The OB stake is blocking my swing. Can I move it without penalty?

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I recently found myself on the local golf course where my ball landed in bounds but the out of bounds post would interfere with my swing. As I did with the red hazard post, I took it off the ground, hit my ball and put it back where it was. My teammate said that I received a two stroke penalty as the post was not in the boundary and for that reason it was not moved. -Bob Wackerman, San Mateo, Calif.

Bob, your playing partner got the decision right even if his explanation wasn't exactly right.

Being a boundary object, an out-of-bounds pole is not treated the same as a penalty area pole. Boundary objects are considered fixed and, under Rule 8.1a(1), may be immovable if doing so improves one of your conditions affecting the stroke, such as your intended swing position.

When you remove a pole, you have the opportunity to avoid a penalty by replacing it before hitting the stroke (see Rule 8.1c), but if you make a stroke with your target swing area improved by the absence of the pole, you get the normal. penalty of two strokes in match play or loss of a hole in match play for breach of Rule 8.1a.

Now that this answer has been posted, we hope others won't make the same, uh, mistake.

For a guide related to stake from our guru, read on…

If the storage pool is not sealed, is it still considered a water hazard? —Paul Neubert, Surfside Beach, SC

The Zen philosopher, Ty Webb, once said, “A flute without holes is not a flute. A donut without a hole is Danish.”

Similarly (or perhaps differently – it's hard to say), Decision 26/3 specifies that if a water hazard is not identified by the committee it does not lose its status as a water hazard. Get into it, and you can still be free of water hazard law…or, better yet, stay out of it.

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