I have to admit that while I subscribe to a few golf magazines, I do my best to not take the instruction in them too seriously.
However, I believe that the October issue of Golf Digest is a must buy because of the feature - "Why You Can't Putt." Now clearly this is a grabbing title their marketing guys got this right. But there are about 20 pages in this issue that are well worth reading.
There is great information on the mental side of putting, some good tips from Dave Stockton (right now the hottest putting instructor out there), an article on how to read putts better, and a lot of information on how to have a putter correctly fit for you.
Page 68 presents a lot of good information on the basics of good putter fitting. Certainly getting the right putter length, lie anglei, and putter face loft (for most at least 4 degrees of loft) are musts. And then - at least for me - the putter needs to look good in your hands - you must believe that the head design is made for you. There are two other items that I think are sometimes overlooked but that are important to consider......
1. Putter length is a key fitting parameter. However, if say your present putter is 36 inches and you really should be playing a 34 inch putter, simply cutting the shaft to get to 34 inches is not enough. Like any golf club, when you cut the putter 2 inches you reduce the putter swingweight by about 12 swingweight points - the equivalent of adding about 24 grams of weight to the head. Good putter swingweights are typically in the range of about C6 up to about D4 - some like lighter some heavier. Consider if you are going to have your shaft cut to a shorter length getting some weight added back to the head - either with lead tape or by adding weight down the shaft.
2. Is the putter built correctly - when you sit the head on the ground does the putter face "square up" - is it square to your chosen target line? If not, then you have to adjust your stroke to compensate for this misalignment - and compensation in putting is a clear way to more strokes on the green.
Enjoy the October Golf Digest issue!!!
Tony
Showing posts with label putter fitting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label putter fitting. Show all posts
Monday, September 6, 2010
Monday, May 17, 2010
Great Putting - Some Thoughts
I thought I would share a few putting tidbits tonight - at least some things that have resonated well with me lately.
First, today I received an email noting that Yes Golf (maker of a well know putter that is being used by a number of touring pros) are offering a free DVD on the key elements of great putting. I am not sure how long these will be available, but if you read this note you might want to go to www.yesgolf.com and see if you can order one. No cost for this, I think all they are interested in would be getting your email address.
Putting is more of interest to me today than normal, because yesterday I had the best putting day I have EVER had. I played our club Member-Member tournament with my best golf buddy (as usual) this weekend. The second day of the event is always 9 holes scramble 9 holes alternate shot - we shot 1 over par which is pretty good for this format, and we won the overall event in our flight. As to my putting, I think I made 3 long putts and at least 4 putts in the 5 to 6 foot range. I attribute this to a number of connected things....
1. I believe my putter fits me perfectly. Right length and lie angle. I have an "Opti Vibe" weight down the shaft and this optimizes the feel of the putter for me.
2. A few months ago I read what I think is the best book on putting I have ever read - Dave Stockton's "Putt to Win." I particularly like his thought to pick a very specific target to roll the ball over.
3. Finally, confidence which has been building for the past few rounds. I feel like my setup has been great and I have a chance to make ever long putt I am looking at.
I hope some of the info. in this post might be helpful to you in your efforts to drain lots of putts!
Tony
First, today I received an email noting that Yes Golf (maker of a well know putter that is being used by a number of touring pros) are offering a free DVD on the key elements of great putting. I am not sure how long these will be available, but if you read this note you might want to go to www.yesgolf.com and see if you can order one. No cost for this, I think all they are interested in would be getting your email address.
Putting is more of interest to me today than normal, because yesterday I had the best putting day I have EVER had. I played our club Member-Member tournament with my best golf buddy (as usual) this weekend. The second day of the event is always 9 holes scramble 9 holes alternate shot - we shot 1 over par which is pretty good for this format, and we won the overall event in our flight. As to my putting, I think I made 3 long putts and at least 4 putts in the 5 to 6 foot range. I attribute this to a number of connected things....
1. I believe my putter fits me perfectly. Right length and lie angle. I have an "Opti Vibe" weight down the shaft and this optimizes the feel of the putter for me.
2. A few months ago I read what I think is the best book on putting I have ever read - Dave Stockton's "Putt to Win." I particularly like his thought to pick a very specific target to roll the ball over.
3. Finally, confidence which has been building for the past few rounds. I feel like my setup has been great and I have a chance to make ever long putt I am looking at.
I hope some of the info. in this post might be helpful to you in your efforts to drain lots of putts!
Tony
Monday, January 26, 2009
How Good ARE We?
From time to time when I am doing club fitting for golfers, I have experiences where I am simply amazed. These experiences continue to reinforce my belief that there are golf clubs that are JUST RIGHT for specific golfers. And when this happens I get inspired all over again about being a clubfitter.
One of the first of these experiences happened this past summer. I was doing a fitting for a golfer who had not played golf in a few years, about 70 years old. I put a 6 iron test club in his hands, very soft flex, and he IMMEDIATELY hit beautiful shots and said the feel of the club was amazing. I could tell that the connection between him and this test club was right. He continues to enjoy the irons that I built for him. There is no way that he would ever have been able to buy clubs with the specs I made for him at a golf shop.
I had a bit of a different but equally pleasant experience this past weekend. I was working with a client who wants me to build him a new set of irons, and we were discussing some of the iron head options that we will be testing soon. Near the end of our meeting, he said that sometime he also wants to have me look at his putter and putting setup, and I said why not now. He set up over the ball, and was in a great putting position.....his eyes just behind where he set the putter on the ground.
BUT I also noticed that he was toeing the putter slightly upright when he set up. I held the putter for him in this position and let him see what he was doing. We both agreed that once I bend his putter about a degree more flat he should have a perfect putting setup with the putter sitting flat on the ground at address and his eyes just behind the ball.
All well and good. But the NEXT part was the payoff. He said that he has a tendency to PUSH his putts and has some fear of three putting - he would almost prefer to miss greens and hit chips close to the hole for easy up and downs than have long putts. We agreed that the REASON he was pushing his putts was almost certainly that he was ADJUSTING for the fact that he presently putts with a putter that starts with the toe slightly up!
So what you say? Well, what this experience says to me is how much we can actually sense when our clubs do not fit us - so we adjust for the lack of correct fit, and sometimes overcompensate for say putters that are too upright, or in other cases shafts that are too stiff or too short.
One of the things that clubfitters are trained to do, as another example, is to limit the number of shots that we have players hit when we are doing things like length fitting. We do not typically allow a player to hit more than 3 shots with a given length club - and look at where the impact on the club is using impact labels. Why 3 shots - because all players will START ADJUSTING for a club does not fit them after a few shots, and so you will not get good length-fitting results if you allow more than 3 shots.
We as golfers do everything we can to try to compensate for clubs that do not work for us. Sometimes this adjusting works pretty well, and we never realize that if we had clubs that really fit us, we would get a lot more of those "a ha!" feelings on the golf course that result from playing with clubs that are a good match for our personal swings.
Once I bend this putter for my friend and he has some on the course putting results with the new setup, I will report the results back to you in this blog!
Tony
One of the first of these experiences happened this past summer. I was doing a fitting for a golfer who had not played golf in a few years, about 70 years old. I put a 6 iron test club in his hands, very soft flex, and he IMMEDIATELY hit beautiful shots and said the feel of the club was amazing. I could tell that the connection between him and this test club was right. He continues to enjoy the irons that I built for him. There is no way that he would ever have been able to buy clubs with the specs I made for him at a golf shop.
I had a bit of a different but equally pleasant experience this past weekend. I was working with a client who wants me to build him a new set of irons, and we were discussing some of the iron head options that we will be testing soon. Near the end of our meeting, he said that sometime he also wants to have me look at his putter and putting setup, and I said why not now. He set up over the ball, and was in a great putting position.....his eyes just behind where he set the putter on the ground.
BUT I also noticed that he was toeing the putter slightly upright when he set up. I held the putter for him in this position and let him see what he was doing. We both agreed that once I bend his putter about a degree more flat he should have a perfect putting setup with the putter sitting flat on the ground at address and his eyes just behind the ball.
All well and good. But the NEXT part was the payoff. He said that he has a tendency to PUSH his putts and has some fear of three putting - he would almost prefer to miss greens and hit chips close to the hole for easy up and downs than have long putts. We agreed that the REASON he was pushing his putts was almost certainly that he was ADJUSTING for the fact that he presently putts with a putter that starts with the toe slightly up!
So what you say? Well, what this experience says to me is how much we can actually sense when our clubs do not fit us - so we adjust for the lack of correct fit, and sometimes overcompensate for say putters that are too upright, or in other cases shafts that are too stiff or too short.
One of the things that clubfitters are trained to do, as another example, is to limit the number of shots that we have players hit when we are doing things like length fitting. We do not typically allow a player to hit more than 3 shots with a given length club - and look at where the impact on the club is using impact labels. Why 3 shots - because all players will START ADJUSTING for a club does not fit them after a few shots, and so you will not get good length-fitting results if you allow more than 3 shots.
We as golfers do everything we can to try to compensate for clubs that do not work for us. Sometimes this adjusting works pretty well, and we never realize that if we had clubs that really fit us, we would get a lot more of those "a ha!" feelings on the golf course that result from playing with clubs that are a good match for our personal swings.
Once I bend this putter for my friend and he has some on the course putting results with the new setup, I will report the results back to you in this blog!
Tony
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