"Are YOU Stuck Up A Golf Gum
Tree?"
Now, what are your options if your ball
comes to rest in a very difficult lie, such as against the
trunk of a tree, or in a gorse bush, or even in a crack in
the ground?
Well, the first thing to know is that
you are the sole judge as to whether your ball is unplayable
and can deem it so anywhere on the course, except in a water
hazard. You don't have to get approval from anyone else.
Having declared your ball unplayable
you have three options, all under penalty of one stroke.
One, you can play a ball as nearly as possible at the spot
from which you last played.
Two, you can drop a ball within two club-lengths
of the spot where your ball lay, but not nearer the hole.
Or three, and this is the one that many golfers don't know,
or forget about, you can drop a ball anywhere on the line
behind the point where the ball was at rest and the hole,
with no limit as to how far behind the ball may be dropped.
Of course, this last option means that
you will have to play over, or around, the tree, the bush
or the crack in the ground, but it is often the best option,
especially when the two club-lengths option doesn't give you
sufficient relief to avoid the interference. Did you notice
that I said, 'you can drop a 'ball' and not 'the ball'?
This means that, providing you can identify
the ball as yours, you don't have to retrieve it, which might
be difficult if it's stuck in a tree or lies deep in a prickly
cactus, because the Rules permit you to continue playing the
hole with a different ball.
Your Golfing Success,
Andy Brown
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P.P.S.
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