LEVELING THE PLAYING FIELD
Ladies, here’s one of golf's dirty little secrets: The game is rigged against you.
It’s not that I mind when my wife has to buy me dinner every time we
wager. But the truth is, it’s a loaded bet. Ever wonder why women celebrate
making par while men celebrate making birdie? Because women are typically playing a course that's far too long for the distances they hit the ball.
Authors Arthur D. Little and Jann Leeming's "Podium" contribution to
this issue (page 8) explains in detail something I have long known to be
true: Most golf courses are not exactly “women-friendly.” Even though the
set of tees you play is farther forward, the golf course you play is still much
more difficult than the one your male counterpart plays.
To quote from their research, "The numbers are pretty simple: the
'average woman golfer' hits her tee shot 140 yards. Hence, based on the
data we collected in our research, the length of the course that an average woman should play in order to have the opportunity to reach greens
in regulation is 4,200 yards.
"The average male golfer hits a drive of 210 yards, while (Matt)
Kuchar’s average drive of 280 yards is within a few of yards of the PGA
Tour average in 2010.
"Thus, if the woman is at 4,200 yards, the average male golfer should be
playing tees at 6,300 and the average PGA pro should be at 8,400 yards...
even though 8,400 yards is approximately 900 yards longer than the lon-gest courses played on the PGA Tour. No wonder those guys are good!"
I just grabbed a random sampling of four scorecards laying on my desk
from courses Landry and I recently played. The forward tees at these
courses were: 5,057 yards (Florida); 5,577 yards (Hawaii); 5,067 (Arizona);
5,421 (California). If 4,200 yards is the average-length course women
should play to achieve par, then according to my rough math, a 5,100-yard
course should actually play to par 79 or 80 for women.
So, ladies, to extract some measure of equality, take your full handicap
and then add eight more strokes to your side of the card. You might still be
buying dinner after the round, but the playing field will be far more level.
Read Little and Leeming's article and send us your feedback and
thoughts. I think the subject is worthy of serious discussion.
Volume 2, Number 4
April 2011
EDITORIAL
EDITORIAL DIRECTOR
George Fuller
gfuller@troongolfandtravel.com
EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD
Brett Brooks, Tim Greenwell,
Rachel Williamson
CREATIVE DIRECTOR
Kevin Gilbert
SECTION EDITORS
Tom Bedell (travel),
Malcolm Campbell (at large),
Scott Kauffman (business), Jason
Kerkmans (apparel), Scott Kramer
(equipment), Jeff Williams (professional golf)
CONTRIBUTING WRITERS/
PHOTOGRAPHERS/ILLUSTRATORS
Tom Cunneff, Jann Leeming,
Arthur D. Little, Rob Smith
ADVISORY BOARD
Fred Ackerman, Dave Barkin, Quentin Lutz
combination of
isture wicking
ructed ultra-erformance
y
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Copyright 2011 by Flagship Custom
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may not be reprinted or otherwise
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