Who doesn’t know about the three minute rule? No one. It’s been drilled into us since the new rules reduced the time allowed for a search from five to a mere 180 seconds back in 2019.
You know you get to the area where you’re ball might be hiding and the clock starts ticking. And, yes, here’s another entreaty to use a watch or a phone to start ticking off those precious grains of sand.
But is that all there is to it? Do the seconds always tick off until they inevitably run out?
We’re going out into the field – or more appropriately some rough – for a real life rules example. One that comes specifically from my life as it happened to me in a recent competition.
I’d tugged my ball left off the tee and into some heavy stuff. It was a busy day and we were being caught by a group behind. After a minute and a half of fruitlessly hunting, said group arrived on the tee.
We waved them through. I was clearly in their potential hitting zone, so I stopped the clock, halted the search, waited for them to tee off, and then resumed looking when they had done so.
I couldn’t find the ball, the time ran out, and I had to go back to the tee (yes, I should have hit a provisional). But should I have done it at all?
How much do golfers actually know about the search rules for a golf ball? If you’re hunting and have to stop to let a group through, can you really pause the timer while you wait for them to hit?
Golf ball search time: Can I stop the clock if I wave a group through?
Yes, you can. This is something well worth knowing but you won’t find it in the regular sized Rules of Golf. Perhaps that’s why it might not be common knowledge.
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This is tucked away in a clarification to Rule 18.2a (1). Check it out on the R&A website or look it up in the big Official Guide to the Rules of Golf.
It reveals when the time allowed for a search is “temporarily interrupted” and this clarification says there are situations when the clock stops.
It gives a few examples but here is the one that saves me an awkward conversation in the clubhouse:
“A player is searching for their ball for two minutes, then steps aside to allow the following group to play through. The search time stops when the search is temporarily stopped, and the player is allowed one more minute to search.”
You’ll want to remember two things before you go gung-ho. Firstly, and I’m saying it for the second time in one article, this is why it’s really important you time your search.
Use a stopwatch, click on your phone – however you do it is up to you. But do it. If you don’t know how much time you’ve used how can you know how much you’ve got left if it’s time to start searching again?
The second thing is to focus on the words “temporarily stopped”. That means the search is STOPPED. Don’t carry on, shuffle around in a circle hoping you might be able to eek out some crafty seconds, or get your pals to carry on the hunt.
If you keep searching, the clock keeps running. Stop what you are doing and wait.
Got a question for our expert?
Despite the changes to the Rules of Golf in 2019 and 2023, there are still some that leave us scratching our heads. I’ll try to help by featuring the best of your queries in this column.
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What do you think about this rule a for a golf ball search time? Let me know by leaving a comment on X.
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