Why do women and men need separate handicapping systems? Answer: They don’t
WHS is about simplifying the system – but different course ratings for men and women only achieve the opposite
I am yet to encounter either a golf course or a golf ball that discriminates on account of gender. The ball has an unfailing tendency to go wherever we propel it, which makes gender-free tees not so much a good idea as a no-brainer.
We choose a set of tees, we golf our ball and then we add up the score. That’s all there is to it – or should be – and from there the World Handicap System admirably does the rest.
In WHS, course ratings and slope seek to establish the relative difficulty of courses compared to each other and varying according to the set of tees selected. Which, as far as it goes, is fair enough.
Lots of factors are taken into account but the one that is causing the problem here relates to the average distance that male and female golfers respectively achieve.
If I can bring this down to my own level of complexity, what this means is that a bunker at driving distance for a man from a certain set of tees might be considered not in play for a woman. And vice versa. Thus a course might be considered harder, relatively, for one than the other.
There may be something in this but it just isn’t worth the trouble it causes because what you end up with is two different course ratings from the same set of tees.
Plus, as an unintended consequence, the sheer frustration of sets of tees that are not rated for women because the required work for the course raters is effectively doubled.
Worse still, play in a mixed fourball, and it is still the bad old days of unfeasibly complicated calculations to work out how many shots everyone is getting.
Golf handicaps: What happens if we all use the same system?
So what would happen if we all used the same handicapping system? Well, I suspect that women’s handicaps may rise a little, though perhaps less than some would imagine.
Nobody wants to see their handicap go up – well, apart from a few bandits perhaps – so I understand that would not be fun.
However, I believe it would be quickly forgotten and the positives far outweigh this minor negative.
Women could play off any set of tees they wanted, the same as men. Mixed golf would become more ‘normal’. Ladies’ competitions would be the same as they are now, just with the occasional extra shot flying about. Elite competitions are played off scratch, so that wouldn’t make any difference.
Best of all, we would move a step further away from the idea that red tees are for women and the men should head for the back markers.
I would love to see the day where mixed golf involves all of us playing from the same tees, which WHS allows us to do with our handicaps adjusted accordingly. This would more often than not involve the men moving forward rather than the women moving back.
The result? More sociable golf, taking less time.
It would also be another step towards the day when everyone on the course is simply a golfer. Call me woke but that, to me, is meaningful equality.
Now have your say
What do you make of Dan’s World Handicap System argument? Are men’s and women’s golf handicaps necessary or do they just make playing golf more complicated? Have your say by leaving us a comment on X.
Dan Murphy
Dan loves links golf, which doesn't mean he is very good at it. He is a four-handicapper at Alwoodley. A qualified journalist and senior editor with 25 years’ experience, he was the long-time editor of NCG. His passion is golf courses and he is the founding editor of NCG Top 100s course rankings. He loves nothing more than discovering and highlighting courses that are worthy of greater recognition.
