Rule 19 · Relief with a penalty
Rule 19: Unplayable ball
Official title: Unplayable Ball
You alone decide whether your ball is unplayable, everywhere except in a penalty area. It costs one penalty stroke, and you have three options.
19.1 You alone decide
Nobody can make you do it or stop you. The ball does not even have to be impossible to play. You just cannot do it in a penalty area, where Rule 17 applies.
19.2 Three options
For one penalty stroke: stroke and distance, back on the line or lateral, within two club-lengths of your ball and not nearer the hole.
Rules questions on this
19.3 In a bunker
The three options apply here too, but with ‘back on the line’ and ‘lateral’ the ball must stay in the bunker. Since 2019 there is a fourth option: for two penalty strokes you go back on the line, outside the bunker.
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