Let me first tell you about my game. I generally score in the 80s on most courses I play so I can be classified as a serious recreational player. I would like to score in the 70s but I think my putting needs improvement.
I am a 'scratch' putter, and by that I mean I will have 36 putts per round, sometimes less and sometimes more, but it averages out to 36 putts. During a round of golf, I expect to sink several longish one-putts, but here is where my problem begins. I will also have three-putts to even it out.
My three putts are on longer putts requiring good lag putting, and this is where I tend to fail. It gets rather tough to read a longer 20+ foot putt particularily when the ball may break several times before it approaches the hole. Sometimes I will leave myself with a 3+ foot second putt with a challenging sidehill slope that presents a tricky putt. Then I miss again.
Sometimes I feel very inadequate when attempting to judge putting tempo for the longer lag putts and leave it short.
How can I improve my lag putting as well as my short putting to avoid those dreaded 3-putts? Is it better putting stroke technique, better green reading or a combination of the two? Is there a mental component to lag putting?
Your advice is appreciated and I hope this is a worthy topic for your attention.
There are two separate issues for lagging putts: a location for STOPPING and a SIDE to stay high on.
If the putt is basically simple in terms of one big or small break, you can divide the world into the high side and the low side using a straight line from the ball to the center of the hole (call this line the "baseline"). Between the ball and the hole, do whatever it takes to STAY HIGH, and never allow the ball to roll across this baseline to the low side SHORT AND LOW. That's half of the problem.
The other half of the problem is STOPPING the ball as far as the hole, neither SHORT nor LONG. But what is the right distance on a breaking putt that does not start off on a line aimed at the hole, but aimed at some indefinite location on the green somewhere on the HIGH side of things? This is where the "fallline" helps. The "fallline" is the ONLY line straight uphill-downhill thru the hole. If you treat the fallline on the HIGH side of the hole as a four-foot high WALL, your ball can never roll past this wall, so that's part of the distance issue. The other part is GET THE BALL ALL THE WAY TO THE FOOT OF THIS WALL. So if you are facing a 35-foot lag with three feet of left-to-right break, you will aim at a location at the base of the wall up the falline three feet above the cup and then putt as if to roll your ball straight all the way to the base of the wall, knowing it will break left in reality. The mental image, though, is of a straight putt along level surface as far as the base of the wall at this target spot, with the ball cozying up to the base of the wall as close as possible.
If you do this, then there is a VERY DEFINITE LOCATION to aim for in terms both of LINE and DISTANCE, and there is also a mental image of the wall so you don't go past this location and the image of the wall for cozying the ball up to its base.
The golfer only gets really good at this sort of lagging when he does BOTH at the same time: plans on rolling the ball FAR ENOUGH AND NOT TOO FAR, and then with that distance in mind, selects a line to the HIGH SIDE that with that energy in the roll for distance will STAY HIGH no matter what. With a little practice, the expertise comes in with knowing how to aim JUST HIGH ENOUGH AND NO HIGHER THAN NECESSARY, but it all starts with a sense of how far your ball will roll. The real key is having a definite stopping point in mind as if the putt were straight and level at this stopping target on the high side of the fallline.
A good constant mantra is "high and slow all the way to the falline."
To practice this, find a decently large breaking putt and see the baseline from ball to cup or even indicate it with a length of string. Then see the fall line to the high side of the cup, and perhaps indicate this with a piece of string also. Now put a tee peg along the fallline where you think the line will be high enough, given the straight-line distance to the tee peg, and aim at the tee peg and pretend it is a straight and level putt that far and give the ball a roll. If you have selected the target location for the tee peg high enough, and not too high, than this sort of planning will result in either a sink or a leave that is near the hole AND on the falline, so the second putt is short and straight to boot.
A good leave is HIGH and JUST RIGHT FOR DISTANCE. A second-best leave is HIGH and JUST A LITTLE LONG. A third-best leave is LOW But JUST RIGHT on the falline. A fourth-best leave is HIGH and TOO LONG. A worst leave is LOW and TOO LONG.
A ball that ends its rolling cozying down to the hole from the high side is much, much better than a ball that leaks to the low side and then continues getting farther and farther away from the hole as its roll dies out.
Getting this basic lag down with reference to single breaking putts is first, and then multiple breaking putts make sense.
We can work on short putts later.
Cheers and best holiday wishes!
Geoff Mangum
Putting Coach and Theorist
PuttingZone.com
Golf's most advanced and comprehensive putting instruction
Athens, Greece
This message has been edited by aceputt from IP address 213.209.186.138 on Dec 21, 2006 2:48 AM