The winter tee mat – a necessary but frustrating part of playing winter golf. Especially when the mercury goes low and the playing surface is harder than rock.
Getting a tee to stay in one can be a Herculean task and god help your clubs if you catch it a bit chunky and get more mat than ball.
Clubs do their best but sometimes the size of the mat can be a problem too. We know the teeing area is defined as being two club lengths deep, but what if the mat isn’t that big?
Rule 6.2b (1) says a player can stand outside of the teeing area when making a stroke at a ball that’s inside it.
So enter my first rules email of the New Year, sent by Tony Leigh. He asks: “Do I have to tee off on a temporary tee mat or can I put a tee in the grass behind the mat provided I am within two club lengths of the tee markers?”
What do the Rules say? Let’s take a look…
Winter tee mat: Can I tee up on the grass behind the mat?
You’d think this was obvious. The mat is there for a reason – to protect the tee from wintry conditions. It seems a bit weird to have a mat and then allow a free-for-all.
What you can do in this situation is ultimately down to golf clubs. Whatever they decide, it should be communicated clearly in their Local Rule establishing the use of winter tee mats.
Here’s what my home club say about it: “Where artificial tee mats are in use, the teeing area is restricted to the area of the mat, so the ball must be played from the mat and the player’s stance must be on the mat.”
What if you don’t follow those regulations? In stroke play it means you have not teed off from inside the teeing area and you’ll get the general penalty. That’s two shots and the mistake must be corrected – if you tee off from the next hole without doing so then you are disqualified.
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It’s got big implications for handicap scores too. What if you were tempted to take a fairway mat and play that from the tee? That would be a bad move. They can’t be used in the teeing area and you’ll breach Rule 6.2b(2) and 6.2b(3) if you do.
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 these golf winter mat rules? Should you always use the winter tee mat or should you always be allowed your full two club length teeing area? Let me know with a comment on X.
