The CMGC has adopted the USGA’s Modal Local Rule that deals with the situation where you have a ball that may be lost or out of bounds and you have reached the point on the course where the ball may be lost or out of bounds and you did not play a provisional ball. This can easily happen on the right side of our hole number 13. Under the rules if you can’t find the ball or you or you do find it but it is out of bounds, you are required to go back to the tee under a penalty of one stroke and put another ball into play hitting your third stroke. Under the USGA’s Local Modal Rule E-5 which the CMGC has adopted allows the player to estimate the place where the ball is lost or estimate the spot where the ball last crossed the edge of the course boundary. The rule allows the player with a two stroke penalty to put another ball into play on the fairway of that hole by dropping a ball within two club lengths from the edge of the fairway no closer to the hole than the estimated spot where the ball was lost or went out of bounds. The player would then be hitting his fourth shot. The original ball is no longer in play and must not be played.
The club’s local rules can be found on our web site by clicking Preferences and then Local Rules. The USGA Official Guide to the Rules of Golf on page 468 and following sets forth the rule and has excellent diagrams to show the full extent of how the rule can be applied.