Presidents Cup: how to play foursomes, the fastest format in golf

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In this week’s President’s Cup, as in the Ryder Cup, four players will play a key role in deciding which team will lift the trophy.

The two captains must turn to their data teams, vice-captains, caddies and the players themselves to judge who will be best matched as golfers and competitors.

The format is sometimes called alternate shooting and is both the fastest form of the game (at least in theory) and the most difficult (because if the two players don’t match their partnership can easily fall apart).

In this video, PGA Tour expert Pete Styles discusses and breaks down the foursomes format.

“Foursomes is a very interesting game because it is known as an apology game,” he said.

And why is that? “Because in foursomes, there are two people who play with their ball, you are a team but you only play one ball and take other shots.”

Styles thinks about playing in pairs and describes a possible strategy.

“We could decide ahead of time, me and my partner, that I would go out on odd holes (1, 3, 5, etc.) and you would go out on even holes (2, 4, 6, etc.).

“That could be because there are more par-3s on odd holes or more long drives on even holes, or whatever.

“So I’m going to tee off on the first hole and I’m nervous, I’m under pressure and I hit my shot behind a tree.

“Normally I would be disappointed. I usually went to try to hit it in the woods. But this time I beat my playing partner in that forest.

“So I just said, ‘Sorry! I did not mean that!’

“They went to the forest to try to hack it, and they hit a good shot. We’re right back in the middle of the road, and I’m like, ‘Thanks for that, it’s great.’

“Then I hit another one in the basement so I’m sorry again.

“So you’ll find in foursomes saying sorry more than anything else.”

The flipside of this is that many partners make it a point to say first that no one is going to say sorry during the cycle.

There’s another problem because Styles adds, “Some golfers would say foursomes are a tough game to get into.”

He takes a hit-and-run driver as an example.

“I might hit from the first, but the third is a par-3 so I don’t hit another driver until the fifth tee. So I’m not really in the trenches or in the swing of things.

“And it may turn out that my partner may hit a few chips but I don’t so I go a long time without hitting them.

“So you can see that sometimes it is very difficult to enter the game. It’s almost like half the game.

“But it’s a fast format, though, because we only hit one ball and, in fact, as I hit my drive my partner might be walking up the fairway to try to speed up the play.”

Pete Styles website

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