Par Talk

[discgolfer25]

I honestly can't wait for Steve's take on Idlewild.

 

[lyleoross]

I honestly can't wait for Steve's take on Idlewild.

Yeah, those last three holes seemed under pared. Curious to see how they play tomorrow.

 

[Steve West]

I honestly can't wait for Steve's take on Idlewild.

DGPT MPO pars are usually pretty good, so I'll wait for all the data. Perhaps you can keep yourself amused in the meantime by speculation on the minor tweaks that might be considered.

For FPO (I think they played the same layout), it looks like par should be one higher on holes 8, 10, 13, 14, 15, 17, 18.

 

[BuiltTooLong]

For FPO (I think they played the same layout), it looks like par should be one higher on holes 8, 10, 13, 14, 15, 17, 18.

They actually did change the par on at least one hole for FPO, but I am unsure how many exactly.

 

[Steve West]

They actually did change the par on at least one hole for FPO, but I am unsure how many exactly.

I took the pars from Udisc. They were the same there. The Caddy book shows an A and B tee for hole 4, but I haven't found the special rules where it would say who plays which tee when.

 

[DG_player]

This is a little late to the discussion, but I finally got to sit down and watch the ledgestone coverage.

I will have to say in my opinion, that is what TDs should be striving for when it comes to par. That's probably one of the best course set ups I've ever seen, if not the best. Aside from a few exceptions, almost all of the holes provided a difficult challenge. Par was an acceptable and oftentimes good score, however all holes provided an opportunity for birdie. This was all done with reasonable and fair roping and a minimum of gimmickiness.

It's clearly possible to satisfy both "close range" and "scoring" par.

 

[Steve West]

Par at Idlewild was rated an average of about 1010, which would be typical for a course with a typical number of chances to make errors. However, watching the video, I think Idlewild maybe had a lot more than the typical number of chances to make errors. That would translate into a par round needing to be higher rated.

When I ran the hole-by-hole numbers, I got a total par of 63. That would have been rated 1034 which would indicate the course had more opportunities to make errors than almost any other course. So, that's probably about right.

If I were setting par for this layout for a future tournament, I'd increase par on holes 13 and 17, and reduce par on holes 1, 2, 4, 11, and 16.

 

[Cgkdisc]

There were 199 OB penalties on hole 16 out of 261 times played (76%). I'm thinking there's one penalty that should be included in the par since it happens 3/4 of the time for players who average 980 rating at that event.

 

[Steve West]

There were 199 OB penalties on hole 16 out of 261 times played (76%). I'm thinking there's one penalty that should be included in the par since it happens 3/4 of the time for players who average 980 rating at that event.

There are times when going OB is not an error. However, even with all the OB, hole 16 still had enough players get a 4 to count as a par 4. I did not remove the scores that had penalties from my numbers.

Perhaps the par of 4 was made possible by enough players intentionally throwing OB, but on a line to make sure the disc was last in bounds way down near the target.

 

[Zanguini]

There are times when going OB is not an error. However, even with all the OB, hole 16 still had enough players get a 4 to count as a par 4. I did not remove the scores that had penalties from my numbers.

Perhaps the par of 4 was made possible by enough players intentionally throwing OB, but on a line to make sure the disc was last in bounds way down near the target.

It all depends on where you went out, Really aggressive RHBH hyzers fadeded out of bounds after crossing over the fairway thus their lie was near to where the disc landed anyhow. Conservitive hyzers and turnovers never came back in bounds and were much further up the fairway. I imagine if you charted it players that went OB and still got a 4 the majority went OB left. I would think to keep it a par 5 and to force a re-tee and stroke if OB on the drive, or a drop zone maybe 300 ft down the fairway. I dont think you should be able to go OB and then put for birdie.

 

[New013]

what if instead of having a runway type fairway there were instead a series of three circles that got smaller as they went down. If the players drive were more accurate in distance they would be rewarded by having more width in which to land and skip.

 

[Steve West]

...I would think to keep it a par 5 and to force a re-tee and stroke if OB on the drive, or a drop zone maybe 300 ft down the fairway. I dont think you should be able to go OB and then put for birdie.

Hmm, I would have gone the other way: leave it par 4, but what if there were no penalty throw (just loss of distance by marking where it went out) for going into the tall grass? Or, if there was a penalty throw, but you'd mark your lie up next to where the disc landed?

 

[Steve West]

2017 PDGA Pro Masters World Championships presented by Innova, for the courses that had 1000-rated players.

 

[Steve West]

The Pittsburgh Flying Disc Open Presented by Discraft had pars that were more appropriate for Advanced Players than for Open at an NT event.

For the "Friday" layout, the par of 66 was only rated 961. The tougher "Sat & Sun" layout was not much better with par of 66 rated 978.

The chart below shows what par should have been, based on the scores of the first two rounds, according to my formula. Obviously, some judgement calls are possible - but that's the fun part, so discuss.

(Friday on the left on each hole).

Par of 59 on the Friday layout would have been rated 1015, and par of 61 on the Sat & Sun layout would have been rated 1014. Both of these ratings are right in the butter zone for a course with a reasonable number of opportunities for experts to make errors.

 

[Steve West]

The FPO pars. Not enough data to split the rounds.

 

[Steve West]

A quick (premature?) calc for DGPT - Vibram Open 2017 Maple Hill Gold 1st Round, since there is talk that #9 should be a par 4 instead of the 3 it is.

I calculated that 70.5% of throws by 1000-rated players are good enough to get no more than 3 (or 35.1% of 1000-rated players will get no more than 3). That's not quite enough to call it a 3. 75% of throws is the usual threshold, so I'd call it a par 4. However, #9 is very close to being enough, so 3 is not really a bad par to use.

The number of players who get 2 has nothing to do with it. Birdies don't make the par.

 

[billalich1]

Idlewild hole 11

Par at Idlewild was rated an average of about 1010, which would be typical for a course with a typical number of chances to make errors. However, watching the video, I think Idlewild maybe had a lot more than the typical number of chances to make errors. That would translate into a par round needing to be higher rated.

When I ran the hole-by-hole numbers, I got a total par of 63. That would have been rated 1034 which would indicate the course had more opportunities to make errors than almost any other course. So, that's probably about right.

If I were setting par for this layout for a future tournament, I'd increase par on holes 13 and 17, and reduce par on holes 1, 2, 4, 11, and 16.

You can't reduce the par on 11 it's a par 3.

 

[lyleoross]

You can't reduce the par on 11 it's a par 3.

This has been debated ad nauseam. Nothing says you can't have a par 2 but personal taste. Ideally, the hole would be adjusted, not par.

 

[Steve West]

You can't reduce the par on 11 it's a par 3.

Somebody's paying attention. But, yeah, I'd make it a par immediately-ruin-the-game-if-ever-uttered-in-front-of-sponsors-or-spectators.

 

[Steve West]

Speaking of par too-horrbile-to-contemplate holes, Maple Hill was just 3 more 2s (out of 300 attempts) from becoming a par less than 3.