I hear coworkers talking about golf handicaps (usually in the 80’s range) and smile/nod my way through the conversation. I’m assuming it’s how many strokes over an 18 hole day?
In: 85
Let’s say you’ve got a bunch of big ice cream cones and bunch of kids. So you hand one ice cream cone to each kid and tell them that we’re going to see how quickly they can finish the ice cream in terms of number of licks (not time). Someone tested it on a few kids and decided that pretty fast eating kid that isn’t phased by brain freeze can do it in 50 licks. That sets “par” or what the organizer thinks is a good standard for a competitive kid to lick the ice cream cone clean.
So they turn all the kids loose, licking away at the ice cream and counting their licks. Technically a bite is a lick – anything that involves your mouth touching the ice cream. So some brave kids take bites and hope it doesn’t give them brain freeze or hurts their teeth too much. Other kids are more conservative and take small licks but keep chugging away.
Eventually, some kid manages to get it done in 48 licks. Other kids range from that up to 70 licks. Any individual kid’s handicap is the difference between par (50 licks) and however many it took him to finish it. So if it was 60 licks, then his handicap is 10.
Golfers use this terminology to compare themselves to each other. And sometimes, it’s used as a way to create tournaments in which players of all skill levels have a chance to win. They can give the handicap to the players as a “bonus” or put them in tiers so they’re competing only against people of a similar handicap. You don’t see it on the PGA tournament because it’s meaningless to that level of player. They don’t care about their handicap – they’re just there to win the tournament. But for average weekend golfers and small local tournaments, it’s incredibly important to allow for socialization and team-based play in an otherwise very solitary sport.
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