The Evolution of Gallus Tournament Wizard
Phase 1: Tournament Software Upgrades (COMPLETE)
Phase 2: League Software (IN PROGRESS)
Phase 3: Online Registration (ON THE ROADMAP)
Gallus has offered a well-designed tournament software for over six years, so a natural question is, “Why put so much effort into something that’s already working?” In short, because our customers encouraged us to continue innovating.
Our goal is to solve complex tournament management tasks while sticking to our core value of simplicity. Our tournament software is loved because it’s simple and provides everything needed to run live scoring events without all of the feature bloat found in other software.
We took this project as an opportunity to address common requests that have been gathered over the years while adding snew functionality that will help tournaments run smoother than ever before. Let’s use this blog post to dive into three main use cases:
Course handicaps can be very complex to calculate, especially for events with hundreds of participants. Clubs not only wanted us to apply a running calculation for each player, but they wanted us to ensure factors like tee box, handicap allowance, and specific rounds were taken into account.
A previous limitation of the Gallus tournament software was only one handicap could be associated to a player for the entirety of the event. Our customers wanting to run events following the World Handicap System’s daily handicap updates had no way to do so, aside from creating a different event for each day.
In Events 2.0, we’ve added a dropdown on the players, groups, and teams pages to select the round. Simply adjust the round using the dropdown and make all of the necessary edits for teams and/or players. The handicap will update for the round and any rounds following (i.e., updates to a round 2 handicap will also update round 3 and any following rounds).
Your net scoring should now be precise and ready to handle all of the index changes you can throw at it.
Another common ask of our customers was the ability to set a handicap allowance for the entire field. This is a method of leveling the playing field by “squishing down” everyone’s course handicap to lessen the range between the lowest and highest handicaps.
To set a handicap allowance, create or edit a net scoring event. On the event details page, you’ll find a box labeled Handicap Allowance. Input the percentage you’d like calculated (i.e., 80) and the system will apply the calculation for all course handicaps inputted automatically.
Multiple Tee Box Support
Events often involve players of varying skill levels. The Gallus Tournament Software always required a single tee box to be associated for everyone. Tournament admins let us know that this limitation affected their ability to run net scoring events using our GHIN integration.
We’re pleased to roll out multiple tee box support for Events 2.0. To use this feature, assign a default tee box for the round when creating the event. Then access either the Teams or Players step (depending on the format you’ve selected) to view and edit everyone’s tee box. As previously mentioned, you can toggle between rounds using the dropdown in the top-left.
One-Click GHIN Course Handicap Updates
Finally, we needed to bring it all together by allowing admins to update course handicaps using our GHIN integration. Previously, the GHIN integration would only calculate the player’s course handicap at the moment their GHIN number was inputted. Tournament Admins that were proactive and setting up their events weeks ahead of time had no quick way to update everyone’s course handicap on the day of the round.
To recalculate everyone’s course handicaps, access the Players step of an event and select the round you’d like to update using the round dropdown in the top-left of the page. Click Update GHIN towards the top and confirm on the modal that appears. Players with a valid GHIN number will have a green icon next to their name. Those with expired or invalid GHIN numbers will have a red icon.
2) Communication
Tournaments often require timely communication leading up to, during, and after the event. Our ever-popular Push Notifications feature, which includes zero per-message fees, was ripe for an integration with the Events module.
Collect each player’s email address and populate it within their Player details. Whenever you need to communicate with the field, go to the Players step and click Send Push Notification. From there, simply type your message, associate an Action if necessary, and choose when to send it out. The message will only send to those with a matching email in their app’s user profile.
Sending a communication out to a tournament field no longer requires a full email to be drafted up. Simply send a Push Notification out to them in 30 seconds or less and get on with your other responsibilities!
Some ideas for tournament notifications:
- Before
- Reminders about the event
- Instructions for arrival
- Teases about silent auctions, on-course competitions, etc
- During
- Silent auction reminders
- Weather notifications
- Closest to the pin and long drive updates
- After
- Event winner notifications
- Reminders to register for next year's event
3) Scoring Formats & Additional Adjustments
Lastly, we added some commonly requested scoring formats and a slew of bug fixes and performance improvements to ensure everything is running smoothly:
Instead of selecting one score from the group at the end of each hole, select two or three. This added flexibility should allow tournament admins to create unique and engaging scoring formats for their events.
We originally had a standard stableford format, but our tournament coordinators indicated a strong desire to adjust the amount of points received for each scoring level (one over par, two under par, etc.) Simply set up an event and choose Stableford to adjust points accordingly.
At Gallus, we’re constantly trying to make the tech side of running a golf course simpler and more intuitive. The less time you’re in our system, the better! We hope these updates improve your workflow and help you accomplish your goals.
And we’re not done yet! Stay tuned for more exciting Events 2.0 features in the coming months.
