Yesterday (October, 31st) was the last day you could enter your score for handicap purposes. This is if you played a game of golf in the province of Quebec or in Ontario.
For all those snowbirds, if you want to play by the rules, you must enter your Florida (or other states) scores on your Golf Canada score center. Now the USGA and Canada have the same basis for score adjustments.
TEMPORARY HOLES
At this time of the year, we often see repairs or constructions on a golf course. If you play a temporary hole, you must not use your real score. You must consider if you had a stroke on that hole depending on your handicap. If you had a stroke, then you must put a bogey on your card from the handicap rule. Even if you made a 2 or even a hole in one.
Let’s say the handicap number is 9 and you have a handicap of 8. You would put a PAR. But if your handicap is 10, it would be a bogey.
HANDICAP IN MATCH PLAY
I often receive questions about handicaps in Match Play. The rule is simple. We must take the lower handicap et consider it at ZERO. A handicap of 17 playing against a handicap of 18, would give only one stroke to the other. It would not be fair to have the 17 receiving 17 strokes against the 18 strokes of the opponent, because the hole with the extra stroke would be the easiest one instead of the most difficult.
The same rule should apply with 4 players. If we have a 5 playing against three others with a handicap of 10, Only 5 strokes would be given to the 3 players.
NOTE: I used the words EASIEST and DIFFICULT only to make sure you understand my point.