Better late than never won’t make up for the fact that the Rules of Golf were a bit unkind to Shane Lowry in 2025. But we have to think the Irishman is taking some solace in a pair of changes from the USGA and R&A to the model local rules that took effect on Jan. 1 and are being implemented this season on the PGA Tour.
Specifically, the tour will be incorporating five newly revised MLRs during the 2026 season:
- Extending embedded-ball relief (MLR F-2)
- Penalty reduction when a player is unaware his ball moved (E-14)
- Obstructions close to putting green modifications (F-5)
- Internal out of bounds from teeing area only (A-4)
- Broken or significantly damaged clubs replacement with components (G-9)
The first two listed here are the ones that Lowry is all too familiar with. Last May during the PGA Championship at Quail Hollow Club, Lowry had the misfortune of not being able to get free relief after his drive on the eighth hole during the second round became embedded in a pitch mark in the fairway. Rule 16.3a specifies that relief is allowed only if it was the player’s own pitch mark. Discussions with rules officials (and, to the chagrin of Lowry, an ESPN cameraman) determined that the pitch mark Lowry’s ball came to rest in remained from another player.
Lowry had to play the ball as it lied, and proceeded to chunk the approach shot—a result that left him more than a tad bit angry.
Under the language of the new MLR, a golfer can take free relief if his or her ball “is below the level of the ground in a pitch-mark in the general area that is cut to fairway height or less that has not been repaired in some way and was made as a result of any player’s stroke.”
Two months later, during the Open Championship at Royal Portrush, Lowry was involved in another rules debate. On the 12th hole in the second round, Lowry accidentally caused his ball to move ever so slightly with a practice swing. In real time, Lowry wasn’t aware of what happened, but rules officials watching it on TV saw it.
After the round, Lowry met with rules officials for 20 minutes, watching the replay of what happened. Their conclusion was that Lowry had to add two strokes to his score, one for causing the ball to move with his practice stroke (Rule 9.4b) and another from not returning the ball to its initial position and thus playing from a wrong spot (Rule 14.7a). Lowry frustratingly accepted the penalty, upset by the fact that 1) he was didn’t know he had done anything wrong, 2) it had no real impact on his next shot, and 3) without the TV camera around to see it, the infraction would have likely gone unnoticed.
“If the ball moved and I caused it to move and it moved, it’s a two-shot penalty,” Lowry said. “The last thing I want to do is sit there and argue and not take the penalty and then get slaughtered all over social media tonight for being a cheat.”
If that same scenario happened on tour in 2026, however, the new model local rule in effect would only assess the one stroke for moving the ball and not the second shot for playing from a wrong place—so long as the player didn’t know the ball had moved.
The tour also is changing the process of determining a relief area when taking relief when playing “lift, clean and place.” Previously, players were allowed to measure a clublength from their position and place the ball in that area. Now the relief area is the length of a scorecard.
This article was originally published on golfdigest.com
