Rules every golfer should know

Rule 17 – Penalty Areas

From January 2019, the term ‘water hazard’ has ceased to exist in the Rules and has been superseded by the term ‘penalty area’.

Penalty areas will still include rivers, ponds, lakes and other water features, but the new definition will also allow Committees to expand the use of the previous red lateral water hazard marking to incorporate areas that do not contain water.

The broader use of ‘penalty areas’ will allow Committees to respond to the wide range of settings in which golf is played by giving relief from areas that present similar challenges to those presented by water hazards.

In recognition of this more diverse application, all such areas have now been rebranded as penalty areas with the default marking colour as red, giving the lateral relief option. So, in the future, you may find red stakes around areas of desert, jungle or perhaps even lava rock fields when you venture from these shores to play golf. However, Committees may still restrict their use to just areas containing water if they so choose.

From a red penalty area, you have three options for relief, each for one penalty stroke. Firstly, you can proceed under stroke-anddistance and play a ball from where the previous stroke was made. Next, you can take back-on-the-line relief by dropping a ball in a one club-length relief area that is based on a reference point going straight back from the hole, through the point where the ball last crossed the edge of the penalty area. Finally, you can choose to take lateral relief, measuring a relief area of two club-lengths no nearer the hole from where your ball last crossed the edge of the penalty area and dropping the ball in this relief area.

The Committee can still retain the ability to mark an area as a yellow penalty area. When marked as a yellow penalty area, the lateral relief option will not be available.

The option to take relief on the opposite side or bank of a penalty area when marked as red has been removed from the Rules, so that players cannot take advantage of dropping on the side of the penalty area that avoids having to play over it. This part of the Rules of old was not well understood and slowed down play. However, Committees may still adopt a Local Rule allowing this extra relief option in circumstances that merit it (for example, where the penalty area adjoins a boundary).

Finally, another change is that you will no longer be penalised for touching the ground or water with your hand or club, taking practice swings or touching or moving loose impediments when your ball lies in a penalty area. You will now be able to do all these things, just as you can elsewhere on the fairway or rough in the general area of the course.