Slope Rating Question

[tony@CIC]

I'm a bit perplexed now about slope rating as I always viewed it as measuring the difficulty of a course - the higher the number the more difficult.  In Florida we play from approximately 5700 yds and the slope rating is 113 for that tee box. The course is challenging in that there's lots of water - sometimes on both sides of the fairway, greens are relatively small but elevated with lots of undulations and some greenside bunkers. Played my old home course in Ohio for the first time this year. It has a slope rating of 123 for virtually the same distance, the greens are approximately the same size but not the extreme undulations of the Florida course. The course played a lot easier than the one in Florida and I obviously played better as well.  I know there are a lot of factors but when I read one of the definitions (below) it makes even less sense. What am I missing? 

"Course and Bogey Rating are calculated using the USGA Course Rating System. Course rating teams consider more than 460 variables on a standard course rating, from each set of tees. The USGA Course Rating System takes into account: the actual measured length of a golf course, factors that can affect the playing length of the course and other challenges that influence the playing difficulty of each hole (obstacle factors). Slope Rating is calculated by subtracting the Course Rating from the Bogey Rating and multiplying it by a constant"

[MGoBlue100]

https://www.popeofslope.com/about/index.html

[tony@CIC]

12 hours ago, MGoBlue100 said:

https://www.popeofslope.com/about/index.html

After reading it's still clear as mud. Guess I'll just take it at face value and not question it. 

[MGoBlue100]

Did you dig down to this point?

https://www.popeofslope.com/courserating/slope.html

[cnosil]

@Golf2Much, you’re knowledgeable in this topic.  Can you provide some things for @tony@CIC to look at when comparing the courses to help determine why the easier appearing course is rate as a harder course?

[LinksgolfFever]

Lots of mud for sure @tony@CIC.  I’ll stick with using the course rating 

[tony@CIC]

35 minutes ago, MGoBlue100 said:

Did you dig down to this point?

https://www.popeofslope.com/courserating/slope.html

Yup I did. I understand the the course handicap concept and do utilize it when I access GHIN. I was trying to get into the minutia of the course rating system which according to everything I read has many factors but none really explained. Again not  big deal as it is what it is - just more curiosity than anything else. 

[cnosil]

24 minutes ago, tony@CIC said:

Yup I did. I understand the the course handicap concept and do utilize it when I access GHIN. I was trying to get into the minutia of the course rating system which according to everything I read has many factors but none really explained. Again not  big deal as it is what it is - just more curiosity than anything else. 

Is something like this what you are looking for? https://golf.com/travel/how-golf-hole-rated-explained-usga-expert/

[Kenny B]

15 minutes ago, cnosil said:

Is something like this what you are looking for? https://golf.com/travel/how-golf-hole-rated-explained-usga-expert/

This is a good overview of the process.  When I followed the rating team around when they came to our area several years ago, it was interesting what they considered and not considered on a hole.  Along with the factors listed above, it was most important what obstacles were located at the appropriate distances off the tees.  It also matters how close the obstacles are to the edge of the fairway and how wide the fairway is at those distances.  If the obstacles are far enough away, they are not considered as important.  One guy told me that a course near Seattle had put in a new bunker and wanted as assessment of how much it was going to change the difficulty.  The rater came out and looked at it and said that it made no difference because the bunker was not in an area that was at the distances for either the scratch or bogey golfers.  He said they wasted money putting it in.

@tony@CIC  I don't know if you have differences in rollout between the Ohio and Florida courses, but that can be very important.  Are the fairways at the Florida course relatively flat compared to the Ohio course?  At our course the architect put undulations at points in the fairway that can give us uphill/downhill/sidehill lies (where I seem to be most of the time ) and the rough also has mounds of grass and flat lies are rare.

I know you have been in Florida for awhile, but I might also add that you may still be more familiar with your CIC course and that could be a reason why it plays easier for you.   Just my 52 cents... inflation, sorry!

[tony@CIC]

Kenny, you're right about my familiarity with the course in Ohio. And we do have some #$%*@*  greenside bunkers BUT the course is relatively wide open compared to Florida and except for a few holes relatively flat like Florida. They do leave the rough higher in Ohio, but there's negligible water in comparison. As mentioned previously, not only do some of our holes in Florida have water on both sides of the fairways but that dastardly architect sloped the fairways on both sides to the water. 

Anyways thx for the responses to all.  I'll just go with the fact that a higher authority  knows better than me how to rate a course. 

[Kenny B]

34 minutes ago, tony@CIC said:

As mentioned previously, not only do some of our holes in Florida have water on both sides of the fairways but that dastardly architect sloped the fairways on both sides to the water. 

EVERYBODY knows that slopes go to the water, right... for runoff?  Well, it does for a couple of our fairways even though we don't have any rain needing drainage, but our course's architect went out of his way to have putts break AWAY from the water!!  Took me along time to figure out the subtle ridges in the greens.  I swore that some putts were breaking uphill.

[MGoBlue100]

4 hours ago, tony@CIC said:

Yup I did. I understand the the course handicap concept and do utilize it when I access GHIN. I was trying to get into the minutia of the course rating system which according to everything I read has many factors but none really explained. Again not  big deal as it is what it is - just more curiosity than anything else. 

Me:

 

[Golf2Much]

@cnosil, thanks for the vote of confidence!  @tony@CIC, hopefully I can point you in the right direction.  For the last year, I've been a volunteer course rater for the Florida State Golf Association in South Florida.  I find it a great combination of my engineering/analytical career and the game I love.   

In a nutshell, the there's two important elements that result from our rating:  the overall course rating and the slope.  The course rating itself can be considered as the expected performance of scratch golfer (0.0 index) on a particular course.  The slope at a high level can be considered as the relative difficulty for bogey player (index 20.0 for men and 24.0 for women).  These numbers are generated by assessing and summing each hole's fairway and green characteristics.  Each tee box is rated for both men and women scratch and bogey golfers.  Landing areas from each tee are established based on the standardize lengths for each of the four groups:  men scratch golfers (250 yards for tee shots and 220 yards for subsequent shots), men bogey golfers (200 yards off the tee and 170 subsequent full shots), women scratch golfers (210 yards off the tee and 190 yards on subsequent full shots) and women bogey golfers (150 yards off the tee and 130 on subsequent full shots).   At each landing zone we look at the fairway width, roll, topography, trees, bunkers, lateral obstructions and other factors within 50 yards of the center of the fairway.  At the greens we look at the green depth and width, the green speed, percentage of bunker coverage, bunker characteristics, any penalty areas that may be within the purview area, recoverability and rough ratings, general green surface (flat, moderate or extreme slope) and other factors.  These are just a few of the things were are looking for as we rate each hole.  

In the end, each hole's data is entered into a formula and the rating and slope for each tee box is generated.  There's so much more involved in the overall rating of a golf course.  Here is a YouTube video that we used in our training that may help explain more of what goes into course rating:  

I hope this helps.

[tony@CIC]

13 hours ago, Golf2Much said:

@cnosil, thanks for the vote of confidence!  @tony@CIC, hopefully I can point you in the right direction.  For the last year, I've been a volunteer course rater for the Florida State Golf Association in South Florida.  I find it a great combination of my engineering/analytical career and the game I love.   

In a nutshell, the there's two important elements that result from our rating:  the overall course rating and the slope.  The course rating itself can be considered as the expected performance of scratch golfer (0.0 index) on a particular course.  The slope at a high level can be considered as the relative difficulty for bogey player (index 20.0 for men and 24.0 for women).  These numbers are generated by assessing and summing each hole's fairway and green characteristics.  Each tee box is rated for both men and women scratch and bogey golfers.  Landing areas from each tee are established based on the standardize lengths for each of the four groups:  men scratch golfers (250 yards for tee shots and 220 yards for subsequent shots), men bogey golfers (200 yards off the tee and 170 subsequent full shots), women scratch golfers (210 yards off the tee and 190 yards on subsequent full shots) and women bogey golfers (150 yards off the tee and 130 on subsequent full shots).   At each landing zone we look at the fairway width, roll, topography, trees, bunkers, lateral obstructions and other factors within 50 yards of the center of the fairway.  At the greens we look at the green depth and width, the green speed, percentage of bunker coverage, bunker characteristics, any penalty areas that may be within the purview area, recoverability and rough ratings, general green surface (flat, moderate or extreme slope) and other factors.  These are just a few of the things were are looking for as we rate each hole.  

In the end, each hole's data is entered into a formula and the rating and slope for each tee box is generated.  There's so much more involved in the overall rating of a golf course.  Here is a YouTube video that we used in our training that may help explain more of what goes into course rating:  

I hope this helps.

Thx - helped a lot. 

[Vegan_Golfer_PNW]

Ok, I have a curiosity. Which course is tougher, higher slope or higher rating? I guess I should try the higher rated course and see if I can score as equally there as the lower rated higher slope course.

 

69.6/128

71.9/126

 

[tony@CIC]

30 minutes ago, Vegan_Golfer_PNW said:

Ok, I have a curiosity. Which course is tougher, higher slope or higher rating? I guess I should try the higher rated course and see if I can score as equally there as the lower rated higher slope course.

 

69.6/128

71.9/126

 

Interesting question - your initial thoughts? 

[cnosil]

1 hour ago, Vegan_Golfer_PNW said:

Ok, I have a curiosity. Which course is tougher, higher slope or higher rating? I guess I should try the higher rated course and see if I can score as equally there as the lower rated higher slope course.

 

69.6/128

71.9/126

 

For a scratch player the second is harder and for the bogey golfer the first is slightly harder.  

[Vegan_Golfer_PNW]

3 hours ago, tony@CIC said:

Interesting question - your initial thoughts? 

well, these are data from the tips. being a high cap, I am feeling really good about the first ones. The greens are hella hard and there is a super long par 3 and some strategically designed par 4s.

The second course to me would be easier if you can just keep the ball in play. Lots of strategic design on that course where you either need to have a lot of distance or can shape the ball both ways off the tee. Greens are much easier on the second course.

[Stuka44]

This link just helped me. As this post got me to thinking.  I found this.  It contains a couple small visual references which helped me understand the concept.

http://www.leaderboard.com/abcs.htm

Edited July 13, 2023 by Stuka44

[tony@CIC]

I have just given up on trying to understand or rationalize it. It's something out of my control and just not worth worrying or thinking about. It is what it is.