I am having a problem understanding the logic behind a ruling (rules of golf are almost always logical I think).

Player A hits ball in scrub. Player A thinks his ball may be lost – then declares and plays a provisional ball. The provisional stroke results in the ball going into the hole. Player A does not look for original ball and accepts score achieved with provisional ball.

Compare this with:

Player A hits ball in scrub. Player A thinks his ball may be lost – then declares and plays a provisional ball. The provisional stroke results in the ball going out of bounds. He then hits another provisional ball and it too goes out of bounds. Player A then walks forward and spends 5 minutes looking for original ball and finds it easily.

Why should the player get the advantage of seeing the result of his provisional shot before deciding whether or not to search for his original ball. Should there be some onus on the player to search for his original ball whether his provisional shot is good or not?

I understand your point, but how do you know if someone has spotted their ball?

The main purpose of hitting a provisional ball is to save time. If the rules insisted that a player having played a provisional ball “must’ spend his allowed 5 minutes looking for his lost ball that would tend to defeat the idea of the rule, It is very rare that you actually gain anything , Except saved time, By hitting a provisional ball.

, It is very rare that you actually gain anything , Except saved time, By hitting a provisional ball.

Good point. Drove a ball deep in the woods today, hit a cracking provisional. Others in group said don’t bother looking. No-way. It’s rare not to be able to chip out. Stroke and FULL distance is ouch.

(BTW I didn’t penalise them for giving advice).

“Others in group said don’t bother looking.”

Not advice. (Did you leave out a smiley?)

No smiley originally intended, but you’ve made me think about it.

Are you suggesting that the woods are pre-existing information and I could have predetermined how hard they are to escape from? And because no-one knew exactly where my ball was, no specific information to the situation at hand was given?

RD

If they had said ‘You don’t need to look and we won’t either’ then I would agree. That is just spelling out an option under the rule.

But I’m not so sure about the actual statement. It would seem to be advising which option to take.

There is certainly no element of public information in there.

‘You don’t need to look and we won’t either’ > ok

‘don’t bother looking’ > bad

I certainly get your points, AAA and Stebboko, but I guess I’ll tend to be lenient here.
Others should listen to you – not to me.

I didn’t mean to divert the thread Stevepop, but it seems silly to open a new topic just for this.

re advice, although their comment did make me consider changing my play based on their superior knowledge of the course, so might somebody yelling out distance information if I hadn’t bothered to check it out myself. And we know the latter is not advice.

Dec 8-1/16 is similar, but the advice is given with regard to the current position of the ball – something that couldn’t have been public information.

I am with you RD.’ I wouldn,t bother looking for that one ’ is ok by me,’ Don,t bother looking for that one’, Is advice. Know it,s probably stretching the point but to me the first one is only Informing the player of his options. ( not Advice)

to get back to Steves point I thin that the Key to it all is that once you have holed out , the hole is deemed to be completed. I think that that rule tends to override many others. Am i right you rules gurus??

A hole is not completed if the ball going into the hole is provisional.

If the player doesn’t search for the original, it’s fine, but if anything with the slightest resemblance of a ball is seen in the bush, the player must take a look. He can not declare the original ball lost.

The hole is only completed with the provisional ball (becoming the ball in play) once the player picks it up from the hole. (Decision 27-2b/2)
At that time the original is just a ball, if it’s found.

I never make a statement regarding a players options when they are playing a stroke, I will ask a question, “Are you really going to look for that ball?” ..... if they answer yes, I will help them… if No then we play on….

i believe you should always look for your ball and take the consequences if you find it. the reason you are allowd to hit a provisional to save time is so you dont have to walk back not so you dont have to look for your ball

If you don’t intend to look for it then quite simply don’t call it provisional. That way it becomes the ball in play even if someone finds the other

I will often ask the owner “do you want me to look for that?”

In a stroke round if you think your ball may be lost it is almost imperative for a player to play a provisional (if you consider speed of play). On courses with thick scrub – it is probably 50-50 whether you will find it or not.
I would not suggest that the rules require you to spend 5 minutes looking for a ball in the scrub – but would suggest that players should at least take a “cursory” look in the area – just in case it is obvious where the ball is.
I think not looking for the ball, if you have played a great provisional, is a cop out and not in the spirit of the game.
Comments???

“Spirit of the Game” whats that? Come on, the rules are so convoluted, complicated, hard to understand and invariably open to interpretation that there is no such thing.

Play to the rules, if you can take advantage of a rule then do it, because sure as hell there will be times when you are in a spot, the rule goes one way and you just look at your marker and say “That just isn’t fair!” and chances are he/she will agree with you but rules are rules… take it when you can is what I say….

Couldn,t agree more . Many golfers whinge when they have to hit out of a divot . Bad luck, thems the rules. So you hit one in the bush hit a great provisional, you have already done 2 shots where is the advantage, OK you go looking for it , find it totally unplayable. Now you possibly have to go back to the tee because you cannot play the provisional. There are many instances like this in golf . so if you get a little good fortune , take it , there,s plenty goes the other way.

Can’t believe the ruiles some people carry around in their head. Today we were playing pairs. I was in the L rough getting ready to hit a fairway wood off a good lie. About 40m behind me a guy was hitting a fairway wood off the deck, somehow managed to hit it out of the heel, dead left straight at me. It missed me and hit my head cover which was sitting near my bag on the ground. As a result his ball stopped and he was left in the trees without a shot.

“Oh, I can replay my shot due to interference from your equipment.”

“Well no, there is no penalty, but you have to play the ball as it lies.”

“No, we are playing in pairs, I get to replay the shot, it’s in the rules.”

(Flummoxed and trying to be polite.) “Sorry, I’m not aware of that rule.”

Player angrily dives into bag for rules book. Some swearing ensues when said rule does not appear. I think he eventually accepted this in good grace, but where do these ideas come from…?

Muntz, you may already know this, so apologies if you do. But just in case – there are circumstances where the shot could be recalled and replayed. Was it Stroke Play or Match Play? Was he your partner, opponent or fellow competitor? I don’t know what “pairs” means in this situation.

This was essentially a strokeplay event played in pairs – 4BBB Stableford.

So we were fellow competitors, not matchplay opponents.

But yeah, I guess he could have got confused with the matchplay rule.

You were correct. 19-4 tells you that, in Stroke Play, when a players ball in motion is deflected or stopped by a fellow competitor, caddie or equipment to proceed as per 19-1 for an Outside Agency i.e. No penalty and play it as it lies. Perhaps his confusion arose because of 19-3 which describes the procedure, in Match Play where he could have cancelled the stroke and played from where he last played (conditions apply).