2015 PDGA Amateur World Championships

[JC17393]

Probably. Congrats to AB! First the USADGC, and now Am Worlds.

(I don't agree with Pros playing Am, but AB doesn't make the rules, he and the others just benefit from them)

AB isn't a pro.

 

[puttlikeablowfly]

With that ending, I sure hope someone has final round coverage.

PDGA Live showed a clip of Izak hopping around while waiting to tee off on the last hole, and you can see Terry Miller standing there with a videocamera on a monopod.

 

[dx_roc]

any idea on how izak took that 6? says it's a par 4 and the pdga twitter said he went ob long off the tee.

laying three, run it b/c he thinks AB will hit it (drive in the circle) and then miss the comeback?

 

[teemkey]

I'm not exactly sure what you mean by "optimize the set of courses for skill equivalence".

Essentially I mean by optimize course selection for tournament divisions based on the assumption that the analytics will be different for men vs women, open vs. amateur, age protected, etc.

This discussion begs a question of whether the PDGA is interested in making their data collection (the biggest data set we have) available to TDs in an easy to use format. Probably easiest would be to provide scorecards by course & division with data-based pars. While I realize that par will change for pin positions & tee pad, and pin positions & tee pad are probably not in the data set, it would still be better than arbitrary.

If nothing else, it would also be nice to provide a link for the monthly par discussions we have on this site ...

 

[Halcón]

AB isn't a pro.

Assumed he was because of all those events he played in Open. How does that work?

 

[oddjob]

Assumed he was because of all those events he played in Open. How does that work?

As long as he doesn't accept cash he's fine.

Not uncommon for guys to play open leading up to am worlds.

Wiggins and Koling were winning in Open events leading up to their runs.

 

[puttlikeablowfly]

Assumed he was because of all those events he played in Open. How does that work?

You can play Open and stay an Am as long as you don't accept cash.

 

[teemkey]

Assumed he was because of all those events he played in Open. How does that work?

(and for the third confirmation ...)

Anyone can play open. An amateur has to refuse any money s/he wins (to remain an am).

 

[JC17393]

Assumed he was because of all those events he played in Open. How does that work?

The pros playing am rule does not extend to Majors. If AB (or anyone) was a pro, he wouldn't be allowed to play USADGC or Am Worlds.

Amateurs are allowed to play Open (or any other pro division in which they qualify) any time they choose. It's actually not all that uncommon for the true contenders for a USADGC or Am Worlds title to play Open quite often in the lead up to those events. Just look at the profile pages for any of the top 5-10 players in most of the divisions at Am Worlds. Almost all of them have events played in a pro division this year...even some of the juniors. It's good preparation for the level of play required to win those events.

 

[Pbmercil]

AB will go pro now. He was only keeping his Am classification for Am worlds, now that he's got this under his belt he's going to the next level

 

[urwatuh8]

any idea on how izak took that 6? says it's a par 4 and the pdga twitter said he went ob long off the tee.

laying three, run it b/c he thinks AB will hit it (drive in the circle) and then miss the comeback?

The last hole is 800ft steep downhill. Izak turned his disc enough that it was about 100 feet right of the basket and 100 feet deep. He then ran his second shot (from probably 350 out where he went OB), probably figuring he had nothing to lose as AB wouldn't take more than a 3 and the others were far enough behind. His second shot also went long and OB, and he missed the putt for 5.

 

[Cgkdisc]

Probably. Congrats to AB! First the USADGC, and now Am Worlds.

(I don't agree with Pros playing Am, but AB doesn't make the rules, he and the others just benefit from them)

any idea on how izak took that 6? says it's a par 4 and the pdga twitter said he went ob long off the tee.

laying three, run it b/c he thinks AB will hit it (drive in the circle) and then miss the comeback?

Gavin drove first and hit the circle. Izak goes second and hangs it way right and never comes close to hyzering back so he's OB halfway down the hill. Throws his 300 ft upshot OB 40 ft right of basket. Misses putt long then makes comeback for 6.

 

[jsc430]

That's the stuff that nightmares are made of. Up by one with one to play and you go double circle 6 to take a triple bogey....yikes. I'm sure he'll be just fine though. Those kids have some ridiculous talent.

 

[allinpflop]

The pros playing am rule does not extend to Majors. If AB (or anyone) was a pro, he wouldn't be allowed to play USADGC or Am Worlds.

Amateurs are allowed to play Open (or any other pro division in which they qualify) any time they choose. It's actually not all that uncommon for the true contenders for a USADGC or Am Worlds title to play Open quite often in the lead up to those events. Just look at the profile pages for any of the top 5-10 players in most of the divisions at Am Worlds. Almost all of them have events played in a pro division this year...even some of the juniors. It's good preparation for the level of play required to win those events.

And in one case (I know quite well bc it was my wife) a competitor has been playing in intermediate and then steps up to adv and shoots almost 50 pts above her rating for the tourney to finish top 3......so proud

 

[coupe]

And in one case (I know quite well bc it was my wife) a competitor has been playing in intermediate and then steps up to adv and shoots almost 50 pts above her rating for the tourney to finish top 3......so proud

Bagger! jk

[I realize F-- divisions are a special case: hard to bag when, given that the typically low turnout in F divisions, the choice typically is either to play in whatever F division is available, or play in an M-- division, which creates a different set of issues.]

Congrats to your wife.

 

[kimnem]

And in one case (I know quite well bc it was my wife) a competitor has been playing in intermediate and then steps up to adv and shoots almost 50 pts above her rating for the tourney to finish top 3......so proud

Thanks hubby! Your caddying was definitely 1000 rated for every round!:clap:

 

[blackcatsmith]

Congrats AB!

 

[1978]

Gavin drove first and hit the circle. Izak goes second and hangs it way right and never comes close to hyzering back so he's OB halfway down the hill. Throws his 300 ft upshot OB 40 ft right of basket. Misses putt long then makes comeback for 6.

Hey I was inside of Gavin on my drive!

 

[1978]

What pool were you in? I was in D. It seemed like most players were 25+.

I played pretty poor golf all week, but had great cardmates. Lots of fun. Heading up to Timberidge in a few to check out the finals. Glad I don't have to hike up those hills again today.

A pool, finished third.

 

[1978]

Most people view a tournament as a place for players to prove themselves. As a designer, I view a tournament as a place for courses to prove themselves. So, which course turned in the best performance at this tournament?

After six rounds, we can do an evaluation of the courses.

Just to get it out of the way, I'll list average scores:
MBN=57.2, MBS=61.0, OSH=61.4, SPC=63.4, TBR=69.1, VRL=60.7.
But average score is not the correct measure for naming a winning course.

And, for trivia purposes, we can look at where par should have been set. Par (Gold, Real, Definitional, Actual, 1000, or Open) would have been around
MBN=47, MBS=51, OSH=52, SPC=52, TBR=56, VRL=53.
If this Par had been used, the leader after 6 rounds would have been 10 over, which would tell him how well he would have done in Open at a big tournament (would have won something).

It is traditional to use Blue par for Ams. This would have been around
MBN=52, MBS=56, OSH=56, SPC=57, TBR=63, VRL=57.
The leader after 6 rounds would have been -20, and Even par would have been tied for 17th place.

But Par is not a measure of course performance either.

One measure of course's performance is correlation of actual scores to expected scores based on ratings. By this measure, OSH barely edged out TBR, even though it gave out lower scores.
MBN=58.8%, MBS=63.0%, OSH=65.2%, SPC=61.3%, TBR=64.9%, VRL=54.5%.

While Correlation is interesting and intuitive, a more useful and precise measure of how well a course sorted players by skill is Scoring Spread Width of Total Scores. By this measure SPC wins.
MBN=16.0, MBS=16.1, OSH=18.8, SPC=19.4, TBR=18.8, VRL=15.5.

The six courses together produced a Scoring Spread Width of 66.9, which means the typical player was tied with just over 3 other players.

A wide Scoring Spread Width is the result of 1) giving out a lot of different scores, and 2) giving them out in a non-random fashion. We can measure how non-randomly a course hands out its scores. By this measure, OSH is the winner, performing better than 98.4% of random results.
MBN=96.5%, MBS=95.3%, OSH=98.4%, SPC=95.7%, TBR=97.7%, VRL=95.6%.

By 1) handing out a lot of different scores, and 2) handing them out in a non-random fashion, and 3) measuring player skills which are not measured by the other courses, a course can enhance the quality of final results. To measure the combnined effect of all three "course skills", we look at Standardized Contribution to Scoring Spread Width of Total Scores.
MBN=6.3%, MBS=4.1%, OSH=9.1%, SPC=4.9%, TBR=6.8%, VRL=3.3%.

OSH wins the title of "Most Useful Course".

There were longs and shorts at both Meyers courses and Oshetmo and VRL did you take that into account? Different divisions played different layouts or 1 round short then the next long. The shorts at all the courses were much shorter.