I usually shoot in the mid 70s.

If it any hotter than that I stay indoors.

Is that how you made your fortunes? Golf in Vegas?

It’s well known by anyone who’s ever been around a golf course in America.
Lots of people have an “off” day every time they play with honest golfers.
That offer to play another round for the same terms on another day is rarely accepted.

The former penal colonies all have high standards.

No, there are surprisingly few big money games in Vegas. I had a friend from Atlanta that was use to playing big and he was shocked how few of the rich guys out there would play for real money. Professional poker players are about the only big fish but they are generally savvy gamblers so you’re not going to have an edge for long.

In my prime, I hovered right around a five handicap.

Of course, I played 1&2 rounds a day during that time.  It also helped that I played the same course so my scores reflected my familiarity of the course.

After taking a break, I shot up to an eight handicap when I was playing about 3-4 times a week.

When I played once a week I went up to a 14 handicap.

I play only a few times a year now so I pretty much suck.  The technique and consistency really goes away fast.

Both of those guys are full of shit, or they hit from the ladies tees and don't take any penalties.

By the way, anyone can enter whatever scores they want when they get to the clubhouse--unless they are in a formal club tournament.  I don't believe even in his prime Biden was a six handicap.  Politicians just don't play enough.

JFC, I did mention earlier, Kerry Packer (Australian, well he was one) at the Pebble Beach Pro-Am.   Briefly, Mr. Packer submitted a handcap from the golf club in Australia which he owned.  He claimed to be an 18 handicap.  Partnered with Greg Norman, they shot 42 under par for four rounds, a figure which used to be the record at the tournament for a bunch of years.  

No 18 handicap is shooting -42 under for four rounds.  That would be what we call, "sandbagging."

I hated fuckers that did that in tournaments...

I play by the book. Why would someone submit a lower score to USGA handicap system?  It only means the get their ass micked by a true handicap.

Story on Trump

https://www.golfdigest.com/story/how-good-is-donald-trump-the-golfer

You only submit scores that are legit, by the book.  Only foreigners count gimme balls.  The worst cheaters are Aussie, probably because Australia is just a dirty old prison island.

If he doesn’t putt the short ones add 5. Not including penalties. Pros miss 4 footers.

But this is about Biden. Lying cheat scumbag communist who can’t walk, can’t ride a bicycle, let alone swing a club, can’t even talk.

Scumbag lying fuck.

I’ve played with guys in their 60s+. Off tee an arrow. 2nd shot close. Up and down par.

So if par for 18 holes of golf is 72 and someone has a 6 handicap that means they shot 78?

What, playing a scramble?



Courses are all different, some 70 to 73.  

It means, in your last 20 rounds, the average of your best 8 scores was, x.

Now, if it was official, it also means each course's slop and rating was also calculated.  Easier courses, higher handicap, harder courses, lower handicap.  Also reflects the length or what tees you play off.  

I’m 55 yo and currently a weekend 9 hcp at a top 30 private course and a 2019 club champ.  I’m pretty sure I’d beat the hell out of him on a golf course.

Shot 77 Saturday.  I never get to practice or even warm up.  I was out until 12:30 Friday and went to sleep at 2:30am, then got up at 8:30am went straight to the tee and shot 40/37.  It takes me until the back nine to get rolling, but once I do …

I can get up and down from a phone booth with a deer in it. ha ha

78?  Weak, I do that on the front 9.

I thought FJB was going to challenge Trump to a push up contest.

72 with a 6 handicap is a net 66.

Once I shot a legit 72 with a good buddy and my late father.  I was a 7 at the time.  That score card is dated, signed by all 3 of us, framed and hanging on my office wall right now.  July 1st, 2010.

I scrolled for awhile.

I didn't see a good explanation.

I understand it.

In fact, I would say that segment was the most important part of that entire debate.


My Mom's Dad and her brother retired from SoCal aerospace defense contracting. I have been around C suite types.

For people that make a ton of fucking money and don't have the time or inclination to get out, the way they measure dicks is golf. Golf is a Big Fucking Deal to a huge number of older movers and shakers. (modern types that ride around on a hoverboard wouldn't get it)

Playing golf like they do is actually hard.

Doubly hard if you forego the cart, carry your own bags and it is hot and fucking humid on the course that day.

Golfing to them is like... war or triathlete marathons. It incorporates a ton of skill like sniping (wind and slight muscular mistakes, you're off target by a mile), stamina (it's a sport that incorporates a literal open field hike measured in miles in some cases), and stress (putting that stupid fucking ball in that stupid fucking hole a mere few feet away while being mercilessly heckled by your peer group / people that are beneath you that can play better)... not even add in money bets and other things.

You and I may not see it that way, but I am telling you, the people that ran the country from the 50's to the mid 2000's, eat every day at the club, and follow that shit like how some people follow football or wrestling absolutely do.


So, for biden to not only say he played so well he needed a hand tied behind his back (literally, the point of a handicap in a sport that has different starting points for women and children) AND taunting trump to not take a cart and bagboy but hump his own shit...

That was a literal shot across the bow.

My grampa would have literally come out of his recliner, no question, and took out the tv.

Trump could not have handled it much better. He verbally patted biden on the head. Yeah, stevie, we all believe you. Sure. Sure.

All in one look and one sentence. "Yeah, I've seen your swing."

Biden outed himself to the people that run defense contracting and monster business right there. It would be like him saying he could fuck up 95% of X games competitors or Tough Mudders.

It was... significant.

I guaranfuckingtee you, even in places where they bleed dem blue and literally can not talk politics without violating some kind of federal contracting law... they were talking in hushed tones about that part.

We have some very good players on ARF and I used to be one of them decades ago. I played in college on a scholarship then worked at a private club as an assistant for a few years and have given a lot of golf lessons.

There are few guarantees in life but I can tell you that Biden has never been a legit 6 handicap and Trump, after seeing him swing, has never been a 3 or under. Not now or even 10-20 years ago.  I would bet everything I have that Biden could not not break 120 right now without cheating.

My son and I played a round with an old dude that was pretty bad ass. He didn’t murder it off the tee, but every shot was where he wanted it to go, and I don’t think he missed a green or a decent putt.  I don’t think he was + anything for par 3s, and birdied more than he hit par.

TRUTH.

It's the same in any discipline or hobby.

When you've spent thousand of hours to see marginal gains in whatever your interest is or risen to a point of being called "good," by your contemporaries or idols, it's a big fucking deal.

There's milestones in every endeavor you choose to do.  What do you choose to do, because you like it, want to get better at it?  Can be anything.  

And when some poser fucking twat comes in and says something so outlandish, but nobody else is the wiser, it's a big fucking deal.

While 100% true, it’s no fault of US golfers, as it’s the system we have to play with.

While there are many vanity cap morons (guys with big egos and typically more money than sense), there are also sandbaggers in our system. Those guys play for money and will hustle you in a heartbeat. They are typically low handicappers who roll with mid level handicaps (say someone who’s really a -5, but never posts their good scores, only their mediocre ones and winds up with a -10 handicap).

I do think Biden probably was capable of being a 6 to 8 cap or so at some point 10-15 years ago, but odds are high it was a vanity handicap (lots of gimmes, mulligans and not posting bad scores).

Trump is the poster child for a vanity handicap…

Dude. He can’t walk or navigate stairs. He can’t break 120 in 5 holes.

He can’t even foot wedge. I bet he can’t even make contact with the ball with a club.

8' is 50-50 for Pros.

I get picking up, what with the fetish for quick rounds these days.  

In money games, AIUI---I'm certainly not good enough to play for $$$--- you don't touch your f@*@*@ ball, and there are no handicaps.  Because it's all bullshit.  You get "spots".  Like, you get to tee off 100 yds ahead of Dewey.  But no strokes.  And presses on the last four holes.

I just like watching the ball sail.  I'm not good.

Trump's backswing is ugly but he makes it work and he rotates well through the ball.

He plays A LOT in front of a lot of people so I'm sure there would be plenty to call him out if he wasn't a good golfer.  Hell, John Daly has played with Trump several times and says he's pretty damn good.

I don't think Trump said anything about his handicap in the debate.

Negative, best score per hole with Norman.  So, #14 at Pebble is a Par-5 and the #1 handicapped hole at Pebble.  Packer would play that hole, from the White Tees, I think, but not as far back as the Pros.  Packer, as a 18 handicap (or whatever I wrote, it was close) gets to take one stroke from his score for each hole.  If he was a 13 handicap, he gets to take one stroke from each hole, 1-13 in handicap.  The course ranks each hole by toughest, #1 handicap, to easiest, #18 handicap.  Anyway, Packer and Norman are a team. Whoever gets the best score---Norman straight up, Packer getting a stroke---that's the score for their team for that hole.

Packer scores a birdie on this hole?  He gets 4, -1, for 3 for the team.

So not a scramble, but you can see where scores can get stupid here.

I started playing by the book 20+ years ago. It’s amazing how much your real score is.

Play by the book and you’ll add 25-30 strokes to your “score”.

So they're playing best ball.

Yup.  They're not playing from the best spot of the two. But it is best ball (with a handicap).

 Very good, simple explanation for non golfers to at least grasp how handicaps work.
Well and simply stated.

Biden has a 6 just like he was top of his class in law school and got 3 degrees.  Proven and experienced liar.

Trump owns really nice golf courses... LOTS of them.  Just like every other capitalist running dog I'm sure he stole them from indigenous peoples and only reluctantly freed his slaves.  But I trust Trump on Golf way more than Biden.

Actually I trust Trump on most anything more than Biden.  He's got no automatic lie filter like most politicians, except when he's bragging about something.

Lol@everyone saying Biden may have been....


Please. Biden was never competitive in any athletic endeavor in his life. The guy is a pencil necked loser.

This

I was a 5-6 handicapper for most of my adult life. Biden couldn't make a 3 footer if his life depended on it.

I could beat him with a pitching wedge and a $5 putter and I suck.

Dude probably gets 87 mulligans each round.

I could not watch Jim Furyk swing. It looked like a lawn chair falling out of a tree in a high wind. Man it was ugly. But he made it work.

Yes. Arnold Palmer's swing went to shit at a much earlier age than did Jack Niclaus's because Jack's swing was much more fundamentally sound and Arnold's was based on him muscleling the club.

We had a similar situation in a dart league I played in.

On another night, a player shot a perfect game against me in 301 or 501. I don't remember what terms were that night. I got my picture in a dart players magazine for being the guy that lost to someone who threw a perfect game.

I can only imagine.  Treble 20 after treble 20:  "Beginners luck!"  

Yeah, go fuck yourself.  Perfect 6 out huh?  Treble 19 double 2 or 17 double 5?

(Played a lot of darts by myself in lawschool.  Cricket is fun with a crowd, provided you omit the bullseye)

Tiger is a PLUS 6. ADD the six to his score.
He would give a 6 handicapper 12 strokes a round.

Being a six takes some serious work. Hard to believe Biden ever spared the time from politics and crime.

I was a 12 handicap a million years ago. When I played 3-4 days week for 7-8 straight at my peak. I was a considered a solid bogie golfer.

I was a full handicap against him. I got like half of the potential points spotted to me. He threw the minimum number of darts needed to go out. Not a single extra dart needed. Dave M. I drive past the bar we threw in a few times a week.

I really shouldn't, but...

https://slate.com/culture/2024/06/presidential-debate-winner-trump-biden-reaction-golf.html

Attached File


Sounds like Biden was talking about when he was VP (7-16 years ago), and he wasn't that far from the number on record.

It's a self-reporting system, Trump is well know to be a horrible cheater/liar regarding golf (a whole book was written about it).  Between the two, there's no question who was likely to be more honest with their reporting.

Trump has only reported two scores since 2016, even though he played golf on 300 days while he was president.

Some of you golfers may enjoy this more in depth article:

https://www.thebulwark.com/p/trump-reported-golf-scores-reveal-he-cheats

Attached File

Attached File


For those who enjoy such things, here's a video of Trump shanking a shot horribly:

https://www.instagram.com/reel/CufLYyCLC_T/?utm_source=ig_embed&ig_rid=cc0e47ae-6f26-4c95-afa2-e8ac8e756dc6&ig_mid=3EAE3BE8-1299-47D5-AB1E-437A1AA31EA6

My Mom is almost 70 and plays 3 days a week.

She’d mop the floor with Brandon.

It was talked about, because one of the Mods asked if he was mentally fit to serve if elected.

His answer was he took two cognitive tests and passed them the best that anyone his age has ever taken the test and he won two golf championships this year.  Then dummy starts talking about his golf game and he's a 6 handicap as VP and you know the rest.

According to Golfdigest Trumps handicap is 2.8.  That means he has the potential to play a round of golf at 2.8 strokes over par given his best scores. His best round of golf listed on his handicap index is a 70.
We talked about it today at work for 2 hours.   My handicap is 17.