My transition from a straight-back to an in-square-in putting style

[B-Con]

For the majority of my life I've been a straight-back-straight-through putter. It was the simplest stroke to make and, in my upbringing, the easiest. I stuck with it for my first couple years.

But recently I had a revelation. I was re-reading a post by iacas here on the forum and it connected with an instructional video* that I had seen, and in an instant I was a in-square-in convert.

* http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5TockpcqG8

New Thought:

In-square-in: (Aka, "gating", "the screendoor", "arcing".) I'd always thought of the in-square-in putting stroke as requiring extra complexity in the form of rotation of the putter, and I didn't like the idea of having to re-square the putter face at impact after the backswing. I preferred to pick a putting line and stay on it the whole time. However, this is a completely wrong way of looking at the in-square-in swing. The in-square-in style actually requires that you never adjust the face of of the putter. Instead, you simply rock your putter with your shoulders and the putter should stay stay square to a gentle arc that is a larger version of the circle your shoulders make when they rotate. In fact, you could say that a in-square-in swing is "straight back" because, on the backswing, the putter should should always be pulled straight back relative to its current position , it is the restriction of the shoulders that should cause it to gracefully open. For me, that thought of always having the putter come straight back and delegating the job of opening the face to the shoulders entirely became my most crucial putting swing thought, albeit a very simple one.

A little more detail on what the 2-dimensional top view of a gating swing looks like (ie, a top-down view with no depth perception). Let your spine be an axis of rotation for your shoulders, and assume your shoulders rotate about it in a perfect circle. If you held a putter and stood straight up, rotating your shoulders would produce a perfect circle around your spine for both your shoulders and your putter. If you bent over at a 90* angle, parallel to the floor, and rotated in a circle your putter would again rotate in a perfect circle, but this time from the top it would appear to be moving in a straight line forward and backward because the circular part would be in the up-down dimension that we are ignoring. For a real swing, your shoulders are in between those two extremes, at about a 30* angle away from straight up. So when they rotate in a circle, part of the circle is contained in the "up-down" dimension. From the top-down view the putter actually appears to travel in a parabola. (In this image, I realize that most players stand with their head over the ball, but that would ruin the over head view, so I realize this is not accurate to scale but the principles do apply.)

In this simple diagram, the circle and protruding rectangles are a player's head and shoulders as viewed from above, and the line is the putter head.



But for all the things that I now think are in favor of the in-square-in swing path, there is definitely one big downside about it: The temptation to pull putts. You must maintain the discipline necessary to not close the putter face during the swing to "help" get the putter back to square. For me, the right wrist/hand is almost always to blame when this happens, the right hand cannot become tighter and the right wrist cannot tense. The putter must return to square by the shoulder rotation and the shoulder rotation alone. If you stray at all, you will either have to then "unhelp" and re-compensate or you'll have a putt that misses left (for the right-handed golfer).

Square-back: Conversely, a square-back and square-through putting stroke does not follow the natural flat rotation of the shoulders. There is no way to keep the wrists and arms perfectly locked and to keep the putter head from rotating at all on the backswing. If your shoulders rotate in a circle about the spine on a square backswing then the wrists have to rotate against to the shoulder rotation in order to hold the face square to the line of putt. (See above diagram.) As well, the wrists, arms, or shoulders have to deviate from being stationary and locked in relation to the shoulders in order to keep the putter head on the backwards-extended line of putt. You have at least one, likely two, more variables introduced into the swing motion, and every action taken in the backswing has to be undone in the actual swing. The timing of the extra variable(s) must be perfect.

A square-back stroke that doesn't appear to have the wrists, shoulders, and arms, locked into position must have a shoulder rotation that doesn't remain flat and perfectly about the spine. I guarantee you that the wrists, shoulders, or arms are deviated during the swing. Try locking your wrists, elbows, and shoulders very tightly and then rotating about your spine an angle of 30* (basically, just a long backstroke). You won't end with a square putter face, and your putter won't be on the straight line.

Conclusion:

I'm not saying you shouldn't have a square-back swing, and I'm not saying that a square-back swing can't be natural. There are a lot of very good players who are excellent putters who use a square-back swing. In fact, I've heard that the majority of PGA TOUR players use a square-back swing. The point I am trying to make is simply:

* The in-square-in stroke is a simple stroke, in terms of joint movement, and keeps the putter face aligned with the most natural source of the turn for the backswing, the shoulders about the spine.

My main goal is to detail how the in-square-in swing should not be feared as complex, even by the high handicapper. It isn't overly complicated and doesn't require extra movement or coordination that could be fatal to a swing. It may not be the swing for you, but don't fear it for the wrong reasons. It really is a natural swing.

And not to go off on a tangent, but equipment can be a big factor here. I've only demoed a couple dozen putters, but I find face-balanced putters annoying for an in-square-in stroke. If I had a face-balanced putter I would probably use a straight-back stroke. For me, personally, I prefer a lot of toe-hang if I'm going to gate my stroke. The putter can definitely dictate which stroke feels best for a player.