Your Putting Style: Utley or Pelz?

[jaggy13]

I find less room for error with utley. our bodies don't have any straight lines, why should we try to manufacture one?

[Dub]

Even though I'll sometimes make a small effort during practice strokes to go back and through squarely.....once I begin putting unconsiously it will be evident that I execute the strokes more like Utley sugggests.

The slight club rotation, for me, is very natural. It's sort of a mini version of the swing.

[lipout]

I bought Pelz's book about 3 years ago, and Utley's early in 2011.  Utley's clearly works better for me.  Looking at some of the other posts, I would like to add that the arc in Utley's method is natural .  The arc is what naturally happens because you are standing to one side of the ball.  If you are somehow working on creating the arc, then you are not benefitting from the simplicity.  Utley's point about Pelz is that square to square is not a natural action, it has to be created with fine muscle control that is not that easy to repeat, particularly if you don't spend lots of time practicing.

The benefit of Utley's method is that there is less to do and so less to practice and less to go wrong.

The other key aspect of Utley is how he uses the hands to power the putt.  He emphasises moving the putter head, not the grip.  For me, this was the key thing.  I was very prone to pushing the putter through, where the grip moves quite a long way.  Utley could be confused with wristy, and it takes a while to become clear about the difference, but once I got it, the increased feel was substantial and distance control improved a lot.  After a whole season, I can say with 100% confidence that I am putting better now.

[Mr. Desmond]

I read Utley, tried Utley, bought the aids, bought his DVD, watched Sergio in his Utley phase at the Byron Nelson - and came to the conclusion that bending and straightening the elbows slightly is not the best idea for me.

I do believe the arc is a natural motion and the Pelz's SBST requires a manipulation - so I avoid Pelz.

I went to Pat O'Brien, Zach Johnson's Instructor, great guy - and follow his program, which is fairly simple - a wide, natural arc, a different grip, and a more upright, neutral stance for starters.

[inthehole]

Originally Posted by Xt1ncT

Straight back and straight through for me.

same here - it's all about a straight back takeaway - if I can get that right, it goes where I want it to.     The tragically unpopular center shafted putter works so much better for me than a traditional blade with teh straight through motion.

[iacas]

Originally Posted by inthehole

same here - it's all about a straight back takeaway - if I can get that right, it goes where I want it to.     The tragically unpopular center shafted putter works so much better for me than a traditional blade with teh straight through motion.

Thing is... I doubt you've got a "straight back takeaway" or that your putter face stays square to the target. You might think it does, but I'd wager the money the good DrPius owes me that it doesn't. :-)

[Kieran123]

I tried the straight back method but it feels uncomfortable and forced no matter how much I do it

Back to the arc.

I stand up a little straight ( er ) than I used to and interlock my fingers now. Been working pretty good.

[inthehole]

Originally Posted by iacas

Thing is... I doubt you've got a "straight back takeaway" or that your putter face stays square to the target. You might think it does, but I'd wager the money the good DrPius owes me that it doesn't. :-)

You're probably right - I make a conscious effort to have a straight back takeaway on my practice strokes which really helps me  ... imagine there is some degree of arc that develops in there someplace during the swing through (I bet I'm closer to SBST than the traditional arc though ).   One thing that I notice I do unconscously is my left elbow protrudes straight out & rises on an arc from my body during the follow through (kinda looks dorky) - this is the only way I can maintain a straight stroke - assume this is common for SBST ?

[misty_mountainhop]

I think I tend to be in-square-in but it's a mild arc. Feels a natural path for me; certainly not a manufactured one. Definitely not a straight back-straight through path.

[namkrats]

I'm more Pennick  haven't really tried either Pelz or Utley

[mdl]

Originally Posted by misty_mountainhop

I think I tend to be in-square-in but it's a mild arc. Feels a natural path for me; certainly not a manufactured one. Definitely not a straight back-straight through path.

Same for me.  I agree with Erik that the SBST line feels unnatural and manufactured.  Everyone always talks about how a repeatable, natural pendulum with no wrist action is the key to putting.  I don't feel like it's even possible to have a natural pendulum with no wrist manipulation with SBST.  My arc's not huge, but just given the geometry of our bodies and that we're standing beside the ball the natural pendulum definitely creates a little arc.

[Ernest Jones]

Definitely an arc, like every other club in the bag.

[Laws of Woo]

Definitely Pelz...Straight back and straight through. I've tried the other way and its not pretty.

[sshadow2]

You have to be perfect to connect the ball at the minute moment the clubface is square to the target line with Utley's method. This means your ball position needs to be spot on every time no matter the lie, grain, slope, break, wind, lighting, your own weariness and level of focus and concentration.

Pelz's method is easier to start with (and finish with). Don't knock it. Stricker is a self proclaimed SBST putter, and he was number one in putter a couple of years back.

[iacas]

Originally Posted by sshadow2

You have to be perfect to connect the ball at the minute moment the clubface is square to the target line with Utley's method. This means your ball position needs to be spot on every time no matter the lie, grain, slope, break, wind, lighting, your own weariness and level of focus and concentration.

Pelz's method is easier to start with (and finish with). Don't knock it. Stricker is a self proclaimed SBST putter, and he was number one in putter a couple of years back.

1. I could easily make the case that you have to be more precise with an SBST stroke because the wrists are being manipulated. In an arc stroke the clubface stays square too - square to the arc - but without the wrist manipulation needed for an SBST stroke. Ball position isn't all that relevant. You line the putter up and unless the ball moves during your stroke you return it to the same position because the putter face stays square to the arc.

2. Steve Stricker doesn't putt straight back and straight through. He might feel like he does, or say he does, but he doesn't. His toe swings open and moves inside on the takeaway.

Here's a tiny stroke and the arc is even visible in this, as is the putter face changing its orientation:

In the end I think that realizing you don't putt SBST - virtually nobody does, and that number is effectively 0 on putts outside of 15-20 feet - will smooth some bumps you have in your putting when you try typical "SBST fixes" despite having a small arc stroke. If you employ some sort of SBST fix to an arc stroke, it could be very bad. Better to realize you putt with a small arc like virtually everyone else, and work on the proper fixes.

[mymizunosrock]

With an Arc with the face rotating open on the back, square (ideally) at impact and closing on the follow through.  Something I am toying with at the moment, especially on putts inside 8-10ft is the tempo.

[Clambake]

Originally Posted by sshadow2

You have to be perfect to connect the ball at the minute moment the clubface is square to the target line with Utley's method. This means your ball position needs to be spot on every time no matter the lie, grain, slope, break, wind, lighting, your own weariness and level of focus and concentration.

In either style - arc or SBST - you need to make sure the club face is square at impact.     But doing this with SBST requires inherent compensations throughout the stroke.      With an arcing stroke, if you've adopted a neutral position and simply move the big muscles properly, squaring the club face happens in a fairly natural manner.    With a SBST, you also need to make sure the club face is square at the moment of impact, but since you are positioned to the side of the ball and trying to turn an inherently circular motion into a linear straight motion, the small muscles in the forearms and wrists need to be providing compensations to make sure you return to the ball with a square club face.      These are more vulnerable to all the factors you indicate such as weariness and lack of concentration.

Originally Posted by sshadow2

Pelz's method is easier to start with (and finish with). Don't knock it. Stricker is a self proclaimed SBST putter, and he was number one in putter a couple of years back.

Originally Posted by iacas

2. Steve Stricker doesn't putt straight back and straight through. He might feel like he does, or say he does, but he doesn't. His toe swings open and moves inside on the takeaway.

Stricker proclaims he is SBST, but only kind of.   Looking at video of even his short putts, there is a slight opening and closing of the clubface through the stroke - once again, what someone feels like they're doing isn't actually what is actually happening.

But I find another aspect of Stricker's self-proclaimed putting style even more interesting.   Take a look at the following video with Stina from Golf Digest.     Stricker indicates that on short putts he tries to be more SBST, but on longer putts he acknowledges he plays an arcing stroke .     In the video, Stricker is also quoted as saying something I found very interesting: that on longer putts the tendency of a SBST putter is to pull the putts to the left, so that he compensates for this by aiming further to the right than his desired target line.

Think about this for a moment.   Stricker isn't a perfectly SBST putter even on shorter putts; its a feeling he strives for, but it doesn't actually happen.   And he says he does not try to preserve that feeling on longer putts and instead feels the arc, meaning that in a way he actually is feeling a couple different putting styles depending on where he is at.     He is also says there is an issue with SBST (pulling longer putts), and to overcome this he builds in a compensation in his aiming.

To me, these should all be red alerts for the normal amateur golfer.   Through countless hours practice over many years, Stricker has been able to handle these different putting feels and to build in the compensations necessary to make it work for him.    Kind of like Furyk's swing - he makes it work for him through thousands and thousands of hours of practice.    But for the rest of us without that time and dedication, can we expect to build in the compensations and changes necessary?   Probably not - we'd be better served simplifying the motions and finding ways to make them repeatable.

[johnclayton1982]

I disagree with some of things you've said in this thread, iacas.  At the risk of arguing with a pro as a 13 handicapper (and rising) - and trying not to come across like a jerk like some of the others in this thread that disagreed with you - i am a huge follower of the Pelz putting method.  I do most of his drills, and I think it is a huge over-simplification to say the Pelz "system" is straight-back straight-through.  While I acknowledge that everyone is a PGA Tour player on the internet, my short game is good.  I hit short off the tee (although improving), and hit my 7 iron about 140 yards.  I'm not long, but I get up and down alot, and I'm a very good putter.  Last round, I played nine holes in 11 putts, shooting a 39 hitting 2 greens (both short par 5s, 412 yards and 460 yards).  Again, its over the internet, but I've followed Pelz's system and it has produced very good results for me.

Pelz presents, in his book, an entire system for getting better, including drills that are proscribed a certain number of times a day for a certain number of putts.  It is very interesting and work on his building blocks of putting. I've been doing it since about July, every day, and it has made a HUGE improvement in my putting.  I honeslty don't think you can take what you want from Pelz and leave the rest.  This may be a serious break from the usual in golf instruction, but I think Pelz is a package.

Developing a SBST swing like most people do, by trying to do it out on the course or on the putting green, is suicidal and silly.  There is no way you can do it.  It is tough, its not a natural motion, and Pelz acknowledges this in his book.  You cannot develop a SBST swing without putting rails.  Pelz has a drill where you fix rails to the putter edges and putt inside a track.  If the face opens or closes, the rails hit the edge.  As you get better and better, you move the track in.  Right now, I can do it with about .75" on each side without hitting the rails on a fairly long putt, whcih is pretty close to SBST.  Pelz acknowledges in his book that nobody putts SBST perfectly, but the idea is to get as close to SBST as possible.  Without doing his drills, it is unnatural and cannot be done with good results. However, with about four months of 60 putts a night on his "truth rails", you can get pretty close.

Another issue is body movement.  Pelz says in his book that if you move your hips, and use that to give your putts power, you cannot help but turn the putter face unless you counterbalance that with wrist movement.  However, if you put with a perfectly still body, you can do a SBST stroke.  In other words, it is natural (because you do it in alot of your other shots) to have a very small pivot in your putting stroke.  You cannot put SBST doing that.  A good way to feel this is to putt knock-kneed (both your knees pressed together).  This makes it impossible to rotate your lower body, and makes putting feel really wierd if you arn't used to doing it.  However, if you do this, a SBST stroke is much easier than if you have even the slightest lower body rotation in the stroke (because your wrists must compensate for the turn and natural opening of the clubface).  A SBST storke with a lower body pivot is a disaster.

Finally, I don't think you can post one video to show that a certain player putts one way or the other.  The other day, i had a tricky lie, decelerated my 7 iron, and hit a horrible shot with a reverse pivot.  I dont hit all my shots with a reverse pivot, but I hit that one with a reverse pivot.  There is a video of an LPGA pro (Annika Sorenstam?) hitting a 3 wood with her weight on the right side and dumping the shot into a lake about 150 yards in front of her, and Arnold Palmer hit a driver off the deck totally fat in a match with Gary Player.  These are on youtube, but we would never say the Sorenstam hits with a reverse pivot, or that Arnold Palmer hits his driver off the deck fat.  You can find a youtube video of a bad single shot and it doesn't mean its the way the player hits the shot.  In fact, Pelz accounts for this in the first few chapters of his book, theorizing that you need to look at not 10 or 100 putts for a tendancy, but more like 800-1000.  So, without much, much more I don't think we can conclude Stricker "doesn't" putt SBST

EDIT: READ POST ABOVE AFTER POSTING (IT WENT UP WHILE I WAS WRITING).  THE POINT ISN'T JUST ABOUT STRICKER, THOUGH.  ITS HARD TO ANALYZE A PUTTING STROKE WITHOUT A TON OF DATA.

I guess my issue is that you are right, nobody putts SBST - I don't, but I come close.  You are correct that a player shouldn't try to putt SBST unless they are willing to do drills to make sure they , in fact, putting SBST and to quiet their lower body to take wrists out.  However, if a player commits to the Pelz method, he can really start to see his putts become very close to SBST and it can produce great results.  I don't think its fair to say "nobody putts SBST" - thats like saying "nobody" has a square clubface at impact (even on trackman, my pro the other day his a very straight shot with his clubface .2 degrees open - that isn't squre).  I think the poll should be :

As close as possible to SBST (Pelz)

Not attempting SBST, doing in-square-in, and working that way (Utley)

Again, not to dispute someone who knows alot more about golf than me, but Pelz has helped me alot, and I put that way (knock-kneed SBST).

-John

PS. I found the Pelz method via a book about putting that has you take a four page perosnality test and then "proscribes" a putting method for you.  I was analytical, and got recommended Pelz, but they had others - Emotional (Dave Stockton), Extrovert (Utley).  It was interesting.  Wonder if that would work for anyone else.

PPS.  I haven't updated my sig yet, but I got an Edel about a month ago, and it is awesome.  Anyone serious about putting, this is as close to buying game as you'll get.  I love my fitted putter.

Another edit: Maybe the hardest thing in putting is aiming the clubface.  In-square-in lets you kinda aim with your subconcious, whereas SBST requires very good aiming with the putterface.  Pelz's lazraimer is invaluable for this (have one in my basement), but this is where the Edel really shines.  The thing lines up right for me.  Most players are awful at aligning their putterface, and I think in-square-in allows them more of a subconcious feel for aim.  Again, though, if you take the time to do the aiming drills, I think SBST produces better results.