Interference, or what?

[ChUcK]

On the last hole of a local B-tier this guy on my card shanked his drive to the left. There is a pretty solid treeline separating this hole from the previous, but we were 100% sure his disc snuck through to the other fairway. It happens more often than it should. Discs don't get lost on either fairway unless they stay treed. Deep right is very troublesome on this hole, but left is a walk in the park to find.

Then the next guy shanks his right, a terrible drive that I know is going to be lost. I told him that it would be wise to swallow his pride and throw a provisional. He does, for the sake of time, a safe shot in the middle, and we begin the hunt for the disc on the right, starting the 3-min clock immediately. The dude whose disc is in the other fairway helps us look instead of looking for his because he knows he's safe.

3 minutes expired, and we went to find the other one. Looking. Searching. Where the hell? Look in the trees. Nope. Not anywhere. 3 minutes expired and we gave up, and he retees for a 5p. We total up our cards, go to Tourney Central, and sitting there in the lost and found radio flyer is his initial drive that went missing. It had been picked up by a player whose round was already complete and didn't see anyone around, because we were all searching for the other disc in the thick blackberry hell. They picked it up while we were playing the hole.

What, if anything, should happen?

803.07

B. If a disc at rest on the playing surface or supported by the target is moved, the disc shall be replaced as close as possible to its original location, as determined by a majority of the group or an official. If a marker disc is moved, the marker disc shall be replaced as close as possible to its original location, as determined by a majority of the group or an official. (If the two meter penalty is in effect, see also 803.08 C and D for movement of a disc above the playing surface.)

C. Any player who consciously alters the course of a thrown disc, or consciously moves or obscures another player’s thrown disc at rest or a marker disc, other than by the action of a competitively thrown disc or in the process of identification, shall receive two penalty throws, without a warning, if observed by any two players or an official.

Should we have given him an approximate lie somewhere on the other fairway? How can we guess if we never saw it land?

The two meter rule was indeed in effect. How could we know whether or not the disc was removed from a tree 2.5 meters up?

I'm sure it's ok to have thrown a second provisional and left it up to the TD to decide a ruling, but I for sure would not have agreed to a randomly selected lie when we couldn't be sure if it was a safe drive or where it ended up. There are a few spots with clear routes back to the pin, and the rest are shite lies you have to spray and pray from. Does he get an easy or impossible 2nd shot? If the rest of the group agreed but me, then I would respect the majority rule, but would question its validity later, probably.

Of course he should have ran up there right away and marked it before searching for the other disc, because it would have been easy to approximate his lie even if he didn't mark it, just made visual contact with it. We didn't think of this. No one else marked their lies and they weren't messed with.

[Parks]

Its exactly as it sounds.

Make your best guess where the lie was, and decide that as a group.

He plays from there. If your best guess is that he was in shit-town, then he plays from there. Otherwise, somewhere in the open where it probably landed.

[Shaolintrained]

And if you just can't come up with a best guess, whether or not it was in the crap, I would've given him the benefit of the doubt. Not sure if this is technically correct, but that's what I'd do. After all, I'm not out there to see others do bad, only to see myself do well.

[geoloseth]

This is one example of why you should make sure your disc is marked and secure before you help someone else find theirs. As I see it I would have given the second player the option of reteeing a provisional and then as a group deciding where a likely landing spot for his first disc. Then finish out the hole from both cenarios and let the td decide after finding out that someone picked up a live disc.

[Chuck Kennedy]

The interference rule only applies when it's observed while playing the hole, not after it was completed as if that player's disc was lost. It may suck, but he played the hole out properly by the rules to take the 5p, with his disc that was picked up being considered lost.

There was no reason to believe the disc wasn't lost. Now if your group saw some kids go running off near the area where his disc might have been, then you might consider that interference occurred if the disc wasn't found. Then, you could have let the player mark near the likely location with no penalty.

[ChUcK]

I think Mr. Kennedy is the only one who fully understood the scenario. No reason to believe it was lost at all.

Seth's right, though. Even though we've played the course a zillion times and never lost a disc where this guy threw, he still should have had the presence of mind to go find it real quick, mark it, and then come help. Considering that we didn't actually see its landing, then we REALLY should have done that, then start the 3-min clock for the other disc when homie rejoins us.

That's actually a sneaky way to earn 15-30 seconds extra to find your disc next time you shank one during a tourney- tell the rest of the card about this horror story (not horror really, more like painful yet bearable) and then tell them all to go mark their lies and rejoin you in the hunt for your drive.


This scenario I described is similar to one I saw a couple years ago during a monthly acepot. Very short hole ~160ft, downhill so steep the pin is hidden with foot-tall weeds. The hole is hit or miss- you can hit the weeds and stick for a deuce or hit the dirt and skip away for a 90 footer. All three of us in the card appear to park it, mine being the worst looking of the three from our teebox view. As we're making our way down to collect what should be an easy star frame we meet a couple of 12 yr olds walking with the other two DGers' discs in their hands.

One of the guys yells "hey!" and the youngsters drop the discs and take off. What do we do now? How do you approximate their lie? Can you really just give them a birdie shot freebie? Can you really place them 90 feet away for only a slim chance at birdie?

This happened before I had any working knowledge of the rulebook, and we ended up having them retee, penalty free. One guy was pissed because he 4p'd it eventually and the other guy parked it for a deuce again. The guy was really sore because he hadn't gone OB on his first drive and didn't feel he deserved the penalty.

[Craig]

And if you just can't come up with a best guess, whether or not it was in the crap, I would've given him the benefit of the doubt. Not sure if this is technically correct, but that's what I'd do. After all, I'm not out there to see others do bad, only to see myself do well.

Exactly!