Bryson DeChambeau’s Open rules controversy, explained

Bryson DeChambeau dominated the headlines on Friday at Royal Birkdale. Unfortunately for him, it was for all the wrong reasons.

Shortly after finishing his second round, DeChambeau entered the scoring tent to put a signature on the card to finalize his four-under 66. Instead, Open Championship officials alerted him that there were questions about if he’d improved his lie when preparing to hit his second shot on the par-4 fifth hole earlier in the day.

Eventually, tournament officials shuttled DeChambeau out to the scene of the incident to tell his side of the events. But despite a spirited debate with R&A officials, DeChambeau was assessed a two-stroke penalty, dropping him from seven under to five under for the championship, leaving him three back of Lucas Herbert’s lead.

The penalty made for a controversial conclusion to the first 36 holes of the year’s final major — even leaving DeChambeau threatening to quit out of protest — and is sure to be debated throughout the remainder of the championship. Check out below for an explainer of the rule in question.

Which rule did DeChambeau break?

If you watch the video of the infraction in question, you will see that as DeChambeau walks to his ball, he tramples down the long grass in the immediate vicinity of his ball. This may seem innocuous enough, but according to the Rules of Golf, this can be grounds for a penalty.

The rule at the center of the controversy is Rule 8, which “covers a central principle of the game: ‘play the course as you find it.’” Specifically, Rule 8.1a, which states that players may not “move, bend or break any growing or attached natural object” in a way that would improve the area of your intended swing. In DeChambeau’s case, this pertains to the grass that he trampled down in the immediate area of his ball.

“Bryson has been penalized two strokes for inadvertently improving the area of his intended swing,” said chief rules referee Grant Moir. “An improvement means to alter one or more of the conditions affecting the stroke so that the players gains a potential advantage for the stroke. Now, I’ll stress that this applies even when the action is accidental, as it was in Bryson’s case.”

Even though DeChambeau did not intend to improve his lie when he walked around his ball in preparation to play the shot, the fact that doing so improved the area of his swing is grounds for a two-stroke penalty. It’s a tough break for the two-time major winner, but according to the letter of the law, the rule was applied correctly.