Even before you learn what golf is, there are at least two words that you know you don't know: handicap and par. Let us bring you on board the mysterious world of golf by telling you what these words mean.

PAR means "Professional Average Result". That is, this is the number rom the first stroke and until the ball ends up in the hole. A golf court usually has 18 holes and each hole is a par 3, par 4 or par 5. In total a complete golf course usually has par 72.

A golf professional is expected to hit the ball only 72 times on such a golf course, and thereby playing at "par".Well, not all players are professional, so they get a handicap to even out the differences. If you e.g. plays a normal Par 72 round and uses 73 strokes - your handicap is 1 (or actually "-1" [minus one]), if you use 90 strokes, your handicap is 18 (72 + 18 = 90). On most golf courses the highest allowed handicap is 36, which means that you on average use 2 more strokes per hole, and 108 (72 + 36) strokes for the whole golf court.

The advantage of the handicap system is that it is possible for two different players to compete against each other - but each is allowed to compete at his level.

Take the case where Mike (handicap 18) plays against George (handicap 36). For each hole that Mike plays "his handicap", that is uses 3+1 stroke on a par 3 hole, 4+1 on a par 4 hole etc he gets 2 Stableford points (named after the person that invented the system). George on the other hand gets 2 points if he uses 3+2, 4+2 or 5+2 strokes. If it happens that George only uses 3+1 on a par 3, he gets one more point (3 points).