During a typical round of golf, I putt with good distance control on 14 to 15 holes. On the other 3 to 4 holes my mistake is knocking it way past the hole (5 to 6 ft.). This is not do to hitting the putt or trying to trying to accelerate through the putt. Rather, I’ve been told that my backswing just seems way longer than what is required. Any suggestions?
With instinctive putting, the tempo and the sense of green speed work together with the target distance to set the backstroke. If you have a tempo that is steady, there really are two parts of the tempo: back and then forward. The forward timing is the one the brain and the instincts really hope you don't change from the usual, familiar timing. The backstroke timing also needs to stay the same for different strokes, but the one that really, really matters is the forward stroke.
What happens is that the instincts "choose" a specific backstroke size that will generate one and only one putter head speed at impact, so long as you don't speed up or slow down the stroke out of the usual forward-stroke timing pattern. The brain and instincts are counting on you sticking to the timing, and that's why the backstroke size is what it is. The brain and instincts are working with and anticipating your forward-stroke tempo in order to generate for you the right putter head speed at impact that will roll the ball all the way to the target and no farther. Once the backstroke is established, the sticking to the tempo will handle the forward stroke such that the putter head speed will accelerate smoothly to the bottom of the stroke and reach its peak speed right before impact, and this peak speed is the one the instincts have "selected" by the backstroke plus the tempo.
The forward-stroke tempo is similar to accelerating a car by pressing on the gas once the stoplight turns green. If you press on the gas pedal and push it down exactly 3 inches and hold it there and then watch the speedometer, as the car passes the first block it will be going 15 miles an hour (mph); at the end of the second block it will be going 30 mph; at the end of the third block it will be going 45 mph, etc. A putting tempo is an accelerating tempo, and the acceleration is "steady" from start to peak, so the putter head gains speed "smoothly" and always at the same rate and always peaks right at the bottom of the stroke. The brain and instincts know this, as you grow up and live with the fact of acceleration by gravity whenever you move on earth. [You can choose to have any tempo timing pattern you want, so long as it fits these characteristics, but you already have one pattern deeply engrained in your brain and instincts by the ceaseless operations of gravity on your body whenever you move.] So, if you stick to one tempo pattern of timing, the brain and instincts are able to "pick" the correct putter head speed for the green speed and distance of the putt simply by giving you the correct backstroke that corresponds to that putter head speed at impact, but then you cannot change the tempo coming forward or the putt will run too long (you speed up or "zip" the forward stroke thru impact) or too short (you shorten the backstroke or tighten up and slow the forward stroke or you miss hit the putt off solid). If the target and green speed require a 45-mph impact to roll the ball all the way there, the brain and instincts are sufficiently trained and experienced to "know" to give you a 3-block-long backstroke, but it all depends on you NOT speeding up or slowing down the forward stroke once the top of the backstroke is reached.
So your friends are all wrong. It is not the backstroke length that is the problem -- it's the forward-stroke timing.
Your backstroke is longer than the backstroke of MOST golfers (including your friends) because you are more closely tuned in to your body and instincts' natural relationship to the timing of gravity as it shapes your movements. Gravity is slower and more casual and relaxed as a force shaping life on earth. Sure, if you fall off a 10-story building, it will hurt a LOT when you eventually hit the ground, but if you simply fainted and drooped sideways onto the grass, your body would not likely get hurt unless you hit your head on a rock. The evolution of the size of the human body and its protection against the usual knocks and falls has been guided throughout time by the reality of gravity, so humans are not giants and when they fall or trip, the forces of gravity don't usually kill them. The start of gravity in accelerating an object downward and the ultimate peak speed reached within the sizes of movements typical for putting are both pretty casual and non-violent affairs. The better golfers get at putting, the more their strokes lose the violence and the excess non-casualness. The ultimate putting stroke is minimalist, and uses no more force or speed than nature and the instintcs require. The good putter always drives the car with the same depression of the accelerator pedal, and not in a herky-jery fashion sometimes fast and sometimes slow and not even sometimes faster than necessary.
It would help you to learn this one odd fact: once the brain and instincts are allowed to give you the backstroke (even if it seems too long back), that backstroke corresponds to one and only one peak speed at impact, so long as you stick to your tempo, the one your brain and instincts expect you to use, as this is the one they relied upon to anticipate and therefore pick the backstroke and its one-and-only-one peak speed. Once the backstroke has been generated, the trick is that the backstroke and its one peak speed has a maximum range built into it, so long as you don't speed up the downstroke ahead of the usual tempo / timing pattern. This means that if the backstroke is really the right one for the target distance, you CANNOT go long! Physics won't allow it. If you hit a ball at 70 inches per second impact velocity of the putter head, given the green speed, there is a maximum distance that putt will roll on that green, which is 100% of the possible distance. It would violate the laws of the universe for you to hit a putt at 70 inches per second and have the ball roll 102%, or 2% long of what is possible from the physics.
For this reason, the only thing a golfer has to do to AVOID GOING LONG is to allow the instincts to set the backstroke and then NOT "zip" the downstroke thru impact, but instead just let nature take its course and stick to the usual tempo and timing.
Even if the golfer understands this reality, it is not unusual for the golfer to have trouble executing putts this way (and instead going too long) until the old pattern of "hitting" the ball with a certain "how hard" to "send" the ball and "get it" to the hole has been washed out by observation and confirming experience. What I teach students is: "Never worry about getting the ball to the hole -- just make a smooth, well-timed stroke and it will get there." This is designed to get the "hit" out of the stroke and force the golfer to simply watch what happens for distance when he focuses on the timing instead of "how hard" to "hit" the ball to "get it there."
The downstroke to impact always, always, always takes the same amount of time for every putt (with the possible exception of very short or very slick putts). From the top of the backstroke to impact always take exactly the same amount of time every stroke, regardless of the size of the backstroke. That's because the longer the backstroke, the longer the distance the putter head accelerates coming down, and hence the faster the putter head speed when it peaks at the bottom of the stroke, and thus the faster the "average" speed from top to bottom. The weird part is that short strokes with slower average speeds and long strokes with faster average speeds always take exactly the same amount of time from start to finish, top to bottom. In the case of a gravity-sponsored stroke with a conventional putter, the timing is about 1/2 second from top of backstroke to impact, always, every stroke, regardless of the backstroke. For other stroke tempos, the timing is quicker to impact (no one is slower than gravity, as gravity sets the minimum tempo). This is your timing pattern that must not be "speeded up" coming down. Whatever your personal tempo, it is a "sin" to reach impact sooner than you should, and this will send the ball off with a faster impact speed, so the putt will roll longer than the instincts anticipated when they gave you a backstroke length.
To experience this and get used to this unalterable law of "how not to putt too far," you have to setup to a long putt and then make an instinctive backstroke and then make sure you hit the ball right on your tempo's count, and not sooner. My count is "one potato ..." for the full, instinctive backstroke, and then "... two" from top to impact (1/2 second down). I have to learn to count this at a pace that is the same as the way gravity moves my stroke. Whatever your timing in the stroke, learn to "say it" or "count it" to sharpen up your ability to repeat it accurately. Just silently making strokes in an attempt to get the timing right is not usually good enough -- it really helps to speak the timing. Then, when you have a good sense of the backstroke timing for a full, instinctive backstroke, AND you know how long the downstroke will take to reach impact, you just "let it grow" in the backstroke and "let it flow" in the downstroke and make sure you aren't "zipping" the stroke down thru impact. Just watch whether impact happens on the count or sooner. So long as the backstroke is instinctive and full, and the downstroke to impact is on time, the ball WILL roll the right distance and CANNOT ROLL TOO FAR.
The lynchpin to this whole deal is the idea that the brain and instincts will in fact give you the correct backstroke, and hence the right putter head speed at impact, that is called for by the distance of the target and the green speed. In my studies and experience, I have to say that the brain and instincts are marvelously astute at performing this task, but that is because they do it all the time whenever humans move around in gravity, and they have been evolving from animal movements and human movements in the same gravity since the beginning of life on earth. So it's not too surprising that the instincts work pretty well to anticipate accurately cause-and-effect when we move around. Otherwise we would not be able to walk or run or catch our food etc., and we would not only die, but our species would go extinct.
Try placing a club shaft down behind a hole at a large distance off and then putting all the way to the shaft without bouncing over it but just cozying up to the shaft, like the way people pitch pennies to land closest to a wall. Then get a sense of the green speed and look from ball to target to get the distance information, and resolve to stick to the timing both back and then down. Make a full stroke and let it go, not speeding it up or slowing it down, but instead letting it gather its own head of downstroke steam, and catch the ball flush without speeding up. The mantra is "let it grow ... let it go." Then just watch what happens. Wait to see just where the ball stops rolling. It may take a while for you to start to notice just what is going wrong when you send the ball too far, but if you are using a good, instinctive, full backstroke (as you should), then it MUST be the case that you are "zipping" the downstroke thru impact faster than the tempo and instincts expect you to. Never hurry, never worry. If you make a good backstroke, the ball will ALWAYS have enough pace to reach the hole, and there is never any need to ADD "hit" to the putt to make sure the ball gets all the way.
In traditional terms, this is the same as "let the putter head do the work." But that expression is crap, and doesn't explain the whole deal. The backstroke and letting the putter head do the work go hand in glove. If you use a relaxed, full, instinctive backstroke, you MUST let the putter head do the work, or you'll get a putt that rolls too long or too short. "Letting the putter head do the work" really goes with a gravity-sponsored tempo, so the more generally applicable rule is "don't zip the downstroke ahead of your normal, expected timing, or else you'll send the ball too far."
If you accept the suggestion to shorten your backstroke, you are in effect choosing to use a quicker tempo in your putting. Join the pack if you like, or putt better than the pack and teach your friends how to putt better.
Cheers!
Geoff Mangum
Putting Coach and Theorist
PuttingZone http://puttingzone.com
Golf's most advanced putting instruction -- you're either in the PuttingZone, or not.
Your experience of someone telling you your stroke is too long is common. I hear it all the time. Ben Crenshaw and Bobby jones and Skip Kendall and many, many others would tell you that I am right and that the advice of pals and teachers otherwise is incorrect. So I have something of a knee-jerk reaction to this question,and that tends to make me overlook more elusive possibilities.
The more elusive possibilities are two: 1. you are misjudging the green speed, thinking the green is slower than it really is, and this makes your stroke too big; and / or 2. you are not accurately targeting for the correct distance, but are either targeting past the actual place you want the ball to STOP or are just looking to the target distance without planning on the ball STOPPING there, and so the putt rolls too far past the target distance.
GREEN SPEED
You did not characterize the 3-4 long putts where your ball rolls too far, but you should check to see whether uphill-downhill effects may be playing a role in upsetting your sense / appreciation of the green speed. Uphill putts can and should be viewed as "slower" than normal putts across more or less level surface. Downhill putts can and should be viewed as "faster" than normal putts across more or less level surface.
First, it could be that you are "overestimating" the effective green speed on uphill putts or "underestimating" the effective green speed on downhill putts. This might happen is on green 3 you have a downhill putt that is a little slower than expected, followed on green 4 by an uphill putt, so that you overestimate what it takes to get the ball all the way but ONLY as far as the hole. The other way is you might have an uphill putt and you non-consciously give the ball more juice going uphill (as you adjust for the effective slower green speed uphill), but you aren't mindful of this, and on the next green you face a downhill putt that is faster than usual and definitely faster than the last uphill putt. If you use the last green as your sense of speed for all putts, this next putt will roll too far as the surface is faster than you are anticipating or appreciate when your brain and instincts plan the backstroke and impact speed. The cure for this is to realize that your basic appreciation of green speed relates to level putts, and that you must be mindful or adjusting your appreciation of effective green speed every time you face a significant uphill or downhill factor in a putt.
Second, it could be that the speed of the greens are not the same, and that some greens are faster than they appear. This sometimes happens when the green is exposed to the sun and wind and is on high ground that drains quickly -- so these greens dry out and get faster at a rate that is different from greens located in a little sheltered area surrounded on two or three sides by tall shade trees and located down low where the green holds the water a longer time. This tendency is exacerbated when the course sends you from a low, shady green on next to a high, wind-dried green, as often happens. So you have to be mindful of the actual speed of each green you play, and separately assess the speed of each green as you arrive at it, with your senses and with your knowledge.
TARGETING VAGUENESS
The second possibility is that you are not strictly defining where the ball should STOP. Touch is the ability to STOP the ball where intended, not simply to roll over and past the intended location. A great deal of conventional golf instruction for putting is at war with this basic concept, and causes or prompts golfers to putt past what should be their target. So golfers generally don't have a clear picture of their golf ball stopping at a certain distance, and instead are very often content if the ball "gets there" with a little extra. If you used this system for normal daily activities, you would be missing door knobs and knocking glasses of water off the table all day. So teachers who suggest targeting "17 inches past the hole" simply don't respect or understand the way the brain and body actually work in a normal fashion to get these things done accurately -- no problem.
To get better at seeing the target distance as the place where the ball should arrive and stop, there are a number of helpful things to replace the bad things. First, visualize the target spot as the place where the ball comes to a dead stop. Second, visualize a very short distance past this target distance as BLOCKED by a wall, and plan ahead not to bounce the ball off the wall but instead to cozy the putt up as close to the wall as possible. Third, trust the backstroke-tempo system of the instincts to handle the size and pace of the stroke non-consciously, without "trying" to manage the "hardness" of the "hit." Just count the stroke and accept a smooth stroke as a good stroke for the given putt, as this lets the non-conscious processes rule the day.
Some "definite stopping target spot" drills are: putt to a dime to stop you ball on top of the dime; tee up a ball on the green and roll your putts up against the teed-up ball to jostle it without knocking it off the tee; on a carpet, place a tee peg upside down and roll a ball from 10-15 feet off so the ball just touches but does not knock over the tee peg; poise a ball on the front lip of a cup and putt so that the putted ball just nudges the poised ball over into the cup and leaves your ball in its place; push a tee peg into the ground on a green and get back a certain distance and roll balls over to the tee with the idea of "teeing up" your putted ball by getting it to stop on the tee.
Some "blocking wall just past target spot" drills are: putt to a far fringe and get as close as possible without going onto the fringe; place a shaft down sideways just behind a hole and putt to sink the putt without bouncing over the shaft and instead cozying up against it; identify the fall-line thru the cup on a long breaking putt and treat the fall-line like a wall packed with nitro-glycerin and putt so the ball at the end cozies up as close to the wall as possible as the putt dies towards the hole from the high side, but if the ball touches or crosses the wall, you kill your caddy in a horrible explosion.
Another image is that of a "cliff and the abyss to hell" just past the hole. Visualizing such a cliff just past the hole, putt with boldness but with relaxed and unhurried casualness to see just how close you can come to sinking the putt as if the cliff did not exist. A related image is of a green on top of a high, flat mesa with the sudden drop-off to the desert floor just beyond the cup. Focus ONLY on the ground on the green between the ball and the cup and ignore the universe outside this realm to the point that there is no consciousness of any cliff edge and certainly no worry about the ball rolling too far and plunging to the desert floor. With this target-as-stopping-point-only consciousness and awareness to the exclusion of all else, putt with relaxed, good timing.
A final image is to visualize as accurately as possible the final 10 or so feet of a long putt, seeing the ball's rolling slowing down and coming to a complete stop right at the correct distance. Then putt to make this happen.
That's pretty much it, except for the issue of tiers, swales, humps, etc., between your ball and the target. But in general, it is more likely that you are speeding up the downstroke due to an insufficiently accurate appreciation of your own tempo, followed in likelihood by insufficient definiteness / visualization of stopping the putt, followed last in likelihood by mis-appreciation of differences in green speeds.
Hoping this helps!
Cheers!
Geoff Mangum
Putting Coach and Theorist
PuttingZone http://puttingzone.com
Golf's most advanced putting instruction -- you're either in the PuttingZone, or not.
If you stroke putts well on 14 greens, and have 4 poor ones on the remaing 4 greens, would you not think that the stroke is probaly quite good in itself ?
-To me it sounds that the 4 bad strokes is an effect, caused by a distracted mind. Either by failing to keep the very precise target in mind, or not applying a hard focus on the ball, or instead of having a quite mind being concerned with what my frinends will say about my stroke if I putt also this one too long.
A mental distraction will cause a mechanical problem, but you do not fix the problem by working on the mechanics, you do it by working on your mind set. Would you agree with this ?
I also agree with you that this length issue could be related to downhill/uphill reading error.
Your question -- "If you stroke putts well on 14 greens, and have 4 poor ones on the remaing 4 greens, would you not think that the stroke is probaly quite good in itself ?" -- and the rest of the above post suggests a clear separation between the stroke and mental "stuff" messing up the stroke. Try this idea instead:
There is no such thing as a "stroke" that the golfer possesses and uses reliably and consistently. Instead, for each "putt" there is a process of perception building and movement building that eventuates in the actual stroke executed on that specific occasion. Mental "stuff" either helps or hurts this physical process of relating to the putt and executing the putt (mostly hurts). While it is true that "memories" about good strokes sort of run together in a blur, and that these memories are activated in the process of engaging perceptions and movement processes during a putt, the notion that there resides inside a golfer "a stroke" to be used like a tool is illusory. Each putt is new.
This is what neuroscience teaches me that strikes me as much deeper and better than standard "sports psych" stuff about muscle memory and motor control. Perceptions and movements are completely integrated into a whole "action process". When a golfer makes a "good putt," he has successfully employed his senses to generate relevant, accurate perceptions that are effectively used to promote accurate stroke movements for that specific occasion. Mental stuff mostly is inappropriate for what is in essence a physical relating to the world of the green and the hole with your ball and putter, and tends to diminish the accuracy and effectiveness of the physical processes.
When you ask -- "A mental distraction will cause a mechanical problem, but you do not fix the problem by working on the mechanics, you do it by working on your mind set. Would you agree with this ?" -- my response is that the notion of the "mind" really only applies to the conscious brain, whereas a good putt is mostly not about the mind. The physical processes of perceiving and movement planning and execution are almost entirely NON-conscious. There is an intent to putt well and to hole the putt or at least give the putt its best chance, and there is "focus", and "stress" and the like, but underneath all this there are NON-conscious processes of the tissues and organs of the brain and body perceiving and moving. When you pay most attention to perceptions and movement, the "mental stuff" starts to dissipate. Under pressure, the response is not to "fix" the mind but to get the heck out of the mind and back to the physical process of perceiving and moving in the putt. If you have a sore foot but you need to climb a tree very fast to escape a rampaging bull bearing down on you, you just climb the tree. You don't stop to put a bandaid on the foot. In putting, if the mind is "off" and hence causing problems, you still have to putt. So if you want to putt well, you will just have to focus on performing the putt the way you know is best -- and that is always, in the final analysis, what you know about perceiving and moving to make your best putt.
As Jane Crafter has said, "Competence makes its own confidence." That means to me that confidence is illusory and that what really matters is know-how or competence. When you know how to putt, but the mind is interfering, then the cure is to focus on how to putt and do what you know is needed to be done to give your best effort in executing the putt.
When this is the idea, the "putt" is spread out in time from the moment you walk onto the green from the fairway until the moment you retrieve your ball from the bottom of the cup or mark it for a next putt. In this spread-out time, what is happening that helps the putt be successful is perception and movement that is protected from harrassment by "the mind." It's a putt: roll the ball in the hole the way you know best -- there isn't any room here for the mind.
The more you focus on fixing the mind, the more you validate the function and presence of the mind in this dumb little game of rolling a ball into a hole. That's backwards. Ignore the mind and focus on doing what you know needs to be done well -- perceptions and movements. When you do this, the "mind" junk fades and the performance becomes the same every time and loads of challenging fun and a great opportunity to show off.
Great putters don't have a lot of "mind problems" to worry about.
If you MUST fix the mind, do it with real feeling! Eliminate the bothersome mind. Apart from learning about the perceptions and movements of a good "putt" that you need to use and the intent to make a great putt, there isn't much use to having one.
Cheers!
Geoff Mangum
Putting Coach and Theorist
PuttingZone http://puttingzone.com
Golf's most advanced putting instruction -- you're either in the PuttingZone, or not.
Geoff,
Interesting thoughts on how the mind works adn it goes away from all the Rotella stuff (which I never really bought into). I would guess that this is why I have a very hard time repeating my performance from the practice green (very good) out on the course (very inconsistent). On the practice green I am allowing the non-conscious mind to take over whereas on the course my conscious mind takes over (don't hit it too far, don't leave yourself a 3 footer, Don't...., etc.).
Any thoughts (no pun intended) on how to bring my practice putting green mind out on the course?
Interesting analogy between the putting downstroke and stepping on the gas pedal to accelerate your car. As we know, car HP is directly proportional to engine Torque ... whereas acceleration due to gravity is dependent on potential energy converting to kinetic energy. How much potential energy is created at the end of different length backstrokes?
Based on your extended explanation between the downstroke and gravity force, I am still confused as to how the force of gravity affects the downstroke to generate sufficient energy for adequate ball impact. As you are aware I am a proponent of the applied-torque putting downstroke and ignoring the insignificant acceleration due to gravity. I believe that the force of gravity may assist the stroking but it is not the main motive force propelling the putterhead through impact.
Surely for short putts with shortish backstrokes, the effect of gravity as a rotational motive force is negligible. For longish putts gravity force may be significant, but surely it is not adequate for the putting distances required for long putts. Only consious applied-torque to the putter through the arms and hands can provide the energy needed for adequate distance control.
Please address your putting concepts to the influence of applied body torque, separate from gravity, to the backstroke and downstroke for putts of different distances. Thanks.
Geoff, always good to read your forum, and glad to be back after a long absence. I, too, am having trouble with distance control, leading to 9 three-putts in my last two rounds. Prior to the last round, I changed to your Pistolero grip after gradually moving that way from a reverse overlap, then a two-finger reverse overlap to now. I practiced with it for three weeks before implementation in a real round. Nightly practices on a putting mat, and on the putting green when possible.
I think I am a good putter, but can't help but be dismayed by my results. If I was burning edges and having 36/37 putts per round, that would be one thing - or if distance control was good, but my misses were left or right. I am just so inconsistent. Usually long or short when things go awry, and I give uphill and downhill putts equal opportunity as I three-putt both of them the same. Fully, a quarter of the holes I have played the last two rounds have been three-putted.
Is this a case where more or better practice would help? Should I seek instruction? Or lighten up?
Thoughts? By the way, I am using a center-shafted Mentor Sports Triad II, 33", 72*, @ 354 grams. In the past, I have lost confidence in putters when I three-putted often, but have never suffered with this many strokes on the green. I really dislike changing my equipment, but I have changed putters twice in the past year.
