Scoring Your Round of Golf

Scoring your round of golf is an important step in learning how to play the game. Only one person needs to write down the score, but every golfer you play with needs to check that his or her score is accurate after each hole. To keep score, get a pencil and a scorecard, which is typically unique to each golf course.

Writing down important information

The first step in scoring your round of golf is to write down the names of all the players on the scorecard. Each player has a space for his or her name that also lists the number of holes on the golf course and the par for each hole. The par is the number of strokes it is supposed to take for you to get the ball into the hole. You are ready to start after the names of all the players are recorded on the scorecard.

Recording the score

Keeping score requires you to simply make a check mark next to the hole number for each stroke taken on that hole. Make the marks quite small; you need to write the final number in the box as well. Simply add up the check marks to find the number of strokes taken by each player, and record that number under the name for every hole. Most golf courses recommend adding up the current score after playing nine holes to give everyone a better understanding of how they are doing.

Tabulating the final score

Tabulate the final score by adding the total from the first nine holes with the total from the back nine holes. This gives you the total number of strokes each player made during the game. The player with the lowest number of strokes is the winner.

Learning how to score a round of golf is a simple process. Use a scorecard from the golf course because all courses have different pars for different holes. All players are responsible for checking that your scorekeeper is keeping score accurately.