I've recently been a beneficiary of this "phenomenon".
I made Master on the 18th. Back on the 11th I played in the January tourney at BPB, as a Tour Pro. I shot 34. Respectable, but only good for 354th place.
Since making Master, I've bought new clubs and have been playing really well. I was looking for a tournament to play in and decided to replay the BPB tourney, forgetting that I changed tiers since I played it last. After a couple of holes I realized that I was hitting from the white tees. I was confused at first but then remembered about the change in tiers. Well, long story short, I ended up shooting a 29. Tied for 7th now.
If I'd stayed a Tour Pro and still bought the new clubs, I may very well have shot the same score. A legitimate possibility. But I still have this feeling of cheating the system. So I had this idea:
If you return to a tournament after tiering up, you have the choice of:
A. forfeiting your lower tiered score and posting a new one in your new tier, or
B. not being able to play in the tournament again because you're not in the same tier you entered in.
What do y'all think? Is it worth the trouble? Does the practice have that much of an impact on the outcome? Is it a common "cheat"?
As a Master, I should have been hitting from farther back. However, I played both rounds with the same driver, wedges and ball, so it wasn't like I was suddenly taking advantage of much shorter approach shots. But I can see where some folks might be able to take advantage of using longer equipment under shorter conditions when the opportunity presented itself.
It's just something I thought of and wanted to get some response.