By local course rule we were playing winter rules and could lift, clean and place your ball in the fairway. My ball landed in a ground under repair area that was not in the fairway, but in very short rough and was covered with mud from the GUR area. When playing winter rules, can you clean a ball after being removed from ground under repair when the ground under repair was not in the fairway?

Thanks

Any time you can legally pick up your ball...you may clean it.
So, in this scenario...a legal drop from gur...yes, you may clean it.

You may NOT clean the ball if you are touching for identification purposes
(where allowed by rules).

You are missing a time when you can't clean it. It will come to you...

Kevin

Almost got it right. You are correct that you may clean it in the ground under repair scenario outlined by the OP. However, your statement "Any time you can legally pick yp your ball...you may clean it" is not correct. You are right that you may not clean a ball when touching it for identification (except what is necessary to aid in identification). But, there are two other instances where you may legally pick up your ball, but you may not clean it. Let's look at the Cleaning Ball rule, Rule 21...

A ball on the putting green may be cleaned when lifted under Rule 16-1b. Elsewhere, a ball may be cleaned when lifted, except when it has been lifted:

a. To determine if it is unfit for play (Rule 5-3);

b. For identification (Rule 12-2), in which case it may be cleaned only to the extent necessary for identification; or

c. Because it is assisting or interfering with play (Rule 22).

Awww...Opus was too quick for me to take the test.
For what its worth, I remember those on the course, just not at my computer.
Although, I probably still would have missed to check if unfit for play, as I probably haven't
even considered it since I stopped playing balata.
(wouldn't know it was unfit until I reached the green...and don't recall ever having a non-balata
ball that the rules would deem unfit.)

Thanks for keeping me honest guys.

Rich

Sorry Rich. My bad.

Yes, the unfit for play part is pretty obscure since the days of the Tour Bablata 100. The last time I saw a ball unfit for play was in college (a loooong time ago). We were playing a match and a guy in my group hit his tee shot low left and into a rough mower about 225 yards away. That ball was most definitely "unfit for play" and also in about 100 pieces.

No sweat Opus.
I know from college a loooong time ago...Pro-Traj...Tour balata didn't exist yet.
But I bet that mower could....uh...unfit a range rock.
Now we have sharp grooves and we worry about scuffing the ball....
then we had dull grooves and worried about *smilies*.
Now that was three grooves too low.