The VSGA Tournaments Department covers Intro & Resources, Parts of the Course, Forms of Play, and Ball Handling.
All right everyone we’ll go ahead and get started here first of all thank you all for uh joining us in our first webinar series for 2024 um we did a similar thing in 23 um using a lot of the same information a couple new rules will’ll cover throughout our three three week series
Um hope you get a basic understanding of each of the rules we cover um for the next three weeks my name is Amanda Brun I am the assistant director of championships and golf operations with the vsga also on the call tonight is Amanda Kelly who is a manager for
Championships and golf operations who will help answer questions throughout our presentation today we do want this to be interactive um so if you do have any questions we hope you came with questions or have questions throughout the presentation we’re going to use the Q Q&A button that is at the bottom of
Your screen to ask those questions um and we will go ahead and answer as we can online tonight um or writing back to you um we’re try to keep all the questions to the rules we’re we’re going through today so we might push some questions if they involve something
That’s going to be covered in the next couple weeks but go ahead and feel free to use that Q&A button to start typing your questions in if you have any or throughout the presentation and we’ll answer them when we get to the question slides we’re also working on putting
Together um a couple full day rules of golf workshops in person um in different uh areas of the state and we hope to have that full schedule released in the next week or so so be on the lookout for that if you um enjoy the rules of golf
And want a deeper understanding um of the rules we’re going to bring back our full day series which we haven’t done in a while this presentation is also recorded um we recorded the one that Happ opened at noon as well and between the two we will go ahead and have one of
Them posted to the vsga website along with the slide deck so in case you wanted to go back and review um either this presentation or future presentations if you can’t make one of the next two weeks um just know that those will be posted uh sometime later
This week um in the future two weeks as well so that’ll be available to you um to review we’ll go ah head and get started here um so we’ll go ahead and in this presentation today we’re going to cover a brief introduction to the the rules of
Golf and what resources are available to you we’ll cover the parts of the course forms of play and end with our ball handling section today to prepare us for um what’s going to come in the next couple weeks so the introd introduction to the game we’re going to start very basic
Here was what is golf so golf is played in a round of 18 Vier holes on a course by striking a ball with a club pretty simple uh understanding of what golf is but it’s the fundamental of of the sport we all love there’s two main principles behind
The rules themselves um so these two principles play the course as you find it and play the ball as it lies will be repeated throughout the rules of golf and something to just keep in the back of of your mind as we try to understand the rules and further your rules
Education um you always want to try to play the course as you find it not altering it in any way and playing the ball as it lies we know that’s not always the case which is why we have a bunch of rules to help a bunch of different situations that we’ll cover in
The next couple weeks um but you see here you could end up with a great shot right down the middle of the Fairway and it just ends up in a divot so you ended up with a bad lie just part of the gamble you play with golf and vice versa
You could hit a terrible shot it’s way the rough but it ends up ending uh pretty much teed up from that rough and you end up having a pretty good lie so just know you got to take the good with the bad and it’s part of the game and
We’re not gonna get relief from those divots in Fairways it’s just an unfortunate situation whereas you might also get a great lie in the rough and the rules are structured and are complicated there’s no doubt about it that the rules are hard to understand hard to digest um and there’s a reason
For it is because the game of golf itself is complicated um we see five Great Golf holes here with five completely different surroundings and um features and this is really why the rules of golf can be complicated because we have one set of rules 25 rules that have to cover so many different
Situations that happen on every single golf course in the world um so you have uh Sandy areas or desert areas we need to deal with or if you’re in Virginia we have a lot of tree lined holes or ponds and penalty areas um so just understand that the rules are complicated but it’s
Because there’s so many different situations that can happen and that’s what we need to cover and have an answer for every single situation golf is also unique in that the spirit of the game really comes into play if you have any other sport um typically players are trying to take
Advantage of the rules and get away by breaking rules which is why we have referees um who have to call penalties and it’s not on the Players golf is the complete opposite of that it’s a game of Integrity where the player themselves are supposed to follow the rules and
Call penalties on themselves um and being honest in all aspects of play it’s part of uh what the game is built on and unlike other sports you don’t yes we have rules officials to help with situations but um it’s really up to the player to uh call those penalties uh and
And make sure they’re being honest it’s also a game of showing consideration to others by playing at a prompt pace and just making sure we’re not slowing down the group um keeping up with playing so we’re not slowing up the whole field looking out for the safety of others not
Distracting the play of another player and then of course taking good care of the course for the next person we’re placing divots smoothing bunkers repairing ball marks and not causing any unnecessary damage to the course we do have some resources here for the rules of golf um we have two
Rules books now um You may have remembered a couple before 2023 um the USGA used to print a players addition to the rules of golf as well um it was a little pocket size book and they decided to get rid of that um and so we only have two rules books now we
Have the regular rules of golf which just covers rules 1 through 25 plus the definitions then they have the bigger official guide which is the spiral Spiral round bound book that has not only the rules 1 through 25 it also has the definitions it has um clarifications
Or examples of the rules and Equity procedures which have the model local rules and recommendations for running tournaments and you’ll see on this the the date for this book is affected Ive of January 2023 um so that was the last time the rules were revised they were not revised
In 24 so as long you have as long as you have the rules of golf that are effective of January of last year those are the current rules and um you’re good to go the next place I would tell anyone is if you don’t have a physical book is
To go to the usgaa website um usga.org has uh under playing a rules of golf page and from there uh you have all of the rules as you see on the screen um 1 through 25 where you can click through and read the text straight from the book
And probably my favorite option is the rules of golf app I know the world has gone digital um in a lot of ways and the rules of golf are no exception to that uh having the app handy on your phone we all have our phones with us usually 247
Now so if you’re on the course and have a question um you can pull up the rules of golf app and it has that search bar at the top and you can search keyword such as out of bounds or penalty area or um anything and it’ll pull up the rules
That are relevant to that key term and it’ll help you get to where you need to be to figure out what what the answer is to your rules question quickly so I highly suggest um if you’re working in the rules or you play a lot of golf to
Have that uh rules of golf app downloaded on your phone to access if you needed it and our last section to start us off here is how do we use the Rules book and and how do we really want to start if we want to get into the rules of golf
Themselves um so these main questions are what we need to answer before we can get to um whatever the ruling is starting with the identifying the form of play we’ll get into what types of form of play there are um a little bit later in today’s presentation but in
Order to answer a question on the rules you need to know whether uh the player is playing match play or stroke play Maybe It’s an individual stroke play tournament or maybe it’s a team event um and knowing which form of play they are playing is necessary and deciding what
Rule um they’re going to go under and necessary it could change what the outcome of the rule is we have our W questions who what where when and why we need to know who and whose ball is involved um did the player act or was it
Someone else who acted be on behalf of the player what happened um what did the ball move did it go to a penalty area and where did it happen we need to know where on the golf course um the ball lies as well as where the breach
Happened um because it could change what the outcome is we’ll go through the different areas of the course in our next section here and really it depends on what part of the course you run as to what the answer may be when it happened um there are a couple situations um
Where time may be important um for instance we have a three minute search time so did you find that ball within 3 minutes or did you find it at 3 minutes and 2 seconds it’s important to know um when something happened for certain rules and then why some rules are
Intent-based um so knowing why the player did something could change the answer to the ruling um whereas other rules are outcome based and it wouldn’t matter why the player did it um if the player did something it would they would just get the penalty if you’re a beginner with the
Rules of golf the first thing I would tell you to do is start reading the definitions um the definitions are unlike your normal dictionary where it just gives you a brief understanding of what a word means um in the rules of golf they give you so much more and the
Majority of the time if you have a question you can go to the definitions which are in the back of the book after Rule 25 and you can find um sometimes you can find your answer in the definitions um so I would really understand what the definitions are I
Would tell you to start reading the definitions because if you understand those you can really understand a deeper meaning of the rules themselves since they overlap so much and then once you start with the definitions go into the rules themselves so figure out what rule number your question is under read the
Rules and it’ll help you figure out um the necessary steps to take to either get relief from something or it’ll tell you what the penalty is um so start with the definitions go go into the rules and if you’re unsure you can check the interpretations um these are um usually
At the end of each section within that official guide and they give you more of examples of different things that can happen for more complicated situations it can also give you examples of things that might or might not be um part of the situation that you’re dealing with
So if you don’t find your answer in the definitions or the rules the next place to go would be checking the inter interpretations in the official book and it might give you a better understanding of how to apply a rule or something that might um be involved or
Not involved and last if you’re did all that and you’re still really not sure of what to do um always start with your professional staff at your course um we can also be available we answer phone calls and emails all the time with rules questions so we’re available to you as
Well as the USGA so they have a hotline um and an email as well that you can send rules questions to and they always have someone on call to get back to you if you have a rules question I’m going to pause there and pull in Amanda Kelly and see if we have
Any questions before we move into our first section of parts of the course no questions so far perfect to our next section here which is parts of the course as you saw um knowing what part of the course you on is uh fundamental in understanding the
Rules and um it could change what the rule outcome is as we go through these different um areas so this graphic is pulled straight from the rules of golf book um they started adding Graphics a couple years ago which I think is great it really gives you a understanding of
Of what they’re talking about especially when we get to um relief procedures but we have five areas of the course that are defined in the rules of golf so we start off with the teeing area and this is the starting place for the hole being
Played um but there can only be uh one teeing area at a time so it’s very specific in saying the teeing area of the hole being played um so and that’s even more specific of it’s not all the teeing areas on the whole you’re playing it’s specific to the player themselves
So if I’m playing the red te’s and Amanda Kelly’s playing the blue te’s our teeing areas are going to be 100% different so mine is going to be from the two uh uh uh T markers and then two club links back whereas Amanda um will be from the blue T markers to Club
Lengths back so it’s specific to the hole that’s being played as well as to the player themselves we also have bunkers um which are areas of sand that are put on the course um they’re uh supposed to be penalizing there’s some things we can do in bunkers and some
Things that we can’t do and we’ll see that in the next section penalty areas um these can be marked by the committee red or yellow and again meant to be penalizing and areas you don’t want to be in but there’s a whole section on the rules that help us get out of these
Areas and we’ll cover the penalty areas in more in depth next week penalty areas can also be any area that holds water um it may not always hold water it could just be a place like a ditch that sometimes holds water or it could just be a part of the course that the
Committee has decided to Mark to help with pace of play and to give players an additional option in case they go into those areas the fourth area of the course is the putting green again this is uh very specific to the hole being played so it’s not all the putting
Greens on the course at one time it’s the putting green of the hole that you are playing so both the tinger and the putting green are specific to the hole and everything else that is not one of those first four defined areas is referred to as the
General area so all the other T markers or teeing areas all the other putting greens on the course would be considered general area it also includes both Fairway and rough a lot of people like to differentiate between Fairway and rough um that is not um differentiated within
The rules themselves it’s all seen under that one term of general area to find so again um as we go through each of these areas each of them are defined a little bit differently so starting at the te area again it’s the two Club length depth area from the t-
Markers um of the hole being played and for that player and it is uh up it extends upward so um as we know we like to tee our ball up in the teeing area to help us hit the ball further so the ball may not necessarily be touching the
Ground in that case it’s um hovering above the ground on the te but is because that imaginary Edge goes upward it would still be considered in the penalty or excuse me in the teeing area even if it doesn’t touch the grass in the putting green um it’s this surface specially prepared for putting
There is no imaginary edge here so there’s no up and down and we’re on the putting green if any part of that ball is touching it um so if it’s on the if any piece of that ball is touching that shortest grass that’s been prepared for putting it would be considered on the
Putting grein bunkers again those areas specifically um created with sand um we again don’t have any edges here so our ball would be in the bunker if it was touching any sand that was in the bunker or if there’s any washed out areas or um parts
That are uh been kind of pushed away it would be where the sand would be would be part of the bunker non- cover grass covered walls or any grass covered areas um like church pews and bunkers or any um little island pieces of ground that’s has grass growing that are in the middle
Of the bunker would not be considered part of the bunker so it’s specific to that sand so if your ball’s touching any of the sand in the bunker it would be considered in the bunker itself penalty areas um we have penalty areas again defined by either Stakes lines or physical features when there’s
Only Stakes uh to Define penalty areas it’s the outermost edge of the stakes at ground level that defined the area uh of of the penalty area and with penalty areas we do have imaginary edges and these go both upward and downward so if our ball is um in a tree overhanging a
Penalty area because we have that imaginary upward line it would be considered in the penalty area and these would be uh your ball would be in the penal area if any of that ball touches it so whether it’s um touching the area in um in that’s inside
Of the stakes or if there’s a line defining the penalty area that line is part of the penalty area so if it was just touching the line itself it would be considered in the penalty area again everything else that is not one of those first four is the general area so most
Of the time it’s generally where players will be playing from and if it’s the balls part of the general area if it’s not touching any of those other four specific parts and not out of bounds and while out of bounds is not necessarily a part of the course um it’s important to
Understand how out of out of bounds is defined it also has an up and down vertical imaginary Edge um so like penalty areas if your ball was in a tree but it was over that out of- bounds line it would unfortunally be out of bounds and typically you see Stakes that
Define out of bounds um it could also include lines and this is different from penalty areas where now it’s the coar side edge of stakes or lines that Define them um but your ball has to be completely out of bounds in order for it
To be not in play so if your ball is um in between two out of- bound Stakes you draw an imaginary line from stake to stake on the coar side edge and a p if a piece of that ball is touching the course it’s your lucky day and that ball
Is in bounds if that ball is 100% over that imaginary line unfortunately you would be out of Bounds at that point and have to go back to where you last played from and then we have how are they treated differently so this image is taken straight from the USGA rules 101
Um course that they created a couple years ago but I think it does a really good job of um seeing how each of these areas is different um and we’ll start with the most favorable and end with the least favorable so starting with the teeing area which some people would
Argue is the most favorable area of the course um again it’s the area that you can tee the ball up and give yourself the best lie possible you’re able to remove Dew and frost as well as sand and soil and you’re even able to alter the surface which is something you’re not
Able to do anywhere else so if there was a weed growing in the teeing area that was right where your ball wanted to be um or maybe it was affecting where your club was going to go you can pull that weed out of the ground which is not
Something you can do anywhere else on the course the putting green is probably the next favorable um again I like to think of the putting green as like a reward you can do a lot of things once you reach the putting green um that you can’t do anywhere else on the golf
Course for instance you can always Mark and lift your ball on the putting green that’s something you can do in other situations but there has to be a reason for it you don’t have to have have any reason to Mark and lift your ball on the putting green once you reach that spot
You’re able to do that you’re always able to clean your ball on the putting green and you’re able to repair any damage on the putting green so damage could be um animal tracks whether it’s hoofprints or Dog Tracks it could be scuff marks from someone who was playing
The hole before you um but you’re able to repair a lot more whereas again anywhere else on the course you wouldn’t be able to repair damage also have uh no penalty for accidental ball movement on the putting green so if you were to um accidentally hit your ball during a
Practice swing or if you were um carrying a bunch of things and dropped something on your ball and it caused it to move as long as it was accidental there would be no penalty to the player and they just have to replace that ball at where it
Was again um you may also remove sand and loose soil on the putting green so if you had um bunkers near your putting greens and someone’s hit their ball into the bunker and has deposited sand onto the green you’re able to go ahead and brush that sand or soil away before you
Putt um and that’s on the putting grain at all times you don’t necessarily have to have your ball in the putting grain to remove sanded soil as long as it lies on the putting grain you’re able to remove those objects in the middle we have general
Area um there’s a lot of things you can do in the general area and it’s um not the worst place on the course to be so we have moving loose impediments um is allowed and that’s allowed anywhere on the course um with loose impediments those are natural objects um that might
Um fall from trees such as um pine straw or acorns or Stones um you’re able to remove loose impediments but you have to be careful because loose impediments if you move one and it causes your ball to move you will be penalized um and you would have to put your ball back the
General area is a little bit more restrictive where you’re not able to mark or lift your ball unless you have a reason to do so but the rules allow you to have relief free relief for embedded balls in the general area um relief from abnormal course conditions um and those
We’ll see in next week’s presentation uh with our relief procedures there’s also um a penalty for causing your ball to move unless you’re actively search for it so if you’re searching for your ball in the in the general area and you kick your ball on accident because you were
Searching for it didn’t see it um you’re going to be covered no penalty because you searching for it and again you just have to make sure you put that ball back and um no penalty to you we’re moving on to our little bit more um penalizing areas of the course
Starting with bunkers so bunkers again um there’s still a lot of things you can do in bunkers such as move loose impediments um again making sure you don’t cause your ball to move um but they’re going to be a little bit more restricting so we’re not able to touch
The ground with a club either near the ball or making practice swings um the rules will allow us to get relief for abnormal course conditions such as ground under repair or uh temporary water in the bunker but they’re going to be more restrictive in saying in order
To get that free relief we’re going to have to keep that ball in the bunker there’s also no relief for embedded ball in the bunker um unlike the general area and like the abnormal course conditions unplayable ball is an option to us in the bunker we’re still going to get the
One-stroke penalty for using the unplayable Ball but the rules are going to go on to say we need to keep that ball in the bunker they do let us get out of the bunker but it’s going to add an additional penalty stroke and it’s going to be a two-stroke penalty if you
Want to take unplayable ball outside the bunker and again we’ll see that in next week’s presentation and like the general area if we’re searching for our ball in the bunker there’s not going to be any penalty for accidentally moving it um but again we’ll just have to make sure we put that
Ball back and recreate the LIE penalty areas um probably one of the most restrictive so we’re not allowed to take abnormal course condition relief we’re not going to be allowed to take embedded ball relief and we’re not able to use the unplayable ball rule if our
Ball lies in a penalty area the reason for this is as we’ll see next week in our relief procedure presentation um the penalty area rules will be used to get you out of penalty areas and the rules aren’t going aren’t going to let you double dip so they’re not going to let
You take abnormal course conditions embedded ball or unplayable if your ball lies in a penalty area again like we’re um if we’re searching for our ball in the penalty area we’re not going to be penalized if we accidentally move it we’re not going to be uh penalized if we move loose
Impediments um so we’re free to do that and we’re also free to ground our club in penalty areas as well but being careful that we’re not um moving our ball in any way and our most uh least favorable uh area of the course is out of bounds it’s not on the course you’re
Not able to play the ball in that situation and your only situ your only option to get that ball back in play it’s going to be stroke distance um unless we have the model local rule in play where we have the additional option for stroke and distance which then we we
Still have to take penalty Strokes to get the ball in play but we don’t have to necessarily go back to where we last played from and the final um see if we have any questions for this section is what do we do when a ball touches more than one area of the
Course so when we go back to um the ball touching the general area in one of the four four specific areas of the course whether it’s the teeing area the bunker a penalty area or the putting green the ball is always going to lie in that
Specific area so if our ball is On The Fringe which would be considered uh general area but is also touching a piece of the putting green you will consider that ball on the putting green and all the putting green rules apply to you um vice versa if your ball’s
Touching a penalty area line so if it’s painted red and that ball is a piece of that ball is touching that red line and the part of the ball is touching um the general area not on the line your ball would be considered in the penalty area
In that situation and the penalty area rules would apply to you but what happens if your ball touches two specific parts of the course whether it’s um a Ball’s touching both a penalty area and a bunker um probably the most common between the specific areas where
Um sometimes a a body of water marked as a penalty area is right up next to a bunker and uh the committee has decided to Mark the bunker or Mark a line through the bunker with red paint to define the penalty area so if a piece of
That line is touching the penalty area as well as a bunker there’s just a hierarchy from least favorable to most favorable so penalty area would have the the it would always be in the penalty area if it’s touching the penalty in another specific part next would be the
Bunker and last would be the putting green now I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a b a bunker and a putting green where your ball could be on both parts of those courses at the same time but if it was the bunker would overrule the putting green so that’s just a
Memorization of hierarchy where if it’s touching two specific Parts um penalty area is going to always have the number one rule and then a bunker and then the putting grain it’s always going to be the least favorable to most favorable and we’ll pause here and see if we have any questions to
Answer do have a few questions here um the first one is on the putting green can a player get a line of relief if here she is putting over a former cup that has been covered with a green circular plug um so an old cup um is not relief it’s
Considered part of the green um you are able to kind of take it down like you would a ball Mark um but you do not get any relief um from that Old cup from that Old cup plug being between your ball and the hole the next one is when your ball is
In the general area can you move sand and soil between the ball and the putting green um for example if you’re putting off from off the green can you brush away sand um on the collar the answer to that is no um the only place you are allowed to brush sand away uh
Between your ball is uh when your ball is on the putting green you cannot brush away any sand that’s on the collar um in the Fairway in the rough uh any place like that and our last one is if a ball is in a bunker and it is lined against a
Rake while removing the rake the ball moves what is the ruling um the r ruling is is pretty simp Le um you know obviously you can you remove the rake um and then if that causes the ball to move you just simply replace the ball replace the ball to its original position um
Where it was you know if the rake wasn’t there where it would be lying um and then you you know no penalty stroke uh continue on playing and that’s all we have right now great those are some great questions so keep them coming as we go through our next two sections
Here our third section tonight is forms of play again kind of going through with what we started with and knowing um what we need to answer in order to get to a ruling answer is what type of play we’re we’re playing and we’ll see what those
Options are um but before we get into that we’re going to talk about types of penalties so throughout the rules of golf there are three different types of penalties that you could see um each one is designed to cancel out any potential Advantage a player might gain by breaking a
Rule so first of we have our one stroke penalties um so minor infractions where the potential Advantage is minimal or the toll for most penalty relief situations so um if it’s a simple procedural uh ruling such as um causing your ball to move by kicking it on
Accident it would only be a one stroke penalty you just have to put the ball back it’s also the most common penalty you see for taking Rel Rel from certain things um as we’ll see next week the general penalty is our um loss of whole penalty in match play or in stroke play
It’s a two-stroke penalty and for the majority of rules and fractions where there is the potential for the player to gain a significant Advantage but not enough that it would nullify the player’s score so the player did something more than just something minor where it’s a a bigger it’s a bigger deal
And we need to figure out a a way to make it um an even play field we have the general penalty um this is different so in match play it’s a loss of hole and we’ll see why in our next slide and in uh stroke play it’s a
Two-stroke penalty that gets added to the player score um so this is if you were to improve your line of play when you’re not allowed to or um hitting sand in the bunker those would be uh the general penalty and last but not least we have our disqualification penalty again this
Is uh doesn’t happen very often but it’s for breaches that are so significant that the player’s score should not be allowed to count um this also applies when a player’s actions are so against the spirit of the game that the players should be removed from the competition
So the example I can come up with for disqualification that might be the most common is if a player takes um uh relief from some in the wrong in a wrong place and gets themsel in a position that’s a bigger Advantage than where they were supposed to take relief from and now uh
There’s no way for the committee to be able to count that score since they got such a significant Advantage um whether it’s by yardage or the difficulty of a shot um where they can’t count the players score and unfortunately that’s when the disqualification comes in we have this chart that has a great
Um over overview of match play versus stroke play and it really um does depend which form of play uh the competition is in order to get to some answers of some rules so we’ll start with match play which was the original format of golf um it’s the head to-head competition so in
Match play it’s between two players um it’s one V one it could also be against two sides um if you have a fourball match um it could be me and Amanda versus our two co-workers Kent and Josh and uh it’s still One V one or 2v2 um we
Don’t really care what what’s happening on the rest of the course in the competition we only really care what’s happening in our match and for that reason uh we count by holes so it’s basically 18 or up to 18 one whole contests um so it’s basically 18 or
Fewer many competitions that can be either won lost or tied so we’re counting by holes here here we have 18 holes to try to beat our opponent and we’re going to count by those holes again by holes whether it’s up or down so we say it’s um someone is one up
Means they’re one hole up from their opponent um similar the other person would be one down and like I said before General penalty in match play is always loss of whole um so you’re going to lose the hole in that situation and just move on to the next one in match play you
Have the right to know where the match stands um it’s an important part of match play of knowing what the match score is it could change the way a player decides to play a shot or plays a hole um so you always have a right to
Know the score and in match play we do have concessions um so you don’t necessarily have to hole out on every single hole um if Amanda and I were playing to 5 feet and I knew that she’s a great Putter and it’s going to make that every single time I would just
Concede it and say hey that’s good pick it up and uh we’d move on to the next hole so concessions are only allowed in match play it’s also unique in match play that uh you can overlook your opponent’s breach so you don’t necessarily have to call every single penalty on your
Opponent if Amanda’s hitting a bunker shot and she hits it poorly and it only goes um up and out and she still has a long shot to the green it doesn’t necessarily hurt me that she may have grounded her Club in that bunker um so I could Overlook that penalty that I could
Call on her and just let her keep playing on from that and in match play we need to resolve doubts or requests of ruling in a timely manner which in this case is before you start the next hole and that’s just because uh we need to know
Um we know what that match score is we need to know who wins each hole because it could affect your what you’re going to do on the next toll so if you are have any doubts or if you had any rulings um you would request that ruling
Before you start the next hole in order for it to be considered different in stroke play um where you have one person playing against the entire field so um there are a lot of differences and the majority of uh golf I would say we see nowadays this stroke play where it’s one verse
Everyone and so we’re going to count um each contest in 18 whole rounds it could be one 18ho round it could be four 18ho rounds whatever the committee decides but our scoring is going to be now considered in Strokes not by holes so we’re going to count all of our Strokes
Including any penalty Strokes that you might uh occur the round and that’s why in our general penalty for stroke play is two penalty Strokes we need to have a way in order to um penalize the player and make sure we have an accurate score for everyone so if you do break a penalty
That is a general penalty it’s going to be two strokes and because it’s one person versus the whole entire field there’s no guarantee of knowing where you stand in the competition um with technology these days um there’s a lot of uh live leaderboards that players can follow and
That’s a nice feature to have but it’s not something that needs to be given to uh stroke play competition there’s no guarantee of knowing where you stand in stroke play you also need to hole out on every single hole there’s no concessions there’s no gimmies um the ball must
Enter the end the bottom of the cup on all 18 holes um if you were to fail to Ho out unfortunately you wouldn’t have a valid score for that hole and you would be disqualified and the rules are really created to protect the field so um we
See all of these rules and in stroke play we need to figure out a way for it to be the most fair for everyone to be playing a a competition and that’s why we have these rules with penalty statements in order to protect the field and call all penalties
But we’re a little bit more laxed into resolving doubts before returning our scorecard so unlike um match play where we need to know or call um make a ruling before you te off on the next toll we have until the end of the round or a player’s round to resolve any doubts so
If you were to play in a stroke play competition hopefully the committee when collecting scorecards would ask all the players did you have any rolling questions and we can go ahead and get those resolved before we finalize the scorecard and turn it in for the day
Because at that point we can still um add penalty Strokes or fix anything or answer any questions before it becomes official and we have how players compete so um we have three different ways that players compete in competitions the first being individual again probably the most common um one person verse
Either um the whole field of individuals or one person versus another person in a singles match our next is partner play so a side of two or more Partners competing against another side um forums uh which is also cons uh called alternate shot is one form of partner
Play and then fourball is the other form of partner Play Each of which have their own rules within the rules of golf book that specifically answer all questions uh for forums or four ball and lastly we have our team competition which is a group of players either playing as IND
Individuals or as partners and then competing against other teams so this is our college or High School event or Interstate team matches or from state- tostate Team matches um so the committee is in charge of determining how many teams compete against each other how many individual scores count and how
Many points a match is worth do have any questions on the forms of play nope no questions on that all right perfect well we’ll move into our last section here which is ball handling um all of this is under rule 14 we’ll go into um marking lifting and then what to
Do if you need to drop a ball to get it back into play um this is really going to set us up for understanding next week’s presentation when we get into uh different rules procedures um we really need to understand dropping and um what in order to have a correct drop
In order to get our ball back into play in case we get into any uh areas we need to take relief from before we get into that we’re going to talk about how to Mark a ball so um marking can happen throughout a round
And if you were to Mark a ball it would just need to be um marked with something before it’s uh picked up and that’s just to ensure that we’re we’re placing it on its exact spot or original spot um whether it’s on the putting green which
Is the majority of the time you would Mark a ball or if you’re marking it for a rule situation that you might um be able to to do something to your ball in order to get it back into play so if the player lifts the ball without marking it
Or marks it in a spot in a wrong way or if you mark your ball and leave your ball marker in play um and you make a stroke with the ball marker there all of those are going to be just a one penalty stroke so our least amount of penalty
Strokes it’s more of a procedural uh error and the rules are going to allow us just to take one penalty stroke uh if we were to do uh any of those in order to Mark there’s a couple things we need to understand and marking is to show the spot again at where the
Ball is at Rest by either placing a ball marker right behind right next to or the rules even allow you to hold a club on the ground right behind or next to the ball so it doesn’t necessarily have to be something physically on the ground it
Could also just be your Club if it’s uh something you just want to do quickly the rules allow you to hold your Club on the ground next to or behind your ball in order to mark it and again this is done just to show the spot where the
Ball must be replaced after it’s lifted we have a definition of a ball marker so again um can uh the definitions are important to understand because they’re used throughout the physical rules themselves so we need to understand what a ball marker is in order to understand what this rule is
Saying and the rules go on to say a ball marker is an artificial object when used to Mark the Spot of the ball to be lifted such as a t it can be a coin it can be an object made to be a ball marker or any other small piece of
Equipment but the key wordss to this definition is that it has to be something that is artificial icial so this doesn’t allow us to use um a pebble that we just found or a leaf that’s on the green next to us it has to be something that is um artificial and can
Be one of these objects and then we get to the section where who can actually lift our ball so a player’s ball can only be lifted by three people so the player themselves can always lift their ball if they need to in partner forms of play A Part
Is is an extension of the player so they’re allowed to use their uh P lift their players The Players Ball if they need to and then the rules go on to say anyone the player authorizes um but the authorization needs to be given each time before the ball’s lifted rather
Than just saying a general statement hey for the whole entire round um Amanda’s can going to be able to lift my ball that is not allowed I’d have to authorize her and ask her to uh lift my ball uh throughout the round if I needed to there is an exception to this Rule
And that is that a caddy can lift the player’s ball without authorization but only when that player’s ball is on the putting green so it allows us to kind of um we know caddies are there to help players and clean their balls and uh help them out so the rules are going to
Let them go ahead and lift the Players Ball off the green anytime it’s on the pting green and they don’t need authorization for that ball um something we all like to do and know we uh play golf courses that may have a little bit more water and we get
Some mud on our ball um we’re going to be allowed to clean our ball almost anytime we have it in our hands it’s really a question of what are the situations where you’re not able to clean your golf ball and there are four of them that are lifted with uh that are
Stated here in the rules so anytime you have your ball in your hand and are taking relief from something you’re able to clean your golf ball the only times you are not able to clean your golf ball is when it’s lifted to see if it is
Either cut or cracked so if you think your ball might be cracked from a shot um you can you can go ahead and lift it to C but you can’t clean your ball in that situation you can go ahead and lift your ball to identify it we need you to
Make sure that the ball you’re hitting is yours so the B the rules allow you to mark your ball lift it for identification um but you can’t clean it if you’re identifying it now the rules do say you’re able to clean it only to be able to see your identifying Mark but
Nothing more than that the third situation is if the if your ball is interfering with play so if my Ball’s On The Fringe and Amanda’s going to put it from further away but my ball’s in her way she can ask me to go ahead and Mark
My ball and lift it but in that case I don’t get a free clean I have to keep that ball the way it was um put it off to the side and replace it um if it was dirty back where it was and the fourth
One is we’re able to go ahead and lift our ball to see if it lies in a condition where relief may be allowed so maybe we think our ball lies in Grown under repair or maybe we think our ball is embedded we’re allowed to go ahead
And Mark that ball to lift it to see if it’s in one of those conditions where we would get relief um if it is in one of those areas let’s say it is in an area that the committee has deemed grown under repair um or it is embedded
Free relief from those situations I’m now allowed to go ahead and clean it since I’m going to be taking a procedural it drop to get it back into play but if it wasn’t in grounder repair or if it wasn’t embedded I just have to replace it where it was and I don’t get
A clean for that if you were to clean your ball by accident when you weren’t supposed to again the rules are just going to give you a one stroke penalty as a procedural rule uh that you didn’t follow so it’s not a general penalty for for cleaning your ball um it’s just just
Going to give you a one stroke and dropping so this is probably one of the most important sections to understand um players the goal for golf is to get the ball from one plate from the te to the green without ever having to pick it up um but we know a lot of
Different obstacles get in the way and we have to drop our ball in order to get it back into play so as we see going forward in our next couple weeks um there will be situations where we’re going to have to drop our ball to get it
Back into play and um there are five things that we need to check off in order to make sure that we do drop it in the right way so the first one is that the player must drop the ball so no caddies um are able to drop the ball
Here you can’t call in a a friend to drop the ball for you it must be the player who drops the ball and when the player is dropping it it must be dropped straight down so you’re not able to try to um spin it or flick it in the air or
Or anything you’re just dropping it straight down and from knee height and without the ball touching the player or the player’s equipment on the way down so once we check off those four things we’re we’re doing great we’ve almost gotten to a correct drop the last piece
Of the puzzle is making sure the ball is dropped in the relief area so whenever you’re taking relief from um pretty much any situation that we’ll see um we’re going to have a designated relief area in this situation we start off with where that circle is on the ground this
Is a one Club length relief area so we have a club length to the left to the right and to behind and we get this nice semicircle where the player is able to drop the ball in order for it to be a correct drop the player must do one of
All the first four and it needs to hit the uh a piece of the ground in the relief area if we do that and it stays in the relief area we’ve done everything correctly and that ball is now in play but what happens um if if we
Get if we drop the ball correctly in all of those ways and it bounces outside so now we’ve dropped it the players dropped it dropped it straight down from knee height um it didn’t hit anything on the way down hit the relief area like it was supposed to but then it rolls outside
The rules go on to say you’re going to try again so we need to drop it one more time so we do it again we drop it in the right way it still hits the relief area and rolls outside well now we’re going to place so we’re going to place the
Ball where it hit the ground on the second drop so the first drop we don’t care about anymore so we only care where it hits on the second drop so it’s our drop drop Place procedure um if the ball were to stay in the relief area from the second drop
We’ve done everything right we’re going to go ahead and play it but if it’s still rolls outside on that second drop we’re going to keep an eye on where it first hit the ground in the relief area and place that ball on that spot I’m going to go back here to what
The rules Define is knee height so knee height is simply the height of the player’s knee when they’re standing in a standing position so um any any way you can get to that spot is fine you can see majority of the time we see players just
Kind of leaning over that’s great in the bottom corner you see a player’s physically uh on their knee that’s fine too whatever that is for the player as long as they’re dropping it from the spot where their knee is um in a standing position and again you can
Players can stand either inside or outside the relief area when they’re dropping the ball there’s no problem with that and our last piece of the puzzle here is um that the rules are going to allow us to substitute a ball anytime we’re taking relief from something so
The player may use any ball each time they drop or place a ball under a rule so in our drop drop Place situation if we dro the ball once we did everything right it hit the relief area and roll outside that I don’t want to use that
Ball anymore let me go to my bag and grab a second ball again I’m dropping the ball correctly it hits the relief area and rolls outside I don’t want to use that ball anymore either so I’m going to go back to my bag and grab a
Third ball and we’re going to place the third ball on the spot where it hit the ground on the second drop um so don’t know why a player would want to do that but the rules do allow us to substitute each time they drop or place a ball under a
Rule and this is uh true now whether it’s free relief or penalty relief there’s no problem um with substituting a ball for any relief procedures do we have any questions yes we have a few questions um here let’s see first one is does Hing out
Mean that the ball has to hit the bottom of the hole um a lot of times the ball rests against the flag stick but it’s partially in the hole um excuse me so my rule here the rule states that um if the ball is has come to rest against
The flag flag stick and the flag stick flag stick is left in the hole um if any part of that ball is in the hole below the surface of the putting green that ball is uh treated as hold even if the entire ball is not below the surface yep great
Question our next one is U Can you use your foot as a ball marker if you don’t move it um and I’m pretty sure I know the definition States artificial objects such as a tea a coin um something that you can put there um to Mark the Spot of
The ball I I don’t believe this counts as a as a foot is that correct that’s a tricky one um I know the USGA has a bunch of rules series um with Jay I’m blanking on his last name and he actually covers what a ball
Marker is um and I know he says um a shoe now I don’t know if the person’s foot is in the shoe or not so that is something I would have to double check um I would say out of just um safety and making sure you’re not breaching the
Rule I probably wouldn’t advise you to use your foot I would use something else such as a shoe without the foot in it um but I would I would highly recommend you go find that video on YouTube G um because I know he covers something very closely to what you’re
Asking yeah um our next question is can anyone other than the player Mark a balls location yes um the player if the player has a caddy the player’s caddy can mark that ball or if the player directly um directly states that somebody else can mark their ball for
Them um they are allowed to Mark the ball the that Ball’s location for that player that’s another tricky one so actually anyone can Mark a player’s ball the rules only specify who can lift a player’s ball so you can Mark anyone’s ball that’s not a problem but the person
Who’s lifting it is really what the rules call out to where it can only be the player the partner if it’s a partner form of play or anyone the player authorizes um and this one I’m not sure I’ve ever seen this question um when dropping back on the line how wide is
The line um of the ball so when we’re dropping on the line this is kind of cutting into next week’s presentation but uh dropping on the line uh did change from 20 uh2 to 23 and we’re now dropping on the physical line itself so we’re uh drawing that
Imaginary line from where the um let’s just say it’s a penalty relief um from where the penalty where it last cross the penalty area line it up with the flag stick and you’re going to draw an imaginary line we’re going to drop it on that line so there’s not really a width
To it we don’t get any space um we’re it’s an imaginary line from two points and far back and you’re going to try to drop it on that line itself perfect um and then another question here is can you use another makeup ball when doing a drop so yes
When you’re taking relief um from basic a penalty area whatever you’re taking proper relief from on the golf course um you are allowed to substitute a ball um for the original one in that in that case it does not have to be the original ball when
Dropping correct and um I think this is kind of going into the one ball rule um which I would say the majority of the time is not in play but make sure you’re checking your uh local rules to make sure the the one ball rule isn’t in play
Which in that case you would have to play the M the same make and model of the ball um and then looks like our last one here is can you elaborate on knee height specifically if you can squat so the ball in your hand reaches your knee
Um I think I know knee height you know obviously differs for everybody um and it’s it can be much simpler when you’re standing on a flat surface um you just you kind of bend over and you know make sure you’re keeping your knee straight you’re not shortening it um but it can
Be a little more tricky when you’re standing on a on a hill and it’s not a flat lie um you kind of can you help me out on this one a minute I’m trying to think of how yeah so you you can do whatever you need to
Do in order to drop the ball if you want to squat and that’s more comfortable for you that’s fine the key is you need to make sure you’re dropping it from the height of your knee when you’re in a standing position so you can’t get any
Closer to ground to the ground and try to beat the system by uh squatting you still have to drop it from the height your knee would be if you were to be standing straight up those are all great questions um so next week I’ve kind of alluded to it a
Couple times but we’re going to cover all of our relief procedures so we have a lot to cover next week we’ll cover uh both our free relief procedures as well as our penalty relief procedures um again we’ll have two presentations um one at noon and one at 6 I believe when
You registered for this you chose uh which days you wanted to attend so if you only chose today and you want to come back next week make sure you go back to that link to re-register um we’ll stay on the line for a couple extra minutes to answer any questions
That might come in um again we appreciate you attending our seminar today we hope you learned something from this presentation as well as the ones going forward and as I mentioned before will have the uh recording um on our website hopefully by the end of the week
And I will also post the slide deck as a PDF in case you wanted to go back and um just review the slides that you saw here so thank you all again for for being with us for this hour um we look forward to seeing you all next week when we
Cover are free relief and penalty relief procedures
