Here’s a question that might stump some of you: Can you take practice swings and hit the sand when your ball is in a bunker?
No, you’re all yelling in unison. Rule 12.2b (1) says you can’t. You’re right, it does.
Before making a stroke at a ball in a bunker, it states that a player must not touch sand in the bunker with a club “in making a practice swing”.
Case closed, right? But what if your ball is in one bunker, and you take a practice swing and hit the sand in another nearby bunker?
Practice swings in bunkers
The observant among you may have already gleaned the answer, though I managed to get it wrong in more than one rules quiz when studying for my exams. You can make a practice swing and hit the sand in another bunker. Why? Here’s my take: because your ball is not in it.
Read Rule 12.2b (1) again. The restrictions on touching the sand, and when it results in a penalty, refers to before making a stroke “at a ball in a bunker”.
It then prohibits a player from touching sand in the bunker with a club. If the ball isn’t there, the restrictions don’t apply.
It’s a little bit of a surprise this is possible, given the R&A and USGA’s major rules change in 2019, which allowed players to generally touch sand when moving loose impediments for example, continued to prohibit touching the sand with a club in a bunker both for “pace of play and to avoid having large amounts of sand deposited outside bunkers (especially greenside bunkers) as a result of repeated practice swings”.
But there we are – though I’m not sure what your playing partners might think if you pull this one out on the course!
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