Putting...

[bostonboy9416]

I made my high school team for the second straight year in a row, and am enjoying the opportunity to play every day. My game is decent overall, on a good day I can shoot a 39 but I also have a tendency to blow up. Those blow ups are becoming more and more so due to my putting. Any tips on green reading/judging speed? People say my stroke is fine, but for some reason I just struggle big time with it.

[klineka]

Have you looked into the Aimpoint method for reading greens? Numerous users on here use that approach, and a few guys on here are Aimpoint instructors I believe. See if you can find an aimpoint instructor or a clinic in your area. I know you mentioned that people say your stroke is fine, but you could also try posting some clips of your putting motion in the swing thread  section of the site if you wanted additional sets of eyes on your stroke.

Also, congrats on making your highschool team again! I would have loved to play for my h.s. team but I was too involved with baseball at the time. Now that I am done with baseball I have more time to golf 

Edited April 12, 2017 by klineka

[saevel25]

55 minutes ago, bostonboy9416 said:

I made my high school team for the second straight year in a row, and am enjoying the opportunity to play every day. My game is decent overall, on a good day I can shoot a 39 but I also have a tendency to blow up. Those blow ups are becoming more and more so due to my putting. Any tips on green reading/judging speed? People say my stroke is fine, but for some reason I just struggle big time with it.

Aimpoint is the best way to read greens. 

If you struggle with distance control it could be the stroke or the putter. 

I would check to make sure that your backstroke is equal length with the forward stroke. You might not be taking a big enough backstroke on longer putts. 

[DaveP043]

This article could help you with your distance control:

 

[Loose Cannon]

We take a fork or spoon, load it with food, and hit a 1" hole we can't even see.  How many times do you stop and try to analyze what it will take to get the bit of steak into  your mouth?  You don't!!!  It comes naturally.

Too often, I've seen players suffer paralysis through over-analysis... especially when it comes to putting.  A couple things that have helped me over the years....

1.)  Spend less time on the driving range and more time on the putting clock.  You hit driver maybe 14 times during a round.  You use the putter 30 times or more.  Which is most important to be comfortable with?

2.)  If you are having distance trouble, play "darts".  If you put the ball in the hole, yes you score 10.  However, the closer you leave the ball to the hole the better the score.  9, 8, 7, etc.  Play like the hole is the bullseye in a 2 foot diameter dart board.  A two-putt isn't all that bad.

3.)  Become friends with your putter.  A guy who has won our club championship a few times uses an old 'no-name' putter he bought for 75 cents at a garage sale 20 years ago.  Still has some yellow paint visible from the time it was a putt-putt putter.  He's tried Cameron and Odyssey and boutique putters.  Goes back to the one he knows and trusts. 

Great to see you playing golf competitively.  Enjoy the game.  This Great Game can provide a phenomenal amount of enjoyment over the course of a lifetime... along with some frustration.  The enjoyment is what keeps me playing 5 to 7 days/week at age 70.  Don't allow the frustration to infringe on the enjoyment the Game can give you.

[TN94z]

In my opinion, speed control is going to be something that you will have to learn by your "feel," For me, at our course, the greens may be a little thicker one day to the next, if you play in the morning versus the afternoon when the sun and wind has beat on the greens and they may roll a little faster. Those are all things I think about when I am looking at a putt. That me be thought of as "over analysis" but it's things that affect the speed for me.

I have been trying to work with my step son on his putting. He leaves them short quite often even at a local course that has some of the fastest greens around. He just cannot seem to get them to the hole. It will take him 7-8 holes to get a clue about the speed of the green. We are working on getting him to pick up on green speeds a little quicker instead of missing what could be birdies and leaving himself in tough positions for par

Edited April 12, 2017 by TN94z

[Groucho Valentine]

My philiosphly on putting is dont get too much into the mechanical minutiae and technical stuff . A good basic setup is important, but putting is 98% personal feel.   The only way you're going to develop that feel is with experimentation and practice. Try out some different grips and rhythms and see what the results are. You just want to get to a point where you're imagining the ball going into the hole and letting your body make dreams come true. Theres no right or wrong way. 

[iacas]

On 4/12/2017 at 3:13 PM, Loose Cannon said:

We take a fork or spoon, load it with food, and hit a 1" hole we can't even see.  How many times do you stop and try to analyze what it will take to get the bit of steak into  your mouth?  You don't!!!  It comes naturally.

That's not comparable at all.

And if you watch a baby learning to feed himself… it clearly doesn't come naturally.

On 4/12/2017 at 3:13 PM, Loose Cannon said:

1.)  Spend less time on the driving range and more time on the putting clock.  You hit driver maybe 14 times during a round.  You use the putter 30 times or more.  Which is most important to be comfortable with?

Absent a glaring weakness… the driver. By far.

On 4/12/2017 at 3:13 PM, Loose Cannon said:

3.)  Become friends with your putter.  A guy who has won our club championship a few times uses an old 'no-name' putter he bought for 75 cents at a garage sale 20 years ago.  Still has some yellow paint visible from the time it was a putt-putt putter.  He's tried Cameron and Odyssey and boutique putters.  Goes back to the one he knows and trusts. 

Or… get fit for an Edel or something, so you know you have a putter you can aim and control distance.

Also, for all putting improvement, fix the worst of the three keys:

[The Recreational Golfer]

Try this drill for improving your sense of speed with longer putts. Find a place on the practice green that gives you a level putt for 45 feet. Drop a ball at that distance, one at 35 feet, one at 25 feet, and one at 15 feet.

Putt them in this order: 25, 45, 15, 35. This is so you don't get into a predictable groove.

Hit these putts over and over until you get ALL of them within 5%. That sounds like a high standard, but if you practice, it's not.

If you have a good sense at these four distances, you'll find it easy to fill in the gaps.

Before you play, do this drill on the course's practice green a few times to get a sense of the speed of the greens you'll be playing on. Hopefully practice green speed = course green speed, but that's not always the case.

 

[DAZinKC]

"Read it, roll it, hole it" - Eddie Lowery