Putting Tips
By Nick
I’ve had a love/hate relationship with putting. Some days they all go in, other days you can seem to make a dam thing. I’ve gone into the pro shop to buy a new putter just after a bad round! That was around 2 years ago then and I think I’ve learned a thing or two about how to accept a few missed putts. At the moment my putting is on fire. I think this is down to a couple of reasons
1, I’ve actually been practising it. Rather than going to the driving range that is a 10 minute car journey I have been making a real effort to get to the golf club. They have a practice range there as well as a putting green to practice putting and chipping. Now rather than just spending 60 minutes hitting golf balls, I can spend that time in the range and then also spend 30-45 mins on my short game and putting. Just because the putting stroke seems so simple, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t practice it! In fact in a good round you’ll take 28-30 putts, whereas you’ll probably hit around 14 shots with your driver! So why do people spend so much more time practicing their driving than their putting?
Having actually spent some time practicing I have felt my putting become much more confident. I now step onto the green feeling I can make every single putt no matter how far it is. I’ll write an article covering the different putting drills I try to do in the near future.
2, I take my time to read the greens now. Rather than take one look behind the ball and try to figure out the break from one view I take my time and walk all around the hole trying to view the putt from as many different angles as possible. You may think this takes a lot of time, but if you do it while your playing partners are taking their putts, being careful not to put them off or stand behind or in front of their line, you’ll find that you’ll have completed your walk around when it comes to your turn to put. Golf course designers are sneaky in how they design the course and greens, they put many things in to trick you and I often find my bad putts are the ones that I haven’t taken the time to have a good look around on. Here are the things I look for and the order of importance I place on them:
- Up or down slope. This obviously has a big effect on how hard you need to hit the putt to get it to the hole, and also how much the putt will break. Generally an uphill putt will break less than a down-hill one.
- When walking around I’ll look for the lowest part of the green and try to view the putt from there. If the green has many different breaks I’ll try to find the lowest point from around the circumference of my putt where the hole is the centre of the circle
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- I often use my hand to kind of mimic how I see the ball is going to break as I walk around the hole. Kind of weird but it helps my mind see how the ball is going to break over the last two feet of the putt.
- Finally I check the grain of the grass around the hole. If the grain is going with the direction of the putt you know it will roll out, if it is going against the grain – the grass is going to add a little more friction to the putt.
- The most important thing is being able to see how the ball is going to get into the hole I try to do this by drawing a red line in my mind of how the ball is going to travel and get to the cup. I chose red because it is my favourite colour (something stupid to do with supporting Liverpool FC!). Once your mind has seen how the ball is going to get to the hole it is a lot easier to make a confident putting stroke
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3, Quite often I’ll purposefully putt the ball away from the middle of the putter. This is something I have recently learned from Neal Granville to help me with fast downhill putts, but I now use it a lot for lots of short putts that have any kind of break. Every putter you try has a sweet spot. This is usually in the middle of the putter face with the size of it varying from putter to putter. You’ll know when you hit the ball from the sweet spot as you’ll hardly feel it in your hands. The problem I have found is when you do hit the sweet spot the ball comes off the putter face quite quickly, and if you have a fast downhill putt or a putt which you’d like to hit gently so it can roll and take the break – you will not want the ball coming off the putter face quickly. Hitting a fast downhill putt out of the sweetspot will often mean the ball races past the hole leaving you with a long one coming back. Hitting the putt out of the sweetspot on a putt where you see it taking a lot of break may mean the ball starts off faster and goes straight through the break.
Using this tactic works well with seeing how the ball will make it into the hole before even putting it. I see the line it will take, how much break to give it, and then try to vary how far away from the sweetspot I’ll try to hit it.
4, I have tried a few different putting grips. I always seem to putt quite well as soon as changing – it is as though the weird grip gives me more feeling through my fingers and I have a better feeling of the putter. I’m currently using a kind of 2 finger overlap hybrid grip with my thumbs down the side of the front of the grip. I try to make sure it almost feels like the putter is being held by just my thumbs and the tips of my fingers rather than the palms of my hands. Generally speaking the lighter I hold the putter in my fingers, the better I putt.
5, Tension is a big problem with any golf shot. I’ve recently found that a lot of tension can come from your jaw without you even realizing it. If you make sure your jaw, neck and shoulders are nice and relaxed, generally all of your other muscles will be as well which will allow you to make a nice smooth putting stroke.
What putting tips or hints do you keep referring to
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