The final event on the PGA Tour schedule provided one last rules incident involving Rory Sabbatini.
During the first round of the RSM Classic at the Plantation Course he realised he had left a small sticker on the face of his fairway wood from when he was practising with the club earlier in the week.
These small stickers are used by launch monitors to track face angle at impact and to collect data on swing speed and other parameters.
Unfortunately for Sabbatini, this rendered the club non-conforming under the equipment rules and he was therefore disqualified after his round.
Common practice among club golfers is to put some protective tape at the top or bottom of the face of their woods to protect them from wear and tear.
Unfortunately, should you play in a competition or tournament you would be playing with a non-conforming club and therefore would be disqualified.
Another interesting rules scenario happened on the LPGA Tour during the CME Group Tour Championship.
During the second round, Jeongeun Lee hit her ball into the penalty area over the back of the green on the 6th hole.
Fortunately for her, her ball stopped short of the water and was playable.
The TV tower behind the green was, however, on her line of play to the hole. On the Tours around the world, TV towers are normally classified as ‘Temporary Immovable Obstructions (TIOs)’.
For a normal obstruction in a penalty area you would not get any relief and would have to either play the ball as it lies or take penalty relief outside the penalty area using the available options under Rule 17.
In this case, however, Lee was entitled to free relief from the TIO as per tournament local rules. The only catch was that she had to still drop in the penalty area when taking relief from the TV tower.
This is one of those cases where if you’re watching at home on TV you can’t understand why you would get a free drop inside a penalty area.
This is why we have tournament local rules that apply specifically on Tour to make provision for these special circumstances that occur.
– This article first appeared in the January 2022 issue of Compleat Golfer magazine. Subscribe here!
