How many scores count in Irish Four Ball?

In the common form: the best one on holes 1 to 6, the best two on 7 to 11, the best three on 12 to 15 and all four on 16 to 18.

Is Irish Four Ball played in Stableford or stroke play?

Usually Stableford points, highest team total wins. A stroke play version exists, with net strokes and a maximum score for pickups.

What is the difference between Irish Four Ball and a normal four-ball?

A normal four-ball counts one score on every hole. Irish Four Ball starts that way and then counts two, three and finally four scores as the round goes on.

Does Parful score Irish Four Ball?

Not yet. It needs a team of four picked from the field and Parful is building that team selection once, properly, for all its group games. The rules are explained here in the meantime.

How are ties settled?

Most clubs use countback over the last segment first, since that is where all four scores counted, then work backwards through the segments.

Golf games

Rules and explanation only

Irish Four Ball

Also called Irish Fourball, Progressive best ball, Irish Rumble.

Irish Four Ball is a progressive four-player team game. In the common form, holes 1 to 6 count the best score in the team, holes 7 to 11 count the best two, holes 12 to 15 the best three, and holes 16 to 18 all four. The pressure rises with every segment because fewer scores can be thrown away.

Players: Teams of 4
Counting balls: Holes 1 to 6: best 1; 7 to 11: best 2; 12 to 15: best 3; 16 to 18: all 4
Scoring basis: Usually net Stableford points; sometimes net strokes
Winner: Highest team points, or lowest team strokes
Segments: 6, 5, 4 and 3 holes

How Irish Four Ball works

Four players form a team and everyone plays their own ball for 18 holes. On each hole the team records some of its four scores and ignores the rest, and the number it must record grows through the round. This is the common form of the game; clubs vary the hole splits, but the shape is always one, then two, then three, then four.

For the first six holes only the best score in the team counts, which is ordinary best ball and gives every player license to attack. On holes 7 to 11 the best two count. On holes 12 to 15 the best three count, so only one poor score can be dropped. On the last three holes all four scores count and there is nowhere to hide.

The game is most often played in Stableford points, where a blob simply scores zero and the team wants the highest total. It can equally be played in net strokes, where the team wants the lowest total and a pickup has to be given a score.

Where the game is won

The early holes reward aggression because three of the four scores are thrown away anyway. The middle holes reward one solid partner and one attacker. The last three holes are where most teams lose ground: a single blob when all four count can undo an entire segment of good work.

A good captain talks about the segment change on the tee of holes 7, 12 and 16, because the correct shot for the weakest player changes at each one.

Ties and pickups

A tie on total is usually settled by countback over the last segment, the holes where all four counted, then the last three-ball segment and so on. In the Stableford form a player who cannot finish a hole scores zero for it. In the stroke form the team must agree a maximum, and net double bogey is the usual choice.

What Parful does

Parful does not score Irish Four Ball. The arithmetic is simple and every input is already on the scorecard, but the game needs four named players in a team, and the owner ruled that Parful will not build a throwaway team picker or a temporary data shape to get there. The game is deferred to the team and group topology phase alongside 1-2-3 Waltz, and will be built on the same team selection that the group games use.

Clubs can run the format today as a competition by choosing the counted-scores formats for each segment on paper. This page states the common form of the rules; when Parful builds it the ruleset will be ratified first.

Worked example

A worked example: one hole from each segment

One team of four playing Stableford points. Each row shows the four net points, which of them count in that segment and the team score for the hole.

Hole	Segment	Ana	Ben	Cal	Dee	Counting	Team points
4	Best 1 of 4	2	0	3	1	Cal 3	3
9	Best 2 of 4	2	2	0	3	Dee 3, Ana 2	5
13	Best 3 of 4	1	2	2	0	Ben 2, Cal 2, Ana 1	5
17	All 4	2	1	0	2	All four	5

The same quality of golf scores 3, then 5, then 5, then 5: a blob on hole 4 cost nothing, a blob on hole 17 cost the team two points it could not drop.

On hole 13 Dee's zero was the one dropped score; on hole 17 Cal's zero had to count.
Over 18 holes a typical team scores 45 to 55 points because the early segments are generous and the late ones are not.

Common variants

Stroke play version: Net strokes instead of points, lowest team total wins. Every counted pickup needs a score, so teams agree a net double bogey maximum. Parful does not score this either.
Different hole splits: Some clubs use 1 to 5, 6 to 10, 11 to 15 and 16 to 18, or run the progression over each nine separately. The counting logic is the same.
Reverse progression: All four count on holes 1 to 3, falling to one on the last six, so the round finishes with everyone free to attack. It is played, but rarely.