The Royal & Ancient Golf Club

Based in St Andrews, the R&A is golf's governing body and organiser of The Open Championship. The R&A is committed to working for golf and operates with the consent of 138 organisations from the amateur and professional game and on behalf of over thirty million golfers in 124 countries.

The R&A takes its name from The Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews, which has continuous records dating back to its foundation in 1754, and although the Club continues its long history with 2,400 members throughout the world, The R&A has become a separate entity to focus on its governance role.

The R&A took over the running of the Amateur and Open Championships in 1920 and has since acquired responsibility for a further nine championships and international matches from the Boys to the Seniors, the Junior Open to the Walker Cup. Authority for administration of the Rules was accepted by The R&A in 1897 and, since 1952, it has jointly issued the Rules with the United States Golf Association.

By developing The Open Championship as one of the world's great sporting events and an outstanding commercial success, The R&A is able to invest an annual surplus through The R&A Foundation into grass roots development projects around the world.

Particular emphasis is placed on the encouragement of junior golf, on the development of the game in emerging golfing nations, on coaching and the provision of open-to-all courses and practice facilities.

The R&A also provides best practice guidance on all aspects of golf course management, with specific reference to ecological and conservation issues, to help the growth of the game in a commercially and environmentally sustainable way.

To browse the R&A's excellent website, including a challenging inter-active rules test, go to randa/org

Rule Changes for 2012

Fortunately you won’t be playing a drastically different game come January 1 but the rule makers in golf have made a couple of notable rule amendments.

STARTING TIME:

Previously if you were late for your tee off time in competition it resulted in immediate disqualification. This has now been amended to a two-shot penalty or loss of hole providing you are no more than five minutes late.

BALL MOVING AFTER ADDRESS:
A new exception has been added to say that a player is no longer penalised if the ball moves after address when it is obvious that the player has not influenced the golf ball.

This means there will be no more situations like those which saw Padraig Harrington and Rory McIlroy penalised in the Abu Dhabi Championship and Open Championship respectively, when strong winds cause their golf balls to move across the green.