All the putting threads I can find seem to be dedicated to novelties like the left vs right breaking putts thread et al. There isn't a thread dedicated to putting specific topics.

I suck at putting. I have one ok eye and one useless eye. 2 dimensional vision makes distance and speed very difficult to control for me. I'm decent at hitting my line but I'm often way off on speed.

Putting is peculiar and any discussion about such individuality in the miscellaneous thread is likely to fizzle quickly. With a common putting thread such discussion is more likely to be engaged as it wont be buried in a low content thread.

Unless we get lucky and hole out a chip or iron, we will use the putter at least once on every hole. Cant say that of any other club.

Green reading matters. I'm ignorant of the different types of grass and how they roll. A lot of the time I just play directly at the pin if im unsure void of local knowledge on break. I dont sink many of these but its not usually far off.

Putter type discussion might pop up. Seems appropriate to me.

Quirks irks and markers encouraged imo. I dont mark my ball to clean it on steep greens with short grass. Maybe if theres noticeable dirt clumps on the ball. Otherwise I play it as it lies on steep greens because I get a little frustrated when the ball wont stay where I marked it. When it gives me this bit of trouble I find myself putting quickly and poorly because I dont want it to roll, which has happened.

I use a long putter that I got as a Christmas gift over 25 years ago. I simply cannot use a short (normal) putter. My hands don't work. I don't get yippy, I just have zero feel. Like, I'll miss a 3 foot putt 2 feet to the left. I think that's why I can't chip.

Anyway, I've always thought my putting has been ok but lately it's awful. I cannot make anything. I honestly think I'm going to start to miss putts. I think they'll have a better chance of going in. I'm half kidding.

So for me personally I practiced a lot from 5-6 feet. This will give you a lot more confidence running your 1st putt by. Obviously you don't want to run it by that much but when you practice these those 3 footers or w/e are simple, It's a bit like a player will almost aim aware from a bunker just because they are not confident getting out of it, Once you learn to get out of them it means you can be a bit more aggressive just because you don't have that worry.

I recently changed putters after I went for a fitting for the whole bag. The putter wasn't really a fitting we just went with what I liked tbh. Compared to my old putter I have a bigger mallet, thicker grip (Which has helped me be more stable and keep it square) and is a longer my old putter was really short probably around 30inches.

I will say this and I think it's a pretty big fault a lot of people have is that you should treat every putt equal meaning if it's for Bogey/Par/Birdie etc etc every putt you should go through your routine. See so many times from my playing partners that they'll just go and step up and hit Bogey and Par Putts but when its for Birdie, They'll mark and clean their ball, Bend down and look at the line and all that, Do that on every putt. Just have a routine and stick to it for every putt.

I'd say pace over line. Once you have the pace right you won't be too far away but obviously don't discount the line.

Since covid happened I don't really ever take the pin out these days. Although my local has these things at the bottom of the pin which make it a little thicker and over the past couple of days it's hit the pin stopped on the edge of the hole and fallen in so will probably start taking pins out soon.

I'm decent at short game so you can imagine I will have a pretty good feel for things, saying that I struggle with the left to right putts mostly being a right hander I just find it tough essentially putting across yourself.

Some of my friends that are scratch to 5 hdcpers have said a putting lesson was the best money they ever spent.

One guy had something really minor going on that he said he would have never figured out on his own. Another was opening his putter face through impact due to deceleration, and was sure he was not going to figure that out. Another guy was using a putter style that did match his preferred set up.

This is why putting youtube videos are probably useless for most of us, while other videos on various aspects of the swing can be helpful.

I would suggest you look for a pro that specializes in putting lessons. People are generally good about going to a pro for full swing lessons, but most everyone thinks that surely they don't need a pro for a putting lesson.

Then you should be a great putter.

Putting becomes easy once you realize, accept, and commit to the FACT that speed is by far the most important component of great putting. Most people have a functional start line relative to their handicap as well as ability to read greens. Where the struggle is speed control which really isn't that hard once you focus almost exclusively on it in practice and on the course. Find a few speed drills and do those for at least 80% of your practice time. To illustrate this idea think of a 10' putt that breaks about a cup left. If you hit the putt too hard it will break later and miss high, too soft it will break sooner and miss low, even given the exact same read and start line.

When I test players on a 20' putt where they are just trying to lag it to a coin the shot pattern will ALWAYS be 4-6 times deeper than it is wide. Now apply the logic above to that idea and you'll see, oddly, that the width of your shot pattern on a breaking putt is more determined by your speed than your start line.

CRAZY ISN'T IT!

heads up putting - that's the post

https://golf.com/instruction/putting...ing-technique/

I started this last fall and my putting has gone from the weakest part of my game to maybe the strongest. When I was playing more often/my best 10+ years ago, I used to be the hit 15 greens, shoot 75 guy. I'm not playing nearly as much as I used to but I've had multiple birdies in my last 5 rounds. Not only that, but it is also so much easier having 6in kick ins for 2nd putts.

I used to have horrible distance control. I think it's because I must have been obsessing over the line/alignment over the ball and would "forget" how long the putt was. Not a problem any longer!

Putting:

Never come up short.
Barely hold the putter.
Use 0 arms.

A thread unfortunately I can get behind. I've tried everything.

I have a Juan Putt face on putter, 43" armlock and a Directed Force 2.1 and I can't hole anything. As a Decade member, I understand what Ship is saying and honestly, I can aimpoint the left and right break pretty well. Its the uphill downhill thing that kills me.

I do the heads up thing. I've gotten a little better but I can't figure out a uphill putts speed. It not uncommon for me to leave a 30' putt 10' short. Give me a downhill putt 10 out of 10 times. I can usually get that there.

I'm always happy to practice but when you're a muni golfer in the NYC suburbs there really isn't a place to work on pace. Where can I find a practice green where I have the space to set up some distance work (like in the Decade app)? Unthinkable.

I do have a putting coach near me, maybe this will be the kick in the rear to get a lesson. Its pretty grating to constantly ball strike to warrant a 78 and card an 84.

Hope the OP gets the flatstick sorted out!


BS-

when you're over a putt

I'm currently the worst putter I know. Three putting left and right with the occasional 4 putt. Granted, the greens I play on are FAST and tricky but still, I suck.

A common occurrence.....30 foot putt, miss by 4 feet (short, long, left, whatever)......my mind then decides to take a stroll and i run the next putt 5 feet by. miss that one.

It may be adding 10 strokes to every round right now.

edit: if anyone is watching the Open watching Bryson 4 putt was a mirror image of what I've been doing

Listening to PGA Tour radio earlier this evening, and they had a show talking about putting. The host was making a point that trying to always get the ball past the hole was not statistically correct, that is the cost of 3 putting exceeds the benefit of more one-putts. Of course he used the worst case to support his POV, that is the longest comeback putt. He did not consider that assuming a normal distribution this outcome was the least likely of all the possible 2nd putts.

Using back-of-the-napkin bell curve calcs, I came up with this for a 20 foot putt. I assume a 2 sigma normal distribution with 1 foot for each sigma.

Assume the radio guy thinks that 1 foot past is optimal. So, below would be the expected putt distance distribution:
19-20 feet: 16%
20-21 feet: 34%
21-22 feet: 34%
22-23 feet: 16%

Assuming that tour players also follow this distribution, then (1.0 - 0.16) = 84% of 20 foot putts either reach or go past the hole. Using 15% as the 1-putt rate for 20 feet, if a tour pro were never short, he could increase his 1-putt rate from 15% to (1.0/0.84) x 0.15 = 17.9%.

Assuming a uniform distribution of 1-putts for any putt distance traveled, the tour pro would have the following result distribution:
a) 1-putt: 15%
b) 0-1 foot (short): 16%
c) 0-1 foot (long): 0.34 x (1.0 - 0.179) = 27.9%
d) 1-2 feet (long): 0.34 x (1.0 - 0.179) = 27.9%
e) 2-3 feet (long): 0.16 x (1.0 - 0.179) = 13.1%

Assuming the following make percentages on the 2nd putt:
0-1 foot: 100%
1-2 feet: (1.0 + 0.99)/2 = 99.5%
2-3 feet: (0.99+0.95)/2 = 97%

The pga pro's expected putts taken from 20 feet is the sum of:
a) 1 x 0.15
b) 2 x 0.16 x 1.0
c) 2 x 0.279 x 1.0
d) 2 x 0.279 x 0.995 + 3 x 0.279 x 0.005
e) 2 x 0.131 x 0.97 + 3 x 0.131 x 0.03
Total: 1.853

For an alternate tour pro to be assured that his 20 foot putts would never be short, his median distance would need to be 2 feet past the hole, or 22 feet. The distribution would be:
20-21 feet: 16%
21-22 feet: 34%
22-23 feet: 34%
23-24 feet: 16%

And the alternate pro's result distribution:
a)1-putt: 17.9%
b)0-1 foot: 13.1%
c)1-2 feet: 27.9%
d)2-3 feet: 27.9%
e)3-4 feet: 13.1%

Assume the same make percentages as above, with the additional 3-4 foot putt:
3-4 feet: (0.95+0.88)/2 = 91.5%

The alternate pro's expected putts taken from 20 feet is the sum of:
a) 1 x 0.179
b) 2 x 0.131 x 1.0
c) 2 x 0.279 x 0.995 + 3 x 0.279 x 0.005
d) 2 x 0.279 x 0.97 + 3 x 0.279 x 0.03
e) 2 x 0.131 x 0.915 + 3 x 0.131 x 0.085
Total: 1.84

So the alternate pro would improve expected putts from 1.853 to 1.84, or about 7% improvement.

Now this uses a simplified distribution of 2 sigmas each side of the median. Of course in real life that would not be the case.

Also true is the fact that 88% make rate for random 4 foot putts is likely too low for a pro who gets to see the break of the putt as the ball is traveling past the hole. Random 4 foot putts account for birdie putts and chips where observing the break is either impossible or not as straightforward.

Without going into further calcs, for shorter putts the tour pro should be even more inclined to get the ball consistently past the hole. This is because the 1-putt rate for putts goes up as distance decreases, thus weighting 1-putts even more in the expectation calculation.

I did the improvement % calc wrong. It should be:

(1.853-1.84) / (1.853-1) = 1.5%

Because the most someone could improve on 1.853 putts would be 1 putting everything, (or 100% improvement), which would be 0.853 putts EV lower than 1.853.

Most players' distributions would be skewed to short, due to slight mis-strikes, which further helps the case for the past the hole method.

In practice , I would think that an uphill putt and a downhill putt would have different targets as the former going past the hole would usually leave a trickier putt than the latter.