What constitutes 'Improving lie'

[cloudshouter]

I watched Jon Rahm today in the rough at the back of the 16th in Madrid. He had a tricky downhill short pitch fo some delicacy and elected to play a lob wedge. He quite clearly patted the club down behind the ball and flattened some grass and flipped the ball out as nice as you like.
I called 'improving his lie, 2 shots', the other guys watching said 'nah, that's ok'. I've seen players locally in heavy rough whacking down the grass enough to hit a 3 wood out of it....clearly not ok. So, where are the boundaries?

 

[rulefan]

It seems that the PGA Tour referees (who are of course employed by the PGA Tour itself) and some Euro Tour referees have a different concept to most other referees and readers of the rule.
They all seem to have the same middle name of Horatio.

Actions That Are Allowed
In preparing for or making a stroke, a player may take any of these actions and there is no penalty even if doing so improves the conditions affecting the stroke:
(4) Ground the club lightly right in front of or right behind the ball.
But this does not allow:

• Pressing the club on the ground,

 

[drdel]

I reckon he knew exactly what he was doing, 2 shot penalty.

 

[duncan mackie]

You will see a lot of players deliberately loose grip when setting the club behind the ball - if it's a heavy club it will obviously flatten some situations. Perfectly acceptable.
Pressing the club down isn't.
To be honest it makes little difference at tour player level - it's the handicap golfer who wants to see and feel he has a good lie to provide the confide.nce to play such shots