The season is now in full swing, and we wanted to take the opportunity to further explain an important 2024 World Handicap System change:
FOUR-BALL MATCH PLAY STROKE CALCULATION
The application of allowances has changed so that the percentage is applied to the unrounded difference between players, rather than to each player's unrounded course handicap.
Handicap allowances are applied to each player's unrounded Course Handicap for greater precision, which will be the case whenever Golf Genius is used. In Four-Ball match play and Foursomes formats, once the handicap allowances have been applied, the player with the lowest Playing Handicap™ plays off zero strokes relative to the other players. The other players receive the difference between their own Playing Handicap and that of the player with the lowest Playing Handicap. With that said, as part of the 2024 revision to the WHS™, the order of operations in Four-Ball match play has been updated so that:
- The player with the lowest Course Handicap is first reduced to zero, and
- The recommended 90% handicap allowance is applied to the difference for the other players.
This procedural change was made after research determined that more equity and consistency would be retained by having the allowance applied relative to the players in the match.
The following depicts examples of the new and old methods of calculation:
