papaputter55:
I might be naive, but how does watching rounds on youtube prove they were not cheating. Not saying they were cheating and they probably are legit, just don't know how these "prove" they are not cheating.
Watching rounds on youtube won't necessarily make you a good player either!
However, as someone who has watched considerable number of rounds played by top players, learned tips for how to play and manage different courses, how to play heavy winds, how to potentially read greens better, and invested hundreds of hours and thousands of rounds practicing those techniques... they do and can help you improve your scoring over and above trying to figure it all out on your own...
But, watching youtube alone, won't get you there... it may speed up the learning curve quite a bit though... it might be like turning a 5 mile race into a 3 mile race, but it definitely isn't making it a 100y dash...
It is the players who appear to getting there in 100y dash time, shooting scores consistently in the 50's from the back tees under challenging conditions in less than 5 months playing the game… that means they supposedly started as a hack promoted to legend and mastered the legend tees that quickly... now that does seem absurd. Those are the players that appear to be multi account or restarts.
Even watching and learning from youtube, I would say it has taken me a good year of playing heavy wind conditions and tough setups to start getting more consistent. I may be able to put a string of upper 50's together now, but it is still tough because you also need good heavy winds conditions sometimes to do that. Courses can play considerable different under good heavy winds and bad heavy winds that make getting close to the hole very difficult or turn long par 4's into 3 shot holes just to get close to the pin for a par save...
But there are a lot of factors at play and there are without question players out there trying to restart, multi account, or some other means to undermine WGT guidelines... but some of them definitely get caught and the accounts appear shut down... So, WGT appears to be doing what they can... but it is always possible for them to restart again I guess... regardless...
I know I wouldn't take a chance it just isn't worth it after all the time effort and work I put in. Heck, I don't want to recommend the game to a family member that could stop by and be perceived as playing on the same IP address. I have heard of spouses in my country club that had to validate their accounts when WGT suspected them of multi account activity but they each played their own account but it was coming from the same IP address.... to me that shows WGT is policing multi account activity and to me... it is NOT worth the risk...