Weather and Rain Delays at Junior Golf Tournaments: What the Rules Say

Three lists: what to pack, what to check before you leave home, and what to do when the horn sounds. The instructions of officials on the day and the organizer’s own terms come first. Where a point depends on the event, the list gives the question to ask.

1. Pack for a wet or interrupted day

• A waterproof jacket and pants, plus a warm layer for waiting out a delay.
• Spare gloves and several dry towels, kept in a sealed bag.
• The golf bag’s rain hood and an umbrella.
• Dry socks and a full change of clothes, left in the car.
• A sealable bag to keep the scorecard dry.
• Extra water and food. A suspension can run long past the posted finish, and Rule 5.7c allows play to resume on a later day.
• A charged phone with the tournament office’s number saved.

Our first tournament checklist covers the rest of the bag.

2. Check with the tournament before you leave home

Read the event’s page, its Local Rules or notice to players, and the organizer’s refund terms. The R&A’s Committee Procedures say the signals a committee uses “should be communicated to the players in the Local Rules”. The organizer pages we read give the on-course signals for some events, but none says where the status of a delay is posted or how families away from the course are told. Ask the tournament office:

• “How will a delay, suspension or cancellation be announced, and where is the current status posted?”
• “Which signals do you use to stop play and to resume it?”
• “Where should players and spectators go if play is suspended for a dangerous situation?”
• “If the round is shortened or cannot be finished, how will scores count?”
• “What happens to the entry fee if the event is shortened, postponed or canceled, and is there a makeup date?”

3. When the horn sounds

• Immediate suspension (one prolonged note under the recommended signals). Play stops at once. Rule 5.7b says a player “must not make another stroke until the Committee resumes play”, and that includes a short putt to finish the hole.
• Normal suspension (three consecutive notes). A group between two holes must not start the next hole. A group in the middle of a hole may stop or play out that hole.
• Lightning before any signal. Rule 5.7a lets a player stop if they reasonably believe there is danger from lightning. The player must report to the committee as soon as possible.
• Rain alone. It is not a reason to stop under the Rules. Keep playing until the committee suspends play.
• The ball. Rule 5.7d lets a player mark the spot of the ball and lift it when play stops. After an immediate suspension, the R&A’s guidance recommends that all players take shelter immediately without taking further actions.
• Where to go. Follow the officials’ directions. The U.S. National Weather Service names two kinds of safe shelter: a substantial building with electricity or plumbing, or an enclosed, metal-topped vehicle with the windows up. It says small outdoor buildings such as rain shelters and sheds are not safe.
• Practice areas. Ask before using a range or putting green. The AJGA’s local rules for its championships and U.S. Kids Golf’s Local Tour rules both close practice areas when play is suspended for a dangerous situation.
• Restarting. Play resumes on the committee’s signal, not when the sky clears. Stay where announcements reach you. Rule 5.7c requires the player to be back where they stopped and ready to play at the time the committee sets.
• After a shortened or canceled round. Before you leave the course, ask the tournament office how scores and the entry fee are being handled for this event.

There is no single answer for every event. The decision belongs to the committee, which the Rules of Golf define as “the person or group in charge of the competition or the course”. It is not a parent’s or a player’s call, apart from a player’s own right to stop for lightning, which is covered below.

Rain by itself is not a reason to stop under the Rules. The R&A’s Clarifications of Rule 5.7 list a player who “takes shelter from rain for a significant amount of time” among the examples a committee is likely to disqualify for stopping play. What the R&A’s Committee Procedures ask a committee to judge is what the weather is doing to safety and to the course:

• Lightning. The committee “should use whatever means it has available to determine if there is a danger from lightning and take what actions it believes are appropriate”.
• Standing water. In stroke play, when “all the area around a hole is covered in temporary water and it cannot be removed”, the course should be considered unplayable and the committee should suspend play.
• Visibility. Play should be suspended if landing areas are no longer visible to players, for example because of fog or darkness.

Canceling a round is the committee’s judgment too. The Committee Procedures say that in stroke play there is “no set guidance” for when to cancel a round, that a round should be canceled “only in a case where it would be very unfair not to cancel it”, and that the proper action “depends on the circumstances in each case and is left to the judgment of the Committee”.

Organizers then add their own terms, and those differ. To find out for your event, read its own page and Local Rules, read the organizer’s weather and refund terms, and put the questions in the checklist above to the tournament office. What three organizers publish is set out further down this page.

Rule 5.7 of the Rules of Golf covers stopping and resuming play. We read it on The R&A’s site, whose Rules Hub names the current edition the 2023 Rules of Golf. Under Rule 5.7a a player must not stop play during a round except in three cases: the committee suspends play, the players in a match agree to stop, or the player reasonably believes there is danger from lightning.

The lightning case is the only one a player can use alone, and it is about lightning, not bad weather in general. The Rule reads: “A player may stop play if they reasonably believe there is danger from lightning, but must report to the Committee as soon as possible.” The R&A’s Clarifications add that when the belief is reasonable “the player is the final judge”. A player who stops for a reason the Rule does not allow, or who fails to report, is disqualified.

The committee can also suspend play, and Rule 5.7b sets out two kinds:

• Immediate suspension. The Rule’s example is imminent danger. A player “must not make another stroke until the Committee resumes play”.
• Normal suspension. The Rule’s examples are darkness or an unplayable course. Players between two holes must not make a stroke to begin another hole. If any player in the group has started a hole, the players may stop or play out the hole, and they have a brief time to decide, which the Rule says should normally be no more than two minutes. In stroke play each player may choose for themselves, but a player may continue only if their marker stays to keep the score.

The penalty for a breach of Rule 5.7b is disqualification. The Rule has one exception: there is no penalty if the committee decides that circumstances justified the failure to stop. The R&A’s examples of a case a committee is likely to find justified include a player in a remote part of the course who does not hear the signal, and a player who has already begun the backswing and completes the stroke without hesitation. Its example of a case that is not justified is a player who hears the signal but wants to make a stroke quickly before stopping, such as a short putt to complete the hole.

When the committee resumes play, Rule 5.7c requires the player to resume from where they stopped. The R&A’s Clarifications say the safety of players “is paramount and Committees should not risk exposing players to danger”. They also say that once the committee has ordered play to resume after using all reasonable means to conclude that the danger from lightning no longer exists, all players must resume, and a player who refuses may be disqualified. If you believe it is still unsafe, tell a tournament official before the restart.

One organizer’s document states a different penalty. U.S. Kids Golf’s Local Tour Rules & Regulations (rev. June 2024) replace disqualification with a maximum score of 10 on the hole, and apply that to a player who does not stop on its stop-play signal.

Rule 5.7b says only that the committee “should use a distinct method of telling players about an immediate suspension”. The signals themselves are in the R&A’s Committee Procedures, under Model Local Rule J-1, which says of the three signals below that they “are generally used, and it is recommended that all Committees use these signals where possible”:

• One prolonged note of the siren: immediate suspension. Stop at once.
• Three consecutive notes of the siren: normal suspension. Do not start another hole. A group in the middle of a hole may stop or play it out.
• Two short notes of the siren: resume play.

These signals are a recommendation, not a Rule. The Model Local Rule itself leaves each signal blank, as “[insert signal to be used]”, and the Committee Procedures say the committee “is responsible for deciding whether to adopt any Local Rules”. The pattern applies at an event only if that event’s committee has adopted it. What three organizers’ documents said on October 11, 2026:

• AJGA. Its Conditions of Competition and Local Rules for AJGA Championships, revised January 31, 2025, put Model Local Rule J-1 in effect: one long prolonged siren or airhorn note for a dangerous situation, three consecutive airhorn notes for all other suspensions, and two airhorn notes to resume.
• U.S. Kids Golf Local Tours. The Local Tour Rules & Regulations (rev. June 2024) use one long siren or horn blast, or verbal direction by a committee member, to stop play immediately and seek shelter. Three short blasts mean play must stop for a non-dangerous condition such as darkness or fog, and two short blasts, repeated, mean play is resumed. Other U.S. Kids Golf levels have their own documents, listed on its Rules and Regulations page.
• HJGT. The Hurricane Junior Golf Tour’s policies page says tournament officials and the host facility will sound an air horn if participants need to evacuate the course, and that once it is blown “you must discontinue all play”. It lists no separate signal for a normal suspension or for resuming, so ask on site.

The Rules of Golf say when a player may stop. They do not say where to shelter. The U.S. National Weather Service does, and these points are quoted from its Lightning Tips and Lightning Safety and Outdoor Sports Activities pages as they read on October 11, 2026:

• “If you hear thunder, lightning is close enough to strike you.”
• “When you hear thunder, immediately move to safe shelter: a substantial building with electricity or plumbing or an enclosed, metal-topped vehicle with windows up.”
• “Stay in safe shelter at least 30 minutes after you hear the last sound of thunder.”
• It notes that “small outdoor buildings including dugouts, rain shelters, sheds, etc., are NOT SAFE”.
• For anyone caught outside with no safe shelter nearby, its list of last-resort steps includes “Never shelter under an isolated tree”.

For organized outdoor activities, the Weather Service recommends that organizers have a lightning safety plan and follow it without exception. That plan is the organizer’s, so ask where the event sends players and spectators when play is suspended, and follow the officials on the day. When play restarts is the committee’s decision under the Rules of Golf. The 30 minutes above is the Weather Service’s general guidance, and this page cannot tell you how a particular committee times a restart.

The Rules of Golf cover stopping and restarting. What a shortened, postponed or canceled round means for the result and the entry fee is each organizer’s decision, written in its own terms. This is what three organizers’ pages said on October 11, 2026. Each statement applies only to the events that document covers, and an organizer can change it.

AJGA Qualifiers. The AJGA’s Qualifier Cancellation Policy says that in “the rare circumstance that inclement weather is imminent, the committee may reduce the number of holes in the qualifying round”, and that all participants will be notified of any changes before play begins. If the round is not completed, the policy says the AJGA must abandon the qualifying round. It then says all confirmed participants in the Qualifier receive one Performance Star and a 50% refund of their Qualifier entry fee, and it sets the priority for entry into the tournament field, which depends on the type of Qualifier.

That policy covers Qualifiers only. The AJGA’s Refund Policy covers a player who withdraws and says nothing about an event that weather shortens or cancels, and its Player Policies page lists no separate weather policy. For an AJGA tournament, ask the tournament office: “If weather shortens or cancels this event, how is the result decided, and is any of the fee refunded?”

U.S. Kids Golf. Its Terms and Conditions say weather conditions “including rain, fog, wind, and extreme temperatures” that do not pose a risk to health or safety “are not typically, in and of themselves, proper reason for Participants to discontinue play” and will not generally result in a suspension. A participant, or the participant’s guardian, may discontinue play if the participant believes there is danger, including because of weather, and is advised to seek shelter. U.S. Kids Golf reserves the right, at its sole discretion, to cancel or shorten any event, and the terms say events that are completed but shortened due to weather conditions “are not subject to any refund”. Its Refund Policy gives the detail:

• If a tournament or round must be canceled after 9-hole players have completed five holes and 18-hole players have completed nine, the round or tournament is deemed sufficient and no refunds are given.
• A multi-day event is considered completed after one round has been played.
• If an event is canceled and will not be rescheduled, customers receive a full refund or a full eCredit. The Terms and Conditions also say all tournament cancellations “are subject to processing fees”, so ask whether a fee is deducted.
• If an event is postponed and rescheduled, registration fees transfer automatically to the new date. A family that cannot attend it can withdraw for a full refund or a full eCredit, and the withdrawal must be submitted 5 or more days before the new date to receive a refund.
• If a Local Tour event is shortened due to inclement weather, the Playoff Policy says scorecard playoffs are decided on the last three holes and then the last hole when five holes were completed, and on the last nine, last six, last three and then the last hole when nine were completed.

HJGT. The Hurricane Junior Golf Tour’s policies page says: “We will continue play in wet weather and cold weather unless lightning or severe weather is in the near forecast.” It also says: “If an event is shortened due to rain there will be no refunds or credits issued.” Shortened rounds use 9-hole increments, and an entire age division must be through at least the same 9 holes for a score to post for that day. If no golf is played and the entire event is canceled, the player’s HJGT account is credited in full minus a $50 administration fee, for use on a future HJGT event.

No two of these match, which is the reason to read the terms for the event you entered. A player withdrawing is a different situation from the organizer shortening or canceling, and our withdrawal and refund guide covers it. For how a delay changes the length of the day, see how long golf tournaments last.