It’s a cliché in golf that your provisional ball is always the much better shot. ‘If only…’ you say as you trudge off into some deep cabbage to try and find your first.
But what if your provisional is perfect? What if you hit it into bother off the tee on a short hole, for instance, and then slam dunk your provisional into the hole?
What happens then? I think you’ll like the answer to this question, which is found in a clarification to the provisional ball rule…
Can a holed-out shot with a provisional ball count?
It’s well known that if you find your original ball on the course within the three-minute search time, then your provisional ball must be abandoned. Check out Rule 18.3c (3).
So if that ball is found, that’s the ball in play. If three minutes have run out, the ball is lost, the provisional is in play, and it’s in the hole.
That’s all there is to it? No, there’s more.
That clarification I pointed out earlier (it’s Rule 18.3c (2)/3) is an ingenious little sidebar that can really change things up, particularly depending on whether you’re playing match play or stroke play.
It says as long as the original ball has not already been found in bounds, the score with a provisional ball that has been holed “becomes the player’s score for the hole when the player lifts the ball from the hole”.
Why is that? It’s because in this situation “lifting the ball from the hole is the same as making a stroke”.
In stroke play, you might go and look for your original ball – after all, you’ve holed one shot, why not another? But it’s more likely you’ll be happy with the outcome, and you’ll be asking anyone in the vicinity not to go hunting.
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But while you can request that your playing partners don’t search for that original ball, they are allowed to do so “so long as it doesn’t unreasonably delay play”.
You can already see how this can impact a match play game. It’s clearly advantageous for your opponent to find your original ball. But you won’t want anything to do with it.
So a footrace could ensue, where your opponent looks for your first ball, and you race down to the hole to retrieve it from the cup.
Now that is a sight I would enjoy seeing on a golf course.
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.
What do you think of this provisional ball rule? Is the ball holed? Let me know by leaving a comment below, email me at s.carroll@nationalclubgolfer.com or get in touch on X.
NOW READ: I ‘lost’ my ball but found it in the hole – is it a hole in one?
NOW READ: I’ve found my ball and it’s unplayable – can’t I just play the provisional?
