FORE!
Happy New Year to all!
As I said last year:
“A New Year holds such promise…a better swing, straighter shots, a smoother putting stroke, a lower score. Well, I can’t help you if your swing looks like Charles Barkley’s, your shot trajectories are like today’s politics, hard left and hard right, or your putting stroke looks more like a muscle spasm. But I can help you lower your scores but getting you to better understand the Rules of Golf.”
Remember those rules refreshers from last year? We’ll revisit those AND add a chance for you to win a prize.
I’ll republish our refreshers from last year (I’ll verify the video links are still good) but I’ll add a one question contest with each one. The question will be from the USGA Rules of Golf BASIC quizzes. To make it a little more challenging, I won’t guarantee that the questions will be related to the same refresher topic. Those that reply to me with the correct answer before I send out the next refresher will be in the drawing for this hat clip and ball-marker (see attached photo).
Speaking of ball-markers, the first question is:
In stroke play, a player accidentally steps on and moves their ball-marker on the putting green. What is the ruling?
a. No penalty
b. One stroke penalty
c. General Penalty
d. Disqualification
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Rule 17 Penalty Areas.
Here are your relief options for when you find your ball within a Lateral Red Penalty Area.
First, you can always play it as it lies from within the penalty area with no penalty.
There are four penalty options when taking relief from a Red Penalty Area. They all incur a 1-stroke penalty.
1. Lateral relief. Drop within 2 club lengths of where the ball last crossed the edge
2. Drop as far back on a line to the flagstick from where the ball last crossed the edge
3. Replay under Stroke and Distance
4. If the course has the Local Rule E-1 Dropping Zones in effect, you may drop in a designated Drop Zone.
Here’s a link to see it done properly:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTTfXcEm5sk
Hit’em straight and not too often,
Tom McKernan
Rules & Handicaps
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