Fundamentals of Putting

[colin007]

another thing i think is important is keeping the handle pointed at your body the whole time.

come on, erik, quit your stalling and jump in.

[MiniBlueDragon]

I think Geoff Mangum's "Reality of Putting" DVD answers it FAR better than I ever could. Amazing DVD!

[johnthejoiner]

You have to treat it as you would any other shot in golf, your stance, grip, ball position, body alignment and you must accelerate through the ball

[sean_miller]

Originally Posted by johnthejoiner

You have to treat it as you would any other shot in golf, your stance, grip, ball position, body alignment and you must accelerate through the ball

I'm not sure I agree with all that.

My ball position and body alignment are similar, but not my stance and definitely not my extremely right hand dominant grip. My set up and grip are personal, but comfortable and repeatable and that's all that counts.

I can also make putts with an accelerating or decelerating blow. My only real fundamentals are trusting my read and getting the ball rolling on the proper line at the desired pace. The ball doesn't know whether the club was speeding up or slowing down once contact is made and it starts rolling.

[johnthejoiner]

Originally Posted by sean_miller

I'm not sure I agree with all that.

My ball position and body alignment are similar, but not my stance and definitely not my extremely right hand dominant grip. My set up and grip are personal, but comfortable and repeatable and that's all that counts.

I can also make putts with an accelerating or decelerating blow. My only real fundamentals are trusting my read and getting the ball rolling on the proper line at the desired pace. The ball doesn't know whether the club was speeding up or slowing down once contact is made and it starts rolling.

Accelerating through the putt is one of the most important thing in the whole art, if you decelerate on a putt you'll never get your distances consistently and it would say to me that there was something fundamentally wrong with that stroke

[sean_miller]

Originally Posted by johnthejoiner

Accelerating through the putt is one of the most important thing in the whole art, if you decelerate on a putt you'll never get your distances consistently and it would say to me that there was something fundamentally wrong with that stroke

It's weird isn't it? My distance control is pretty solid.

[max power]

After a certain level of competency I agree that putting becomes more and more personal, and general rules/platitudes no longer apply.  But I think nearly every bogey or worse golfer should focus on a small amount of acceleration through the putt.

Originally Posted by sean_miller

It's weird isn't it? My distance control is pretty solid.

[sean_miller]

Originally Posted by max power

After a certain level of competency I agree that putting becomes more and more personal, and general rules/platitudes no longer apply.  But I think nearly every bogey or worse golfer should focus on a small amount of acceleration through the putt.

I don't always "decelerate", but unless I'm putting from the fairway or my backswing is somehow restricted I don't focus on acceleration of the club head. My tempo is pretty steady on the way through the ball and on very fast greens and down hill putts I probably do decelerate a tad. Conscious acceleration, I FIND does more to put the club head off line than it helps.

Different stroke for different folks.

[WUTiger]

Overall strategy: Roll the ball into the hole.

First of all the putter itself. Make sure your putter has:

• The correct shaft length for your stance
• Enough swingweight to ensure a smooth, stable stroke
• Correct lie: If it's too flat or too upright for your setup, it's hard to hit the ball squarely (I played an Acushnet Bullseye putter for about 20 years, and had good days and bad days. Switched out putters, and had better luck. After I got a putter fitting on my Ping Pal, I pulled out the Bullseye and hit some putts with it. Turned out it was too upright for my stance.)

Walking to Green: Look at terrain for highside, lowside; water nearby, ball likely breaks that way.

Lineup: Try to look a ball from behind, and from cup going back to ball. The last two years I have gone nonverbal on putting setup. No work talk: just use visual images.

Setup: Eyes directly over the ball... Ball about an inch behind the left heel. have putter head about 1/8" off the turf.

Grip: I use a left-hand low, overlap grip. Make sure the grip has square, palm-to-palm pressure.

Stroke: Last year I returned to a pendelum putting stroke - straight back and straight forward. Much more stable day-to-day. I push straight back and pull straight forward, letting the shoulders guide the stroke. Try to roll the ball about a foot past if it misses. Hit ball slightly on upswing = roll.

Super downhill putts , such as upper terrace going to lower terrace: If it's likely to roll off the green, putt with a 7 iron.  Ball will get some checkspin as it starts its descent, and will move forward using mostly gravity.

[wrx_junki]

I like to keep things simple. This is my routine so I don't know if it qualifies as the fundamentals.

1. Look at the contours of the green when balls are hit onto the green and when you are walking up to the green.

2. Read the putt from a few choice angles.

3. Practice stroke.

4. Stay loose and focused on target then stroke the putt.

I think staying loose and focused on your target is the most fundamental thing in putting. Your mind does wonders when focused.

[Colding]

I would say:

- Putterhead positioning at impact; If you open or close the head, no matter how you align the ball will not go where you aim.

- Speed; Speed sems to be crucial. With low speed break in the green will affect the ball more than with high speed. I guess Touch comes along here. Being able to understand how hard to put.

- Being able to read greens

I good tip that i got last year is always aim a bit after the hole. A study showed that most amateurs leaves their puts short whereas pro's puts too long giving themselves a better % of holing their puts.

[ks8829]

1) Making consistent solid contact with the ball

2) Distance control

3) Hitting a straight putt

4) Reading the greens for breaks and speed

5) Making it all work under pressure to win a major championship

The above are to me the fundamental of putting, the other factor that compliments a great putter is a great short game that will allow you to have 23 putts per 18 holes to shoot a low score.

[talismand]

Originally Posted by ks8829

1) Making consistent solid contact with the ball

2) Distance control

3) Hitting a straight putt

4) Reading the greens for breaks and speed

5) Making it all work under pressure to win a major championship

The above are to me the fundamental of putting, the other factor that compliments a great putter is a great short game that will allow you to have 23 putts per 18 holes to shoot a low score.

I have to agree with 1 - 3. I assume that with #3, you meant straight as in "on your line". I think that 4 isn't really a "fundamental", it's a necessity, but without the first 3, it's useless (ok, not useles, but I think you get what I'm saying).

We've seen all types of stances, grips, tempos, putter types, etc on tour, and they seem to make it work, so those things can't really be considered fundamentals. It's big picture stuff like the above.

[iacas]

Okay, first, thanks to all who participated and shared their thoughts. Greatly appreciated. Nobody's wrong but I will share my thoughts.

As with the full swing, when I talk about "fundamentals" I talk about the basic commonalities. You'll often see the best players have all of them in supreme command and the worst players have none of them. Within each particular fundamental, you'll often see wide disparities between the best and worst players.

"Commonalities" is a key part of that phrase. Many of you disagree with me when I say that the grip is a "fundamental." I do not call it one because it's not a commonality, and saying that "everyone has a grip" is like saying "everyone tries to get the ball in the hole." "Everyone has a grip" does nothing to separate the good players from the poor players.

So "grip" is out.

Attitude, similarly, is out. I can have the world's best attitude for putting and still be terrible at it. Similarly, the best putters on the PGA Tour often have very different mindsets. Brad Faxon talks about how he doesn't care if the putt goes in or not. Others talk about trying to make every putt. Kids putt well by not thinking at all, but some putters are true grinders. Pre-shot routines vary, etc.

Other things that are out? "Hitting the ball on the sweet spot" is out. It's common, but I know of a few good putters who will either miss the sweet spot with every stroke they make or will miss it on purpose (for example, to help deaden a down-hill putt). "Firm wrists" is out for obvious reasons, as are all the stroke types - straight back and through, inside-down-the-line, inside-square-inside, etc.

So what do I consider to be the true fundamentals of putting? There are three in my eyes:

1. Read

2. Line

3. Speed

Many of you said these three things. Some of you had some different ideas. Let me explain why I chose each of them:

Read

Something like 90%+ of first putts break, and even a straight putt has to be "read" properly - if you read a cup of break on a straight putt, it ain't goin' in.

The best putters are all really really great green readers. They don't regularly under-estimate or over-estimate the break on a putt by much and they almost always know which way a virtually straight putt will wiggle. Some read greens differently than others, but they all get the reads right.

Line

A great read does the player no good at all if they can't start the ball on that line. It's critical that you must start the ball on-line, as you can have Tiger Woods (not lately! :-D) or Ben Crenshaw, or Brad Faxon or Loren Roberts, or Jack Nicklaus reading your putts, and if you can't start the ball on that line, you're not going to make anything.

Speed

Some folks call this "capture speed" or "capture dynamics" but speed is absolutely critical. The best putters do not often run a putt six feet past the hole because, even if it hit the hole, it would not fall in. Similarly (and more obviously), the best putters do not leave putts short because they almost never go in!!!

So, Those are My Three

So, those are my three fundamentals. Every great putter has them, and every poor putter is lacking one, two, or all three of them.

Note that sometimes the order changes. Speed is more important on a 40-foot downhill putt than on a straight three-foot putt, where line and read become the most important pieces. Speed is still important on the short putt, but less so than the line and read.

Where I'm Going with This (Professionally)…

In a (CamelCase) word, here:

http://aimpointgolf.com/

Dave and I have had several conversations over the past few weeks, months, and years about the true fundamentals. Both of us are pretty good putters, and we have these three fundamentals down pretty well. As we look to expand our capabilities as instructors, we're looking at every avenue for improving our students and improving the quality of our instruction. We continue to do this with the full swing, our practice methods, our pitching and short game and putting stroke instruction, and so on.

We feel that AimPoint is a perfect compliment that will allow us to best teach golfers how to read greens . After all, consider how you'd tell someone to read a putt? It might go something like this:

"Uhh, you see that swale there? That's gonna throw the ball to the left a little bit, and that ridge coming off the back side of that bunker is gonna move the ball back to the right a little... so I'd aim somewhere in this area... and it should get close."

AimPoint, at the most basic level, provides the instructor and the student with a common language, a common dictionary, and combines that with specific techniques and charts so that everyone can not only speak the same language, but they can get a read that's about as scientific as it gets. AimPoint's three fundamentals are the same as the ones Dave and I came up with independently, so it's a little bit of a case of "great minds think alike."

Now, you've seen the AimPoint technology working on Golf Channel broadcasts, so you know how accurate it is. And, while those are laser-mapped and thus incredibly precise, AimPoint will let me (and Dave, and others) understand how to read greens and how to teach that to students. We look forward to being able to help students who know "this putt breaks eight inches to the left" and be dead-on accurate with that read, and improving these three fundamentals for our students.

As John Graham, one of the few AimPoint Level II instructors, said - "I've always been a good green reader. AimPoint showed me why ."

Dave and I are making plans to take some intensive AimPoint training in March and will look to offer schools and clinics throughout 2011 and into the future. This thread's about the fundamentals of putting, and I'm still relatively new to this, but I'm looking forward to sharing some of my knowledge over the coming weeks, months, and years, and encourage everyone to think about what I've said here about the true fundamentals and, if you decide perhaps that you're weak on your green-reading skills in particular, to seek out the nearest AimPoint instructor for what will be an eye-opening experience.

A Brief Word on "Aim"

If I understand things correctly, AimPoint is considering adding a fourth fundamental - "aim" - which will differ from "Line" in that you have to also be able to AIM your putter properly. To that end, they're strengthening their partnership with Edel Golf , makers of truly custom-fit putters. After all, starting the ball on line is going to be a lot easier if you can aim properly.

Dave and I will also carry an Edel putter fitting system and look forward to seeing what our personalized, completely customized putters look like, feel like, etc. I'll be reporting back on that later on.

[Stretch]

Quick excursion off topic, Erik. Any particular reasons you guys went with AimPoint over PuttingZone? Seem to be many similarities, perhaps it's ultimately just a choice of flavor. Do realize the answer may involve politics and/or economics, so be only as explicit as you care to.

[Zeph]

Haven't read any replies yet, I'll give it a quick go.

My focus are always on the important stuff. First you have to read the line, pretty standard, nobody putts without reading them (nobody good anyways). Then you have to find the starting line, I usually pick a place on the green pretty close in front of the ball. Once I've found this and stand over the ball, it's only focus on the speed, nothing else matters.

You don't even have to hit it in the middle of the putter face, though that is generally the prevailing opinion, which I agree with. As for stance, setup, grip, swing and all that technical stuff, it's pretty much a matter of style, it doesn't matter if you do it traditionally or saddle-back (or w/e it's called).

So, to put it into a few words:

Read the line

Pick a starting point

Hit it with the correct speed

The speed may vary slightly depending on your putting style, which in turn affects the line ever so slightly. The ball may take a different path if it is just dropping into the hole compared to rolling two feet past.

[iacas]

Originally Posted by Stretch

Quick excursion off topic, Erik. Any particular reasons you guys went with AimPoint over PuttingZone? Seem to be many similarities, perhaps it's ultimately just a choice of flavor. Do realize the answer may involve politics and/or economics, so be only as explicit as you care to.

Simply because it's off topic a little, I'll keep it short. I like the science AimPoint's doing and PuttingZone has always struck me as a bit less so. I even re-watched Geoff's hour-long video with Elk last night and looked for something to use as an excuse to delay this decision more, but I think it's a case of "you can't go wrong with either" and "AimPoint feels better." I like Geoff and hope he won't hold this against me... He's not fond of AimPoint, to put it one way...

P.S. Purely from a practical standpoint, I think AimPoint is going to be easier to market. But that's wasn't really a deciding factor at all.

[MiniBlueDragon]

Originally Posted by iacas

... I like the science AimPoint's doing and PuttingZone has always struck me as a bit less so. I even re-watched Geoff's hour-long video with Elk last night and looked for something to use as an excuse to delay this decision more, but I think it's a case of "you can't go wrong with either" ...

I'd never taken a lesson on putting, watched any videos or read any books save for Bob Rotella's "Putting Out Of Your Mind" and as a reasonable newcomer to golf my putting was bad bad bad. I'd pretty much 3-4 putt 90% of holes, 2 putt 7% or so of them and single putt the rest if I got lucky.

I took the plunge and bought The Reality of Putting by Geoff and Elk after seeing it on SitD and within an hour my putting had turned from shoddy at best to actually quite good with straight putts. On course it was still infinitely better although reading greens is still somewhat of an art form so not perfect for me. I've not seen any AimPoint stuff so I have no frame of reference there but I'm glad I managed to select one of the two front runners from your post above. I'd estimate now that I 3-putt 10%, 2-putt the far majority and occasionally putt a great single putt hole.