Dear NoMoreYips,
From your description, I would assume that your yipping long putts under pressure but not in practice is a result mainly of a fear of leaving the putt way short. This is the normal fear of almost all male golfers, so let's call it the "Alice syndrome." Once this fear has you, the reaction is to substitute blasting the ball for real distance control. You either blast it (and it goes way past the hole, and the blasting is also a loss of putterface and stroke path control, so the ball often goes way off line also), or you decelerate at the last minute after sensing the inappropriateness of the blasting (and the putt ends up short but less off line). In either case, the pressure causes a loss of your method for distance control.
That is to say, the fear becomes indecision about HOW to control the distance. In practice, the fear doesn't come up, and your normal method for distance control stays in place in the putt. So let's get explicit about the METHOD for distance control, and take a look under the hood of instinct.
Distance control is absolutely NOT trying to THINK how HARD you should HIT the ball. The only thing you can control is the SPEED of the putterhead at impact. The trick is to get a consistent method that relates distance to speed of putterhead. The answer is TEMPO plus TRAGETING.
To illustrate, take a look at what you do for distance control on shorter putts. You look to the target and sense the distance and then make your normal smooth stroke and roll the ball to the hole. On all putts between, say, five feet and 20 feet, your stroke very likely has a consistent tempo, or total time from start to finish -- especially the same from the top of the backstroke to the end of the thrustroke. IF YOU HAVE THE SAME TEMPO FOR DIFFERENT LENGTH PUTTS, THAT NECESSARILY MEANS THAT PUTTERHEAD SPEED AT IMPACT IS SLOWER FOR THE FIVE-FOOTER THAN IT IS FOR THE 20-FOOTER. How does that happen? The shorter putt has a shorter backstroke. How does that happen? TARGETING automatically sets the backstroke length "instinctively." How does that happen? The brain sets the backstroke length by utter reliance upon your stroke pattern of making the stroke with the same usual TEMPO. When you look at the target for location and distance, the brain is simulating rolling the ball to the hole, and this simulation utterly relies upon a forthcoming stroke with your normal tempo. That's why a good stroke on a given putt feels "smooth" or "flowing."
In other words, what correlates putterhead SPEED with perceived distance is simply a consistent TEMPO, and it's a matter of non-conscious "instinct."
For long putts, it's not really different. After about forty-five feet (approximately), there is an added factor of the amplitude of the backstroke being so large that you feel unsure about controlling it. (It travels inside too far going back, and this causes worries about returning the putterhead to impact.) The cure here is to FORGET the stroke path on real long putts and concentrate instead on a smooth tempo and simple solid contact sending the ball off on the correct start line.
So, what do I really mean about TEMPO plus TARGETING? By tempo I mean something between one second and 0.8 seconds from the top of the backstroke to the top of the thrustroke. Your smooth short-putt stroke probably already fits within that range (unless you are a "pop" or "rap" putter), since it is mostly a matter of physics of pendular motion that has little to do with any specific golfer. Suspend your putter between your thumb and forefinger at the top of the handle and let it swing freely from side to side -- a 35" putter always take about one second, so this is a "hitless" ideal tempo. Your tempo is likely a bit faster than this, but not much. Now vary the length of the swinging stroke of this suspended putter and observe that even at different length strokes, the putter still takes the SAME time to fall all the way thru from top of backstroke to top of thrustroke. The stroke's speed accelerates "smoothly" from top to bottom and reaches a peak just at the bottom of the stroke arc. A longer stroke reaches a faster speed at the bottom. So length of backstroke corresponds to putterhead speed at impact. If you have good tempo, all five footers on the same green give you exactly the same backstroke instinctively, and all 8 footers give you a longer backstroke instinctively. It's just physics, but not too many golfers appreciate what it means. Whatever your usual tempo is, your brain has learned it well, probably without conferring too much with your consciousness about that fact. If you stay with your usual tempo, your brain is able to "set" the backstroke so that the top lets the accelerating fall of the putterhead have the right length to attain the right putterhead speed at the bottom called for by the distance of the putt. So TARGETING the distance automatically sets the right backstroke for your TEMPO. It's only when you get off your TEMPO that things go haywire.
For long putts, your TARGETING is pretty good, so that's not the problem. In fact, it's because you have good targeting that you are worried. You SEE how far it is to the hole. The real problem is that this worry gets you off your TEMPO, and makes you faster. You "gas" the putt. Gassing putts is the cardinal sin of a feel putter. A feel putter is just someone with good tempo.
So, to convince yourself that this is all true, go on the practice green and work on 35 footers. Watch only that you stick to a consistent tempo. Get to the point where you are consistently rolling almost all or all putts stone dead at the hole (+ or minus one or two feet). Then do the same for a series of 25 footers. Then do the same for a series of 40 footers. Watch the tempo on every putt and forget everything else.
On uphill putts there is a slight wrinkle, because aimed uphill your thrustroke has a tendency to dies out. Gravity is what shapes the stroke from top of backstroke to top of thrustroke, but on an uphill putt the whole system is tilted with respect to gravity (back foot lower than front foot, front shoulder higher than back shoulder.) To overcome this dying out of the thrustroke, you can add just a touch in the upstroke past the bottom of the arc, but try to preserve the overall symmetry of the stroke's speed pattern. You still don't "gas" the putt going uphill, but to make the speed pattern of the thrustroke symmetric and "smooth," you just have to add a little body motion to keep it from dying out.
Try a few uphill putts from, say, forty feet, to get a sense of how the shoulders-arms system wants to die out on uphill putts.
So, the answer (I hope) to your long-putt yipping is TEMPO. The anxiety about not getting the ball all the way to the hole interferes with your normal plan of action with a smooth stroke, and you replace the normal plan with a gas attack! Ka-boom! ... Stick to smooth, especially on long putts.
By the way, you will have to convince your conscious mind that smooth is good enough on long putts. Normal golfers do not at all believe this, since they don't understand how the brain works with true physics and they haven't had the years of experience that pros have by which the nonsense gets washed out eventually. The advice "accelerate thru the ball" is a bandaid for poor putters aimed at dealing only with quit strokes. That's not your problem, and it's bogus advice as a general matter of how to putt well. The book PGA Tour Manual of Golf states correctly that you should forget about accelerating thru the ball; the putterhead will be accelerating unless you prevent it! The hallmark of really nice smooth touch is a consistent, even and usually slow tempo. No jerking, no stabbing, no gassing the putt.
Try this and let me know how it's going.
--
Cheers!
Geoff Mangum
Putting Theorist and Instructor
The PuttingZone.com
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