Disclosures and Terms

What this document is

GRND GOLF measures your golf and tells you where your strokes go. Some of what the app shows you is measured directly. Some of it is calculated, and some is estimated. This page explains which is which, in plain language, so you can judge the numbers for yourself.

We would rather put this in one place you can read once than print a footnote under every chart.

Distances from a launch monitor are calculated, not measured

A launch monitor does not watch your ball land. It measures how the ball left the club: how fast, at what angle, in what direction, and how much it was spinning. The app then calculates where a ball leaving that way would finish.

That calculation is a model of ball flight. It is good, and it is not perfect. It does not know the wind, the temperature, the altitude, how firm the ground is, or which ball you are playing. A number you see for a launch monitor shot is our best answer from the launch conditions, shown as a plain number.

What "vs Tour" means

Most of your statistics are shown against a Tour benchmark. That is the reference point, not a target and not a judgement. It means: playing the same hole from the same place, this is how many strokes a professional would typically take.

Almost everyone reads negative against it, including very good amateurs. A negative number is not a bad result. What matters is which part of your game is furthest from the line, because that is where the strokes are.

The benchmark figures come from published golf statistics research, listed at the end of this page. We transcribe them as published and do not adjust them.

How strokes gained is calculated

Strokes gained compares each shot to what a professional would be expected to score from the same spot. Hit it to a better place than expected and you gain; leave yourself worse and you lose.

We calculate this two ways, depending on what we know about your round.

Simulated rounds and your handicap

You can play a simulated round with a launch monitor. Those rounds are yours, they appear in your history, and they feed your practice statistics.

They do not count toward your handicap index. A handicap index is governed by the rules of golf and is built from rounds played on a golf course. A simulated round is not one, however well it is measured, so we keep the two apart rather than blur them.

Shots in a simulated round are priced from the launch monitor reading, and the app records that they came from a simulation and not from a course.

Your data

We store what you record: your rounds, your shots, your practice sessions, your launch monitor readings, and the account details you gave us.

We use it to produce your statistics and your improvement plans. We do not sell it. We do not share your individual data with other members.

If you share a round, only that round becomes visible to anyone with the link, and only the scorecard and the shot map for it.

You can ask us to export or delete your data. Ask through the app or by email and we will do it.

What we do not promise

We do not promise that a calculated distance matches what your ball actually did on a given swing. We do not promise the app will lower your handicap. We do not promise a statistic is accurate when the app tells you it is an estimate.

What we do promise is that the app will tell you which kind of number you are looking at, and that when we find something wrong we will say so and fix it.

Changes to this document

This document has a version number. When it changes in a way that matters, you will be asked to read it again once. You will not be asked again after that until the next change.