cartsThe golf season is here and now that we have our equipment ready for play and we are in somewhat good shape, it's time to talk about how we play the game as explained by the Rules of Golf.

The Rules are your friend and they can help you in many different situations. No matter your status as a casual player or a tournament player, you need to understand the Rules of the Game. Below is a great article written almost sixty years ago that is still pertinent to the Game today.

After reading this article it would behoove you to buy a 2012 Edition of The Rules of Golf or go on-line at the USGA site and click on “Rules.” There you can find all the information you need on the Rules and more.

Some Principles Behind the Rules of Golf

by Joseph C. Dey, JR.
USGA Executive Director, February 1953

Suppose you were called upon to write a code of rules for playing golf. Suppose you had to start from scratch, with no previous rules to help you and with only your experience in playing the game to guide you.

What would you do? Would you start with what happens on the tee ground? Or would you begin by pointing out the difference between match play and stroke play? When would you deal with things like pipes and bottles, and how would you deal with them? What about twigs and leaves? How about the right to remove the flag stick?

If you had the job of writing the Rules from scratch, a stream of details would come flooding in upon you. You could easily be engulfed by them if you didn't have a couple of life preservers.

All too many of us are confused by the Rules. Sometimes they seem like a hodge-podge, full of don'ts and can'ts and prohibitions and exceptions and technical qualifications. Sometimes we get lost in the maze of the letter of the law.

There is a way out. There is a spirit behind all the technical little details. There are a few simple basic ideas that can guide us.

It's important for everyone to know what these basic ideas are. We may not be called upon to write the Rules of Golf, but, just by reason of being players, it is incumbent upon us to know the Rules. Golf is a unique game in that every golfer is his or her own referee.

Purpose and Principles

The first thing to clarify is the purpose of the Rules. Why do we need them?

The purpose of the Rules is to make sure, as far as possible, that everybody plays the same game. That is how it is phrased by Richard S. Tufts, a Vie-President of the USGA and a long-time student of golf.

Thus, when somebody departs from playing the same game that everyone else is playing, penalties are applied. The penalties are for two main purposes: to discourage anybody from taking unfair advantage, from trying to play a different game, and to try to equalize matters when somebody has played a different game, either consciously or unconsciously.

Underlying the Rules are two very simple principles:

PLAY THE COURSE AS WE FIND IT.
PLAY THE BALL AS IT LIES.

Certainly, if everybody plays the course as he/she finds it and if everybody plays his ball as it lies, where he/she hit it, then everybody will be playing the same game. The object of the Rules, then should be observed by those two elementary ideas.

But even the Garden of Eden had its imperfections, and, golf being an imperfect human affair, not all questions of the Rules can be solved by applying one of those two basic principles.

For example, when your ball is at the bottom of a lake, twenty feet under water, it just isn't possible to play the course as you find it or to play the ball as it lies. You've got to have a way to proceed. So, too, when your ball is twenty feet up in the air, sleeping in a little bed of pine-tree needles.

From this we arrive at a third fundamental principle:

If we can't play the course as we find it or if we can't play the ball as it lies,
then play fair. Just that: fair play.

A large percentage of the Rules of Golf deal with cases where the first two principles won't apply, and those cases are pretty well governed by this third principle. There is one general Rule which provides: “If any point in dispute be not covered by the Rules or Local Rules, the decision shall be made in accordance with equity.”

To summarize, the three main ideas behind the Rules of Golf are:

There will be more on the Rules of Golf in future newsletters.

"I noticed ye hardly pay attention to the walkin' part. Well that's too bad. Not many people do. 'tis a shame, 'tis a rotten shame, for if ye can enjoy the walkin', ye can probably enjoy the other times in yer life when ye're in between. And that's most o' the time; wouldn' ye say?"
-- Shivas Irons (Golf in the Kingdom)

walking

Watch the short video on the Links website, and you'll be inspired for the new season!

Jim Knowles
Golf Course Manager

 email Jim Knowles