“It's good sportsmanship not to pick up golf balls while they are still rolling.”
—Mark Twain
It used to be that golfers couldn't legally pick up their balls from the green and replace them with “markers.” Maneuvering around other players' balls while putting was considered part of the game. By the 1950s, a couple of pros in tournament decided to take advantage of these rules, hitting their opponents' balls far afield, as if playing croquet. The rules were soon changed.
“If the following foursome is pressing you, wave them through—and then speed up.”
—Dean Beman
In 1744, the Magistrates and Council of Edinburgh approved the world's first codified rules and regulations of golf. The “Articles and Laws in Playing Golf—The Rules of the Gentlemen Golfers of Leith” were only thirteen in number. Here they are:
It seems like trying to become a virgin again, but it is possible to have your amateur status reinstated by the United States Golf Association (USGA) after going pro. Hundreds of golfers have made the transition back.
However, if you go pro and stay that way for five years, you're ineligible to have your amateur status restored.
No, you can't putt by straddling the ball and hitting it croquet style. That was banned in 1968.
You also can't putt with a pool cue. The USGA forbade the use of pool cues for putting in 1895 after a dispute came up during the U.S. Amateur.
In Professional Golf Association (PGA) tournaments, a player is penalized if he dallies more than 45 seconds before hitting the ball.
Other than glasses or contact lenses, you're not allowed to enhance your vision or better estimate your distance from the hole through the use of a sextant, binoculars, range finder, global positioning system, or any other device.
If you begin your swing and the wind blows your ball off your tee before you can hit it, it still counts as a stroke.
Nowadays, when you hit your ball out of play, you “drop” a ball by holding it out at arm's length and letting go. However, it wasn't always that way. There was a time when you were supposed to drop it over your shoulder. The problem was that the ball would often bounce off the player's body and roll away, so the rule was eventually changed.
According to the official rules of golf, if an opponent asks how many strokes you've taken on a hole, you must tell him or her the truth.
According to the USGA, a player is entitled to relief, or dropping another ball without penalty, if the player's ball comes to rest near a bird's nest and he cannot play the ball without damaging the nest.
A player also gets relief if his or her ball comes to rest in a dangerous situation, for instance, near an alligator, a live rattlesnake, or a bees' nest. Whew!
Aplayer is not entitled to relief under USGA rules if his or her ball comes to rest in a herbally dangerous situation. If a ball is found within poison ivy, for instance, or poison sumac, a player cannot drop another ball without incurring a penalty. Calamine lotion, anyone?
“Go ahead and putt, you are not interrupting my conversation.”
—Robert E. Zorn, golf writer
Strangely enough, according to PGA rules, you get a two-stroke penalty for accidentally hitting your partner with a ball … but there's no penalty for hitting any-body else.
You can also get a penalty for acts of God that occur after addressing your ball but before your club makes contact with it. Say you've addressed the ball and the wind or an earthquake knocks your ball off the tee before you hit it. That's stroke one.
You're not allowed to wear shorts in PGA tournaments (or on some golf courses). As a way to get around the prohibitions, golfers traditionally wore colorful knickers, also called “plus fours” because four inches of fabric were added so that they'd reach below the knee.
Dress code of the PGA Tour dictates players must wear long pants and collared shirts. In 1992, when Mark Wiebe showed up at the Anheuser Busch Classic in shorts to beat the 102-degree temperature, he was fined $500.