2024 Howell Park Thursday Flight
the nastiest hole at howell... good thing we hardly ever play it...

Welcome to the 2024 Howell Park Thursday flight! This package contains most of the information that you'll need to get started, including the schedule and the first week's pairings. Here are some other important details:

• Schedule: The first night of play will be May 2nd, at Howell, unless the course is closed. The first match parings are here. You can click on the value in your handicap column to see your handicap sheet.
• Web-Site: The League's official web-site is http://www.hogolf.net - feel free to drop by and look around. Weekly match results, and statistics, will get posted at the flight's web-site. I've patched up most of the previous years' pages so that results, stats, etc, are accessible, but do report dead links if you encounter them.
• League Fees/Prizes: No Fees. No Prizes. Less work for me. This option is so attractive to me that I'll pay the web-hosting fee all by myself!
• 2023 Flight Championship: The 2023 Flight Championship was won by Andy Melanson & Bruce Gundaker. Mike Patrick won the Most Improved award. A small flight history is available. This includes links to previous years' pages.
• Release Forms: Release forms are still downloadable, but I just throw them out, so why bother???
• League Rules: The rules package is available at the League's web-site. Golf within the flight is governed by the USGA Rules of Golf, except as amended by our local rules. We observe several additional local rules:
  • we will not enforce the 2-stroke doubling penalty - but get subs if you can.
  • we play all the wooded perimeter and waist high fescue areas as lateral hazards.
  • we allow no more than 3 minutes to look for a last ball - this became the USGA rule in 2019.
  • we are allowed to remove loose impediments in sand bunkers - this became the USGA rule in 2019.
  • we establish quad bogey as the maximum score allowed for a hole, regardless of how it may impact a match.
  • we give putts! (within reason... don't make a mockery of the handicap system!!!)
  • we don't take handicaps down to decimal points to determine A & B players - the team with identical (rounded) handicaps gets to choose, or flip a tee!

  Remember, decisions on who are the A & B players, as determined on the 1st tee, are final - even if a subsequent review of handicaps suggests otherwise! How many arguments has this started in the past? Too many to count....

  Hopefully, the new green at #12 will be open before we play a league match on the back nine. If not, suck it up and play out the hole until you're within 4 feet (add one stroke), or have holed out.

• Handicaps: The maximum 9-hole handicap this year is now 27. We're all safe for a while.
• Match Results: All I need from you is the score card after your match. You can give me the card at the course, at the bar (see below), or give me the hole-by-hole scores via e-mail (in plain text, not a spreadsheet, white-space delimited, not dashes or commas or whatever) the morning following play. If there's any doubt, make sure you indicate who played against whom!!! I'll accept legible photos of your scorecard, e-mailed to my usual account or texted to my phone.
• Match Rescheduling: We all lead complicated lives, and occaisionally need to miss a match. Here are your options, roughly in the order you should consider them:
  • Get a substitute.
  • Partner doubles.
  • Reschedule. For all practical purposes, the window for this is 6 days before the original match date to 6 days after. Plan to play early, so you've still got options if the first date doesn't work out.
  • Available team plays as scheduled, unavailable team matches cards with next scheduled match.
  • Available team plays as scheduled, unavailable team plays on a different night.
  • Both teams match cards with next scheduled match.
  • Remember - you cannot match cards for matches 7 and 15, and you cannot match cards two weeks in a row.
• Tee Times: The county courses are using Tee-Time Reservation System to reserve tee-times. You will need to be in possession of a vaild (unexpired) county golf I.D. card (or equivalent non-resident golf I.D. card) and sign up to use the service. Cards good for two years are available. It is my understanding that reservation service rules infractions (failure to show up, show up with fewer golfers than reserved, etc) will be strictly enforced this year, and will result in fines and/or loss of reservation privileges. Use the service responsibly!

  Again, for 2024, a MCPS-sanctioned league materialized at Howell Park on Thursdays, sucking up the first five tee-times after 5pm. We are going to have to be vigilant to get all the times between 4:27pm and 4:54pm, and flexible in their distribution.

• Watering Holes: The unsanctioned tailgate session behind Andy's and Bruce's SUVs is still a thing, but the official watering hole is Mulligan's, until it is not! Watch the message boards inside for the schedule of "Bike Nights" - those are a good reason to investigate Woody's once in a while.

Well, that's about it for now. Let me know if there's anything else you need to get started. See you all at Howell.