During the BMW Championship in Europe last weekend, 2 interesting rulings will be explained in this article. Ernie Els penalised himself 2 strokes for playing from the wrong place and Brendan Grace got a questionable relief.
Notice to competitors
It is mentioned that an imbedded ball lying through the green (including the rough) may be lifted, cleaned and dropped as near as possible to the original lie.
Rules of golf
When a player is not sure his ball is embedded, he must inform his fellow competitor that he wishes to lift the ball to see if it is embedded. He must give the chance to the fellow competitor to watch the moves. If the ball is not embedded it must replace the ball in the exact spot.
What happened next
On this Par 5 hole, after replacing his ball, Els sent his shot directly in the hole for an EAGLE. Because the stroke was so perfect, Els decided he had put his ball back in a wrong place because originally he had a bad lie.
I know some of my readers that would have never done something like that…
Brendan Grace
This incident is quite different. Grace found his ball in a very bad lie on the upslope of a bunker. After taking his stance (like if he was weighting 300 pounds) he reached the protecting mat under the sand. He called the official and he got a free relief from an immovable obstruction. His next lie was much better than the original lie. The official did not see the movement of the feet.
Many players were very upset of this way of using the rules for your advantage and they think the official made a mistake.
Those 2 rules incidents were one the same golf course and on the same day. Was Els a too good guy and did Grace cheat?