The Tuesday Morning Rules of Golf

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THE TUESDAY MORNING
RULES OF GOLF
As amended by four retired guys, every Tuesday since 1994

I'm Bill Veloz. I spent thirty-one years building airplanes at a plant in Wichita, Kansas, and retired in the spring of 1994. The first Tuesday after I retired, three fellows I knew from the plant called and said they had a 7:10 tee time at the municipal course on the west side of town and needed a fourth. We've had the same tee time every Tuesday since. Same four guys, same course, same arguments.

Over five years we have built up our own set of rules. They are written down on the back of an old scorecard that lives in the Professor's glove compartment and has been laminated twice. My grandson put this page together so the rules would be "backed up." Next to each one I've put what the real Rules of Golf say, in plain English, so nobody can accuse us of not knowing better. We know better. We just don't do better.

The Foursome:
The Professor (Tom Ehrhardt). Engineer. Keeps the card. Owns a rule book and has read it.
Coop (Richard Coppock). Tool and die. Has never hit the same club twice on the same hole.
Fast Eddie (Eddie Andrews). Sheet metal. Seventy-one years old and the slowest man in Sedgwick County. The name is a kindness.
Velcro (me). Because everything I hit sticks in a tree.

HOLE	TUESDAY RULE	WHAT THE BOOK SAYS
FRONT NINE
1	The Mulligan Schedule. One mulligan off the first tee and one off the tenth. One more on your birthday. They can't be saved, traded or carried over to next week. (Coop tried in 1996.)	There's no such thing. Every stroke counts. If your first one goes out of bounds and you hit another, that's stroke and distance: you're hitting your third.
2	The Gimme. In 1994 a gimme was anything inside the leather. In 1995 it was a putter's length. By 1997 it was the length of the flagstick. This year it's a cart's length. We are discussing the parking lot.	In stroke play you hole out every putt, every time. Skip one and don't go back before you tee off on the next hole, and you're disqualified. Only in match play can your opponent concede a putt.
3	The Tree Is a Lesson. If your ball hits a tree and comes back behind you, you may replay it from where you stood, no penalty, since the tree was trying to teach you something and you've learned it.	The tree is part of the course. The stroke counts, and you play the ball from wherever it ends up.
4	The Lost Ball. You may search as long as it takes the other three to hit. If you don't find it, drop one where everybody agrees it "was in the fairway when we last saw it." No penalty.	You get five minutes to look. After that it's lost, and a lost ball is stroke and distance: one penalty stroke, and you go back and play again from where you hit the last one.
5	The Pond on Seven. Drop on the far side, by the green, one stroke. Nobody walks back to the tee in July.	A ball in a water hazard is a one-stroke penalty. You play again from where you hit, or drop behind the hazard, keeping the spot where it last crossed the edge between you and the hole. Not on the far side. Red stakes give you two more choices: within two club-lengths of where it crossed, or the same distance from the hole on the other bank.
6	The Scorekeeper. The Professor keeps the card, because he's the only one who can add. He reads every score out loud on the next tee, his own included. Nobody may say "put me down for a five" on a hole where four people watched him take seven.	In stroke play another player marks your card, you check it, and you both sign it. Sign for a lower score than you took on any hole and you're disqualified. Sign for a higher one and the higher one stands.
7	The Beverage Cart Treaty of 1995. When the cart comes into view, play stops, whatever stage the backswing is in. The man farthest from the hole buys. Everybody tips a dollar. Nobody tees off while the cart is within range of a slice. (This one is written in after the Incident on Twelve.)	The Rules of Golf don't mention beverage carts. They do say you have to play without undue delay. We figure a cold drink in August isn't undue.
8	The Whiff. A swing that misses the ball entirely is a practice swing, provided you say "practice" before anybody laughs.	If you meant to hit it, it's a stroke, whether you touched the ball or not.
9	Off the Tee. If the ball falls off the tee while you're setting up, put it back. No penalty, and no comments from the gallery.	For once the book is on our side. If it falls off before you've made a stroke at it, re-tee it with no penalty. (The comments from the gallery are not covered.)
BACK NINE
10	The Cart Path. Ball on the path gets a free drop. If it was "headed for the fairway," you may drop it in the fairway.	The path is an obstruction and the drop is free, but it goes at the nearest spot off the path where it doesn't bother your stance or swing, within one club-length, no nearer the hole. Usually that's the rough. Sometimes it's the trees.
11	The Drop. A drop may be performed by placing the ball gently on a nice tuft of grass.	Stand up straight, hold the ball out at shoulder height and arm's length, and let go. Where it lands is where it lands.
12	The Fence on Twelve. A ball over the fence is out of bounds only if you can't see it from the cart. If you can see it, take one stroke and drop it on this side.	Over the fence or past the white stakes is out of bounds, period. Stroke and distance again: one stroke, and play again from where you hit.
13	Unplayable. Any lie Coop doesn't care for is unplayable, and he may move it to one he does care for, no charge.	You can call your ball unplayable anywhere but in a water hazard, and it costs one stroke. Then you have three choices: go back where you last hit from; drop within two club-lengths, no nearer the hole; or drop as far back as you like, keeping the spot between you and the hole.
14	The Bunker. Rake the sand smooth before you hit. It's only polite.	You can't touch the sand with your club or smooth it out before you play. That's two strokes in stroke play. Rake it after, which is when it's polite.
15	Winter Rules. In effect all year. It's always winter somewhere.	You play the ball as it lies. You may only lift, clean and place in the fairway when the course posts a local rule for it, which ours does when the ground is soggy, and not otherwise.
16	The Flagstick. Leave it in. It's a backstop.	If you putt from on the green and your ball hits the flagstick while it's in the hole and nobody's tending it, that's two strokes in stroke play. From off the green, no penalty.
17	The Bag. No limit on clubs. Fast Eddie carries seventeen, including two drivers "for different moods."	Fourteen clubs, most. In stroke play it's two strokes for each hole you played with too many, up to four strokes for the round.
18	Advice. Unasked-for advice is permitted at all times and encouraged after a bad shot.	You may not give advice to, or ask it of, anybody but your partner or your caddie. Two strokes in stroke play. If this one were enforced on Tuesdays, none of us would break 200.
EXTRA HOLES
19	The Practice Swing. If your practice swing nudges the ball, it didn't count, because it was practice.	On the tee, before your first stroke, the ball isn't in play yet: tee it back up, no penalty. Anywhere else, if you move your ball by accident, it's one stroke and you put it back.
20	The Green. You may tap down anything between your ball and the hole: ball marks, spike marks, footprints, and Fast Eddie, if he's standing in your line.	You may fix ball marks and old hole plugs in your line. Spike marks you may not touch until you've holed out.
21	The Wrong Ball. If you hit somebody else's ball, you keep it. If it's a better ball than yours, that's the breaks.	In stroke play, hitting the wrong ball costs two strokes, the strokes you made with it don't count, and you have to go back and play your own.
22	The Rain Rule. When it rains, the round is over on whichever hole Fast Eddie happens to be winning.	You're allowed to stop play if you believe there's danger from lightning, and in Kansas you'd better. The book does not say the round ends where you're ahead.

A word from the Professor, who asked to have it put in: "The Tuesday Rules apply only on Tuesdays, only to the four of us, and only at our course. If you play in a real tournament, follow the book. I do." He does, too. He's the only one of us who has ever called a penalty on himself, and he did it twice in one round, and we have never let him forget it.

Questions about the real rules? Your course's pro shop will have a copy of the rule book, and it's worth reading, even if you play Tuesdays like we do.

1999 SEASON STANDINGS
Through Tuesday, September 21

Player	Wins	Avg.	Coffees Bought
The Professor	9	88.4	5
Velcro	7	91.2	6
Coop	6	92.7	8
Fast Eddie	4	95.1	7
Total	26		26

Thirty Tuesdays since we opened the season on March 2. Four we lost: two to rain, one to a wind out of the south that took Coop's hat to Oklahoma, and one in July when it was 104 by ten o'clock and our wives held a meeting. That leaves 26 rounds. Low score with the Tuesday Rules wins the day. High score buys the coffee. Ties go to the oldest man, which has been very good for Fast Eddie, who would be in last place by more otherwise.

Averages are kept by the Professor, with the Tuesday Rules in force, which means they are not handicaps and should not be shown to anybody at the pro shop.

The Excuse Book
Every excuse we've heard on Tuesdays, rated one to five for believability. If you shot a bad round, look yours up before you go home.

A Fellow Sufferer: Down in Myrtle Beach, an insurance adjuster named Dan keeps Duffer Dan's Golf Page. He's a 19 handicap who made a hole-in-one in 1998 that his own playing partners won't believe, and he has a rant about five-hour rounds that I read out loud on the first tee to Fast Eddie. Eddie said Dan should come to Wichita and try it with his knees.

Golfers who have signed the card:

Send me your own house rules: [email protected]
Last updated Tuesday, September 21, 1999, after the round
The Excuse Book · Augusta