How do you measure nearest the pin? Edge of the hole or centre of the cup?
It turns out some golfers measure nearest the pin a little differently to others.
I had a reader ask me last week how exactly one should go about measuring nearest the pin.
Specifically I was asked whether you should measure the distance from your golf ball to the edge of the cup or to the centre of the hole?
To be honest we had never given it much thought before as we always assumed it should be measured from the edge of the hole. It must be more accurate with a hard edge to measure against the end of the flagstick or a tape measure if provided.
But the question came about because a group of players from a different golf club to the one being played has always taken their nearest to the pin measurements from the centre of the cup.
We would’ve been inclined to think these golfers, and this reader has misunderstood until we were sent this link that tells members to measure from the centre of the club.
So if these members are playing at other golf courses measuring the nearest the pin the same way, they’re probably selling themselves a little short, by exactly 5.4cm!
A short survey we ran soon after revealed everyone else I spoke to measures from the edge of the cup.
Anyone else measure the nearest the pin from the centre of the cup?
It also depends where the zero is on the flagstick.
I think human nature is to make the distance the shortest as possible so we should just make sure that the process captures the shortest possible distance (i.e edge of cup to front of ball) and then there shouldn’t be any issues.
If the ball is overhanging the lip but not in the hole what would be the measurement by those that measure to the edge of the hole (say negative 1 cm). Accordingly it makes more sense to measure from the centre of the cup.
My group always measured from the edge of the cup, but yesterday the golf courses measurement tape fit inside the cup and measured from the center where the pin would be, it is also referred to as “closest the the pin” and “closest to the hole”, I guess that determines where you measure the distance.
The name NTP ( nearest to the pine _) explains it , Other wise it would be NTE ( nearest the Edge )
Good Debate