2024 Olympics in Paris: Why isn’t there a cut line in the golf tournament?

After the first day of play at Le Golf National the leaderboard in Paris has offered a few surprises. For starters, we’ve Japan’s Hideki Matsuyama out front which is not to say he’s not good for it but in such a stacked field, it would be safe to say it’s a little unexpected. Nonetheless, there is some distance to go in this one and so, here’s the breakdown of how it works.

To cut or not to cut, that’s the question

Before we get to the intricacies of it all, one should know that the men’s golf tournament in Paris consists of a field of 60 golfers from 32 countries taking part in the competition that runs from August 1st - 4th at Le Golf National, the site of the 2018 Ryder Cup. That tournament will be followed by the women’s event, which is set for August 7th - 10th. Again with a field that consists of 60 golfers who will be representing 33 countries.

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Now, in terms of who these golfers are, it’s worth noting that unlike most other sports in the Olympics in which you have ‘amateurs’ competing, the field in golf is almost exclusively made up of professionals. To be clear, qualifying for the competition is based on an Olympic Ranking system that mirrors the Official World Golf Ranking for men and the Rolex Women’s Rankings for women. To that end, the tournament will see fourteen of the top 25 men in the Official World Golf Ranking competing, while 19 of the top 25 women in the Rolex Ranking will be in Paris.

This brings us to the format itself. As mentioned before, there are two separate individual events at Le Golf National, one of them is for men and the other one for women. Each tournament is a 72-hole stroke-play tournament, just as you would witness on the PGA Tour and LPGA, however, there is no cut line in either tournament, meaning that all golfers - men and women - will play until the final day rather than some being cut after 36 holes. Naturally, the player shooting the lowest score wins the gold medal, with second place earning silver and third earning bronze. In the event of ties for any of the places, there will be a playoff with only three total medals being awarded.