Once the guys playing their second round got under way at 8 AM things went pretty smoothly.  The guys who started on #10 in the morning had some big gaps which meant that their finish was pretty staggered and slow.

The afternoon players were much better.  The final group finished 4 minutes faster then the first of their groups which is very good.  I was done before 7PM with scoring on at #9.  The play at Del Monte went well and even though they started 1:45 later than orginally scheduled, they were able to finish before sunset.

One sad thing that happened was that two of the groups yesterday at Del Monte turned in scorecards that weren't filled out correctly.  In both cases, the card had the pros score and in the Gross Best Ball, which is the best score of the pro and the First Tee player was a lower score which is what the kid had shot.  But, that score was not recorded on the kind for the kid.  Therefore, because it was not identifiable as being made my him, it was ignored and the pros score was counted for the team instead.

Rule 31-3 says that the player's scores must be recorded to count and must be individually identifiable.  Putting the score on the best ball line rather than the player's line is not good enough.  When it isn't on the player's line, the other player's score will be used.

See my previous article for more about Rule 31.

Four-Ball is one those old terms that have hung around golf and causes confusion. Back when golf was a match play competition, the term came about because there were four balls in play in the match. Similarly foursomes meant a match with only two balls in play (you only hit the ball some of the time.) Once we got to stroke play, the terms don't make a lot of sense, but they have hung around in the Rules. Rules 30 (Match Play) and 31 (Stroke Play) have to do with Four-Ball competitions. Many people use the term Best Ball when referring to Four-Ball, but that term really means a match where one person is playing against the best ball of 2 or more people.

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