Every hole you have ever played on a course, remembered. Your best score on each one, your average, your worst, greens hit, fairways hit and putts, hole by hole. Play a course twice and it starts to build; play it for years and it becomes the truest scorecard you own.
A 72 at a hard course is not the same as a 72 at an easy one. Course-Adjusted Gross lets golfers of the same handicap play a gross game while playing different courses.
The lowest result wins.
Example. Player A shoots 72 on a course rated 74.0: adjusted 72 − 74 = −2.0. Player B shoots 72 on a course rated 70.0: adjusted 72 − 70 = +2.0. Both shot 72, but Player A played two strokes better than the expected scratch score for his course and Player B two strokes worse. Player A wins by 4 adjusted strokes.
Why it works. Course Rating is the expected score of a scratch golfer on that course. Comparing each player’s gross score to the rating of the course he played is a simple, fair way to measure who played better relative to the difficulty in front of him.
The formal way (WHS). To take the Slope Rating into account as well, use a Score Differential:
Player A, 72 on a 74.0 / 140 course = −1.6. Player B, 72 on a 70.0 / 120 course = +1.9. Player A wins by about 3.5 differential strokes.
In Big Fairways. The game mode Course-Adjusted Gross coming records each player’s gross score, reads the Course Rating for the tees each played, works out Gross − Rating, and shows both the real gross and the adjusted score. Lowest adjusted score wins. It keeps the feel of a gross game while admitting that a 72 on a brute is not a 72 on a pitch and putt.
Like racing your own best mile. Big Fairways knows your average score on every hole of a course you have played. Turn on the ghost and you play that number, hole for hole: beat your average on a hole and you win it, lose to it and the ghost does. At the end you know, plainly, whether today was better than your usual self.
We will load real rounds from professional golfers, hole by hole, and you can play one of them in a net game: your net score on each hole against the pro’s gross on the same hole number. Match play or stroke play, your call. Beat Tiger on the 12th and you will hear about it.