PORTRUSH, Northern Ireland — Shane Lowry incurred a two-shot penalty on Friday during the second round of the British Open when he was deemed to have caused his ball to move in the rough while taking a practice swing.
Lowry, who won the Open here in 2019, was unaware anything had occurred until a rules official approached him on the 15th hole and said the issue would be reviewed later.
A lengthy review of video occurred after the round and Lowry was understandably upset afterward. His score for the day went from 70 to 72 and he completed 36 holes at 142, even par, believing he was 2 under.
🚨⛳️👀 #LOOK — Shane Lowry’s ball appeared to move during his practice swing @LowryTracker
— NUCLR GOLF (@NUCLRGOLF) July 18, 2025
Thoughts?
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“I was in there with the rules official and wasn’t arguing my case, but I’m disappointed that they don’t have more camera angles on it,” Lowry said afterward. “The one zoomed in slow motion—they’re trying to tell me if it doesn’t move from the naked eye, if you don't see it moving, it didn’t move. I told them I definitely was looking down towards the ball as I was taking that practice swing, and I didn’t see it move.
“But I had to take the penalty because—I’m still not sure, to be honest, whether it was or not, but I had to take the penalty because I can't have my name talked about or tossed around like that, and I just get on with it.
“It’s obviously very disappointing. I felt like I played really, really well today. And yeah, that’s hard to take. Look, I’ll just have to dust myself off and get out there tomorrow and give it a go.”
Rule 9.4 addresses a ball played from the wrong place being caused by the player when a ball is not on a green. Rule 14.7 concerns not replacing the ball and thus what essentially became two one-shot penalties.
“Assessing whether the movement of the ball was visible to the naked eye in such a situation assumes the player being in a normal address position for the stroke,” the R&A said in a statement.
“In Shane Lowry’s situation, the movement of the ball to another spot, including the movement of the logo, was discernible to the naked eye. The naked eye test is satisfied whether or not the player was looking at the ball when it moved.
“It was clear that the ball moved immediately after the player’s club touched foliage close to the ball during a practice swing and that the player’s actions caused the ball to move.”
“If the ball moved and I caused it to move and it moved, it’s a two-shot penalty,” Lowry said. “The last thing I want to do is sit there and argue and not take the penalty and then get slaughtered all over social media tonight for being a cheat.”
Scottie Scheffler, who was also in the group with Lowry and Collin Morikawa, was involved in the scoring area after the round. He was unaware there was an issue until later and was asked to review video as well.
“Ultimately in golf it’s up to the player, and I felt like Shane was put in a pretty tough situation there when they were zooming in on his golf ball,” Scheffler said. “In the rough it’s hard to tell. From what I looked at very briefly on the video, it looked like it was very difficult to see if the ball moved. The camera was kind of zooming in as stuff was happening.
“One of the great things about the game of golf is that you call your penalties on yourself. This situation, I think it was just—it was a very tough spot for Shane to be put in. He handled it really well. It’s obviously very frustrating. It’s frustrating for me as a competitor of his and a player to watch him after kind of deal with that because the last thing you want to be known in the game of golf is somebody who cheats.
“I’m not going to state a strong opinion here in the media on whether or not I thought he deserved the penalty, but all I’m going to say is it was a very tough situation for him to be put in, and I thought he handled it really well.”
This article was originally published on www.si.com as Shane Lowry Hit With Surprise Penalty After Video Review of Moved Ball.
