Parts of a Golf Course Explained

Every golf hole, from a short par 3 to a long par 5, is built from the same few parts. The official Rules of Golf, written by the R&A and the USGA, divide the course into five defined areas: the teeing area, the general area, bunkers, penalty areas and the putting green. Knowing what each one is, and what you are allowed to do in it, makes a first round far less confusing. This guide walks through a hole from tee to green, and explains how the weather changes each part.

The Teeing Area

Every hole starts at the teeing area, often called the tee box. Most courses have several sets of tees on each hole, marked by different colors, so that golfers of different abilities can play from a suitable distance. The colors are not standardized, so check the scorecard to see which markers belong to which set.

Under the rules, the teeing area is a rectangle two club-lengths deep, starting at the front edge of the two tee markers. This is the only place on the course where you can place the ball on a tee peg.

The General Area: Fairway and Rough

Almost everything between the tee and the green is the general area. In practice it has two very different surfaces:

• The fairway: the closely mown strip that leads to the green. It is the ideal place to play your next shot from.
• The rough: the longer grass on either side. The ball sits down in it, which makes clean contact harder and the shot less predictable.

Weather affects the fairway more than any other part of the course. Firm, dry fairways let the ball roll a long way after landing, making the hole play shorter. Wet fairways stop the ball almost where it lands, making the hole play longer. After heavy rain, puddles that are visible before or after you take your stance count as temporary water, and the rules give you free relief from them.

Bunkers

Bunkers are prepared areas of sand, found beside fairways and around greens. They are one of the defined areas because special rules apply: for example, you may not touch the sand with your club before your shot or during your practice swings.

Bunkers change a lot with the weather. Rain packs the sand down and makes it firm, which changes how the club behaves. After a downpour, a bunker may be partly flooded; the rules then allow free relief within the bunker, or relief outside it with a one-stroke penalty.

Penalty Areas

Penalty areas are mainly water: lakes, ponds, creeks and ditches, though a course can also mark desert, jungle or lava rock as a penalty area. They are marked with stakes or painted lines:

• Yellow penalty areas allow relief back on a line from the flag through the point where the ball last crossed the edge.
• Red penalty areas also allow lateral relief: dropping within two club-lengths of where the ball crossed, which is usually more generous.

Taking relief from a penalty area costs one stroke. You may also play the ball as it lies, without penalty, if you can find it and hit it.

Out of Bounds

White stakes or lines mark out of bounds, which is not part of the course at all. A ball that finishes out of bounds must be replayed from where the last shot was made, with a one-stroke penalty (known as stroke and distance). If you think your ball might be out of bounds or lost, you can play a provisional ball to save walking back.

The Putting Green

The hole ends on the putting green, the most carefully prepared surface on the course, with the flagstick marking the hole. Around it is a slightly longer collar of grass, called the fringe or apron, which counts as part of the general area rather than the green.

The speed of a green, how far the ball rolls from a given stroke, is measured with a device called a Stimpmeter: a ball is released down a short ramp and the distance it rolls is recorded in feet. Weather changes green speed from day to day:

• Dry, sunny and breezy conditions firm up greens and make them faster.
• Rain and morning dew slow them down, and dew can leave a visible track behind the ball.
• Frost leads many courses to delay tee times, because walking on frozen grass damages it.

Getting Started

A good way to learn a new course is to study its scorecard and layout before your round: where the penalty areas are, which side of each hole is out of bounds, and which tees suit your game. Then check the forecast for your tee time on our golf weather pages to see whether you should expect firm and fast conditions or a soft, wet course. If you are curious how the landscape itself changes a course, see Types of Golf Courses Explained.

Photo: first tee at the Kingsley Club, Kingsley, Michigan, by Ben Scripps, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Resized from the original.