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About the Tour |
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Flight Placement The AAGT is divided into six separate flights and two divisions (Open and Senior). Flights are based on the members current Index in the first event played in the following order:
FLIGHT Handicap Index CHAMPIONSHIP 0-3.9 PALMER 4-7.9 HOGAN 8-11.9 SARAZEN 12-15.9 JONES 16-19.9
All members will be placed into a flight after Indexes have been determined. A player’s Index is determined by one of the following: The Index from the previous year, a USGA® Index card or local golf association Index. If a player does not have proof of an Index a player can be placed into a flight based on submission to GameTracker (www.golfchannel.com/gametracker) of 6 attested scorecards. Players will be re-flighted throughout the season when/if their indexes change.
A member that plays and qualifies for the national event in the Open flight, but turns 50 near the end of the season is not permitted to play in the Senior Tour Championship. They can only participate at nationals in the flight they qualified in during the season. A member who is 49 and 10 months at the start of his local tour season may play in the Senior Division.
Re-flighting of members throughout the season will be performed on a periodic basis. An example would be on April 30th, June 30th and August 30th all indexes will be reviewed by the local, regional and national office. A member whose index is .4 points below the flight guidelines will be re-flighted to the next lower flight. In example: On April 30th, the first index review shows that Joe Smith’s tour index is a 19.6. He has been participating in the Snead flight with index guidelines of 20 and above. After this revision, Joe will be re-flighted to the Jones flight 16.0-19.9.
If a member’s index has increased by 1.6 points, they may be moved up to the next higher flight with the members’s permission. In example, Bill Doaks’ is in the Hogan flight (8.0-11.9) and at the June 30 review his tour index is 12.5. He should be moved to the Sarazen flight.
Of course, if a member falls below the flight guidelines in which they are competing between the review dates, the Tour Director always has the option to re-flight a member at anytime. After the last review date of August 30th, all players will be flighted according to their tour index and complete the remainder of the season (local championship, national championship) in this flight (no .4 grace will be allowed in this final review).
If a player is moved from one flight to another, the player will not be allowed to move any higher than a tie for 3rd place in that next flight. Points will be adjusted to reflect the move.
Example: If a player is moved from the "Hogan" flight where they had 200 points, up to the Palmer flight where 3rd place has only 150 points, then the player’s point total will be reduced to 150 and will then be placed in a tie for 3rd.
The Tour does not want to penalize players for getting better, but this will help keep players from taking too many points from an easier flight and moving past everyone in the tougher flight. Rather than stay in an easy flight and eventually lose your points, it would be to the player’s advantage to move up if playing in the wrong flight.
**NOTE** A Tour Director reserves the right to disqualify a player and/or move a player to another flight even if the above criteria has not been met. Although these instances are rare, the integrity of the entire tour and the proper flighting of players must be maintained to protect the field/tour. Should a player be moved by a local director without meeting the above criteria, the player has the right to appeal the movement to the national office.
It is very important to provide an honest initial assessment of your playing ability. If a player is deemed to have ‘sandbagged’, that person could lose all Order of Merit Points earned to that point, and then be moved to the proper flight. Sandbagging will NOT be tolerated and could potentially result in loss of membership privileges
Tournament Flight Guidelines Each tournament field will vary in the size. In order to present a competitive field in terms of competition, Order of Merit point distribution, prizes, and side games, a flight must consist of at least 6 players on tours with less than 150 members and 8 players on tours with more than 150 members.
EXAMPLE: The field for the Golf Channel Amateur Tour Fourth of July Classic has 47 participants (7 Championship, 4 Palmer, 11 Hogan, 12 Sarazen, 10 Jones, 3 Snead). The Palmer players would be moved/combined with the Championship flight for the event and the Snead players would be moved/combined up to the Jones flight. Both the Palmer and Snead players would compete for merit points, prizes and trophies in the Championship and Jones flights, respectively. The Championship flight now consists of 11 players with the Jones flight consisting of 13 players. If the Palmer players finish 3rd, 5th, 8th and 11th, they will earn prize fund and merit points based on that finish.
Under no circumstances should players be moved to a higher flight to form a conforming flight i.e. Palmer to Hogan, Jones to Snead.
If the Championship flight has nominal participants the Tour Director may, at his or her discretion, offer the Championship players an option to withdraw from the tournament or compete with less than 6/8 players.
It is the local Tour Directors/committees option to offer separate Senior divisions within a flight. This division can be added when there are enough Open players and Seniors (6 for tours with less than 150 members or 8 for tours with 150 plus in members) within the flight to host a separate divisions. EX 1: Tampa event has 18 Hogan Players and 250 members. 10 of the members are Open and 8 are Seniors. Tampa has the option to host separate divisions within the Hogan flight for this event (these two divisions would offer separate prize pool, trophies and merit points). EX 2. Ft. Myers event has 14 Sarazens and less than 150 members. 5 Sarazens are Open and 9 Sarazens are Seniors. Since the Open flight has less than 6 members, there is only one division for this event, which would be a 14 field Sarazen event.
While a player may have played the tournament in a flight lower than his tour flight, his Merit of Order points will accrue to him in his assigned tour flight.
At no time, are “separate” Senior points awarded for a flight operating only one division. Separate Senior points are awarded only when the Senior division stands alone in an event.
Regional majors will require a minimum of 10 Seniors for a separate division within a flight. Tournament Tees A breakdown on the average distances the Tour tries to set yardage to (based on course availability):
FLIGHT YARDS Championship 6600-6900 Palmer 6600-6900 Hogan 6400-6600 Sarazen 6400-6600 Jones 6000-6300 Snead 6000-6300
The yardage will vary depending on the course teeing grounds, slope and rating. The AAGT will attempt to provide every golfer with an opportunity to participate under the most competitive tournament set-ups possible.
Women, Juniors, Seniors
GOLF CHANNEL Amateur Tour’s policy for regional and national events are that all competitors (juniors/women/men and seniors) will hit from the "same" set of tees based on their GOLF CHANNEL Amateur Tour Handicap. If a regional or national event has enough participants to field "separate" divisions (junior/women/senior) they will hit from a specific set of tees for their division. Local tours throughout the country may opt to offer different yardages/tees (junior/women/seniors) based on the local tour policy. It is the sole responsibility of the tour member to contact the local Tour Director for policies and procedures relating tee yardages for event participation.
Tournament Results & Order of Merit Points All tournament results and year-to-date leaderboards will be available at every event as well as on the Web site after each tournament. Points will be awarded in each flight based on the order of finish. Points will be awarded as follows:
Position Points 1st 175 2nd 125 3rd 100 4th 90 5th 80 6th 70 7th 60 8th 50 9th 40 10th 30 11th+ 20
Points will be awarded on a ‘bottom up’ basis from 10th place. In example: In a flight with less than 10 players, the last placed finisher in the flight will receive 30 points, second to last will receive 40 points and so on up the schedule of points. If there were only 9 players in the flight, then the winner would receive 125 points. If there were only 6 players (the minimum to make a flight) the winner would get 80 points. If there are 10 or more players in the flight, then 1st place will receive 175 points and anyone finishing 11th or below would receive 20 points.
Determination of Tied Scores For all first place ties in flight, there will be an on-course playoff (course permitting), supervised by a Committee Member. The golf course and the availability of carts, holes, daylight and other factors will determine the holes used to conduct the playoff. The playoff will commence until a player records a lower score than the other(s) on a particular hole (sudden death). If an on-course playoff is not possible, a scorecard playoff will take place using the cumulative score of the back nine , then the last 6, then the last 3 holes. If the players are still tied after matching the final 3 hole scores, then it goes to the #1 handicap hole on the back nine, then to the #2 handicap hole on the back nine until a winner is determined. Aside from first place, the scorecard playoff will be used for all places that pay out a prize/gift certificate, within flight.
For awarding points in the event of a tie, the Tournament Director will add up all points for the tied places and divide by the number of players tied for the spot. The tied players will then be awarded the same number of points (Example: If there are 3 players tied for 2nd place, add up 125, 100 and 90 and divide by 3 - each player will receive 105 points).
Distance Measuring Devices With respect to rule 14-3 and the use of Electronic Distance Measuring Devices, the AAGT local tour directors (by Local Rule) will have the option to permit the use of distance-measuring devices on an event by event basis.
The AAGT national office is currently planning on permitting the use of such measuring devices at all 2008 events.
Regional Majors Each region is different, but typically a region will hold two to four “Majors”. A Major is a two-day 36-hole event that will include players from all Tours in that region as well as across the country. Majors have significantly enhanced “Order of Merit” points per the schedule below. A player is only allowed to compete for points in as many Majors as their region has scheduled. The top three finishers in each flight at a major automatically qualify for the Tour Championship. However, the Tour policy regarding minimum playing requirements must be attained (see below).
1st 350 9th 80 2nd 250 10th 60 3rd 200 11th 40 4th 180 12th 40 5th 160 14th 40 6th 140 15th 40 7th 120 16th 40 8th 100 17th+ 40
Qualification Guidelines for Championship Week
Championship Week is the 7-10 day stretch at the end of the season during which the Team Championship Cup matches, the Senior Tour Championship and the National Tour Championship are conducted. It is usually held the first or second week in October at some of the finest courses and resorts around the country. National Tour Championship The 2008 National Tour Championship, held during the annual “Championship Week”, is a 72-hole event with a cut after the third round (54 holes) of competition. The cut line is based on a percentage of players in each flight. The players that make the cut will participate in the 18-hole final round to determine the National Tour Champion in each flight. For the latest information on the national championship, check the website.
All tours with less than 150 members can qualify 20% of their membership for the national event. Tours with 150 -299 can qualify 25% of their membership and tours with 300 plus can qualify 30%. Members who have qualified through a regional major will not count against a tours % allotment.
All members qualifying for the National Tour Championship MUST play in 50% of the number of events on their home schedule of which 50% of these tournament entries must be on the local tour. EX: David Herman joins the Tampa Tour which has 18 single day events and 2 regional majors (national championship event will not be factored into the minimum number of events needed to qualify for nationals) for a 20 event schedule. David must play in a minimum of 10 tournaments (50% of 20 is 10) and of these 10 events 5 (50% of 10) of them must be played on his local tour.
Senior Tour Championship Seniors need to have been flighted as Seniors throughout the season and can qualify through the various options available to a local tour. They can also qualify through a regional major that has separate Senior flights. Seniors must meet the minimum participation guidelines above. Team Championship & Qualifying The Team Championship is the oldest event on the GOLF CHANNEL Amateur Tour. Each local Tour has the opportunity to send a team of twelve (12) players to compete during “Championship Week” for the coveted Cup. The tournament is a 45-hole match play event with 27 holes played on day one and 18 holes on day two.
A member qualifies for their local Team Championship team through the criteria established by the local Tour Director. The local Tour Director can choose from a variety of programs to make their team.
A team will consist of two players from each flight on that Tour. If either player is not able to attend, the local Tour Director will select replacements by moving down the list of players in that flight until a team is full (see your local Tour Director for Team Championship qualifications). In some cases, players from other tours will fill in spots that can not be filled by the local tour.
Skins Contractual Obligation By signing and mailing or electronically submitting a member application and/or tournament registration form to play on the KCAGT and/or in a Golf Channel Amateur Golf Tour event, the participant understands and agrees that they are contractually obligated to pay for the membership and/or tournament fee. The cancellation policy will be part of the contract between said player and the Kansas City Amateur Golf Tour. Assumption of Risk and Release From Liability
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