PGA Tour adds internal out-of-bounds at East Lake after Scottie Scheffler discussed shortcut

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East Lake Golf Club’s restoration has given several players fits this week in preparation for the PGA Tour’s season-finale Tour Championship, highlighted by the new-look par-5 18th hole. Scottie Scheffler attested on Tuesday the hole was so hard that he was considering taking an alternative route down the 10th hole, believing it would be the easier way to birdie.

Unfortunately for Scheffler and the rest of the field, that is no longer an option.

The tour announced overnight (Australian time) that it is instituting internal out-of-bounds on the 10th fairway for those playing the 18th, as well as the seventh fairway for players on the sixth hole.

The tour’s rules committee had contemplated internal OB at the beginning of the week before deciding against it, believing the change would be too penal. However, with a number of players asserting their intentions to circumvent the 18th, the tour decided to reverse course.

“The way they reshaped the fairway there, the fairway crowns like this and it’s a very difficult fairway to hit, and if your ball goes into the right rough and you don’t get a good lie, you have to chip it 10 yards down the fairway because there’s nowhere really to lay up,” Scheffler explained. “Before there used to be some opportunity there, where now there’s not. You’re now hitting it across the lake. If you hit it into the right rough, you’re now hitting it over a pond to a fairway that’s pretty narrow. If you hit it in the left rough you probably can’t hold the green from there, and if you don’t get it to the fairway, you’re going to be in the water.

“It seems like a safer play to take all that out of play, hit it down 10. The green is going to be pretty extraordinarily hard to hold anyways with it being a downslope and having a long club in there. It’s more you’re playing for birdies. There is less opportunity I think for eagle than there was before.”

Though rare, this is not the first time the tour has implemented internal OB during a tournament week. Notably, after Bryson DeChambeau’s viral drive over a lake at Bay Hill’s par-5 sixth during the 2021 Arnold Palmer Invitational, DeChambeau stated he was thinking about playing TPC Sawgrass’ 18th hole by driving up the ninth fairway. Days later during the Players Championship, the tour announced the ninth would be out of play when playing the 18th.

UPDATE: The PGA Tour released the following statement regarding this decision as well as adding internal OB on the sixth hole:

For the safety of spectators, players, caddies and everyone on property at East Lake Golf Club, the PGA Tour Rules Committee has established two internal boundaries for this week’s Tour Championship. The fairway on No.7 is out-of-bounds during play of No.6, and the fairway on No.10 is out-of-bounds during play of No.18.

Chief referee Gary Young: “This decision was made primarily out of safety concerns, specifically to prevent players from effectively putting people in harm’s way by taking an alternate route. When it sounds like that is going to be a possibility, it necessitates an internal boundary.”