Are you spending 70% of your practice time on your short game like Michael Breed implies you should?

[Golfingdad]

In other words, be the opposite of @Golfingdad.

Since I know you like memes and vids etc like me ...

[Gunther]

[URL=http://www.pgatour.com/stats/stat.403.html]http://www.pgatour.com/stats/stat.403.html[/URL] Exactly: My goal is to at least be in the top 50 percent of the tour with these stats. 5 footers you can just tap your ball on line and it usually goes in. Get to a 20 footer and I actually have to dial in my speed and get the line perfect.. not good at that.

I get it, and I recognize that 5' and in would improve the numbers. I probably have a lot more 4 and 5 footers than I do tap-ins so I'd still guess from 5' and in I'm around 80%. 95% from that range is phenomenal in my mind and since it's 188 on tour, that classifies it as such.

[RFKFREAK]

To late.... I heard.

Now that I know the secret, I am going to start implementing it this week.

You guys will probably see me at the US Open....

Oh, did you get your ticket from Ticketmaster?

Since I know you like memes and vids etc like me ...

[mvmac]

I separate myself in a bad way with putting. I feel like I am hitting as many greens as the next guy who may be leading the tournament. Can I learn to get closer to the hole? Absolutely, will it help me make more putts, I guess so since they are shorter but they better be within 5 feet. Most of my birdies are kick-ins and I make pretty much 95% of putts within 5 feet. Anything outside of that, I always just tell God that I am going to need some help on this one.

Do you 3 putt a lot?

You may be overestimating how many putts you "should" be making from short distances.

[RFKFREAK]

Do you 3 putt a lot?

You may be overestimating how many putts you "should" be making from short distances.

It's too bad GPS isn't super accurate so we could keep stats on that through devices like GameGolf.

I for one know I'm terrible at gauging distances.

[GHIN0011458]

Do you 3 putt a lot?

You may be overestimating how many putts you "should" be making from short distances.

I three-put very often. By very often I mean usually twice per round to three times per round. Since I know that GIR if king of stats, I try to hit the green first. This may leave me between 20-40 feet away sometimes, but I am on the green. My glaring weakness is my lag putting. Sometimes it is up to 10 feet short or long. The hardest ones for me, as for anyone I would assume, would be the ones going up to a different tier on a green. I also leave myself with around 15 feet regularly with a wedge in my hand and give myself about 5-6 shots at birdie from this range per round. I am typically only making one of those on a good day, or 16-20 percent which is basically half of the top player on the PGA Tour. I would like to make at least two of those per round bringing that up to 32-35 percent.  I have 3 putted eight times in the last 58 GIR as well. So almost 14 percent of the time I three put. One in 7 GIR I am three putting...

[mvmac]

I three-put very often. By very often I mean usually twice per round to three times per round. Since I know that GIR if king of stats, I try to hit the green first. This may leave me between 20-40 feet away sometimes, but I am on the green. My glaring weakness is my lag putting. Sometimes it is up to 10 feet short or long. The hardest ones for me, as for anyone I would assume, would be the ones going up to a different tier on a green. I also leave myself with around 15 feet regularly with a wedge in my hand and give myself about 5-6 shots at birdie from this range per round. I am typically only making one of those on a good day, or 16-20 percent which is basically half of the top player on the PGA Tour. I would like to make at least two of those per round bringing that up to 32-35 percent.  I have 3 putted eight times in the last 58 GIR as well. So almost 14 percent of the time I three put. One in 7 GIR I am three putting...

Well good news is that lag putting is relatively easy to improve on. My guess would be that you try to gauge distance by how hard you "hit" a putt. I used to struggle with the same thing. So the fix would be to start to make more of a pendulum like stroke, meaning your backswing will be the same length as your followthrough. Distance control will be determined by the length of the backswing and not how much you "accelerate" into the putt. Will probably feel like you're making a longer backstroke on most putts.

[Dave2512]

2-3 times a round is a wicked high 3 putt %. Seriously put a pencil to that.

[GHIN0011458]

Well good news is that lag putting is relatively easy to improve on. My guess would be that you try to gauge distance by how hard you "hit" a putt. I used to struggle with the same thing. So the fix would be to start to make more of a pendulum like stroke, meaning your backswing will be the same length as your followthrough. Distance control will be determined by the length of the backswing and not how much you "accelerate" into the putt. Will probably feel like you're making a longer backstroke on most putts.

The hardest part, which I may be using as an excuse to justify in my mind, is playing different speed greens every round. It is so hard to get a feel. A lot of my tourneys are an hour or two away so I don't get to go out there one night during the week and practice on them. I went from playing 11.5- 12's to playing 9-10's on Saturday to playing in the last group Sunday where they were measured at the slowest at a 7.

I prefer putting on fast greens by a bunch. I feel like it is much harder to make a short putt on slower greens.

[GHIN0011458]

2-3 times a round is a wicked high 3 putt %. Seriously put a pencil to that.

The sad thing is I don't remember the last round I had that I didn't have a 3 putt.. :(. Even my bogey free tourney round had a 3 putt for par on a par 5.

Oh yeah- the multi quote thing.. please combine.

[Golfingdad]

The sad thing is I don't remember the last round I had that I didn't have a 3 putt.. :(. Even my bogey free tourney round had a 3 putt for par on a par 5.

Oh yeah- the multi quote thing.. please combine.

Then seriously ... go read the OP of the thread that @mvmac linked.  You need better speed control.

And then when you are finished with that one, read this one next, and then these as well:

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

[mvmac]

The hardest part, which I may be using as an excuse to justify in my mind, is playing different speed greens every round. It is so hard to get a feel. A lot of my tourneys are an hour or two away so I don't get to go out there one night during the week and practice on them. I went from playing 11.5- 12's to playing 9-10's on Saturday to playing in the last group Sunday where they were measured at the slowest at a 7.

That's the reason for doing it, when the backstroke and followthrough match up your lag putting will travel better, the adjustments are easier to make and you're not relying on the feel for how hard to hit it. You'll have a baseline for how far back you take a 10ft, 20ft, 30ft putt on stimp 10 greens (example). If you play stimp 9, you know you just need to take it back a little farther, even if you're off you won't be as far off as having to "accelerate" into your putts. A pendulum like stroke is just more consistent, a short back swing/long followthrough stroke brings a lot of problems into play that will effect distance control.

It's a little bit like when players get confused by distance control with wedges from short distances, better players are good at estimating how far to hit it because their mechanics are better and contact is more consistent, tough to gauge distance when contact is all over the place.

[shortstop20]

Putter fitting combined with a longer, smoother stroke(no acceleration) has me putting better than I ever have in my life.

I'm making alot of the short putts and my lag putting is good. Still need to work on the 15' footers more, I tend to be a bit tentative on them.

[The Recreational Golfer]

Yes, but it's because I can (and do) spend 90 minutes on the practice green, and in no way could I hit balls for 90 minutes.

[rkim291968]

My long game practice used to be hitting balls at range until my arms got tired.  Now, I mix that with indoor drills, swing practice, taking and reviewing  my swing video.  The end result is ...

1. it's less boring (& convenient to practice at home), hence, I am more likely to practice
2. it's cheaper (no need to pay for the buckets when at home)
3. it has been more effective

[rehmwa]

I spend 70% of the time just randomly smacking shots at the range and around the green with no real plan other than entertaining myself for no other reason

sometimes I work on distance control, other times shot shaping, other times lofting and delofting, then there's long chipping, chipping, pitching and putting...to no real proportions or plan other than what I feel like doing

does that count?

I'm having a good time and not getting any worse or better.  Maybe a little better, but nothing big, more like just more consistency as if I'm familiar with my current shots.  (no kidding)

[natureboy]

That's the reason for doing it, when the backstroke and followthrough match up your lag putting will travel better, the adjustments are easier to make and you're not relying on the feel for how hard to hit it. You'll have a baseline for how far back you take a 10ft, 20ft, 30ft putt on stimp 10 greens (example). If you play stimp 9, you know you just need to take it back a little farther, even if you're off you won't be as far off as having to "accelerate" into your putts. A pendulum like stroke is just more consistent, a short back swing/long followthrough stroke brings a lot of problems into play that will effect distance control.

It's a little bit like when players get confused by distance control with wedges from short distances, better players are good at estimating how far to hit it because their mechanics are better and contact is more consistent, tough to gauge distance when contact is all over the place.

Wondering if on longer approach putts (50' +) or severely uphill if there is a diminishing relationship between length of stroke & speed at the bottom? I am finding that on these long ones, the backstroke is long enough to start feeling my left side muscles get a bit of that X-factor type stretch which feels as if it adds speed to the downstroke relative to dropping the putter with acceleration only from gravity. When I get back in this 'stretch' zone a small extra backswing length seems to result in a significant increase in ball travel relative to the less torquey feeling pendulum zone.

Have you found this to be a factor? How do you keep the left side muscles from adding anything on the longer putts to keep it pure pendulum?

[JazzFatCat]

I was looking through random GameGolf rounds and me it looks like there is a pattern for high handicap golfers when they get triple or quadruple bogeys they often hit 3 wedge shots in a row.

I imagine people often feel like they are wasting range balls just hitting 30 to 70 yard pitch shots and there's nowhere to practice hitting out of juicy rough anyways.