised by the WHS survey results? Let us know in the comments, email me at s.carroll@nationalclubgolfer.com, or get in touch on X. We’ll reveal your thoughts in a later article.
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