‘The effect the Rules of Golf have had on pace of play has been dramatic’

Pace of play at England Golf’s elite tournaments will approach the four-hour mark in 2020 – and the Rules of Golf have played a big part.

James Crampton, director of championships, revealed the governing body is amending overall round times for its tournaments, following the positive impact since the new laws were introduced in January.

That could see as much as 12 minutes trimmed off the duration competitors were expected in achieve in 2019.

Typical round times for England Golf’s championships were in the region of four hours and 17 minutes to four hours and 20 minutes this year.

Starting time spacing and the use of referees to close gaps on course have already made their mark but the changes to the rules, which allowed players to putt with the flagstick in and restricted the time allowed to search for a ball to three minutes among other initiatives, have also had a significant effect.

“We’ve found the flag being left in, and the way we now mark golf courses where, primarily, penalty areas are now red, has made a difference,” Crampton explained.

“With the current pace of play practices we already have there has been an improvement. The consistency in the way players are required to drop the ball back into play has been good and the ability now to ground clubs in penalty areas, to remove loose impediments in penalty areas, has all made a big difference.

“The flagstick has certainly contributed, without doubt, to quickening things up.

“Off the back of that, because of the changes to the rules, and witnessing the game quickening up a little bit, we have amended our overall round times for 2020.

“So the impact of 2019 is actually going to lower our expected round times for championships.”

He continued: “Our typical round time for a championship would be somewhere in the region of 4:17 to 4:20. With the changes and discussions we have made, we are potentially looking at round times going down to low as 4:05 or 4:10.

“Historically, that feels really quick and to start to get to nearly four hours round 7,000 yard golf courses is quite a dramatic change – both to us and potentially to the players.

“It will be interesting to see how that pans out next year and our processes will continue to review those to get players round the golf course as quickly as possible.”

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