The Zone Interactive Golf Magazine (UK) The Zone Issue 26 | Page 42

DEREK CLEMENTS
without penalty. Apparently not. But wait
a couple of minutes for a gust of wind to
come along and blow them all out and that
is just fine.

repair spikemarks. They are, after all, allowed
to repair pitchmarks. What’s the difference?
Come on, that’s a question and I am waiting
for somebody to give me an answer.

Speaking of bunkers, will somebody kindly
explain to me how the following can
possibly be right? It has been raining. Hard!
You put your approach into a water-filled
bunker and the only place you can drop
it within that bunker is at the back, on a
downslope. The sand is saturated so you
drop the ball and it plugs. You could be in
there all day. Of course, you can lift it out
under penalty, but why? If the bunker is not
fit for purpose (ie unplayable), you should
be entitled to a free drop.

Then there are those busybodies sitting
at home watching the golf on TV. “Ooooh
Mabel, did you see that? I am sure that
Tiger’s ball moved then.”“Ooooh, look at
that, Gloria, he shifted a twig and that ball
moved. I am sure it did.”“Esmerelda, get in
here quick. He touched the sand with that
club. Where’s the phone book? I am going
to get on the phone to those nice old men
at the PGA Tour and tell them.”

From bunkers we move to paths - those
you walk on and those built for carts. Once
again, logic would dictate that a manmade
path is not an integral part of any golf
course and if you are unfortunate enough
to find your ball on one then you will be
entitled to a free drop. Huh! On some
courses you are, on others you are not.
We have all hit wayward shots that have
found their way onto pristine tees on an
adjoining hole. If the ball hadn’t landed on
the tee, it would probably have finished
up in the rough. On certain courses I have
played, if you land on a tee you have to
drop the ball, without penalty, at the
nearest point of relief. On most others, you
get to take an iron, remove a divot which
disappears into the rough and walk off the
tee shamefaced at the mess you have left
behind.
But please, please, please, don’t get me
started on spikemarks. Week after week we
see the best golfers in the world made to
look stupid when a putt is knocked off line
by a spikemark. Rub of the green, the PGA
and European Tour tell us. Poppycock! Pro
golfers should be allowed to tap down or

Let’s have them all put down. Please! It’s for
their own good. You know it is. Golf is a selfpolicing game, and the people who play it
are honest if they accidentally move a ball.
And if a top pro inadvertently replaced his
ball 25 feet nearer the hole, don’t you think
he would know? Don’t you think he would
hold his hands up?
Retrospective punishments are just plain
stupid. Here’s one you will love. Some years
ago, Padraig Harrington was playing in the
Benson & Hedges International Open at The
Belfry, near Birmingham in England, in May
2000 and broke the course record in the
first round. After three rounds, he was five
shots clear of the field. The club decided
they were going to frame Harrington’s
course-record card but when they retrieved
it, they discovered he hadn’t signed it. Just
as he was about to start his final round,
he was taken aside and told he was being
disqualified. How absurd is that? He had
since played two further rounds!
The rule-makers have banned square
grooves, they got rid of the stymie rule and
they finally saw sense over penalising a
golfer when a gust of wind moved his golf
ball. Now let’s see them tackle some of the
above.

HAVE YOU FALLEN FOUL OF THE RULES? WE WANT TO KNOW ABOUT IT
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