Nine holes or 18. Golfers have pretty much been limited to those options for 250 years, or since the boys at St. Andrews in Scotland set the standard.

It's time for a change, say Jack Nicklaus and Kevin Earl, who are championing the idea of a 12-hole round.

Nicklaus, the playing legend, last year created a 12-hole loop at Muirfield Village, his championship course in Ohio. He doubles the cup size during some competitions in an attempt to entice new golfers to a game they might think is too hard or takes too long.

Earl, the general manager at Cold Springs, has likewise created a 12-hole option, doing so by building three new holes on acreage in the middle of the 18-hole course that was barren before. He's also in favor of more people playing golf, especially if they do so at his private club in Placerville.

"We're just trying to be a little different, give players more options," Earl said, especially during the increasingly competitive marketing of outside tournaments.

The three new holes – par-3s measuring 55, 120 and 150 yards – will be a practice area when not in play. They will be maintained like the rest of the course and give Cold Springs configurations of three, nine, 12, 18 and 21 holes. They will be ideal for juniors and tournament tiebreakers.

Earl designed the holes, and they're built to United States Golf Association standards. One elongated green is patterned after the quirky No. 4 at Spyglass Hill.

Cold Springs might not be ahead of the curve for long. A much-anticipated 13-hole par-3 course at Bandon Dunes in Oregon called Bandon Preserve is scheduled to open in May.

Rules game

Here are a few rules-related tidbits that might be helpful going forward, with an assist from Ryan Gregg, the director of education and rules for the Northern California Golf Association:

• Relevant rule change for 2012: A player can rake within a bunker before hitting from the bunker if stance, lie or path is not improved (footprints can be raked before a shot is played to speed pace of play) without penalty. A two-stroke penalty would have been incurred previously.

• Rule change from 2006 that still seems to confuse: Players are allowed to identify their ball within a hazard (bunker or lateral) and then re-create their lie. Hitting the wrong ball from a hazard is a two-stroke penalty. Hitting the wrong ball from a hazard was not a penalty before 2006.

• The rules violation Gregg most often sees: Players incorrectly moving their ball to identify it before first marking its spot and letting a competitor know the intention.

Dueling aces

Rich Carlson and Angel Judal were teammates in a Roseville Golf Club four-person scramble Saturday at Diamond Oaks. Both hit good tee shots on the fifth hole, a 133-yard downhill par-3 with a mostly blind green. Both thought that their balls could be close to the hole. Both made aces, as it turns out.

Even though Carlson hit first, a review of the scorecard shows that Judal was credited with a drive on the hole – the scramble format called for a minimum of three drives from each player.

We'll let them hash it out as to which ace went for naught.

Weather report

Bing Maloney and Bartley Cavanaugh experienced the longest frost delays so far this fall/winter Tuesday when play didn't begin until 10:45 a.m.

The temperature at both courses reached a low of 25 degrees early Tuesday, superintendent Campbell Turner said.

So why wasn't there frost on car windshields Tuesday morning, the at-home barometer of whether or not there's going to be a delay at the course? A lack of moisture in the air, Turner summed up, after mentioning dew formation and humidity, among other factors. Despite the near-record dry December and January that has been a bonanza for public-course coffers, there was still enough water in turf and plants to freeze, Turner said.

The dry-weather gravy train is poised to depart this week with rain possible today and a near-certainty for Friday and Saturday.

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