Golf Rules That Are Unclear

Golf Monthly

In this video, Neil Tappin is joined by Golf Monthly rules expert Fergus Bisset to talk through the 5 golf rules that are surprisingly vague or unclear. Whether it's determining if your ball is in a hazard, declaring a provisional or understanding what constitutes advice, there are actually quite a few grey areas in the rule book that you need to be careful of.

Transcript

00:00Hello and welcome to The London Club and this video in which we're going to take a look at

00:03the five golf rules that are surprisingly vague. Now there are certain rules in the book that are

00:09very clearly black and white and there are a few others where there's a little bit of a grey area

00:13and it's there for a very good reason and we're going to talk about exactly what those are in

00:17this video. I'm joined by golf rules expert Fergus Bissett. Right let's get started.

00:31Now Fergus for this one we're going to talk about advice and advice is a term that you'll see within

00:37the rules of golf but there is a little bit of I think something around it that would leave people

00:41feeling a little unsure at times. Tell me what constitutes advice and more importantly I think

00:48what are the things that people need to watch out for? Okay good this is rule 10.2a which deals with

00:54advice. Now a player is not allowed to give advice to other players in the competition nor is a player

01:01allowed to ask advice from anybody other than their caddy. Now advice is a comment or an action that

01:08would influence a player in the way that they either selected a club or chose to play a hole.

01:13Play the shots. So me telling you here this is a 150 odd yard par three over water it's difficult.

01:19Me telling you I've just hit an A time I'm going to get a penalty for that. You would be receiving a

01:24general penalty. What if I subtly showed you the bottom of the golf club? I'm afraid you would also

01:29be in contravention of 10.2a there. You can't shame me. Now I would not be allowed to ask you what club

01:35you've hit. I could however before we played the hole say oh remember the fourth hole roughly the

01:42same length what club did you hit there? Right that would be okay. That seems a bit odd that you can

01:46do that but you can't ask what club I fit here. It does seem quite odd. I would be allowed to have a

01:52little look in your bag and say ah the A town's missing you must have hit an A town here but I'm not

01:58allowed to move that out of the way. They'd be touching my equipment. You're in contravention of the rule if

02:04you touch a player's equipment or clubs. Yeah interesting. And another thing about what I've

02:10said that you can ask your caddy a spectator might give you some advice. Not me I don't have very many

02:16spectators. If they did you wouldn't receive a penalty in that instance however you would have to

02:21encourage them to not give you any further advice if they continued to give you advice as you went

02:26around and you hadn't discouraged them from doing that you would you would breach 10.2a and receive the

02:30general penalty. Interesting. So there's some quite you know things you've got to watch out for.

02:35Subtle differences between what you can and can't do here the sort of thing that could really catch

02:38you out if you're playing in competition just be very careful of that make sure you aren't going

02:43out of your way to ask the advice of any of your playing partners. Now this one refers to wind

02:49direction and Fergus we're all used to throwing up a few blades of grass to figure out what the wind's

02:54doing. There is some wind they're just going over there. Yeah. But there's some things here that you're not

02:58allowed to do aren't there. Explain to us what you can and can't do around wind direction and making

03:03that judgment call. This is rule 4.3a which is to do with allowed and prohibited use of equipment.

03:10You're not allowed to use a piece of equipment that artificially eliminates the requirement for

03:14essential skill or judgment within golf. Right. Now throwing up grass that's fine. Grass isn't

03:21equipment. Good to know. However there are 4.3a part two deals with wind direction and it says there

03:29are certain things that you can't do if for some reason you had some powder with you. I don't know

03:34why you might some talcum powder. I don't have any talcum powder with me. That would be part of your

03:37equipment and if you threw that in the air to assess which way the wind was going that there would be a

03:42penalty. Right okay. And you are not I mean if you have a hanky in your pocket you're not allowed to

03:49to wave that. Use it like a flag and just figure out. Or if you happen to have a ribbon in your bag

03:54again I don't know you may be but you're not allowed to use that. Right okay. So you've got to be

03:59quite careful with what you're doing and you would receive the general penalty if you tested the wind

04:04in one of those ways. Yeah. Or with an artificial object. Yeah. If you did it again you'd be

04:09disqualified. Two shots or out. So quite harsh. Now that leads me to asking the question then what about

04:14range finders because my range finders most do has slope to it. So if I was zapping this hole I know

04:21not to use slope in competition. Yeah okay. The hole that we're playing here is a par three it's

04:26definitely down it's probably down 10 yards or so. Why is it that I can have the yardage through this.

04:32Right. But I can't have the slope as well. The reason is because the yardages are publicly available

04:39information. The yardage is something that you will be given on. Yes I can see.

04:46Absolutely. Down there yeah. However you have to use your judgment to decide how much the slope here

04:52would impact that yardage and if you use a device to tell you that that's in contravention of that rule

04:58of prohibited use of equipment. Good advice and I'm going to throw in an extra piece of advice. When

05:03you're playing golf just make sure that your slope is turned off before you start if you're playing in

05:07competition because that could definitely catch you out.

05:17Oh that's a bit dicey over there. I was over there the other week but that's not very good.

05:22I think I'm going to have to play another one. Okay. Now Ferg I know from experience from having

05:28done this with you before having spoken about this subject before that when you have to hit a provisional

05:33ball you need to be quite prescriptive I'd say about what you're about to do. Is that fair?

05:39That is fair. 18.3 which is a provisional ball. 18.3b says that you need to make it clear to your

05:47playing partners that you are playing a provisional ball. If you don't make it clear that you're playing

05:52a provisional ball then this ball that you're about to hit will automatically become the ball in play.

05:56Even if Lyman is sitting in the rough. No problem. Exactly. And so what I just said then which was

06:02oh that's dicey over there I'm going to have to I think I'm going to have to play another. Is that

06:06good enough or is that not good enough? That's not good enough. Do I have to say I need to play a

06:09provisional? You have to technically the rules would like you to say that you must play that you're going

06:15to play a provisional. Right and then here's where the sort of uncertainty. Some uncertainty because if you

06:20said I'm going to play another one just in case that suggests that you're playing a provisional ball.

06:26That's good enough. Because of the doubt. Because of the doubt. And if you said I'm going to play

06:30another one under rule 18.3 if you're a real rules bot then that would be okay. I like it.

06:38Another thing would be that perhaps not on the tee but say that you were down in the fairway and

06:41your playing partners were somewhere else if you required to play a provisional ball at that point

06:46you wouldn't be able to tell them before you hit the shot. Am I not shouting across the fairway? No you

06:50wouldn't need to do that. You would play your provisional and then you would go to your

06:53partners and say I have played a provisional ball. Okay. Now okay there's there's some uncertainty

06:58about the wording here. My advice and the rules advice is always just categorically state I am

07:04playing a provisional ball. Right well Fergus I'm playing a provisional ball. Correct.

07:09And you might want to play a bit. Okay so I have hit my tee shot on the 14th hole here at the London

07:25Club into this position in here. Now I know that Fergus this is an immovable obstruction but the

07:31golf rules are slightly vague in this scenario and I'll tell you why. Because the green is over your left.

07:39Shoulder just over there the fairway is behind me behind my back the nearest point of the fairway

07:45and I would be doing everything I could I think to be getting a free drop from here by coming along

07:52and saying I was going to hit a four iron onto the green from this position. Now tell me as my personal

08:00referee then that's perfectly acceptable. I would seriously question you. 16.1a part three says that

08:10you will not be entitled to relief if it is clearly unreasonable. Right so you think this shot with a

08:16four iron is clearly unreasonable. Well basically you would get a relief if you were taking a shot that

08:23you meant you were going to be taking anyway and the immovable obstruction affected either the live

08:30ball your stance as it does would do in this case or the swing path. Now you have to be honest about the

08:39type of shot that you would realistically be taking on from here. Now I can see that if you aim down that

08:46line you're hitting over rough and trees. For about 100 yards. Your ball is buried thick in the rough.

08:54There is no way you would be taking on that shot. So realistically I would be chipping it back out.

08:59Everyone would be chipping it back out. Which means I'm now not standing on the path. Exactly. So you

09:04would not be entitled to free relief and that would be the honest way. And a referee in competition

09:11would say that. So in amateur golf you just have to be honest. Even if I pleaded. I think even if you

09:18pleaded they would just say there's no. Please look. Go on you have a go at that shot. I want to see it. I'm

09:23going to stand up here. I'm going to prove you wrong. Right. I'm going to prove you wrong. Here we go.

09:27Yeah. Yeah. I can get a four right out of here. I mean but you're just going to head it straight into

09:30the rough. I'm not. Oh my god. Well that ball will never be seen again. I mean there was no it was

09:42just unreasonable. It was an unreasonable situation. Okay so we have another scenario for you where the

09:48rules of golf are a little bit vague. Purposefully vague. Fergus. Now the scenario for you is that I've

09:55hit my shot from over here just to playing down the right hand side of the hole. The ball's gone

10:00over the crest of the hill. We've both seen it go over the crest of the hill and we know there's

10:04water and we know there's a penalty area down here. Now I was hoping against hope that I might find my

10:10ball sitting on this grass here but I haven't found it. It's gone in there or at least we're virtually

10:18certain it's gone in there. Explain to me how we need to proceed in that scenario. Well yeah this is

10:22known or virtually certain. This is a term that's used in the modern rules quite a bit and it is

10:27the standard for deciding what has happened to a player's ball. Has it gone in a penalty area?

10:32Has it been moved? How was it moved? Those sorts of situations. Now here I think we can be virtually

10:40certain and in the definitions of the rules that's being 95% sure. So 19 times out of 20 the ball will

10:47have come over the crest of the hill. The fact that it's not here means it's in there. Okay one in

10:53a thousand times a seagull's picked up your ball. Unlikely. Highly unlikely. Highly unlikely. Yeah.

10:59We're virtually certain we are 95% at least sure that the ball has gone in the penalty area and you

11:05would take relief accordingly from a red penalty area. It's in this scenario actually it's it's fairly

11:10clear. It's very clear. However if what we were standing on here was heavy, thick, fescue, the

11:18sort that you're struggling to find your golf ball in anyway. Yeah. That's where virtually certain

11:22in the rules the terminology really kicks in because can you be virtually certain that your ball's got

11:28in there? It may well have done but you can't be sure can you? Probably not and in that case I think

11:32you wouldn't be able to say that you were 95% sure that what has happened you think has happened has

11:38happened. You could well be in the thick grass. In that instance you would have to search for your

11:42ball and have your three minute search and if you couldn't find it I think you would have to go back

11:46and play again. Probably feeling a little bit hard done by but better feeling hard done by than

11:52potentially breaking the rules and causing any sorts of issues for yourself. Correct. So there you have it.

11:57If you are unsure about whether your ball might have gone in if you're not virtually certain then it's best

12:02just to go back and hit another. So there you have it that's our look at the five golf rules that are

12:08surprisingly vague. Hopefully Fergus's explanations there have helped you whenever you find yourself

12:13in any of those scenarios. If you're unsure about anything please do leave some comments below we'll

12:17get back to as many of you as we can and of course don't forget to hit the like and subscribe buttons but

12:23thanks for watching we will see you next time.

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