Validity of "the putts always break towards the water"?

[Bulls9999]

Can anyone give a good reason for the phrase "the putts always break towards the water?" ..... is this something that should be sent to the Myth Busters?

Is this phrase meant more for links style courses built on natural terrain? Most, or many, US courses are now pushing huge amounts of earth around (perhaps less with the naturalist movement) whereby the course, or especially the greens, do not conform to the natural slope of the surrounding terrain.

[CristieKerr]

Even if you're pushing a boat load of earth around, I think over a long period of time the idea would still hold true. But, I think it should be sent to Myth Busters anyway. I always keep it mind when putting (and keep the away from mountains sister saying when out West too), but in all honesty, I've never really paid enough attention to know if it's true or not.

[Ty_Webb]

Originally Posted by Bulls9999

Can anyone give a good reason for the phrase "the putts always break towards the water?" ..... is this something that should be sent to the Myth Busters?

Is this phrase meant more for links style courses built on natural terrain? Most, or many, US courses are now pushing huge amounts of earth around (perhaps less with the naturalist movement) whereby the course, or especially the greens, do not conform to the natural slope of the surrounding terrain.

It's because of the grain, not the slope of the ground. The grass grows towards the source of the water. Hence it lies in one particular direction and if the grass is grainy stuff, then it can cause the ball to break in that direction. I would expect that links type courses would be least likely to exhibit this behaviour as the grass on them doesn't have much grain.

It should also work with the setting sun because the grass grows towards that too.

I think anyway.

[Fourputt]

Originally Posted by Bulls9999

Can anyone give a good reason for the phrase "the putts always break towards the water?" ..... is this something that should be sent to the Myth Busters?

Is this phrase meant more for links style courses built on natural terrain? Most, or many, US courses are now pushing huge amounts of earth around (perhaps less with the naturalist movement) whereby the course, or especially the greens, do not conform to the natural slope of the surrounding terrain.

First anytime someone says always he are asking to be disputed. Better to say that the tendency is for putts to break toward the water. There are a couple of reasons to always take that into consideration.

When playing in a river valley or near a large body of water, the normal slope of the land is toward the water, so the eye can be fooled into seeing a flat putt even when it actually slopes slightly down toward the water. My home course doesn't have the water factor, but the course wraps around 2 sides of a large hill (and we are also only a couple of miles from the edge of the mountains), and there are many putts which are very deceptive because the eye gets used to the general slope away from the hill and the brain forgets to factor that into the putt. There is one par 3 green which appears to slope significantly back into the hill, yet most putts are nearly flat. It's so deceptive that I have seen players new to the course play 3 feet of break on a 15 foot putt, then watch the putt roll dead straight.

The second point is because of the natural slope, water tends to run off the greens in the general direction of the lowest part of the land on or near the course. That means that any grain in the green may tend to lean that way. But grain is a tricky thing, and if you play on grainy greens (Bermuda in particular), you have to learn to read the actual grain, not just how the land lies. The grain can actually lie uphill and cancel out a break caused by the slope. If the same putt has grain that lies down the slope, the putt can break twice as much as it appears to.

[Wazmankg]

I assume you're talking about a large nearby body of water as opposed to a greenside hazard. I learned to play on a lakeside 9-holer and lived by this phenonemon. The surrounding terrain of course sloped towards the water which was the lowest point of the surrounding area. When on the greens, the slope was imperceptible. Now this was 40 years ago, but I distinctly remember my dad and I standing on the green of a par 3 (it was the green closest to the water FWIW) and practicing putting what looked like a straight 3 footer I'd just missed. It broke over a foot towards the water every time. It's definitely not a myth but as your post mentioned the effect can be neutralized by moving a lot of dirt around when building the greens. I'd think even in those cases, while putts might not necessarily break towards the water your mind would under-assess the water's influence. I imagine the same would be true for courses near mountains.

[Bulls9999]

OK, let me be devil's advocate....the source of water from most courses is sprinklers?

Originally Posted by Ty_Webb

It's because of the grain, not the slope of the ground. The grass grows towards the source of the water. Hence it lies in one particular direction and if the grass is grainy stuff, then it can cause the ball to break in that direction. I would expect that links type courses would be least likely to exhibit this behaviour as the grass on them doesn't have much grain.

It should also work with the setting sun because the grass grows towards that too.

I think anyway.

[Ty_Webb]

Originally Posted by Bulls9999

OK, let me be devil's advocate....the source of water from most courses is sprinklers?

Possibly, but the grass doesn't know that. Whatever it is that makes the grass grow towards a water source I imagine still applies even if that grass is watered regularly.

[JPsuff]

.


I believe that this theory has more to do with Einsteinian physics than the slope of the land. Any natural slope can be neutralized by simply moving some soil around and creating a putting surface which is independent of such a slope.

The real root of this tendency lies in the gravitational aspects of large masses such as oceans and other large bodies of water as well as nearby mountains. The theory is that the mass of these bodies is so great that an object such as a golf ball is drawn towards them because of their large (and very local) gravitational properties in much the same way that a planet's moon is drawn towards it. It's an interesting theory and when you look at gravitational physics overall, it certainly makes sense.

All I know is that there are far more people in the golf world who believe that this phenomenon is real than there are skeptics and this has been discussed for decades. That alone is evidence enough that there must be something to it, otherwise why would it be a subject of discussion over all those years?


-JP

[Fourputt]

Originally Posted by JPsuff

.


I believe that this theory has more to do with Einsteinian physics than the slope of the land. Any natural slope can be neutralized by simply moving some soil around and creating a putting surface which is independent of such a slope.

The real root of this tendency lies in the gravitational aspects of large masses such as oceans and other large bodies of water as well as nearby mountains.

-JP

The trouble with using gravitation as reason for this is that putts break AWAY from mountains, and your gravity theory would have the ball attracted TOWARD the larger mass. Something of a contradiction.

I still think that it's just the way that the dominant slope of the terrain can trick the eye and the brain into not seeing subtler slopes that flow with the lay of the land. It's easy enough to test just by taking a simple level with you and using that to check a green that has this property.


Of course you wouldn't do that during a competition round.

[C-Tech]

Like everyone else, I have always heard the common wisdom that putts break towards water, away from mountains and in some cases, towards a particular town.

What FourPutt said is accurate, I believe. The general slope of the land towards water and away from mountains disorients our minds enough that we don't see the slope since everything is slightly tilted. As far as reading greens using this theory, I always look first to see where the water drains off a green to determine the break and, secondarily, I look at the general terrain to see if there is a predominant direction of the lay of the land.

[Bigvivec]

Originally Posted by C-Tech

Like everyone else, I have always heard the common wisdom that putts break towards water, away from mountains and in some cases, towards a particular town.

Yeah...where I grew up it was every young putt's dream to one day break to New York...

[JimSomebody]

Water accumulates in low-lying areas. Low-lying areas are closer to the center of the earth. An event horizon forms around the perimeter of a body of water, pulling all objects toward it. A small round object rolling on a smooth surface must comply with the laws of the universe.

Seriously, I putt based on what I see on the green. If I'm having a hard time reading the green, I do take into consideration the location of any nearby water. But in my experience, I haven't missed so many putts on the water side of the hole that looking for H2O has become part of my pre-putt routine. I regard the axiom as something that is true some of the time and so should be considered as a possibility.

[Bigvivec]

Here is a for instance...a stream runs alongside a green...to which part of the stream does the ball break towards? Or, on one hole on my course, there is water on three sides of the green...so which water does it break to? A much better indicator for me is to find where the water would drain in that section of the green...if you poured a big bucket of water down where you stand, where would it run? Find that point and then you have where the ball will break towards...this is easier said than done sometimes...there is a course here in the mountains outside of town that the greens break contrary to how they appear...takes a great deal of trust to play them and I honestly didn't enjoy it as you feel like you are a blind man being led by the hand...

[Fourputt]

Originally Posted by Bigvivec

...there is a course here in the mountains outside of town that the greens break contrary to how they appear...takes a great deal of trust to play them and I honestly didn't enjoy it as you feel like you are a blind man being led by the hand...

And yet the guy who designed it probably thought he was a genius....

[Bulls9999]

That's the type of greens I enjoy...the ones that take analysis and perhaps needing to play them several times before you 'understand them'. It's boring, to me, to play obvious putting lines....I like to be rewarded for my understanding of the putting surface (since I'm not a long hitter, I have to enjoy my short game).

We have several greens at my home course that you would swear break in a certain direction, but when you putt them, the ball goes straight, right through any break you would presume....time and time again. It has taken me a long time to 'give up' on reading break into those several positions....and I've been rewarded by doing so, because it really does roll straight (even though the eye sees about 5-8 degrees of tilt in the entire quadrant of the green...it could simply be like the V-pitch of a roof, if you flatten the V- a bit and tilt the roof to one side so one side of the V-surface is level, then relative to the other side, it may still look pitched, but relative to the earth/gravity, it may be level?).

But that is what I meant about the phrase "putts breaking towards the water" when courses are made by moving mountains of earth, they do not have to mimic the natural slope of the terrain, especially greens since they are built entirely like embedded tabletops, a foot deep....they can be made to any pitch/slant/slope that the course architect desires. Even if a hole follows the natural terrain, there is no requirement that the putting green also follows it, imo, so to me, you're better off just trying to 'read the green' rather than rely on the addage that it 'breaks to the water'.

Originally Posted by Bigvivec

Here is a for instance...a stream runs alongside a green...to which part of the stream does the ball break towards? Or, on one hole on my course, there is water on three sides of the green...so which water does it break to? A much better indicator for me is to find where the water would drain in that section of the green...if you poured a big bucket of water down where you stand, where would it run? Find that point and then you have where the ball will break towards...this is easier said than done sometimes...there is a course here in the mountains outside of town that the greens break contrary to how they appear...takes a great deal of trust to play them and I honestly didn't enjoy it as you feel like you are a blind man being led by the hand...

[Bigvivec]

I like a challenge as well but these were circus greens...there is not one point of reference as you are on the side of a mountain and the ball can go inexplicably in any direction...fully depend on the caddy for putting lines...there really is no read on many of them...

[C-Tech]

Originally Posted by Bigvivec

Yeah...where I grew up it was every young putt's dream to one day break to New York...

During the Match Play, didn't you hear the announcers saying that the putts would break towards downtown Tucson? Just so happens that course is built in the foothills of the Santa Catalina mountains and Tucson is directly below it.

Also, you have a nice swing, but you should wear longer shirts...and I thought you were a guy???

[petermo]

As with most things in life it's a generalisation that should be at the back of your mind when you're a bit undecided on the line - putts will generally break with the slope and the slope leads towards natural watercourses (many of which appear to be non-existent until there's a downpour). Modern course architecture places much more emphasis on green design than older courses with the result that there are many "counterslopes" or exaggerated slopes that fool the eye.

Usually when I'm a bit undecided or it looks "flat" I'll play for the ball to break with the surrounding terrain - it's usually pretty accurate.

[Bigvivec]

Originally Posted by C-Tech

During the Match Play, didn't you hear the announcers saying that the putts would break towards downtown Tucson? Just so happens that course is built in the foothills of the Santa Catalina mountains and Tucson is directly below it.

Also, you have a nice swing, but you should wear longer shirts...and I thought you were a guy???

Of course I'm a guy...that's why I like Melissa Reid's "swing"...