Lady Golfer of the Year Rules

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2021 Ladies Golfer of the Year

Rules:

The points awarded for the Golfer of the Year competition are allocated for the Top 10 net scores in each of the designated competitions.

The events are:

  • All 18 Hole Competitions in Bearna Golf & Country Club held betweenMay 14th 2021 until 19th September 2021 inclusive.

Points will be allocated as follows:

  • 18 Hole Singles Competition (apart from Majors)
    • 1st     12 points
    • 2nd    10 points
    • 3rd       8 points
    • 4th to 10th: 7,6,5,4,3,2 and 1 point respectively
  • Major competitions (Lady Captain’s Prize, Captain’s Prize to Ladies, President’s Prize and Directors prize)
    • 5 times the above point structure e.g. 1st place in Lady Captain’s gets 18 points and so on

Please Note – there are no allocated points towards GOY for the winners/runners up of the ladies club singles matchplay.

Each player will have their points from their best 12 events over the year added together

The person with the highest number of points will be deemed to be the winner of Golfer of the Year. The winner will be awarded the GOY prize and will be entitled to park in the Ladies GOY parking space for the 2022 golf season.

In the event of a tie for first place an 18 Hole singles stableford competition will decide the winner.

May 2021

Bearna Golf Club – 25th Anniversary

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In 2021 Bearna Golf Club will celebrate its 25th Anniversary. The first Drive-in was held on the 31st March 1996 with men’s Captain Richard Hughes and Lady Captain Liz Neville doing the honours.

The above photograph is of the members waiting to play in the scramble after the drive-in. Note, that even in those days the current wooden cabins had not arrived and that the current clubhouse was a building site. 

During the year the Men’s and Ladies Committee’s will be organising various events to celebrate the occasion. It is planned to publish a brief history of the club, arrange special competitions and to commemorate the occasion in many other ways. Any inputs or suggestions from members would be gratefully accepted.  If any members have any memorabilia that they believe might be interesting, please send details to John Collins at collinsjoh15@gmail.com. 

So here’s to an exciting year in 2021.

Repairing plug marks near your ball

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Conditions on the course are getting softer as we head into winter and a ball will often plug after a stroke then hop out of its plug mark before coming to rest. If this plug mark is near the ball you cannot repair it before you make a stroke as in doing so you are improving the conditions affecting the stroke by which is meant improving the area of intended stance or swing, lie of the ball and line of play so resist the temptation to press it down with your foot! By all means repair the plug mark afterwards. The rules do allow us to repair plug marks on the green and it is good etiquette to repair any marks you see whether or not you were responsible for making them either before or after you putt.

Winter Golf – Points to Remember

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1.  You have 3 minutes to search for a ball so time the search from when you get to where you think your ball may be.  It can be difficult to find a ball in the soft ground after all the rain we have had.

2.  If a crow takes your ball replace it or another ball on the original spot, which if not known can be estimated. No penalty.   It must be known or virtually certain that the bird took the ball otherwise the ball is lost.

3.  When you place the ball during the preferred lie period you can play either the original ball or a substituted ball under the new rules.

 

You can go back and play a provisional ball during the 3 minute ball search

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If a ball may be lost or out of bounds always play a provisional ball to save time.  Ideally you should play the provisional ball before going forward to search but you may also go back during the 3 minute search period and play a provisional ball while others keep searching for you.  If your original ball is found within the 3 minutes it is still your ball in play and a provisional ball played has to be abandoned.  If after 3 minutes your original ball is not found then continue playing with the provisional ball which is now the ball in play, under penalty.  It is important that someone in the group clocks the time that the player begins a ball search as 3 minutes goes by very quickly!  The search time starts when the player him or herself get to where the original ball is thought to be.

Quick Quiz on the new Rules – have a go!

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Rules Quiz

Click on Rules Quiz and see how you get on.  Answers will be posted at the end of next week.

And another thing….a few points following the Bearna Rules Night

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Thank you all for attending the Bearna Club Rules Presentation.  As many of the new rules as possible were covered and here are a few additional points:

  • No penalty if a ball strikes you, your partner, your caddie or equipment.  Play the ball as it lies.
  • No penalty for casually leaning on a club in a bunker as long as you are not intentionally testing the condition of the sand.
  • If your ball is still in the teeing area after a stroke – that is, it is at rest in the rectangular area between the tee markers and 2 club lengths behind them then the ball may be re-teed without penalty.  If it is mis-hit and comes to rest forward of the tee markers, play the ball as it lies as it is now in the general area or re-tee under penalty.
  • Free relief from any abnormal course condition is for interference to stance and area of intended swing as well as to the lie of the ball
  • In taking free relief from any abnormal course condition in a bunker or on the putting green you may take maximum available relief if you cannot find a spot that gives you full relief from the condition. 

In answer to a question from the floor, you are penalised one stroke if you move a loose impediment and the ball moves anywhere on the course except the putting green.  However if your ball is at rest in a penalty area, you have no intention of playing it and decide to take relief under penalty outside the penalty area then you may lift the ball and if you move loose impediments in lifting it there is no penalty as you are not playing the ball as it lies.  Had you decided to play in the penalty area and moved loose impediments around the ball then you would be penalised one stroke.

Download the 2019 Rules of Golf App to your phone for easy access to the rules while on the course.

Bunkers and the New Rules

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Bunkers have a rule all to themselves in the 2019 Rules of Golf, Rule 12 and while the challenge of playing out of a bunker is the same the rules about playing from a bunker have changed

You may

  • Remove loose impediments from the bunker like leaves, twigs, stones or any natural object before you play from the bunker but be careful not to move the ball in the process – if you do the penalty is one stroke and replace the ball
  • As before remove any movable obstruction like a rake, litter or any other artificial object and if the ball moves in the process no penalty and replace the ball
  • To save time rake footprints before you play as long as it is for the sole purpose of caring for the course, is not testing the condition of the sand and is nowhere near your ball i.e. does not improve the lie or area of stance or swing of your ball
  • Use the new option under the unplayable rule of taking the ball out of the bunker altogether for 2 penalty strokes and dropping back on the line behind the bunker.  This option is in addition to the normal unplayable ball options of stroke and distance, back on the line in the bunker and within 2 club lengths in the bunker.
  • Lean on your club in the bunker without incurring a penalty

Note: stones in bunkers can no longer me treated as movable obstructions by local rule as they are loose impediments by definition and can be removed under the new rules so be careful not to move the ball if moving stones near it in the bunker.

Ball played from the red penalty area on the 4th comes to rest in the same penalty area…what are my options?

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Your tee shot on the 4th ends up in the red penalty area on the right and you decide to play it but unfortunately it ends up still in the penalty area.  What are your options if you do not want to play the ball as it lies?  Under penalty of one stroke you can:

  • Take stroke and distance relief by playing from a relief area based on where the previous stroke was made in the penalty area, 4th shot
  • Take lateral relief, the reference point being where the ball last crossed the edge of the penalty area, 4th shot
  • Take back on the line relief by dropping a ball in a relief area based on a reference line going straight back from where it last crossed the edge of the penalty area and the hole (an unlikely option at the 4th in Bearna), 4th shot or
  • Play from the tee again, 4th shot

If you choose the first (stroke and distance) option, drop the ball and then decide NOT to play the dropped ball, for an additional penalty you may take lateral relief, back on the line relief or play again from the tee, 5th shot

All of these options are described in Rule 17-2, Options after Playing Ball from Penalty Area.  You cannot declare a ball unplayable in a penalty area, you can only proceed under the penalty area rule.