How a scramble works, and how to handicap one

1. Every player on the team tees off.
2. The team chooses the best tee shot. Each player marks the spot and places their ball within one club length of it, no nearer the hole and in the same kind of ground (a ball chosen in the rough is played from the rough, a ball in a bunker from the bunker).
3. Everyone plays the next shot from there, and the team chooses again. This repeats until the ball is in the hole.
4. On the green, each player putts from the chosen spot, usually placed within a few inches of the mark. The first putt holed ends the hole.
5. The team writes down one score for the hole, the number of shots it took using the chosen balls.

Teams are usually two, three or four players. The format moves quickly, keeps every player involved, and produces low scores: a four-player team of average golfers often shoots well under par gross.

A scramble team gets one handicap, built from each player's course handicap. List the players' course handicaps from lowest to highest, multiply each by its percentage, add the results and round to the nearest whole number (a half rounds up).

The weights favor the lower handicaps because their shots get chosen more often, and they keep a team of four high handicaps from receiving more strokes than it can use. The course handicap calculator works out team handicaps for any of the three sizes. For simplicity, the examples on this page treat each course handicap as an exact whole number. The USGA applies each percentage to the unrounded course handicap and rounds once at the end, so a real calculation can occasionally differ by a stroke.

The team takes its handicap as strokes on the hardest holes by stroke index, one per hole. A team handicap of 8 gets a stroke on the holes ranked 1 through 8, and its net score is the gross score less 8.

Two four-player teams play a net scramble on a par 72 course.

Team B was 3 shots better gross, but Team A wins the net game by 1 because it received 4 more strokes. In match play the same two teams would play off the difference: Team A gets 4 strokes, on the holes ranked 1 through 4, and Team B plays off zero.

• Minimum drives. Many events require each player's tee shot to be used a set number of times, often 3 or 4 per player in a four-player team, so the longest hitter cannot carry the team.
• Simpler handicaps. Some charity events give each team a percentage of the combined handicaps, such as 10%. It is quick to work out but favors teams with very high handicaps.
• A reduced allowance. Some events play off a share of the USGA number, for example 90% of it. Wedge lets the organizer scale the team handicap this way, and uses 100% by default.
• Florida scramble (step-aside). The player whose shot was chosen sits out the next shot.
• Gross only. Some outings skip handicaps and award separate gross prizes, often with teams balanced by the organizer.

In Wedge each scramble team keeps one shared card. One player with the app holds it and enters the team's score on each hole, and every teammate sees the same card. Players without the app can be on a team as guests, but every team needs at least one Wedge player to hold its card.

• Wedge works out the team handicap from the players' course handicaps for you before the round, and the strokes go on the card by stroke index.
• On a golf trip, every scramble team playing that day is ranked together by score to par, including teams of different sizes, and the day's scramble prize is paid by place.
• A team's prize is split evenly among its players.
• The shared card is the team's score, not any one player's, so it does not count toward individual games that day, such as skins, Stableford or the stroke-play leaderboard.

A scramble is normally paid by place, with each team's prize divided among its players. With six four-player teams at $25 a player, the pot is $600. Paid 60% and 40%, the winning team takes $360 ($90 a player) and the second team $240 ($60 a player). Teams tied on score share the places they cover.

• Using the Handicap Index. The percentages apply to each player's course handicap for the tees played, not to the index.
• Sorting the wrong way. The largest percentage goes with the lowest course handicap. Applying 25% to the highest handicap in a four-player team gives far too many strokes.
• Rounding too early. Add the unrounded products first and round once at the end. Rounding each player separately can move the team handicap by a stroke.
• Improving the lie. The ball must stay in the same kind of ground as the chosen shot. Moving it from the rough to the fairway is the most common way a scramble score gets padded.
• Posting the score. A scramble is not an acceptable score for a Handicap Index because players do not play their own ball, so team rounds are not posted.
• A player leaves early. The team can keep playing with the remaining players, but agree before the round whether the team handicap is recalculated. Most groups leave it as it was at the start.