a large extent. But why Octopus? When
we teach Rules, we refer to Rule 20 as The
Octopus, since it has its tentacles in almost
every other Rule, in the current book. Believe
me, for us administrators, life has indeed
been made simpler, with the new Rules!
Among others, important changes are
- removing penalty for a ball striking ones
own equipment, being able to putt with the
fl agstick in, no penalty for striking the ball
more than once, disallowing caddie or partner
from lining you up, reducing search time to
3 minutes and permitting removal of loose
impediments in a penalty area (currently
known as hazard).
FOR REGULAR JOE
For friendly (or not so friendly) four balls, it
must come as a great relief that your caddie
can now merrily, mark your ball without
specifi c authority every time (did you not
know that, currently, you needed to authorise
your caddie?? Well, lucky you, if you haven’t
had the misery of being penalised 2 strokes
every time!!!!). For those who can’t play
bunkers for toss, have no fear, we have now
allowed you to jump out of the bunker by
giving away 2 strokes ( as you read it you will
still have to go back to where you last played
from, if you want to get out of the bunker
without playing a stroke!). And if you were
loathe to climb all that way back up the hill
to put another one onto play, if you lost your
ball or found it (mysteriously) out of bounds,
have no fear, petition your Club Committee to
implement Model Local Rule E 5, where you
can drop a ball proximate to where you think
you lost it, all for just 2 strokes!!
WE WERE WATCHING YOU
For elite tournament golf, under the scrutiny
of TV, a signifi cant change is that a player’s
judgement in estimating a spot, point, area
etc will not be second guessed by later TV
evidence, if you have made every effort to get
it right!
THE IGU HARD CARD
Circa 2012, taking the que from the major
Professional Tours, we produced a Hard Card,
that listed out the Conditions of Competition
and Local Rules that would be in effect in 70
+ events, held annually, under the aegis of the
IGU.
The New Rules have also made signifi cant
changes to the erstwhile Appendices.
Conditions of Competition is now to be
called “Terms of Competition”, “Decisions”
have now become “Interpretations” and
“Recommended Local Rules” have become
“Model Local Rules” under Committee
Procedures. We have therefore had to make
substantial changes to our Hard Card and
while this has now gone to print and be
available for distribution to all our players,
offi cial and stakeholders on 1st January, 2019,
a sneak peek of the document is appended
to this column. Some of the signifi cant
modifi cations to the 2019 Rules are:
1.
Model Local Rule F-2.1 - Embedded
ball relief only in closely mown areas
2.
Model Local Rule G 5 – Distance
Measuring Devices not to be used
3.
Model Local Rule G 8 – Use of Audio
GolfPlus
and Video devices prohibited
LOCAL RULES
If you are a Club Committee member in
charge of the Local Rules and don’t know
where to start, do contact us and we will help
you draft your Club’s Local rules. But rewrite
you must, since the changes are dramatic,
and you need to let your members know what
they are.
IGU RULES SCHOOLS
The IGU’s Level 2 School is scheduled for
January 11-13,2019 at Chennai. If you are a
Level 2 certifi ed offi cial, do contact the IGU
for a slot in this School. If you are not, we
will be commencing our Level 1 Schools
across the country from February 2019. So,
watch the IGU website for details.
Until then, keep smiling, the game is
about to get much easier- understanding
Rules I mean!!
DECEMBER
2018
19