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Thread: Local Rules

  1. #1
    Hall of Fame mpare is on a distinguished road mpare's Avatar
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    Local Rules

    The October 4, 2010 issue of GolfWorld contains the following letter from Bryan W. Jones of the PGA of America Rules Committee that may be of interest to some of you:

    "It has been a tough stretch for us in the rules business, but the reality is we appreciate the opportunity to educate golfers. As an official at the PGA Championship, I found your Bunker story .... committed the same offense as some players: It wasn't aware of the local rules. The PGA of America does not include the one-ball rule as part of the "Conditions of the Competition." Had Dustin Johnson substituted one of Chip Sullivan's balls there would not have been a disqualification. The misinformation highlights the need for anyone who plays golf for a living, at a high level of competition or just for fun, to know the rules and the "Conditions of the Competition." This also applies to all who report on golf. Thanks for all you do."
    Proud member of the 2007, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014 Ottawa Golf Ryder Cup teams.

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    Singles Match Play Champ 2010 Ruskie is on a distinguished road
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    Hmm... can we get some background here? I for one have zero clue as to what the guy is talking about.

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    Hall of Fame mpare is on a distinguished road mpare's Avatar
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    At the moment I can't access the story to which the writer referred. That said, he is talking about the "one ball rule" that prevents a player who begins a round with a type of ball changing to another type of ball during that round. Under the rules of golf, there is nothing to prevent a golfer from playing, for example, with a Pro V1 on the first hole and a Srixon on the second, etc. However, if the "Conditions of Competition" for a tournament, which are set I believe by the Rules Committee, specify a "one ball" policy, then you must use the same ball throughout any given round. The PGA Tour has such a condition. The PGA of America does not. That is what this man is talking about.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ruskie View Post
    Hmm... can we get some background here? I for one have zero clue as to what the guy is talking about.
    Proud member of the 2007, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014 Ottawa Golf Ryder Cup teams.

  4. #4
    Singles Match Play Champ 2010 Ruskie is on a distinguished road
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    Thanks for the clarification. Was he referring to a specific incident?

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    1 Iron PapaPat is on a distinguished road
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    Quote Originally Posted by mpare View Post
    The misinformation highlights the need for anyone who plays golf for a living, at a high level of competition or just for fun, to know the rules and the "Conditions of the Competition." This also applies to all who report on golf. Thanks for all you do."
    Poor Dustin Johnson? Week after week I work events where the players have not read or paid any attention to the CofC and Local Rule sheets provided. This week it was the OCAA Provincial Championships where some of the players (and Coaches?) decided that the local rules in effect were those printed on the course's (Lora Bay)scorecard, rather than those on the GAO hard card and event specific Local Rule information provided. Significant events rarely use a course's local rules. A quick aside, this was a very good event featuring teams from many of the province's Community Colleges, played on a very good course.

    But, it is agreement with the last line of this comment that leaves me yelling at the TV when watching Golf. Mike Terico telling the viewers that we are playing "lift clean and place, through the green", Dottie Pepper rambling off on an erroneous explanation of what happened in the Fowler drop, Maltbie referring to "fellow competitors" in an all match play event, and the constant use of BestBall rather than BetterBall are just a few examples from last week. All this while telling us that some rules mucky muck from the PGA (perhaps the individual quoted above?) is sitting with them to clarify any rules situations. I might be prepared to cut Terico a bit of slack, but some brave person needs to tell Pepper that she does not know the rules nearly well enough to ever be commenting on them. I also did not find Darren Clarke's gratuitous "stupid rule" comment particularly helpful or appropriate.

  6. #6
    Golf Canada Rules Official L4 BC MIST is on a distinguished road
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    Quote Originally Posted by PapaPat View Post
    Poor Dustin Johnson? Week after week I work events where the players have not read or paid any attention to the CofC and Local Rule sheets provided. This week it was the OCAA Provincial Championships where some of the players (and Coaches?) decided that the local rules in effect were those printed on the course's (Lora Bay)scorecard, rather than those on the GAO hard card and event specific Local Rule information provided. Significant events rarely use a course's local rules. A quick aside, this was a very good event featuring teams from many of the province's Community Colleges, played on a very good course.
    Having worked the OCAA event in 2008 and many other OVGA and Golf Quebec events, it IS astonishing the number of players who do not take a copy of the available COC or Notice to Competitors that we provide at each tournament. These notices are authored to possibly SAVE players strokes and yet half are left sitting on the registration table and on course, players have made stroke costing errors, simply because they refused to read. One would think that the recent examples of Tour pros failing to read their notices would be a lesson to tournament playing ams.

  7. #7
    1 Iron PapaPat is on a distinguished road
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    Quote Originally Posted by BC MIST View Post
    Having worked the OCAA event in 2008 and many other OVGA and Golf Quebec events, it IS astonishing the number of players who do not take a copy of the available COC or Notice to Competitors that we provide at each tournament. These notices are authored to possibly SAVE players strokes and yet half are left sitting on the registration table and on course, players have made stroke costing errors, simply because they refused to read. One would think that the recent examples of Tour pros failing to read their notices would be a lesson to tournament playing ams.
    The other thing was that at their pre-event meeting the coaches were told to emphasise that if there was any doubt about a situation, players should play two balls. 3-3. We can't be everywhere. Both Starters also mentioned this to all groups as they teed off. Two situations at Lora Bay, that should have raised a question in the minds of those affected by them had players taking relief or not based on the suggestions of their Fellow-competitors or is some cases their coaches. When asked why they did not do play a 3-3 they said that they did not really have any doubt about what they were doing.

    As you will know BC, this field is fairly broad including some of our tournament experienced Juniors and former Juniors as well as many players who have never played when Rules Officials are there. In some cases I think that it is a matter of trying to be too correct and not just play like their fathers that has them busily playing off french-drains and path extensions when they could have been taking relief.

    As I have already stated, even though this was a very well organized and conducted event it can be used to illustrate the fact that players and coaches generally could do a much better job of paying attention to what each situation calls for.

  8. #8
    Golf Canada Rules Official L4 BC MIST is on a distinguished road
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    Quote Originally Posted by PapaPat View Post
    [COLOR=black][FONT=Verdana]The other thing was that at their pre-event meeting the coaches...
    At this meeting, were the organizers as generous to you as they were to us? Wine, cheese, Stella glasses, mugs and so on. I needed a box to carry everything out to the car.

    The coaches organization of the championship was exceptionally well done but as you indicated, leave the rules stuff to us.

  9. #9
    1 Iron PapaPat is on a distinguished road
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    Quote Originally Posted by BC MIST View Post
    At this meeting, were the organizers as generous to you as they were to us? Wine, cheese, Stella glasses, mugs and so on. I needed a box to carry everything out to the car.

    The coaches organization of the championship was exceptionally well done but as you indicated, leave the rules stuff to us.
    As you point out, our treatment was first class. Both my wife (a Starter and Scorer) and I plan to whine and snivel next year to try to get assigned to this event.

    As for the coaches, something that concerned me before I got there, they were great. I think that many of them saw it as an opportunity to see Rules Officials in action and perhaps clear up some of their own uncertainty about a given rule. Many took the opportunity to ask us questions on the course. Lora Bay has a number of paths against LWH's and I found that coaches watched closely how I got players out of these situations. One said, "That's exactly how I draw it up for my team."

    I also found the deportment of the players to be excellent. When I mentioned this to one coach he was not surprised and said that the overriding rule for his team is "Thou shalt not embarrass your coach."

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