We have all witnessed things on the golf course that have left us speechless - and not just in the amateur game either. There have been some scarcely credible incidents within the professional game too.
I can remember Nick Faldo reporting Sandy Lyle way back in the day because the Scot had put a bit of tape on his putter to prevent glare from the sun. Faldo argued that it altered the club and was therefore a breach off the rules.
There have been golfers who have been shamed for blatantly cheating.
(Image Credit: Kevin Diss Photography)
So which bad behaviour or practices would have you drawing the line? When would you call out a playing partner or opponent? This is a game that prides itself on its ability to police itself, on the integrity of those who play the game.
Grounding their club in a bunker
The rules of golf are clear - when playing from a bunker, you are not allowed to ground your club on the sand when addressing the ball. But how many times have you seen people doing precisely that? Whether you like it or not, it is cheating and those who do it are fooling nobody but themselves.
Not raking bunkers
Please do not get me started on this one. I have a real problem with walking into a bunker and finding my ball lying in a footprint. Let’s get something straight - raking the sand takes seconds and is part and parcel of the etiquette of the game. So if one of your playing partners hits a bunker shot and fails to rake the sand properly, do you point it out to him? Do you ignore it? Or do you climb into the trap and make a huge point of doing his job for him? For the record, I would call them out every single time.
Not replacing their divots
We have all found ourselves hitting perfect tee shots that end up nestling in a freshly-left divot mark in the middle of a fairway. There is much debate as to whether we should be allowed to take a free drop in such circumstances but surely the bigger issue is that we should all be replacing divots as a matter of course. If I am playing with somebody who consistently fails to replace divots, I will always do it for them in the hope that they might eventually get the hint.
Not repairing their pitchmarks
Club golfers are encouraged to repair pitchmarks. It is something that I have always done. I fix my own and then I look for any others and repair them too. Of course, if we all repaired our pitchmarks there would be no need for any of this. I have a simple solution - I always repair my partners’ pitchmarks before attending to my own. I then fix mine and look for any others. And do you know what? Playing partners quickly get the message and start almost racing you to the putting surface to fix it before you can!
Marking the ball incorrectly
I played in a team match earlier this season and watched in utter disbelief as one of my opponents marked his ball on the green by putting his marker in front of the ball, using a massive roulette-style chip, and then replacing it on the other side of the marker, thus moving his ball a couple of inches closer to the hole in every single occasion. I play this game for fun, and I have to say that I was raging - this was obvious cheating. I said nothing on the course but had a quiet word with his partner after our game. He said: "Oh yes, he is known for that." In other words, nobody had ever challenged him.
Temper tantrums
So, you are out there on a glorious summer’s day enjoying the company of like-minded people when one of those you are playing with hits a poor shot and then slams his club into the ground, curses, swears and storms off. He doesn’t speak for several holes and continues to throw tantrums at regular intervals. This is unacceptable behaviour and is something that we should ALL challenge. There is absolutely no excuse for it whatsoever.
Taking too long searching for lost balls
How long do you get to look for a golf ball? Three minutes. Period. No argument. End of. So will somebody please explain to me why so many of us don’t say a word when those we play with take far longer to keep searching? Worse than that, what about those who declare their ball lost, then find the original and play if as if nothing had happened? As golfers who follow the rules and understand etiquette there is surely a duty to put these individuals right?
Slow play
If the group in front of you has clearly lost two or three holes and is holding you up on every tee shot, then you are going to have a right old moan about. But what do you do? Do you grin and bear it? Do you tell them they are holding everybody up and ask to be waved through? Do you wait until you have finished your round and then report them to the pro? Doing nothing will only encourage them, and others like them, to carry on regardless. They should be challenged on the course.
Dropping the ball in the wrong place
How many times have you seen golfers placing the ball incorrectly after hitting their original into a hazard? This is often done because of ignorance of the rules and I will always put them right.
Blatantly cheating
Where to start? When somebody finds a golf ball and you know it is nowhere near where the original went, what do you do? When you watch golfers supposedly "identifying" their ball in the rough and improving the lie, what do you do? When somebody tells you they have had a five when you know full well they have taken six, what do you do? When you see somebody using a club to improve their lie in the fairway, what do you do? You could do nothing, I suppose. But if you ignore it you know full well that they will carry on doing it. My feeling is that challenging them on the course is not the way to handle this but I would definitely be having a quiet word after the round has finished. And I will always challenge an incorrect score on the spot.
No returns
We all have nightmare rounds from time to time, often in important competitions, and the temptation may be to decide to put in a no return. Sadly, there are some serial offenders. I have played with a few of them over the years and when they reach the point in the round where they tell me they are not going to bother putting in a card I will always challenge them and "encourage" them not to do so. It doesn’t do anybody any favours.
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