Algarve 2011 results

The gang are on their way home....

Hopefully they will post their tales of glory and woe, on here..

Plus the usual excuses from Govan......

Justed arrived home from Portugal.

We were delayed as Stuart 'Tortoise' Goven had to have his shell removed before he could get on the plane!

Russ

Davei hope tour wife and son are ok after there ops.As for the algarve. Well lets just say the weather was good because the golf wasnt lol.It was a great week with new and old good friends. Really enjoyableand for once goven wasnt last.

Yes, Stuart wasn't last, but he gave it a good shot!

Really enjoyed the golf, the courses were great and the weather was good.

My feet are killing me and I've got a body like a mountain goat now, they really were some hilly courses. 

The views were great but I play on flat courses so wasn't used to uphill/downhill lies.

And taking a new pair of golf shoes with me wasn't such a good idea!  Big blister on my right heel (got that one at Alto on Saturday afternoon), and now I've got two blisters on my right foot, little toe (think I got this at Pinta on the Tuesday).

Already started working on the wife to get my name down for next year.  If you haven't been before I would say come and play here.  It was my first time an I had a great time.

Russ

hope every one got home safe and well Ihad a great time and look forward to next year.

WELL DONE MARTIN AND TIM.

I had a great time too and once again a big thank you to Martin and Tim for getting us all there.

Met and played with a great bunch off guys and girls and hope to be part of next years trip.

                                                    Golfer                          Day1                            Day2                            Day3                            Day4                            Day5                                                       Total                                           Martin Millichip                                  20.0                               13.0                               20.0                               20.5                               19.5                                                          93.0                                         Paul Milward                                  18.0                               16.5                               17.0                               17.5                               19.5                                                          88.5                                         Jimmy Govere                                  17.0                               16.5                               21.0                               12.0                               18.0                                                          84.5                                         Alan Davison                                  15.5                               20.0                               15.0                               15.0                               15.0                                                          80.5                                         Gary Newbury                                  11.5                               19.0                               17.0                               19.0                               13.5                                                          80.0                                         Pete Wilson                               14.0                               21.0                               11.0                               14.0                               17.0                                                          77.0                                         Russ Middleton                                11.5                               18.0                               12.5                               20.5                               11.0                                                          73.5                                         Malcolm Fell                                  19.0                               14.5                               17.0                                 7.0                                  6.0                                                           63.5                                         Paul Hughes                                 9.0                                11.0                               19.0                               12.0                                 6.0                                                           57.0                                         Andy Kirk                                 21.0                               11.0                                 3.0                                16.0                                 3.0                                                           54.0                                         Chris Millichip                                 9.0                                11.0                                 8.5                                12.0                               11.0                                                          51.5                                         Michael Fulton                                  4.0                                  7.0                                  8.5                                17.5                               13.5                                                          50.5                                         Tony Kempsell                                 15.5                                 3.0                                  4.0                                10.0                               16.0                                                          48.5                                         Darren Loftus                                   7.0                                  4.0                                  5.5                                  8.0                                21.0                                                          45.5                                         Tim Hawkins                               13.0                                 7.0                                12.5                                 9.0                                  4.0                                                           45.5                                         Darren Millichip                                    9.0                                  7.0                                  8.5                                  3.5                                11.0                                                          39.0                                         Martin Litchfield                                   6.0                                  5.0                                14.0                                 3.5                                  9.0                                                           37.5                                         Kev Shearsby                                    4.0                                14.5                                 5.5                                  1.5                                  8.0                                                           33.5                                         Stuart Govan                                    1.0                                  9.0                                  8.5                                  5.5                                  6.0                                                           30.0                                         Pat Bourke                                  4.0                                  2.0                                  2.0                                  1.5                                  2.0                                                           11.5                                         Ron Deveraux                                    2.0                                  1.0                                  1.0                                  5.5                                  1.0                                                           10.5         

Dont want to sound thick but what scoring system did you use?

Dave CAC handed Geordie.

Based on positions for stableford points we had 21 players. 1st place got 21pts and 2nd 20pts etc etc.

Where players received the same stableford points the leaderpoints were shared ie 36pts two players, the days winner was calculated by usual countback and the OOM points were (21+20)/2 = 20.5

Never heard of this scoring system before. How would it have compared to straight stablford pts accumulated. Surely someone must have worked it out. What are the pros and cons of this system as I may suggest it for my society.

Dave CAC handed Geordie.

It's a pretty good system, Dave.  It means that if you have a bandit golfer having a good day coming in with 42 points with the rest trailing in the mid 30's, it's only worth 1 point.  It also means that groups of players with the same number of points are equally rewarded.  Works pretty well in the society we play in.

I would happily play strokeplay but the higher handicappers won't want to. Have to be fair to everyone. Take a poll from the players and see what answer you get

Strokeplay favours the lower handicaps as the 'blow-up' holes are very few & far between, whereas a 9 or a 10 could be quite common on the higher hcaps.

Could be the same diffence of a single figure player against a pro in strokeplay.

I'm not against your suggestion as I like playing strokeplay & I never mind playing 3/4's.

Blatant provocation alert.......http://www.golfshake.com/scripts/ckeditor/plugins/smiley/images/regular_smile.gif" title="smiley" width="20" />

Yes, it would be interesting to see if there was any difference in final positions adding stableford scores up instead of points. However, this is pretty much the same as arguing that the footy Premiership should be decided on goal difference rather than points awarded. If you look at the current league table you'll see that, with a few notable exceptions (e.g. Chelsea), the current league positions based on goal difference almost exactly match those based on points gained.

In the system we used in the Algarve, the points awarded actually equated very well to the comparative order of individuals' success. The only difference is that, just like in the Premiership, the Chelseas of the golfing world don't get to win the trophy again this year just because they happened to score the golfing equivalent of a hatful of goals against a very poor WBA and Wigan sides last August.

Also, whilst I'm on a roll, I'm sure many more high handicappers would be very happy to revert to stroke play for everything if the men's handicap system wasn't artifically capped at 28. Utter sexism and ageism given that women are allowed upto 36 and juniors upto 54. And as for giving us only 3/4 or 7/8th of that capped entitlement.......Some of you sub-10ners will be wanting us +20-types to play with left handed clubs next, or perhaps to use only range balls or to make us go off the blue tees - in order to ensure that golf's rightful order is always restored whenever there's a competition to be won.http://www.golfshake.com/scripts/ckeditor/plugins/smiley/images/tounge_smile.gif" title="cheeky" width="20" />

Both myself and Darren M calculated the final leaderboard based on stableford points and the top five positions had remained unchanged.

Also, to add, I would also play strokeplay everyday of the week as opposed to stableford as I work hard to get to my level of golf  and strokeplay is THE true test.

You will not get this argument past high handicap golfers who have a "points" mentality and not "stroke" mentality.

There, maybe a can of worms for golfers to discuss !!!!!!

They can still score 36pts or better which indicates that they played to their handicap but the "blob" holes would maybe have been 8,9 or even 10 strokes if they had continued and holed out, which would have meant they had played well over their handicap.

This is the issue.

Setting your sights on the women now?  Bit more of a realistic target I suppose.   Silly old fool.

if you start using stroke play then you will need to get used to 7 or 8 hour rounds with people going back to the tees, taking the full 5 minutes to look for the ball etc. We were taking more than 5 hours to play Stableford in Portugal and i have to say after a few Hamlet moments in the bunkers, i was glad to have been able to pick up.

This wonderful game is based on the number of strokes taken and not the number of points. scored.

If one does not wish to play the game as it was intended then the situation we find ourselves in regarding handicaps, with their misuse, will contine to grow even further.

Playing to the rules does not make a round longer it is attitude that makes games as long as they are.

Problems start when someone carves it into the trees, then states that he will have no trouble finding it or playing it and then after a five minute search has to walk back to play, when he should have played a provisional immediately on seeing where the ball went.

Slow play is not even considered as slow play by those players who are relatively new to the game. It is what they have come to believe is the norm and when someone politely points out that fourballs used to take no longer than three hours one is treated as though they are talking out of their rear.

Only last week I played 18 holes on my own starting at 1100 hrs and was back in the changing room at 1230. I had changed and was ready to go home when the pro asked me to play again, so I changed and we went out as a three ball and played another 18. I was back in my house at 5.00 pm. 36 holes in less than six hours.

Last week I played in a 2 ball & carried for a change & we completed 18 holes in 2 hours 40mins.

Can we please keep this topic about the Algarve results and not a discussion about slow play. Start another thread should you wish to talk about pace of play

I wasn't complaining about slow play, what I was trying to say was I thought the stableford format was the best approach, considering the varying ability of golfers that were taking part in it. It was nice to see that the lowest handicapper and best player over there managed to win with this biased format and I am not sure but I think there was an even match of high and low handicappers in the top 10.

And frankly who cares how long it took for a round.  We weren't held up and we didn't hold anyone up, the sun was warm and we strolled along in tee-shirts and shorts in pleasant company on beautifully kept courses.

Ha!

Thanks for that Tim,

I was just about to sit down & eat my tea & now I've got the thought of you strolling around in shorts in my head. I'll leave my tea for later