The CP Open is an Individual Stroke Play Tournament where players compete against their own handicap to earn tournament points throughout a 5 week “regular season” and a 2 day, 36 hole championship event.
At registration, each golfer must provide a valid handicap that can be backed by previous round history. This will be their starting handicap and will be key in determining their tournament scoring. For each of the 5 “regular season” weeks, players will declare and play one Individual Stroke Play Round in which they compete against their own handicap and the slope / rating of the course they are playing. Depending on their performance of that round, the player will be awarded “Tournament Points” (TP). A tally of each weeks TP will be compiled at the end of the season for each golfer and will be ranked by most to least TP. The players that end the regular season with the most TP will get stroke advantages in the CP Open Championship event. You can see a breakdown of scoring here.
Additional to the Individual Tournament, each golfer will be drafted to a 4 man team. As golfers play each of their rounds, their total individual TP will also be added to their teams total TP. Team TP will be counted throughout the regular season and the CP Open Championship for a total of 7 rounds. The team with the most TP at the end of the Championship event will be the Team Winner.
Accurate handicaps are required as they are the key factor in our scoring model. Players Original Handicaps will be determined by using the USGA Handicap System. (18 Birdies handicaps are preferred and will be used for anyone that has enough, valid, solo round history.)
As we know, each course is not the same. Golfers will be playing a wide variety of courses throughout the regular season. Because of this, each player will be assigned a “Course Handicap” based on the course that they play for that round. Course Handicaps are determined by applying your Handicap Index (Current Handicap) to the USGA Course Handicap Formula, which is:
Course Handicap = Handicap Index × (Slope Rating ÷ 113) + (Course Rating – Course Par)
We will then apply that Course Handicap to the gross score of each round. For example:
Tiger Woods has a Handicap Index of 18
He plays at Sky Mountain from the White Tees which has a slope/rating of 118/67.8
Running his Handicap through the Course Handicap Formula, his CHP is 15
Tiger finished his round with a gross score of 85 (13 over)
Applying his CHP to his gross score of 85 gives him a net score of 70 (80-15), or -2.
*Notice* His Handicap of 18 is only used when calculating the course handicap.
For each round of the tournament, all player handicaps will be minimally adjusted to accurately reflect their current abilities. Once a player completes a round, we will calculate their score and add that round to their Handicap Index calculation.
This year, we are capping weekly handicap adjustments by a maximum of +1 or -1 their Handicap Index. Additionally, we are capping seasonal handicap adjustments to a maximum of +2 or -2 the players Original Handicap. It’s important to note that the majority of handicap adjustments will be small — don’t expect to see a fluctuation of +1 or -1 stroke every week.
Weekly Handicap Adjustment Example:
Let’s bring back the Tiger Woods example from above
He just scored -2 for his round at Sky Mountain
We take his round and add it to a calculator to create his new handicap
After doing the calculation, we get a new Handicap Index of 16.9
However, he can’t improve his handicap by more than -1 in a week, so we round his new Handicap Index to 17 for the next week
So by shooting -2 his handicap, he improved his handicap by a stroke.
If he were to go out and shoot -2 his New Handicap Index and was to, say, drop his handicap another 1.5 strokes, he would adjust to be a 16 handicap for that next round.
Because he would then have improved his handicap -2 his starting Original Handicap, any improvements beyond this would have no effect.
If you have any questions regarding our handicap system, don’t hesitate to reach out to us and we can further explain.
