Friday Golf Association

The Friday Golf Association weekly tournaments are coordinated by designated members based on information provided by the Handicap Chairman.  A coordinator will generally handle all games in a particular month.  These coordinators are selected by the President and, in most cases, a member will only be chosen once every 2 or 3 years.  If the coordinator can not run a match any week of his assigned month, the President should be notified so that a replacement for that week may be found.

The coordinator is responsible for notifying each golf course regarding how many people will play on a particular week, setting up the playing groups, collecting a weekly entry fee, marking results on a scoring sheet, and determining the winners of the weekly tournament.

 

The coordinator will receive the coordinator bag from the previous month's coordinator containing a binder, closest to the pin markers, golf ball sleeves for the closest to pin winners, etc.  The binder contains blank forms, monthly signup sheets, and other information needed to perform the task.

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The coordinator will maintain monthly signup sheets allowing each member to select in advance which games they plan to play in that month, and whether they will be riding or walking.  The member must notify the coordinator as soon as possible if there is a change in those plans.

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It is highly recommended that the coordinator send an email to all members 6 to 9 days before a game showing all players that have signed up to play, and whether they are riding or walking.

 

Each course may have different preferences regarding when and how they should be notified of the number of playing groups we require.  Some courses want us to send a finalized playing group sheet in advance.  There should be an information sheet in the coordinator binder indicating the preferred point of contact for the course, the method of communication (e.g., email or phone), and whether they want the playing group sheet in advance.

 

In general, the coordinator should notify the course at least four days in advance of the game regarding the number of playing groups.  It is preferable to give more notice if we have significanly fewer people signed up than normal for the course.  The golf courses must be notified ASAP if people drop out, and we no longer need that many groups.

 

The coordinator will use the monthly signup information to create a sheet indicating the playing groups for that week.  Players should be rotated throughout the month so that they play in different groupings and with a varied tee-time order.  When considering the rotation of the foursomes, the coordinator should reference the Playing Group History report (available on the FGA website or from the Handicap Chairman), which indicates the groups in which the individual players were placed in the previous months.   This report displays a playing group index for each player indicating which group they were in over the last 10 weeks, as well as summary values for the last 3 months, 6 months, 12 months, and overall.   The playing group index is normalized to a scale of 1 to 5, where 1 indicates the first group and 5 indicates the last group.  The coordinator should also attempt to allocate riders and walkers to the groups such that the number of single cart riders is minimized.

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Normally, there will be blank playing group sheets in the coordinator binder.   If not, blank forms can be downloaded or printed from the FGA website (under the Reports menu).  It is important to designate on the playing group form which players are hitting from either the forward tees or back tees by appending "**" or "##" to the player's name.  The scoring sheet provided to the coordinator will indicate which players should be hitting from the forward or back tees.

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Team tournaments are an exception to the normal playing group allocations.  Teams will normally be determined by a software program based on an algorithm that randomly creates teams with a distribution of players dependent on handicap. The coordinator should interact with the Handicap Chairman to obtain the generated playing group and scoring sheets.

 

The coordinator should normally be placed in one of the first three groups so that they will be ready to complete the tabulations for the flight and blind bogey winners.

 

The coordinator should prepare three copies of the playing group sheet.   One should be provided to the Golf Course, one should be posted for the members, and one should be retained in the monthly coordinator's book to assist in future foursome assignments.  The Mission Trails and Carlton Oaks golf courses have requested us to email them the playing groups sheet the day before the game.

 

The Handicap Chairman will provide the coordinator a scoring sheet for each game in that month.   For individual format games, this sheet will contain a table showing each member’s name and their corresponding course and playing handicap.   The table contains blank columns for the playing group number, net blind bogey number, paid blind bogey number, gross score, net score, number of putts, adjusted gross score, and blind bogey winner.   At the bottom of the sheet, there are blank fields to indicate who won the closest to the pin for specific holes and what the winning blind bogey number was.

When players arrive at the golf course, they should pay the coordinator the $2.00 entry fee and select a blind bogey number.   The coordinator should enter this number into the Paid Blind Bogey number column on the scoring sheet.  If it is a team tournament, the entry fee is usually $4.00 and there is no blind bogey competition.

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A member of the first group should be assigned to carry the closest to the pin flags.

 

When players finish their round, the coordinator will enter additional information onto the scoring sheet.   For individual format games, the playing group and gross score should be entered.    The Net Blind Bogey number should be entered by subtracting the Paid Blind Bogey number from the Gross Score.   The Net Score should be entered by subtracting the playing handicap from the Gross Score.    Number of Putts is only specified during the annual tournament.   Adjusted Gross should be left blank (this column will subsequently be used by the Handicap Chairman).

 

A blind bogey number should be chosen from a bag of chips that have the set of numbers between 70 and 80.   If this number does not match the Net Blind Bogey number for any player, another number should be drawn.  The Winning Blind Bogey number should be entered on the score sheet.    Also, the Closest to Pin winners should be entered on the score sheet.

 

In general, players will compete in one of three flights, depending on their playing handicap (it is possible the club will decide to have fewer than three flights if the game has a low turnout).  The coordinator must determine the handicap breakdown for the three flights.   This determination has been facilitated by having the scoring sheet organized in playing handicap order.   The coordinator should draw a line on the scoring sheet between the first and second flight, and between the second and third flight, such that each flight contains approximately the same number of players.   For example, if there are 24 players in a particular week, the 8 players with the lowest handicaps would normally be in flight 1, the next 8 players in flight 2, and the remaining 8 players in flight 3.   However, the coordinator must ensure that players with the same playing handicap are not placed in different flights.   If this situation occurred, it might be necessary to adjust the number of players in a particular flight.

 

Money collected shall be divided four ways with one fourth of the money to each of the three flight winners (based on net score) and to the blind bogey winner. In the event of ties, the one fourth share will be split evenly.  The coordinator shall also give a sleeve of golf balls to each winner of the closest to the pin contest.  Normally, all winners are paid in even dollar amounts.  This may result in a small amount of the collected money not being paid out.  This money should be placed in an "extra money" envelope in the coordinator bag.  Alternatively, the prize money share to the winning players can be rounded up to an even dollar amount by using funds in the "extra money" envelope.  When a winning player has left the golf course before receiving their prize, the coordinator should place the winnings in an envelope in the coordinator bag with a note indicating the winner and the amount.

For team games, the scoring sheet will indicate the team members and the group number for each team.  For scramble team games, it will also indicate the team handicap value.  Normally, the handicap chairman will bring a computer to the golf course, and the Golf Manager software program will be used to compute the gross and net scores of each team, and the prize winnings for the winning teams.  The team winners will be based on net score.  If the computer program is not used to record the results, the coordinator should enter the gross and net score for each team, and the winnings for each team.  The coordinator should also indicate the closest to the pin winners.  The number of places and amounts paid is somewhat arbitrary, but the computer program will compute the recommended amounts.

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After the tabulations are complete, the coordinator should give the Handicap Chairman the score cards and the score sheet for that week.  In the event that the Handicap Chairman is not present, the scorecards and score sheet should be retained for pickup the next week.

 

Players should write their playing group number, the date, and the start and finish time of the round on the scorecard that they turn in.  The scorecards should show the member’s last name (not nicknames).    If there is a guest playing, their full name should be shown.

 

 

REMEMBER:

 

1.       Be fair and consistent with your foursome assignments

 

2.       Check your calculations

 

3.       Mark Flight and Blind Bogey Winners

 

4.       Write down closest to pin winners

 

5.       Have each group write their group number, date, and start/finish times on the card