Oxfordcomma
Challenge Tour Pro
Hello all
I'm pretty sure I know what the answers to this one are but thought it was worth checking and then also asking a question.
In my round yesterday, my two FCs played their shots onto the green and ended up 3 inches apart. As it's a bounce game they're both using old balls out of the bag and it turns out they were both playing Srixon Softfeels that had red pen marks. One had a red dot, one had a red circle round the number. Different and recognisable, but very similar.
FC1 arrives at the green first, marks the closer of the two balls and picks it up, tells FC2 that it's him to play. FC2's ball has no mark visible, the red circle is facing downwards. So, FC2 plays the ball, misses the putt, taps in for his 2 points. FC1 then replaces his ball and FC2 immediately spots his own mark and tells FC1 that he has marked the wrong ball. (actually, he put it rather more strongly than that!! FC indeed. Good thing they're very old friends.)
So first of all confirmation - if this had been a qualifier, we were all agreed that FC2 is responsible for checking his own ball and should have a 2-stroke penalty. He's played the wrong ball, Rule 15-3. Looking afterwards, I initially thought that that FC1 should also have had a penalty under 18-3 but actually that only applies to matchplay, 18-4 for strokeplay says that FC1 has no penalty. Do these interpretations sound correct to the rules gurus out there?
And if I'm correct in that, here's the question - does that not just seem wrong? If you pick up the wrong ball and mislead your mate into playing yours, innocently or not, shouldn't you also get some form of penalty?
I'm pretty sure I know what the answers to this one are but thought it was worth checking and then also asking a question.
In my round yesterday, my two FCs played their shots onto the green and ended up 3 inches apart. As it's a bounce game they're both using old balls out of the bag and it turns out they were both playing Srixon Softfeels that had red pen marks. One had a red dot, one had a red circle round the number. Different and recognisable, but very similar.
FC1 arrives at the green first, marks the closer of the two balls and picks it up, tells FC2 that it's him to play. FC2's ball has no mark visible, the red circle is facing downwards. So, FC2 plays the ball, misses the putt, taps in for his 2 points. FC1 then replaces his ball and FC2 immediately spots his own mark and tells FC1 that he has marked the wrong ball. (actually, he put it rather more strongly than that!! FC indeed. Good thing they're very old friends.)
So first of all confirmation - if this had been a qualifier, we were all agreed that FC2 is responsible for checking his own ball and should have a 2-stroke penalty. He's played the wrong ball, Rule 15-3. Looking afterwards, I initially thought that that FC1 should also have had a penalty under 18-3 but actually that only applies to matchplay, 18-4 for strokeplay says that FC1 has no penalty. Do these interpretations sound correct to the rules gurus out there?
And if I'm correct in that, here's the question - does that not just seem wrong? If you pick up the wrong ball and mislead your mate into playing yours, innocently or not, shouldn't you also get some form of penalty?
