Why Greens (and fairways) In Regulation Are Useless- And What You Should Track Instead

GIR stands for green in regulation.

A gir means a player got their ball on the green “in regulation.”

Regulation is determined by the par for the hole.

As all holes allow for two putts to make a par, in order to get a green in regulation, you must get on the green in:

1 shot on Par 3s
2 shots or less on Par 4s
3 shots or less on Par 5s

How To Track Greens In Regulation

Greens in regulation can be tracked over a round, tournament, or year and are typically displayed as a percentage.

For example, if you hit 11 out of 18 greens in regulation in a round, your GIR percentage would be 61%.

Greens in regulation were a very common and popular stat until just a few years ago. Now, strokes gained is the primary stat that professional (and amateur) golfers use to measure performance.

Why Greens In Regulation Can Be Misleading

It doesn’t account for differences in proximity to the hole

For example, as long as the ball is on the green, you are credited with a gir, whether the ball is 2 feet from the hole or 56 feet from the hole.
Same goes with missing the green in regulation: You could miss the green by 1 foot or 100 feet; either way, you don’t get credit for a gir.

It doesn’t take into account reasons for missing the green

For example, if you hit a bad tee shot and cannot even attempt to go for the green in regulation, your gir stat doesn’t reflect that. It just shows you missed greens, not why. It could be because of a poor drive, a duffed second shot on a par 5, or a penalty off the tee.

Why GIR (and FIR) Are (Usually) Useless Stats To Track

GIRs and FIRs (fairways in regulation) are very black-and-white statistics.

You either did it, or you didn’t.

If you missed the green by 3 inches or 30 yards, it doesn’t matter: you don’t get credit for the gir.

Now imagine two players in a match:

Player A hits 10/18 greens.
Player B hits 16/18 greens.

Which player hit better approach shots?

Most people would say the answer is obviously Player B, but it is impossible to answer that question simply based on how many greens a player hits.

Now imagine this:

Player A was just barely missing greens. His average distance to the pin was 21’, with 3 inside 8′.
Player B, on the other hand, only missed two greens. But on one of those he missed, he put his approach in a pond, and of those greens he did it, he never hit one closer than 12’. His average distance to the pin was 42’.

Now which player do you think hit better approach shots?

Strokes Gained Is The Best Metric

Strokes gained answers that question directly and clearly.

It takes care of all the ambiguity that comes with tracking girs and firs.

In the above example, Player A would have a better strokes gained approach than Player B.

There would be clear, irrefutable data about which player had the better approach game that round.

While it’s always nice to hit a lot of greens, and it’s always a goal of mine to hit as many as I can each round, but the stat on its own can be misleading and it often doesn’t tell the full story.

Along with fairways in regulation and total putts, greens in regulation are an essentially useless stat in the age of strokes gained.

They make it difficult to compare rounds, track performance, and gauge improvement.

If you had 28 putts one round and 33 the next, there is no way to tell which one was a better putting performance.

But if your strokes gained was 1.2 for one round and .4 for another, it is clear which day you putted better.

Same with fairways and greens.

If you hit 9 fairways one day and 13 the next, it doesn’t necessarily mean you drove the ball better on the second day. You could have put one of your other drives out of bounds, 1 in the woods, topped one, and put the other two in deep rough.

But if one day your strokes gained driving was .8 and the next day it was -1.6, you know which day you hit the ball better off the tee.