Dropping a Ball in a Defined Relief Area

· New dropping procedure: You must drop the ball from knee height.

It must drop straight down and not touch anything before it touches the course in the relief area. If it then hits or rests against your foot or any equipment or outside influence this is ok, as long as it’s not deliberately stopped. If the ball moves when you move your foot etc., the ball must be replaced.

The ball must remain in the relief area once dropped.

If the ball fails to come to rest having been dropped twice correctly in the relief area, the ball must be placed on the spot where it first touched the course.

http://www.usga.org/content/usga/home-page/rules-hub/rules-modernization/major-changes/new-procedure-for-dropping-a-ball.html

· Longest club is used to measure the relief area: The size of the relief area is either 1 or 2 club lengths, as it is now, depending on the rule. You use the longest club in your bag, other than a putter, to measure the relief area.

http://www.usga.org/content/usga/home-page/rules-hub/rules-modernization/major-changes/measuring-the-size-of-the-relief-area.html

· Defined relief area: The ball needs to be dropped in and played from the relief area. It is no longer allowed to roll up to 2 club lengths.

http://www.usga.org/content/usga/home-page/rules-hub/rules-modernization/major-changes/where-a-dropped-ball-must-come-to-rest.html

Ball to Use in Taking Relief

· Substituting another ball: You may continue to use the original ball or replace the ball with another ball, whenever you take either free relief or penalty relief under a rule.

http://www.usga.org/content/usga/home-page/rules-hub/rules-modernization/major-changes/substitution-of-a-ball-always-allowed-when-taking-relief.html

Next week we will look at different relief situations.