Blog
Front, middle, back: why one number is not enough
18 August 2026
Ask a golfer how far they have and they will give you one number: the distance to the pin, or to the middle. It is the number on the rangefinder, the number on the sprinkler head, the number on the card.
It is also, quite often, the wrong number to be playing to.
Greens are bigger than you think
A typical parkland green runs somewhere between 25 and 40 yards from front edge to back. Across the courses in our own catalogue the spread sits right in that range, and a lot of greens are closer to 40 than 25.
That means front and back can be two full clubs apart. If the pin is at the front and you play the middle number, you are not being safe. You are landing your ball fifteen yards past the flag, on a green that probably slopes away from you.
The three numbers do different jobs
Front is the carry number. It is what you have to clear to be putting rather than chipping. When there is water, a bunker or a false front, this is the number that matters and the other two are noise.
Middle is the default. When you do not know where the pin is, or the green is flat and unguarded, play the middle and take your two putts.
Back is the disaster number. It tells you what you must not exceed. Long is dead on more holes than most players realise, because the ground behind a green is usually where the mowers stop and the trouble starts.
How to actually use them
A simple habit that saves shots:
- Look at the back number first and note the club that would fly it. That club is now out of play.
- Look at the front number. If you cannot comfortably carry it, you are laying up, and that is a decision rather than a mistake.
- Play between the two, biased toward the side of the green with less trouble.
The pin position matters less than most amateurs think. The trouble matters more.
Where our numbers come from
Front and back are not calculated by adding and subtracting a fixed number from the pin. They are taken from the actual mapped green outline: every point on the edge of the green is projected onto the line you are playing along, and we take the nearest and the furthest.
That means on a green sitting at an angle to your approach, which is most of the good ones, the numbers reflect the shape you are actually facing rather than an assumption about it.