OB that isnt marked.

[Frank Delicious]

Well I don't know if "instinctively" is the way I want my OB marked, no matter how improbable it might be to get to.

I played in a tourney a few years ago where a guy on my card grip locked his drive and went 90 degrees right and hit a shelter area that was about 100' away. Even though it was improbable that anyone would throw to this shelter, it was still marked as OB in the caddy book and mentioned at the players meeting before the first round.

For anyone local, it was hole 16 at zebulon. The dude threw it into the baseball shelter area.

[Chuck Kennedy]

Note I said "explicitly" noted. Roads in general were noted as OB and the road went right thru and around the gravel parking lot. Frankly, the rule I believe closes the door on this is 803.01F Rule of Fairness. Is it more fair to allow the player to play from the parking lot among the cars with no penalty? Or, more fair to the players in his division that he get penalized for a shot into an area that would have been explicitly identified as OB if in the "normal" field of play but was just indirectly identified by association with the OB road? TD gets to make that call.

[veganray]

Roads in general were noted as OB and the road went right thru and around the gravel parking lot.

Water in general is noted as OB.
Water goes right thru (sic) and around North America.
∴North America is OB.
QED

[Apothecary]

So the first thing that needs to be addressed is the PDGA message board. I do not go on there and a lot of the information is just plain wrong. With that being said the information that I am giving you is not private in anyway but I do not want it copied and pasted on the message board. The situation that you are referring to is over with, it was handled at the event, and the player accepted the decision. I do not want to propagate it any further on the message board.

The rules are not always cut and dry. That is why there is a rules committee. That is why there were four marshals and the competition director at the event. One professional baseball game has four umpires, a football game has six and they still use video replay. So not everything is cut and dry in any sport and there is always going to be someone that is not happy with the results.

The local staff, myself, the marshal, the course TD, and the competition director all walked the course prior to the event to go over the ground rules and make sure everything is addressed. Well the area in question (hole 7)never crossed anyone’s minds that it would come into play. It was almost behind the tee and about 300' away from the tee. I still don't know how the disc got to where it did. I don't know what was said on the message board but the disc landed on the only road/parking area for the course. So everyone that was playing that course parked on this road/parking area. In the ground rules it did not specifically say this parking are was OB. However it did say all roads and beyond are OB. Then there were specific ground rules for hole 18 stating that the parking area and road were all OB. The road and parking area where the players disc landed is connected to the same road and parking area on 18.

So as officials we have to look at the over all picture and what is best for the event. In this situation we do not want people playing from an active parking lot ever! I have never in 16 plus years of tournaments ever seen a parking lot safe. It just doesn't make sense. All of the official people I listed above were on the same page about this decision. Not one person thought that the player should have been able to play out of the parking lot.

Again there is no possible way to account or cover every possible situation and decisions have to be made. This was the correct decision. Myself and all of the marshals and staff would make the same decision again.

Thanks for the question.

so it sounds like there was "road and beyond" in play...though its not quite clear if that was in the players meeting, caddy book, etc. with a shot as bad as that he should have considered not drawing undue attention to it.

[Frank Delicious]

While I see the reasoning in the ruling, it seems really odd that it takes til halfway through the email/message to actually address the ruling.

[Apothecary]

its called dancing.

[Apothecary]

It was in the ground rules sheet given to each player. There was a sheet specific to each course.

so there we have it. dude just didnt do his homework.

[Whiz]

This was definitely NOT a case of major griplock. On a 400+ ft. hole the ob parking lot was directly right of the basket about 200'. On a clock face, think 2-3 o'clock. Also, because of trees blocking the direct line to the hole the best shot on the hole was a hyzer TOWARD THE PARKING LOT/GRAVEL. The shot in question just flattened/was turned by the wind and may have come back in bounds if not for the parked cars. Shawn Sinclair's description of the hole is patently wrong. I was on the card where Nils was penalized and I saw at least one other player on one of the top four cards nearly throw into the same lot. It was not a case of a "terrible shot". It was an unlucky shot and probably a bad one but the fact that the TD and Marshals did not see fit to list the lot as OB strikes me as ridiculous. Additionally, the gravel area/lot was not in use as a parking area before the tournament. When I played my practice rounds there were zero cars parked in the area. Only due to the fact that the tournament closed the regular parking area were there cars parked in the gravel area in question. Shawn Sinclair should at least admit they made a mistake in not designating/marking the area OB.

[Chuck Kennedy]

I don't think any of the officials would disagree it could have been marked better. Likewise, it wouldn't be fair to everyone else in his division to not penalize him for an obviously poor throw into an area that would normally be considered OB but it just wasn't marked as clearly as it should have been. Now, let's say he landed in the mulch surrounding a group of rare trees and the TD said we forgot to mark it OB. Then you have a much stronger argument that a penalty would not be fair.

[Frank Delicious]

Can we get a pic of this hole or something since where the OB is seems to be hotly contested and easily verified.

[Whiz]

Okay, here is the hole. I am not sure how to put markers for the teepad but the tee is from the path just to the right (approx. .5 in. on screen) of the google zoom tool. You then tee to the right. The hole is at the white rectangle above the pavilion in the upper middle/right of the map. The lot where the shot went OB is below said pavilion. You can see the lot stretches the length of the hole. No where was it painted OB. You can also see how the edges are very indistinct with grass and gravel interspersed in places. The length of the hole (according to google) is about 410'. The distance from the pin to the OB using a line drawn through the pavilion is about 100' at the closest point to the pin. The path to the left (upper part of map) is OB on or across and the fairway, as dictated by the trees between the tee and the pin, plays as a RHBH hyzer toward the right edge of the pavilion/left edge of parking lot. Sorry if my description is confusing. I am using "left" and "right" to designate directions as if you were standing on the teepad looking at the basket.

http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=43.12113 ... 19&vpsrc=6

[Frank Delicious]

That seems like an area that would need an OB line or flags or something, I can def see people throwing into that by accident.

[veganray]

If it weren't for the obvious fact that the pDGA - and, by extension, all of its agents such as TDs - can do no wrong, I'd say that that was some pretty poor officiating by the TD not defining that as OB, and some pretty poor officiating by the TD to capriciously make it OB once somebody put it there, and some pretty poor (though statutorily correct considering the convenient "all fuckups are magically authorized once the prizes are handed out" clause in the rulebook, aka 803.04F[1]) officiating by the PDGA to back him up.

[veganray]

I'd bet the ranch that if another player had thrown into that area, checked the rulebook, found that it was not OB, & played on without penalty or provisional, and that information had gotten to the TD as he was mulling his ruling, the TD would've declared the area in-bounds instead of calculating the other player's (much more severe) penalty, tracking him down, and working up the sack to slap him with it.

[Timko]

I would also say that's a pretty reasonable OB to assume someone would land in, especially a power sidearm thrower (like Nils) or a big armed lefty.

Regardless, I would have probably made the same call as the TD.