Skins: one hole can win the pot

1. 1

   One skin per hole

   Eighteen skins in a round, each worth one unit. The group decides the unit.

2. 2

   Lowest unique score wins

   A 3 wins if nobody else made 3. Two 3s and a 4 is a tie: nobody wins, the skin carries.

3. 3

   Carryovers stack

   A carried skin is added to the next hole. Three ties in a row make the fourth hole worth four skins, and the winner takes them all.

4. 4

   The end

   Skins unclaimed after 18 stay unclaimed, are played off or are split: your rule, agreed first. The scorer shows the number.

Gross skins between a 6 and a 22 is a gift to the 6. Net skins gives each player the strokes they receive on the hole by stroke index: the 22 gets a stroke on most holes and two on the hardest, so their bogey is a net par and their par wins skins. Tick net in the scorer, type the playing handicaps and the stroke indexes from the card, and the lowest net score takes the hole. The carry rules do not change.

When a hole is worth three or four skins, the mistake is to attack. Everyone else does, and the pot usually goes to the player who made par from the middle of the green. Know where your stroke falls, play to the fat side, and let the others find the water. The second mistake is to forget the ties are what make the game: a hole halved in 4s is not a wasted hole, it is a bigger next one.

Handicaps from the handicap calculator, the unit, the rule for unclaimed skins, and whether a skin needs at least a par. For a match between two sides instead of a pot, play a Nassau; with four who like to choose, play Wolf.