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Turn your phone off when on the course
In most sports you’ve got players or teams obeying a set of rules. When those rules are broken, an umpire or official is on hand to give their final verdict on the matter. Golf, though, often doesn’t have such an arbiter. Instead, it relies on the manners, common sense and sportsmanship of the players. Together, these are the golfing rules of etiquette.
Sportsmanship and the rules
Golfers don’t like cheats. And, perhaps even worse, they don’t like people who bend the rules. This isn’t football with its divers or baseball with its heckling. On the golf course you’re expected to behave with manners and follow the rules as best you can.
While these aren’t official rules, they should be obeyed as if they were:
- Don’t stand on someone’s putting line – If your ball is in the way, ask to mark it and then step away
- Keep out of view on swings – In fact, keep out of anyone’s eye line and peripheral vision when they’re taking a shot. This includes your shadow
- Give people room – People don’t want to be worrying about hitting another golfer, so keep well back
- Don't offer swing advice – Unless specifically asked for, even if someone has something clearly wrong with their swing, don’t offer advice
- No taunting – Don’t attempt to put someone off their swing at all
- Help out – If your golfing buddy has lost their ball, help them find it
- Keep score – After you’ve all completed the hole, ask for scores and be honest
- Stick to the rule books – As a regular golfer you’re expected to know the rules. If there are any ‘house rules’ (mulligans allowed etc), agree them beforehand
Other golfers
One of the biggest faux pas on the golf course is slow play. While a game of golf can be relaxing, chatting between holes, taking your time on shots and spending too long searching for balls can slow play down. Be ready to play when it’s your turn – have your club selected and know where your ball is.
On busy courses, slow play can create a backlog of players looking to play through. If you’re a naturally slow player and a group are always coming up behind you, let them play through.
The R&A’s guidance on this is that if the group in front of you is more than a hole ahead, then you should let the team behind you play that hole.
Oh, and make sure your phone is turned off.
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Looking after the course
Your behaviour doesn’t just extend to other players. A golf course is a finely managed and maintained thing and needs as much care as your favourite clubs. And it’s expected that the players help out with this maintenance.
While they’re not expected to cut the grass, they should repair any divots or ball marks they’ve made. Sometimes, repairing these divots isn’t possible with soil flying everywhere. In these situations, do your best – push as much of the turf back into place as possible and level it off. If you’ve got a soil and seed mixture on your cart (which many do) add it to the hole.
If you happen to land in the bunker, come prepared with a rake. Enter the bunker from the lowest point (ie don’t slide down the steepest face), and after you’ve played your shot (and managed to get out the bunker), rake the area you’ve disturbed.
On the green, while you should repair any marks made by your golf spikes, only do this after you’ve played your shot. And to keep it in good condition, don’t lean on your club while on the green.
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Player safety
Finally, while it’s not a contact sport there are plenty of ways to get injured on a golf course. Making sure you play safely should help stop these injuries.
This includes never playing a shot if you think that it could hit someone. If someone does walk into the flight of the ball, yell ‘fore’ to warn them. If you’ve played and hadn’t noticed people nearby, apologise to them after.
And, most of all, keep your temper under control. Throwing clubs, playing shots while angry or kicking balls could end up injuring someone. And, if we’re honest, it’s all-round bad golfing etiquette.
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