2020 - Week 1 Predictions/Statistics Online

The predictions and statistics for this week, the Sentry Tournament of Champions (US PGA Tour) are now available on Golf Predictor. It's the first week of the new GP season (the 2020 calendar year) and it's time for everyone to look forward to another full year of golf! I would like to wish all readers/users a Happy New Year and a prosperous 2020 using Golf Predictor, now that it's free!

There is no event on the European Tour this week.

Golf Predictor Now Free!

I would like to announce that Golf Predictor is now free to use by everyone! I have taken this move after over eleven years of running Golf Predictor on a subscription based model. Developing Golf Predictor to its current state has involved thousands of development hours and many hours almost every single week updating the stats over that time. My personal circumstances have changed this year and it is unlikely that I will continue to be able to dedicate the time to this task. Therefore, I have decided to make the site free in 2020, in case I will not be able to supply the service at the highest possible level.

The site has been updated to show everything* that was previously hidden behind the pay wall to all logged in users. There is no catch or your data will never be sold to anybody. I only ask that you consider donating every now and again to help keep the site alive. I have always run this site as a labour of love, but now that my only revenue stream will be donations, the site shall be dependant on this for continued operation. Instead of prompts encouraging you to subscribe, you will now get similar prompts asking you to donate instead. If you should be gracious enough to do so, these prompts will be hidden for the period of time indicated on the new donate page. To procure another revenue stream, I may add advertising or sponsorship to the site at a future date.

The terms and conditions have been updated to take account of this big change. I haven't missed a week in over eleven years, but now that it's free, that perfect streak may no longer be maintained. I'm not planning to skip any weeks, but unlike in the past, I may not update the site during holidays or other events, such as family funerals etc.

The service may get many more users, now that it's free. However, unless the donations bring in sufficient funding, I will not be able to upgrade the hosting plan. The service will be free, so please don't complain about the site performance unless you are a donor. If you use the site, especially if you do not wish to donate, I would appreciate a shout out on social media or recommendation to your friends.

The donation process is exactly the same as the previous subscription process, save for the addition of a much cheaper donation option. This is so I can leverage the existing payment infrastructure. As before, the donations/subscriptions are once off payments, i.e. you will NOT get a recurring charge. The new cheaper option covers one week and hides the donate prompts for four days. That is enough to cover the tournaments for one week, assuming you donate at the right time!

Current subscribers have two options: you may continue to support the site and you will not be shown any donate prompts until your subscription runs out. Alternatively, since the site is now free, if you want your outstanding subscription fee back, that's totally fine. Obviously, I would appreciate the former, but in the case of the latter, I will return the unused percentage of your subscription**. Please send me an email with your decision. I plan to email all subscribers directly in the near future, but please get in touch if I don't contact you. In addition to not seeing any donate prompts, only donors will be able to see all the results for a tournament. I also plan to add a few great tools for donors only, as a reward for supporting the site.

I'd like to thank everyone for supporting GP down through the years and I wish you a happy year of free golf analysis on GP in 2020! Note that you may have to reload any pages (Ctrl+F5 on Windows) to see the changes to the site.


* Except for full tournament results. Only donors can have access to that infomation.
**PayPal fees may be non-refundable for older subscriptions (their rules, not mine!).

2019 Golf Predictor Betting/Tipping Summary

Another golf year has finished and it's time to report on the Golf Predictor bets/tips for 2019. Only one win this year, a few play-off losses and a plethora of places, which all add up to a loss of just under 41 points for the year*. It's all fine margins and if my 80/1 tip Antoine Rozner had holed his birdie putt on the final hole in Mauritius a few weeks ago or had J.B. Hansen been able to chip on to a green from ten yards away at the penultimate hole in France, it would have meant a profit for the year. Alas, it wasn't to be and those failures coupled with a sizeable number of near miss places (including two at the very last tournament in Australia!) meant a non-profitable year. Overall though, over the longer term, I remain significantly ahead of the bookies.

I like to use Golf Predictor to find golfers to bet one unit each way on in the 40/1 to 80/1 range and this is borne out by some basic statistics. Out of the 224 bets that I made over the year, usually three per tournament (US and European Tour), only twelve (5.4%) were 33/1 or 35/1 and another nine (4%) were 125/1 or greater. As the image below shows, 84.4% of my bets were in my preferred range. 

Odds distribution for 2019 Golf Predictor bets/tips

I like each way bets in this range as it usually offers a (modest) profit for the tournament if just one of the golfers place. While a golfer in the 40/1 to 80/1 range hasn't got as much of a chance of winning as the top rated guys in single figures, they are very good golfers. In addition to being capable of winning, I believe they have a better chance of placing than, say, a 6/1 or 8/1 shot has of winning for a similar return. All you need for a profitable year is about two wins and a steady stream of places. While I had the latter this year, only having Shane Lowry in The Open (at 45/1) meant I just came up short in 2019. The basic stats are as follows:

Number of bets: 224

Profit/Loss: = -40.83

Winners: 1 (Shane Lowry at The Open)

Places: 34 (including two play-off losses and ten dead heat places)

No profit this year, but I'm hoping to get back in the black next year!

*Notes: I stuck with one bookie for convenience. If I used an odds checking site and multiple accounts, I probably would have cut my losses by around 10 to 15 points.

2019 - Week 50 Winner

Adam (ranked 1st by Golf Predictor) won the Australian PGA Championship on the European PGA Tour. The 39 year old Australian won his first title on home soil in over six years on the Gold Coast. Leading by one shot overnight, Scott was overtaken by Michael Hendry around the turn. However,  Scott rallied on the back nine and despite a closing bogey, won by two shots in the end. Scott was our top ranked golfer and we had eight of the top nineteen plus ties (8/21) in total.

2019 - Week 50 Predictions/Statistics Online

The predictions and statistics for this week, the Australian PGA Championship (European PGA Tour), are now available on Golf Predictor. While this marks the fifth year that the Australian PGA has been on the European Tour (and hence on Golf Predictor), it has a long history, dating all the way back to 1905. However, only the tournament history for when it has been part of the European Tour (i.e. last four years) is available in Golf Predictor, so please factor that into your analysis. Local golfer Cameron Smith is going for a hat-trick of titles this year and Adam Scott aside, the competition isn't particularly fierce!

2019 - Week 49 Winner

Rasmus Hjogaard (ranked 76th by Golf Predictor) won the AFRASIA BANK Mauritius Open on the European PGA Tour. The talented 18 year old Dane went one better than his twin brother Nicolai by taking first place in a tour event with his win in Mauritius. Hjogaard prevailed over my 80/1 betting tip Antoine Rozner with a fabulous eagle at the third extra hole after Renato Paratore was eliminated two holes earlier. Our top ranked player, Thomas Pieters, finished tied 13th and we had six of the top seventeen plus ties (6/20) in the weak fielded event. 

There was no official event on the US PGA Tour this week. Golf Predictor doesn't cover the (very) restricted field junket that is the Hero Challenge.

2019 - Week 49 Predictions/Statistics Online

The predictions and statistics for this week, the AFRASIA BANK Mauritius Open (European PGA Tour) are now available on Golf Predictor. Despite the exotic setting in the Indian Ocean, only four golfers inside the top one hundred in the world rankings are teeing it up in Mauritius. Belgium's Thomas Pieters is probably the biggest name in the event and he will be hoping to add to his trophy cabinet on Sunday.

There is no event on the US PGA Tour this week, except for Tiger's invitational junket (Hero World Challenge). As in previous years, Golf Predictor is not not covering that (very) restricted field event.

2019 - Week 48 Winner

Pablo Larrazabal (ranked 13th by Golf Predictor) won the Alfred Dunhill Championship on the European PGA Tour. The 36 year old Spaniard won his fifth tour title with an amazing performance at sweltering Leopard Creek. Leading by three shots going into the final day, Larrazabal could barely walk on Sunday due to blisters on his feet. That caused him to go out in 41 and drop eight shots in his first thirteen holes. However, he somehow managed to carry on and steady the ship, finishing strongly to pip Joel Sjoholm by a single shot. In doing so, he became the first player ever to win a European Tour even while dropping that amount of shots in his final round! Our top ranked golfer, Eddie Pepperell finished in tied 19th and in an event that is usually difficult to predict, we had nine of the top nineteen plus ties (9/21) in total. 

There was no event on the US PGA Tour this week.