Math Is Fun Forum

dumbinmath

Member

Registered: 2009-11-07

Posts: 1

golf foursomes

I have eight guys golfing six rounds and need two foursomes per round.  But I want the least amount of duplication in the two foursomes.

What are the two foursomes over six games?

bobbym

bumpkin

From: Bumpkinland

Registered: 2009-04-12

Posts: 109,606

Re: golf foursomes

Hi dumbinmath;

These may be variants of Kirkman triple systems and Steiner triple systems. Problem was solved partially by the great Arthur Cayley. I worked on two of these on this forum under the guise of them being called progressive dinners. When I worked on them I did not know of the charts that were available and had to solve them by mostly trial and error. Generally it is an unsolved problem. A guy named Harvey used to maintain a page of all known solutions but it is gone now.

Can any of this help you?

http://www.cs.brown.edu/~sello/golf.html

http://www.cs.brown.edu/~sello/solutions.html#3-2-2

P.S. found a new link to harvey's page:

http://www.cs.st-andrews.ac.uk/~wh/golf/

Last edited by bobbym (2009-11-07 12:55:58)

---

In mathematics, you don't understand things. You just get used to them.
If it ain't broke, fix it until it is.
Always satisfy the Prime Directive of getting the right answer above all else.