"Ross River virus affects more than 6,000 Australians every year. If we can find a way to prevent the virus surviving in mosquitoes we can stop it infecting humans.”1 September: University of Canberra Emeritus Professor, Graham Pollard and Swinburne University PhD student and president of Tennis Australia, Geoff Pollard have developed software that can identify the best possible team when selecting two or more four ball, best ball pairs.
Professor Pollard said, “A Ryder Cup team has thousands of possible combinations when selecting four pairs from its 12 players for one day of play. Using 2006 PGA Tour statistics, we considered which combination of players is overall best for a team.
“For example when selecting a team of 4BBB pairs, it’s possible that the best pairings to play a stronger team are different than when playing against an equal or weaker team,” he said.
Professor Pollard and Mr Pollard developed the mathematical model and the software that can identify the better of the two pairs of 4BBB golfers, using underlying player performances on par 3s, 4s and par 5s.
Professor Pollard added, “While it is always best for the stronger (or equal of the two) teams to play their best team, occasionally it is best for the weaker team not to play the team that is usually their ‘strongest’.
“We also found that where two teams are essentially equal, each team should combine its players so that the 4BBB pairs are as close to equal as possible,” he said.
The paper will be presented at the 9th Australasian Conference on Mathematics and Computers in Sport on the Gold Coast.
