The Golf Scores That Result in a Quadruple Bogey

A quadruple bogey is a score on a single golf hole that is four strokes higher than the hole's par. Or, to make it more explicit, these are the numbers of strokes it takes to make a quadruple bogey:

• On a par-3 hole, a quadruple bogey is a score of 7.
• On a par-4 hole, a quadruple bogey is a score of 8.
• On a par-5 hole, a quadruple bogey is a score of 9.

And if you ever run across a par-6 hole, it would take finishing the hole in 10 strokes to make a quadruple bogey. (Related: What are the names of the scores that come after quadruple bogey?)

Obviously, making a quadruple bogey is not something any golfer wants to do! But, rest assured, all golfers do make quadruple bogeys. The best golfers make them far, far less often than the rest of us, but even the Hogans, Nicklauses and Sorenstams of the world will (rarely in their cases) make a quadruple bogey.

The term is often abbreviated as "quad." A rarely used slang term for a quad is "double buzzard." A quadruple bogey is also sometimes called a "turkey." Remember that par refers to the number of strokes an expert golfer is expected to need to complete the play of a hole. And "bogey" is the golf term for a score that is one stroke higher than par (1-over par). So "quadruple," meaning four, is just added to "bogey" to denote four strokes more than par, or 4-over par.

"Quadruple bogey" is a term that is relatively recent in invention. A search of a newspaper database didn't find the term used until the 1940s. (Note: A different, larger newspaper database than the one we have access to might produce a different result.) The term "quadruple bogey" did not appear in the New York Times until 1964.

Related articles:

• 4-under par on a hole is a 'condor'
• What is a 'bisque stroke'?
• The 'quintuple bogey' explained