I think this is the right sub forum for this.

Can anyone shed some light on what a local index means and why it exists? I looked it up on the USGA site and it says the L next to an index means local use only and is used when the index is higher then the maximum allowed.

I don't play in events or anything else so my index having an L is pretty irrelevant to my game( It just means I suck ) but I'm just curious if theres more to it then the little info I found on the USGA site.

From the USGA handicap manual:

A "local handicap" is either a handicap that is above the maximum Handicap Index limit (Section 3-4), a handicap that is revised more frequently than allowed (Section 8-3) or a handicap based on a player's temporary disability. A local handicap is not a Handicap Index, and it must be identified by the letter "L" to indicate that it is for local use only. A local handicap is expressed as a number taken to one decimal place and is used to convert to a Course Handicap (e.g., 41.5L).

The manual also says that for inter-club play, local handicaps that are higher than the maximum allowable Handicap Index (36.4 for men, 40.4 for ladies) should be reduced the maximum allowable Handicap Index.

It looks like the purpose of the local handicap is to provide players with a handicap when the handicap index doesn't properly represent the players true potential ability.

In my experience "L" indexes appear most often in the following 3 situations.

1) When a player makes a successful 'medical appeal' for an index change. An example might be a player who has just returned from some kind of major surgery, can't play to their pre-surgery potential, and would like to participate in some team oriented club competition, but doesn't want to be a drag on his/her team. The handicap committee has the ability to assign ann altered index which would be marked with an "L" to indicate that it can't be used outside of the club.

2) A player just joins a club (say at the beginning of the season) and has no posting history or good record of last year's round. The handicap committee can give this person an "L" index (or not).

3) Our system calculates an "instant index" which would be your index at the next index update if no more scores are posted. This index is noted with an "L" designation.
dave

Thanks. It sounds like, in my case, it's a situation of "Here's a number, so you can have one, but it's not good for much." That's actually perfectly fine with me. I only started working on an index to try and track the improvements to my game. Them allowing my index to go above the max allowed for a guy is perfect.