Dear TBB,
Sorry for the delay. I've been researching handedness and there are lots of issues to sort out. I'm not even close to finishing yet, but wanted to respond to your idea of practice strokes for feel from the opposite side of the ball. That's a truly novel idea that may have some merit. It bears checking out.
My first thought is that putting right-handed but making a practice stroke from the opposite side of the ball (left-handed) probably works best when the putt breaks left-to-right. For a right-hander, that would have the ball below the feet, breaking away from the feet. A practice stroke from the opposite side converts that sort of break to one with the ball above the feet and with the break running in towards the feet. When the slope is above the feet, so that the golfer is looking up into the surface rather than down across it, the golfer gets a richer look at the surface detail. It's the difference between holding a book in the normal fashion for reading versus trying to read the pages holding the book down and away from the face on a slant.
The richer visual information of looking up into the green surface combines nicely with bending or leaning forward uphill, so that vision and balance are in a synergistic relation. Putting while leaning downhill is always a tough proposition, and I advise setting up the putter flat on a ball-below-the-feet slope and conforming the body posture to the sole and surface (rather than to gravity) -- but then you have to pretend you are setup normally on a level surface by ignoring the inner ear, visual, and proprioceptive sense of tilting downhill. Altogether, making a stroke with the ball above the feet and the body leaning uphill is much more suited to balance and vision and posture, so that the brain gets a better sense of the putt in all its aspects. That is, I believe one might well find that making a practice stroke from the opposite side when the putt breaks away from the feet downhill enhances not only a "feel" for distance, but also a sense of the putt's break and energy pattern altogether.
Turning now to consideration of the reverse situation, when the putt for a right-hander has the ball above the feet and is breaking right-to-left in towards the feet, the benefit of making a practice stroke from the opposite side of the ball is less clear. It may be that, if the golfer pretends he is setup on a level surface, that the natural tendency to "pull" all putts may assist the golfer to get the real putt high enough up hill. And there simply may well be something to the notion of getting a symmetrical, "even-handed" sense of any putt from both side of the ball. There are exercises, like tapping each thigh or knee in alternating sequences, that some brain researchers believe "balance" out the brain. That reminds me of the round-house slapping that Moe of the Three Stooges gives Curly and Larry one way and then back the other way, but I suspect there is something to this idea really, although how much is a big question.
Basically, I think this is a very neat idea that needs some checking out.
Cheers!
Geoff Mangum
Putting Theorist and Instructor
Geoff Mangum's PuttingZone
Golf's most advanced and comprehensive putting instruction.
Over 775,000 visits and growing strong ...
518 Woodlawn Ave
Greensboro NC 27401
336.230.0612 home
