Are you allowed FREE RELIEF if your ball has landed in thick mud?
If your ball has unfortunately finished in an area of thick mud, are you allowed to move it?
You can get some very tough breaks in golf and sometimes, the quality of your round can be determined by how lucky you get.
Luck often levels itself out, but if you suffer from some unfortunate circumstances on the golf course, the rules of golf can sometimes bail you out.
If your ball and your situation suit the guidelines of the rules of golf, then you can occasionally be saved. This is why knowing as many rules as possible is so important.
However, the rules can also be a cruel mistress and it is important to also apply them correctly, such as in this situation below where a ball has been found in a large area of thick mud.
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On an Instagram post put up by golfrules_questions, the ball is in an awful situation and it is an example of the rough breaks that you can get on the golf course.
The question to consider is: Are you allowed free relief from the mud? The answer is, unfortunately, no. This is just very unlucky and you are not allowed to pick and place your ball in a better lie.
If there is standing water on the golf course and your ball is in the middle of it, you are able to move it. But the conditions in the image above are not comparable to this.
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In the post, it looks as though there are tyre tracks. If your ball ended in a mark like this, there is potential for a local rule to save you.
However until this happens, you need to prepare to splash your ball out of the mud towards the green.