The rules of golf are difficult! Luckily we have the guru. Our Rules Man knows the book from cover to cover. Do you have a question? He has all the answers.
During a stroke play tournament, I hit a ball into the bushes of an unfenced backyard, with no posts or markers in sight. When we drove up, we found a woman who got my ball out of the bush. She asked whose ball it was and threw it at me. Since the ball was clearly in the bush before it was retrieved, I decided to take lateral relief from an unplayable ball. Another player in the group said that if I played from the wrong place there was an additional penalty of two strokes: He felt that I had to make the woman put the ball back where it had been before I could take relief. After a calm discussion he was overruled. Have we understood correctly? —Al Zolin, Brookshire, Texas
Sounds like it, although Rules Guy would have paid a lot of money for you to ask the nice lady to please put the ball back in the bush where she found it – that would have been a hoot!
Rule 9.6 does require you to replace your ball if it has moved due to outside influence, but Rule 14.2c allows the player to take relief without first replacing the ball, in this case as long as the correct reference point (the original location of the ball) was known and used.
For more enlightenment guidance from our guru, read on…
I hit my tee shot on a par 3 well over the green onto the tee box of the next hole. As I was getting ready to hit my recovery shot, I noticed that the ball washer was interfering with my intended swing. I informed my playing partner that I was receiving free help. He said that the ball washer was a permanent structure and that I should play my ball as it lies. Instead, I took the correct solution, no closer to the hole, hit a great chip and made the putt for par. He told me to lay down a bogey for an unplayable lie. Who was right? –Matt Davis, Woodbury, Minnesota.
Matt, the answer depends on whether there was liquid in the ball washer. Just kidding! The answer depends on whether the ball washer was movable or not.
Based on your description, it sounds like it was permanently installed, in which case you were free to take relief because it interfered with your area of intended swing, per Rule 16.1a(1). Thus, there is no penalty provided the relief taken was correct (i.e. the nearest point of full relief, one club length, no closer to the hole).
It is worth noting that the other outcome would have been playing from a wrong place, which gives you the overall penalty of 2 tricks, and not 1 trick for unplayable, since you had no intention of continuing under the unplayable rule. This is also the result if the washer were actually movable, since the free relief allowed for movable obstacles consists of clearing the object out of the way.
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