Rules #1-2008 Rules Changes

Every four years the USGA® and the R&A (Royal and Ancient) put their heads together to iron out some of the kinks in the golf rules. 2008 is one of those special years. There are several significant changes of which Joe and Jane Golfer should be aware, and others that involve minor tweaks to the rules. If you are interested in reading all of the principal changes, visit this link:

http://www.usga.org/news/2007/October/2007_79.html

I will describe below in detail the changes that I feel are most important for you to know.

Rule 12-2, Identifying Ball

OLD RULE: Prior to 2008, you were not permitted to lift your ball for identification in a hazard (bunker or water hazard). You simply hit the ball you found and thought was yours; if it turned out that it wasn’t yours, you resumed your search, hit the next ball you found, and were not penalized for hitting a wrong ball.
NEW RULE: If your ball is in a hazard, and you are not able to identify it, you are now required to lift it for identification. If you hit a wrong ball out of a hazard, you will incur a two-stroke penalty (loss of hole in match play).
PROCEDURE: If you need to lift a ball for identification in a hazard (or anywhere else, for that matter), you must follow the correct procedure:
1. Tell someone in your group what you are doing, and ask that he watch you lift, identify, and replace your ball. Someone MUST observe you identifying your ball.
2. Mark the position of the ball.
3. Carefully lift it.
4. You are NOT permitted to clean this ball. However, if there is so much goop on it that you cannot read your identifying mark (I trust you heeded my prior warnings to put a personal identifying mark on your golf balls), you are permitted to clean off the least amount necessary to recognize the ball as yours.
5. If it is your ball, you will then replace it exactly as you found it. For example, if your ball was embedded in the sand, it will have to be re-embedded. If your ball was leaning against a loose impediment (a leaf, a twig, a half-eaten apple, a pine cone, etc.), it will have to be replaced in that same predicament.
Note: If you do not follow any part of this procedure (announcing, marking, lifting, replacing), you will incur a one-stroke penalty. If you do not properly replace your ball, the penalty is two strokes (loss of hole in match play).
RATIONALE: There are a couple of reasons for this rule change. One is that since there are other situations when you are permitted to lift a ball in a hazard, it is not unusual for a player to do so. (Examples: you may lift a ball to determine if it is “unfit for play,” which would be if the ball were cut, cracked, or out of shape; you may lift a ball that interferes with someone else’s stroke), But the more important reason, I feel, is to avoid the scary predicament of hitting an unidentified ball out of a hazard into a place where you will never be able to determine whether the ball you hit was yours. This could happen if you hit a ball from a bunker to an inaccessible out of bounds area, or perhaps hit a ball from a dry part of a water hazard into a deeper part from which you could not retrieve it.
REMINDERS: (1) Follow the proper procedure if you need to identify your ball in a hazard – one-stroke penalty if you don’t. (2) Two-stroke penalty (loss of hole in match play) if you hit a wrong ball out of a hazard.

Rule 19-2, Ball in Motion Deflected or Stopped by Player, Partner, Caddie or Equipment

OLD RULE: Remember the old days when you hit a ball and it ricocheted off a tree and hit you in the head, and then your pain was compounded by a two-stroke/loss of hole penalty? Those days are no more.
NEW RULE: Now, if you hit a ball that accidentally (would you ever hit yourself or your partner on purpose?) hits you, your partner, your equipment, or your caddie, the penalty has been reduced to one stroke.
RATIONALE: The reduced penalty is clearly more fair.
REMINDER: After your ball hits you and you assess yourself the new, easier-to-swallow one-stroke penalty, you will play the ball where it lies. If it landed in your partner’s pocket, take it out, ask your partner to step aside, and drop it right where he was standing.

Rule 4-1, Clubs

OLD RULE: If you carried a non-conforming club (e.g., a 60-inch driver, a weighted club with a goofy grip, a club to which you applied tape to reduce glare DURING THE ROUND), the penalty was disqualification.
NEW RULE: The penalty has been reduced in stroke play to two strokes per hole, maximum four per round. In match play, when you discover the error, complete the hole, and then deduct one hole from the state of the match, maximum two holes per round. In both match play and stroke play, if you hit the ball with a non-conforming club, you are disqualified. Also, if you discover the non-conforming club between holes, the penalty will apply to the next hole. So if you discover the breach on the way to the second hole, you will incur the maximum penalty (4 strokes in stroke play; state of match adjusted two holes in match play).
REMINDER: You must declare a non-conforming club out of play as soon as you discover it. If you make changes to your club during the round, such as adding or removing lead tape or applying tape to reduce glare, your club is now non-conforming, you will incur the penalty, and you must take it out of play (not use it for the remainder of the round).

Rule 14-3, Note: Distance Measuring Devices

This is not a new rule, but it has been moved from the Decisions book to the rule book. Committees are allowed to establish a local rule permitting the use of distance measuring devices. The SJGA has decided to permit their use in tournaments beginning in 2008.
WARNING: The only such devices you are permitted to use are those that measure distance only. You may not use a device that also measures other factors that might affect your stroke, such as wind, gradient, or temperature, even if you leave those features turned off. The penalty is disqualification.

Other additions to the rule book:
1. You may exchange information on distance, including answering such questions as “How far is it from my ball to the hazard (over the hazard, to the hole, etc.)?” This is NOT advice.
2. “Stroke and distance” is now an official term in the rule book. It refers to any situation where you choose (e.g., unplayable ball, water hazard) or are required (e.g., ball lost or out of bounds) to assess yourself a one-stroke penalty and hit your next shot from the spot where your original ball was last played.
3. In Rule 15-2 (substituted ball), if you substitute a ball when you are not supposed to AND play it from a wrong place, the total penalty is two strokes. Previously, the penalty was one stroke for the incorrect substitution plus two for hitting from the wrong place. The new math is 1+2=2. (This same two-stroke penalty also appears in the penalty statements for Rule 18 and Rule 20-7c, which can be found in your USGA rule book on pages 58 and 67.)
4. There is no penalty for standing on or astride your line of putt if you do so accidentally or to avoid standing on someone else’s line of putt.
5. If the wrong person places or replaces your ball, the penalty is one stroke (see Rule 20-3a, pp. 63-64).
6. You are permitted to move a flagstick when a ball is in motion, provided the flagstick is being attended, removed, or held up (Rule 24-1). The important change here is that if you lay the flagstick on the green, someone putts his ball, and it appears that the ball might hit the flagstick, you may now pick up the flagstick and get it out of the way. In reality, the only time you may not move a flagstick is if it is in the hole and it is not attended. A player who putts a ball on the green and hits a flagstick that is in the hole and unattended will incur a two-stroke penalty. (Of course, if your putt from on the green hits an attended, removed, or held up flagstick, or the person holding the flagstick, there is still a two-stroke penalty. Please be very attentive when you are given the responsibility of attending the flagstick, and make sure you and the flagstick are not in the path of a putted ball.)
7. The old term, “reasonable evidence,” has been replaced by a new term, “known or virtually certain.” When you are deciding whether a ball that has been hit towards an obstruction, an abnormal ground condition (e.g., casual water, ground under repair), or a water hazard is lost, it must be “known or virtually certain” that the ball went into one of those conditions. If it is not “known or virtually certain,” you must proceed under stroke and distance (see #2).

I plan to explain in greater detail each of the rules and accompanying terminology that are referenced in these rules changes in future columns posted on the blog. If there is a particular rule that puzzles you, let me know and I’ll plan to address it sooner rather than later. Don’t forget to send me your questions on specific rules incidents – I think it’s fun for all of us to find out the strange and unusual situations that happen to others, and to learn how the rules of golf want us to deal with them.

Linda

Copyright © 2008 Linda Miller. All rights reserved.