Sandbagging by playing shorter tees?

[DaSquire]

inn playing with multiple golf groups, it has become clear that some folks have figured a loophole in the handicap calculations. Players who should play the typical "blue" tees have noticed that if they regularly play from the "white" or "red" tees that their scores are affected only slightly but their indexes rise. This is due to the slope/rating of more forward tees being much lower than how scores change in reality. 

By way of example, player A is a 9 from the blue. When they start playing regularly from the white their handicap goes up to 11 or 12 and they score about the same or only a stroke or two better on average. So when playing for cash from the blue, they end up getting a few extra strokes for free. 

I wrote to the USGA and their response is that this cannot happen and the handicap system will account for this perfectly. In reality, at least in our area, this is not the case at all and more people have discovered it and are taking advantage of "playing it forward" to quiet sandbag. 

Is this only an affect we are seeing in our area, or have others seen players exploiting playing more rounds from the shorter tees to sandbag a few more strokes?

Have any of you tried this and did it work for you?

[GolfSpy_APH]

No have not tried it and no not an issue where I am. I can play either men's forward or back tees and usually do based on what my group is playing. The course handicap (which is the part that these guys you are talking about should be taking into account) plays 3 shots harder from the back, so playing up means I need to shoot 3 shots better than the back and in reality playing back is almost easier? Landing areas are bigger off the tee and altho some of the par 5s aren't quite reachable in 2, they still can be good birdie chances. Also playing up takes driver out of my hands for a few holes as I can go through the fairway. 

What is the difference in course handicap between playing up and playing back?

[richk9holes]

I agree @GolfSpy_APH this is a matter of improper course rating/slope adjustment.

I will say that individuals might have better net scoring potential from a particular set of tees, but it's not as simple as "being closer is easier." It depends on the individual's game. 

I personally hit for good distance and struggle inside 100y. Moving up to play with my dad from senior tees actually hurts my scoring, even though I get fewer strokes. I'm not such a big hitter that I can reach par 4 from the forward tee, so all I accomplish moving up there is I turn approach shots that would be a 5-8 iron and since I'm 50y closer now they are PW or 52° shots that require less than a full swing.

I don't play blue tees often, but the few times I have had about average scoring but was getting extra strokes.

[funkyjudge]

1 hour ago, DaSquire said:

inn playing with multiple golf groups, it has become clear that some folks have figured a loophole in the handicap calculations. Players who should play the typical "blue" tees have noticed that if they regularly play from the "white" or "red" tees that their scores are affected only slightly but their indexes rise. This is due to the slope/rating of more forward tees being much lower than how scores change in reality. 

By way of example, player A is a 9 from the blue. When they start playing regularly from the white their handicap goes up to 11 or 12 and they score about the same or only a stroke or two better on average. So when playing for cash from the blue, they end up getting a few extra strokes for free. 

I wrote to the USGA and their response is that this cannot happen and the handicap system will account for this perfectly. In reality, at least in our area, this is not the case at all and more people have discovered it and are taking advantage of "playing it forward" to quiet sandbag. 

Is this only an affect we are seeing in our area, or have others seen players exploiting playing more rounds from the shorter tees to sandbag a few more strokes?

Have any of you tried this and did it work for you?

I think you have something backwards there. A golfer’s handicap will go down, not up, when they move up from the blue tees to the whites.  At my home course, I am a 13 from the white tees, and a 15 from the blue tees. This two stroke differential is about correct (I generally shoot in the mid to mid-high 80s from the white tees, and right around 90 from the blue tees).

I also play in a statewide senior travel league with 30 teams and more than 390 golfers. My handicap ranges from 12 all the way to 18 or 19 depending on the course that I am playing. Tomorrow morning, I will be playing an away match at the “easiest” course (according to the USGA Course and Slope ratings), and my handicap will be 4 strokes lower than it is at my home course. I am actually at a disadvantage on this course because, although I generally score fairly well there, many golfers, particularly the members of that course’s team, score exceptionally well on this “easy” course.

All of the above being said, golf handicaps tend to sort themselves out pretty well for most golfers, in accordance with the course and slope ratings of the courses that they are playing.

Edited June 19, 2023 by funkyjudge

[cnosil]

3 minutes ago, funkyjudge said:

I think you have something backwards there. A golfer’s handicap will go down, not up, when they move up from the blue tees to the whites.  At my home course, I am a 13 from the white tees, and a 15 from the blue tees. This two stroke differential is about correct (I generally shoot in the mid to mid-high 80s from the white tees, and right around 90 from the blue tees.

he is also saying that if he scores the same, his handicap will go up and then when he plays the blues and scores the same the differential will be greater.    So if you shoot 85 from the whites, your handicap will go up and then when you play the blues in a tournament you will a 17 and not a 15 because of your performance on the whites.  

[funkyjudge]

If that happens consistently, I would be very suspicious of some sandbagging going on. When a golfer moves up to a shorter (and thus “easier”) set of tees, he or she should shoot lower scores — maybe not a great deal lower, but at least a couple of strokes.

[cnosil]

5 minutes ago, funkyjudge said:

If that happens consistently, I would be very suspicious of some sandbagging going on. When a golfer moves up to a shorter (and thus “easier”) set of tees, he or she should shoot lower scores — maybe not a great deal lower, but at least a couple of strokes.

Depends on weakness.  Weak short game and moving up may cause higher scores.   

[Kenny B]

30 minutes ago, funkyjudge said:

I think you have something backwards there. A golfer’s handicap will go down, not up, when they move up from the blue tees to the whites.  At my home course, I am a 13 from the white tees, and a 15 from the blue tees. This two stroke differential is about correct (I generally shoot in the mid to mid-high 80s from the white tees, and right around 90 from the blue tees).

 

Not necessarily.  Last year I moved up to the White tees from the Blue tees.  My index has gone up a little since then because I have to consistently shoot lower scores in order to maintain it; I do occasionally but not enough.  My course handicap from the Whites is 6 and is 9 from the Blues.  My index from the Blues was just under 10 and now it's 11.2 from the Whites.  From the Blue tees I had to play FW/hybrids for nearly all 2nd and 3rd shots and rely on wedges a lot; very few iron shots.  I can still do that but I like hitting more iron shots, and I have no reason to go back to the Blues.

[funkyjudge]

54 minutes ago, Kenny B said:

Not necessarily.  Last year I moved up to the White tees from the Blue tees.  My index has gone up a little since then because I have to consistently shoot lower scores in order to maintain it; I do occasionally but not enough.  My course handicap from the Whites is 6 and is 9 from the Blues.  My index from the Blues was just under 10 and now it's 11.2 from the Whites.  From the Blue tees I had to play FW/hybrids for nearly all 2nd and 3rd shots and rely on wedges a lot; very few iron shots.  I can still do that but I like hitting more iron shots, and I have no reason to go back to the Blues.

My comment was in reference to a golfer's handicap AT THE SAME TIME, which will always be lower from tees that are further forward.  In your case, you are talking about a change over a period of time, and I suspect that at the time your index was 11.2 from the white tees, it had risen to about 14 or 15 from the blues.

[DaveP043]

2 hours ago, funkyjudge said:

If that happens consistently, I would be very suspicious of some sandbagging going on. When a golfer moves up to a shorter (and thus “easier”) set of tees, he or she should shoot lower scores — maybe not a great deal lower, but at least a couple of strokes.

It just doesn't always happen that way, each player has a different set of skills. A change in distance may impact one player to a greater extent than the rating system would predict, a different player may have a much smaller scoring difference.  

[Caddie1966]

3 hours ago, funkyjudge said:

I think you have something backwards there. A golfer’s handicap will go down, not up, when they move up from the blue tees to the whites.  At my home course, I am a 13 from the white tees, and a 15 from the blue tees. This two stroke differential is about correct (I generally shoot in the mid to mid-high 80s from the white tees, and right around 90 from the blue tees).

I also play in a statewide senior travel league with 30 teams and more than 390 golfers. My handicap ranges from 12 all the way to 18 or 19 depending on the course that I am playing. Tomorrow morning, I will be playing an away match at the “easiest” course (according to the USGA Course and Slope ratings), and my handicap will be 4 strokes lower than it is at my home course. I am actually at a disadvantage on this course because, although I generally score fairly well there, many golfers, particularly the members of that course’s team, score exceptionally well on this “easy” course.

All of the above being said, golf handicaps tend to sort themselves out pretty well for most golfers, in accordance with the course and slope ratings of the courses that they are playing.

Agree 100% with @funkyjudge.  Handicaps godown as you move forward. My index is 8.5.  I am 10 from the blues and 7 from the white. If I move back to black, I go to 11.  I also agree with @richk9holes, moving up doesn’t mean easier if your weaknesses are accentuated by being closer to the greens.  

[DaSquire]

Thanks for the comments. To clarify a few things:

I am talking about over time. Sandbaggers intentionally playing say 16 out of 20 scores from a forward tee so they get the benefit of moving higher in index overall. 

In theory, yes the slope and rating should short this out but it seems for many courses this is not the case. There is too much of a difference in slope and rating between tees, agian part of the question is: is this a local phenomena or other places seeing it too?

As an example:

 

 

here are white vs red for a course that we play. If one shoots par 72 from white, one would need to shoot 70 from the red to post almost the same score differential (but note it is still .1 higher). Makes sense if the course is really 2 strokes harder from the white, but it is not, there is only 400 yards total difference generally evenly distributed over every hole between these sets of tees and nothing as far as trouble is more in or out of play. This is one example course, but this pattern seems to be similar for nearly every course in the area that we regularly play (30+ courses). The slope / ratings do not appear to reflect the actual playing differences in the course from the different tees. We see it in the difference in people's handicaps when they realize this and start playing forward frequently.  Suddenly their handicap goes up even though they are posting 81,80,76,75's etc. at essentially the same rate as before they moved up. Kind of a domino effect as suddenly player X starts getting more strokes and winning more, then player Y, then player Z start moving up to more forward tees too, and so on and so on.  

It does seem a little counter intuitive and I would not have thought this would work until seeing it in real life and started looking at the sandbaggers scores and doing the math. It is a strategy that does work generally though, agree there are exceptions for some players where this will not work, but for our sake it is generally healthy decent players who are in the goldilocks zone for sandbaggers (9-17). 

  

[DaSquire]

33 minutes ago, Caddie1966 said:

Agree 100% with @funkyjudge.  Handicaps godown as you move forward. My index is 8.5.  I am 10 from the blues and 7 from the white. If I move back to black, I go to 11.  I also agree with @richk9holes, moving up doesn’t mean easier if your weaknesses are accentuated by being closer to the greens.  

Sorry but you are both missing the point. For an individual round you are adjusted based on tee box. But if one can capably play from the blue, but started playing from the white tees (at least here) their handicap index goes up. So after playing forward tees for a month or two the person who was a 9 index is now an 11 index with no change in talent. So in future they are getting 2 additional strokes when play a match from the blue (as a 9 say they get 9 but as an 11 they now get 11 - obviously this is just an example and would need to be calculated for the course, but you get the idea) 

[vandyland]

I play from 6,000 yds and get accused (in a good natured way) of playing "too short." I hit the ball fairly far, lately I have been hitting my driver about 285-290 with roll (it is dry here in TN) so I usually have 30-70 yds in on most holes. Here's the thing, I don't putt particularly well and I don't stuff wedges in there. So I usually just two and three putt a lot and end up shooting 75-78 out there. If moved back to the blues (6,400 yds) I would probably lower my index because I could still reach all the holes fairly easily but I would get a few extra strokes for the putts I don't make. The strengths of my game lately have been iron play and driver so I don't really get that "rewarded" as much from the white tees at 6,000 yds. But it is fun from up there so I stay there. 

[DaSquire]

2 minutes ago, vandyland said:

I play from 6,000 yds and get accused (in a good natured way) of playing "too short." I hit the ball fairly far, lately I have been hitting my driver about 285-290 with roll (it is dry here in TN) so I usually have 30-70 yds in on most holes. Here's the thing, I don't putt particularly well and I don't stuff wedges in there. So I usually just two and three putt a lot and end up shooting 75-78 out there. If moved back to the blues (6,400 yds) I would probably lower my index because I could still reach all the holes fairly easily but I would get a few extra strokes for the putts I don't make. The strengths of my game lately have been iron play and driver so I don't really get that "rewarded" as much from the white tees at 6,000 yds. But it is fun from up there so I stay there. 

This is the exact scenario about which we are discussing. You are playing too short tees if you actually drive ball 285-290. From 6000 you are carrying a higher handicap than if you always played at 6400. So when you go back to playing at 6400 for a game you would be getting more strokes than you would get if you regularly played and posted scores at 6400.  

[vandyland]

1 minute ago, DaSquire said:

This is the exact scenario about which we are discussing. You are playing too short tees if you actually drive ball 285-290. From 6000 you are carrying a higher handicap than if you always played at 6400. So when you go back to playing at 6400 for a game you would be getting more strokes than you would get if you regularly played and posted scores at 6400.  

First of all, I can play whatever tees I want. I watch guys my age play the TIPS all the time when they are 20+ hdcps and, while it annoys me, as long as they keep up the pace of play I have no problem with it. I don't really play competitive golf (I play by all the rules and putt everything out but that is just so I have a real score) and I find it is more fun to play from 6,000 yds. It is not so I can puff my chest out and drive greens, I just enjoy it more. I am a 5-7 HDCP so really who cares? I'm not a good player. Unless you are scratch or a +HDCP, you aren't really anything special, in my opinion. Just go out and have fun. 

Do I actually hit it 280? Quite often yes, here are some from today's round:

 

 

 

[RickyBobby_PR]

5 hours ago, DaSquire said:

inn playing with multiple golf groups, it has become clear that some folks have figured a loophole in the handicap calculations. Players who should play the typical "blue" tees have noticed that if they regularly play from the "white" or "red" tees that their scores are affected only slightly but their indexes rise. This is due to the slope/rating of more forward tees being much lower than how scores change in reality. 

By way of example, player A is a 9 from the blue. When they start playing regularly from the white their handicap goes up to 11 or 12 and they score about the same or only a stroke or two better on average. So when playing for cash from the blue, they end up getting a few extra strokes for free. 

I wrote to the USGA and their response is that this cannot happen and the handicap system will account for this perfectly. In reality, at least in our area, this is not the case at all and more people have discovered it and are taking advantage of "playing it forward" to quiet sandbag. 

Is this only an affect we are seeing in our area, or have others seen players exploiting playing more rounds from the shorter tees to sandbag a few more strokes?

Have any of you tried this and did it work for you?

I don’t see it and most people I know don’t play shorter tees in they are under 60-65.

People who need some kind of validation by winning at golf will find ways to cheat the system. It’s why I only gamble and compete against people I know.

 

[Vegan_Golfer_PNW]

5 minutes ago, vandyland said:

First of all, I can play whatever tees I want. I watch guys my age play the TIPS all the time when they are 20+ hdcps and, while it annoys me, as long as they keep up the pace of play I have no problem with it. I don't really play competitive golf (I play by all the rules and putt everything out but that is just so I have a real score) and I find it is more fun to play from 6,000 yds. It is not so I can puff my chest out and drive greens, I just enjoy it more. I am a 5-7 HDCP so really who cares? I'm not a good player. Unless you are scratch or a +HDCP, you aren't really anything special, in my opinion. Just go out and have fun. 

Do I actually hit it 280? Quite often yes, here are some from today's round:

 

 

 

Ditto except I’m only a 22 cap. For tournaments they move me up a set

[Caddie1966]

The GHIN indexes are a function of slope and course ratings which vary by tee box combination for every course that has been rated and sloped and is in the GHIN system.  Ratings and slopes are established by teams selected by the USGA to do exactly that.  I’m guessing the R&A does something similar.  Ratings and slopes are calculated based on difficulty to make par based on how each hole plays from each tee box for a scratch player.

GHIN doesn’t know how far you hit the ball or how good your short game is or how you putt.  It evaluates your score (hopefully you are entering it by hole so it can adjust according to the stroke index by hole), against course rating and slope rating from the tee box you posted the score from.  However, how you enter the score matters.  

If you post your score by hole, GHIN will adjust your score by hole to reduce your net if you exceed the limit per hole based on your handicap.  i.e.  if you are a 10, GHIN will adjust any triple or higher down to a double.
 

 If you shoot 82 on a par 72 and don’t enter the scores by hole, GHIN accepts the 82 and assuming slope and rating end up at 72, you will be “adjusted” by GHIN to 10 over for the round.  If you shoot 82 and enter by hole and have 15 pars, 2 triples and a quad, GHIN may adjust your net score to 78 or 6 over for the round.  This is why some courses require players to turn in their cards, so the pro shop can enter scores into GHIN and limit one way to sandbag.
 

If you shoot 99 and are a 10, if you entered as a 99, GHIN will not adjust.  If you enter it by hole, it will take it down accordingly, perhaps by 9-10 strokes.  The variation in how the adjustments are made varies by range of handicap index.  Lower handicaps get limited to double bogey.  Higher handicaps can legitimately post an unadjusted triple on a hole.  

[Caddie1966]

27 minutes ago, Vegan_Golfer_PNW said:

Ditto except I’m only a 22 cap. For tournaments they move me up a set

Amen, I’m 70, hit driver 265-290 and play with friends who can’t get to my tee shots after their second shot.  When I play with them, I play from the boxes they want to play from so I am not holding up the group every hole.  They will never play blue as they couldn’t reach the fairway on some holes and couldn’t carry water hazards on 3 other holes.  My handicap gets adjusted accordingly.  When I move back, I get adjusted accordingly.  At the shorter tees, my adjustment is to 7 when I play blues, I go to 10 and my index is 8ish. I don’t understand why this is an issue.

[Golf2Much]

If I could just add something to @Caddie1966 excellent description.  When rating a course, we take into account distances for men and lady scratch (0 handicap index) and bogey (interesting enough 20 handicap index for men and 24 handicap index for women) golfers.   I've been rating courses here in South Florida for about a year.   From the tee box down the fairways, we take into account the obstacles in each groups' landing areas and rate them accordingly.   

[Javs]

6 hours ago, DaSquire said:

inn playing with multiple golf groups, it has become clear that some folks have figured a loophole in the handicap calculations. Players who should play the typical "blue" tees have noticed that if they regularly play from the "white" or "red" tees that their scores are affected only slightly but their indexes rise. This is due to the slope/rating of more forward tees being much lower than how scores change in reality. 

By way of example, player A is a 9 from the blue. When they start playing regularly from the white their handicap goes up to 11 or 12 and they score about the same or only a stroke or two better on average. So when playing for cash from the blue, they end up getting a few extra strokes for free. 

I wrote to the USGA and their response is that this cannot happen and the handicap system will account for this perfectly. In reality, at least in our area, this is not the case at all and more people have discovered it and are taking advantage of "playing it forward" to quiet sandbag. 

Is this only an affect we are seeing in our area, or have others seen players exploiting playing more rounds from the shorter tees to sandbag a few more strokes?

Have any of you tried this and did it work for you?

I am not following what you are claiming here. If you are a 9 from the Blue Tees, then you will not be a 11 from the White Tees. Perhaps you had that backwards? Depending on slope a 9 from the Blue will be at least a drop of 1 to 3 shots from the White making them between a 8 to 6.

[Javs]

1 hour ago, DaSquire said:

Thanks for the comments. To clarify a few things:

I am talking about over time. Sandbaggers intentionally playing say 16 out of 20 scores from a forward tee so they get the benefit of moving higher in index overall. 

In theory, yes the slope and rating should short this out but it seems for many courses this is not the case. There is too much of a difference in slope and rating between tees, agian part of the question is: is this a local phenomena or other places seeing it too?

As an example:

 

 

here are white vs red for a course that we play. If one shoots par 72 from white, one would need to shoot 70 from the red to post almost the same score differential (but note it is still .1 higher). Makes sense if the course is really 2 strokes harder from the white, but it is not, there is only 400 yards total difference generally evenly distributed over every hole between these sets of tees and nothing as far as trouble is more in or out of play. This is one example course, but this pattern seems to be similar for nearly every course in the area that we regularly play (30+ courses). The slope / ratings do not appear to reflect the actual playing differences in the course from the different tees. We see it in the difference in people's handicaps when they realize this and start playing forward frequently.  Suddenly their handicap goes up even though they are posting 81,80,76,75's etc. at essentially the same rate as before they moved up. Kind of a domino effect as suddenly player X starts getting more strokes and winning more, then player Y, then player Z start moving up to more forward tees too, and so on and so on.  

It does seem a little counter intuitive and I would not have thought this would work until seeing it in real life and started looking at the sandbaggers scores and doing the math. It is a strategy that does work generally though, agree there are exceptions for some players where this will not work, but for our sake it is generally healthy decent players who are in the goldilocks zone for sandbaggers (9-17). 

  

How does moving up tees help a sandbagger? I am not tracking this logic. If someone wanted to raise their handicap they would play consistently from the tips with a higher sloped course. Making the course shorter or easier won’t raise a handicap unless they lie about the score. Then that is an entirely different matter.

[Javs]

5 hours ago, cnosil said:

Depends on weakness.  Weak short game and moving up may cause higher scores.   

That is true, but then they should hit more par 5’s in two and possibly have a chance to drive some par 4’s.

[cnosil]

1 minute ago, Javs said:

How does moving up tees help a sandbagger? I am not tracking this logic. If someone wanted to raise their handicap they would play consistently from the tips with a higher sloped course. Making the course shorter or easier won’t raise a handicap unless they lie about the score. Then that is an entirely different matter.

He is addressing the player that shoots the same scores from either the blue or white tees.    If the player shoots 85 from the white they will establish a handicap based on that.   If they still can shoot 85 from the blues they will get more strokes in a tournament.   It is a fairly unique scenario that could happen depending on players strengths and weaknesses.   

[Javs]

9 minutes ago, cnosil said:

He is addressing the player that shoots the same scores from either the blue or white tees.    If the player shoots 85 from the white they will establish a handicap based on that.   If they still can shoot 85 from the blues they will get more strokes in a tournament.   It is a fairly unique scenario that could happen depending on players strengths and weaknesses.   

I am tracking now. Thanks for the clarity!

[RickyBobby_PR]

1 hour ago, Caddie1966 said:

The GHIN indexes are a function of slope and course ratings which vary by tee box combination for every course that has been rated and sloped and is in the GHIN system.  Ratings and slopes are established by teams selected by the USGA to do exactly that.  I’m guessing the R&A does something similar.  Ratings and slopes are calculated based on difficulty to make par based on how each hole plays from each tee box for a scratch player.

GHIN doesn’t know how far you hit the ball or how good your short game is or how you putt.  It evaluates your score (hopefully you are entering it by hole so it can adjust according to the stroke index by hole), against course rating and slope rating from the tee box you posted the score from.  However, how you enter the score matters.  

If you post your score by hole, GHIN will adjust your score by hole to reduce your net if you exceed the limit per hole based on your handicap.  i.e.  if you are a 10, GHIN will adjust any triple or higher down to a double.
 

 If you shoot 82 on a par 72 and don’t enter the scores by hole, GHIN accepts the 82 and assuming slope and rating end up at 72, you will be “adjusted” by GHIN to 10 over for the round.  If you shoot 82 and enter by hole and have 15 pars, 2 triples and a quad, GHIN may adjust your net score to 78 or 6 over for the round.  This is why some courses require players to turn in their cards, so the pro shop can enter scores into GHIN and limit one way to sandbag.
 

If you shoot 99 and are a 10, if you entered as a 99, GHIN will not adjust.  If you enter it by hole, it will take it down accordingly, perhaps by 9-10 strokes.  The variation in how the adjustments are made varies by range of handicap index.  Lower handicaps get limited to double bogey.  Higher handicaps can legitimately post an unadjusted triple on a hole.  

Or one could do the adjustment themselves and enter the final score and have the correct handicap. 
 

 

[Caddie1966]

2 minutes ago, RickyBobby_PR said:

Or one could do the adjustment themselves and enter the final score and have the correct handicap. 
 

 

Good call.

[funkyjudge]

7 hours ago, cnosil said:

he is also saying that if he scores the same, his handicap will go up and then when he plays the blues and scores the same the differential will be greater.    So if you shoot 85 from the whites, your handicap will go up and then when you play the blues in a tournament you will a 17 and not a 15 because of your performance on the whites.  

 

2 hours ago, Caddie1966 said:

Amen, I’m 70, hit driver 265-290 and play with friends who can’t get to my tee shots after their second shot.  When I play with them, I play from the boxes they want to play from so I am not holding up the group every hole.  They will never play blue as they couldn’t reach the fairway on some holes and couldn’t carry water hazards on 3 other holes.  My handicap gets adjusted accordingly.  When I move back, I get adjusted accordingly.  At the shorter tees, my adjustment is to 7 when I play blues, I go to 10 and my index is 8ish. I don’t understand why this is an issue.

I’m 74 (almost 75), and I generally play from the white tees, or whatever tees result in an 18 hole course length of about 6,250-6,400 yards. Why do I do this? I hit driver more than 265 yards on-average and have hit a handful of 300-yard drives in the last month. I also hit my 7-iron 155-170 yards and have 3 clubs in my bag (in addition to my driver) that I regularly hit more than 200 yards.  Yes, I am an anomaly among senior golfers, and I know it.

Today , I shot the best 9-hole round of golf I have played this year (38 on a par-35 nine), with two double bogeys (6 pars and a birdie, too!).  I didn’t have an approach shot of more than 100 yards on any par-4 and a few of those approaches were between 35-85 yards. Could I have played from the blue tees? Sure, I could, and I would probably still have shot 38 or 39. However, the league that I was playing in actually recommends that I play from the gold tees (I play from the whites). If I played from the gold tees, I would have driven the greens on a few par-4 holes, even if I hit my 4-wood or 3-hybrid on some of those holes.

[cnosil]

6 minutes ago, funkyjudge said:

 

I’m 74 (almost 75), and I generally play from the white tees, or whatever tees result in an 18 hole course length of about 6,250-6,400 yards. Why do I do this? I hit driver more than 265 yards on-average and have hit a handful of 300-yard drives in the last month. I also hit my 7-iron 155-170 yards and have 3 clubs in my bag (in addition to my driver) that I regularly hit more than 200 yards.  Yes, I am an anomaly among senior golfers, and I know it.

Today , I shot the best 9-hole round of golf I have played this year (38 on a par-35 nine), with two double bogeys (6 pars and a birdie, too!).  I didn’t have an approach shot of more than 100 yards on any par-4 and a few of those approaches were between 35-85 yards. Could I have played from the blue tees? Sure, I could, and I would probably still have shot 38 or 39. However, the league that I was playing in actually recommends that I play from the gold tees (I play from the whites). If I played from the gold tees, I would have driven the greens on a few par-4 holes, even if I hit my 4-wood or 3-hybrid on some of those holes.

I don't disagree with anything you have said.    The OP is discussing sandbagging and a way he believes is being used to beat the system.