ColinL

My point was that it sounded as if stroke and distance was referred to as the only option after finding that lateral relief wasn't possible. Back on the line is also an available option. Whether wise or possible to choose is another matter which I wouldn't venture a view on based on a line on a drawing.

I think it's being overlooked that If lateral relief isn't possible, there are two remaining options, back on the line as well as stroke and distance.

Apart from what OP has just repeated, the clue is in the term temporary water, the revised name for what used to be called casual water. As it is a temporary condition, you could not designate an area as temporary water all the time. And to push that thought further, if it were water all the time it wouldn't be temporary but by definition a penalty area. It wouldn't be surprising if on occasion parts of this mushy area do meet the criteria to be temporary water (I get the notion that you get occasional showers in Seattle) but it could be very difficult to know or have virtual certainty that a lost ball was in such a patch.

Your only hope is to react quickly enough and stop your downswing or deliberately miss the ball.

It's clear that the agenda behind this thread is too strong to make it worth the time trying to put up an argument to the contrary in the expectation it will be engaged with rather than bludgeoned. By the way you have misunderstood and misrepresented much of what I have said and so there's nothing more to be said.

Yes, I think you may be missing something. There is more than one way of not knowing about penalty strokes you have incurred. There is ignorance of the rule (and that includes DJ's error) and there is knowing a rule but not realising that you have breached it eg by not noticing you touched sand with your backswing in a bunker, not noticing you accidentally moved your ball, not noticing that you had teed up in front of the markers. You cannot know what you have not seen. In such a situation it's right that the player cops the penalty for whatever it was, but not right that he should be further penalised. Exception – Failure to Include Unknown Penalty: If one or more of the player’s hole scores are lower than the actual scores because he or she excluded one or more penalty strokes that the player did not know about before returning the scorecard.

A player of integrity who knows the rules but who breaches one without noticing has his attention drawn to it after he has put in his card. He immediately goes to the committee and reports that he has been advised that he had breached this rule but he had not noticed that he had . The penalty is added on to his score and he feels relieved that he did not inadvertently end up with a better score than he should have done. He has, in short, done the right thing, the honest thing. He has shown integrity. Is it just that he be penalised a further two strokes because other golfers might deliberately cheat their way to a better score than they made? [By the way, if I make an honest mistake in a tax return and correct it after the return date, I don't get penalised. Perhaps US tax law is different.]

I'm not seeing the advantage. If you breach a rule and know to take penalty you are 1 or 2 strokes worse off than if you hadn't breached it. If you breach a rule and don't know to take a penalty but it is later discovered and added to your score, you are the same 1 or 2 strokes worse off. The only two ways in which you can have an advantage is 1)if you breach a rule and no-one including yourself knows you have; and 2), if you are dishonest and knowingly don't take a penalty you know you have incurred. If I understand correctly, iacas wants the player who has the penalty for a later discovered breach added to be further punished for his ignorance - pour encourager les autres, I presume. In my view, threatening players into learning the rules is not the purpose of a penalty in golf. And considering you see so many players with no knowledge of the rules, as a threat it doesn't seem to working too well, does it? We should also bear in mind that one of the reasons for not knowing you have incurred a penalty is not being ignorant of the rules, but being unaware you have broken one. Take touching sand in a bunker with your backswing, for example. I know perfectly well that is not allowed and I get a 2 stroke penalty for doing so, but I could simply not have realised, not have noticed that I had. That is not ignorance of the rule, but genuinely not knowing there had been a breach. I do not need an additional 2 stroke penalty to encourage me to know the rules. I know them but I might breach one of them without noticing.

I just don't get the fuss about this particular rule. The game depends on the integrity of the player and the rules are based on the premise that players will proceed honestly. Why pick out one rule over all the others which can be bent, broken or manipulated by the dishonest?

True!

These are loaded questions designed to steer answers to a desired result. .

Try it at my club and find out.

My first paragraph was only intended to point out that it wouldn't normally be possible to stand in front of the player and simultaneously see the target and the player's stance. I missed the aspect of the question whereby if you are on the other side of the hole on the green you could see both target and player. Thanks for pointing that out. I see nothing that would prohibit the caddie standing there and guiding his player while he took his stance provided he moved away before his player made his stroke. Attending the flagstick is specifically excepted.

The prohibition on standing behind the player while he takes his stance is to stop a caddie assisting in lining up his feet and body. That can only be done from behind. If the caddie stood in front and faced the player to line up his feet etc he wouldn't be able to see the target. If he faced the target he wouldn't be able to see his player. Off the green, anyone can stand on your line of play to point it out. The person must move away before the stroke is made, which means he can be there while the player takes his stance. [Rule 10.2b (1)] On the green, your caddie will be able to stand on your line of play while pointing it out as there be no penalty for touching the line of play. He must not stay on or near the line of play while the stroke is being made (except if attending the flagstick) which again means that he could be there while you take your stance. [Rule 10.2b(2)]

I had never heard the term "waste area" until meeting it on American forums. There weren't any on the links courses in Scotland I spent my early days of golfing on. Plenty of sand dunes though. 😀

WIkipedia has got it wrong then. A bunker is just a bunker wherever it is situated and there is no such thing in the Rules as a "waste bunker".

Thanks for the reference. I'm going to use this as part of a presentation to members on the new rules.

I reckon if you were putting down a slope like that, the ball would bounce off the flagstick and continue to accelerate to a position a long, long way away. 😀

Yes, it really has to be if the flagstick is at a considerable angle. I've certainly seen it happen that the flagstick has not been properly returned to its hole at the bottom of the cup and is leaning against the edge of the hole. That would mean a ball could be stopped against it without any of it even being over the hole never mind part of it being below the surface. Unusual though. But if in the end it is at all possible, the rule has to cover it. If you try the tap in with the flagstick in I don't suppose many people will say, "That's fine. It's covered in Rule 13.2." 😉

No need! Next year a ball resting against the flagstick will be considered holed if any part of the ball is below the surface of the green. If no part of the ball is below the surface, then it is not holed but you can put all the care in the world into removing the flagstick and ensuring the ball falls into the hole, it will not be holed. You will have to replace it on the lip of the hole. See Rule 13.2c

The two statements did not contradict each other and I hope the post above and klineka's post explain that. The second statement is correct. Decision 24-2b/4 explains that after taking relief you are completely free to play your shot with any club. It does not have to be the one used to determine the Nearest Point of Relief. Nor for that matter does it have to be the one used to measure the one club length from the NPR

That's correct - exactly what I said in Post #12. To avoid confusion through the words used, you do not measure the NPR, you determine where it is or as you rightly put it, you find it. The distance between where your ball lies and the NPR is the length of a piece of string: it depends entirely on the circumstances. It might be just a few inches away from a sprinkler head; it might be a matter of yards if your ball is on a road or in a large area of GUR. It is only when you have established where the NPR is that you might measure the club length from it in order to be sure to drop your ball in the right area. These two Decisions are helpful http://www.usga.org/rules/rules-and-decisions.html#!decision-24,d24-2b-1 http://www.usga.org/rules/rules-and-decisions.html#!decision-24,d24-2b-4

Sure, but it didn't quite read that way!

Just to clarify this a bit. To determine the nearest point of relief, you should use the club you would have used for the shot you would have played had the path not been there. To measure one club length from the NPR you can use any club in your bag (until December 31st!). Once you have dropped your ball, you may play with any club you wish. That means, for example, you can measure with a driver and play with a wedge.