What's your stroke technique with the putter?

[Golfaddict]

Do you "hit" it with the putter, using a shorter swing to give the ball a firm rap, or do you prefer a longer swing to "stroke" the ball? I've seen good putters use both techniques and I've seen poor putters use both techniques.

I believe that the "hitters" with the putter are more into mechanics, and the "strokers" are more feel putters. This is just a personal perception. I have a long putting stroke.

[Leaguegolf]

Sometimes my short putting nearly makes me have a stroke.........but I consider myself a feel putter and use a longer stroke when putting. I've tried, with some streaky success, to putt more mechanically but it's never felt natural. Put me down as a stroker.

[bonknhead]

Funny you ask that, because for years I was a stroke putter, taking the clubhead back slowly and smoothly. I've been practicing a shorter swing, and on my last round putted really well. It could be just a fluke, but I felt more confident with my putting than I have in years.

[BunkerBound21]

i use a mid to longer stroke, and keep an insane amount of focus on keeping the toe and hell straight coming all the way through

[OnePutt]

Straight back and forward stroke. Long and easy stroke, never a sudden rap type hit.

[LockStock666]

I just changed putters from a light, very cheap blade style to a cheap but very solid and heavy mallet style. ($28ish)

The difference is that it has enabled me to feel the weight of the shot much more with a short swing. I try to limit by backswing as much as possibe, 18 inches back from the ball seems right to me but still as smooth as possible. The shorter it is the less there is a tendancy for me to lose the desired line or twist the head too much (the mallet makes twisting much easier to detect).

With the short swing in mind I've been really tring to aim just past the hole (thanks to some recent threads on this site ). I didn't make it everytime but when short was only short by 1-2ft rather than the 6-15ft short that had been plaguing me.

My putting last round was improved 100%
Out of 9 holes 3 putted once (25 ft). One putted once (3 ft). 2 putted 7 times from all over the green inlcuding one lip out from 12ft so I cant complain really.

[Wazmankg]

That "hit" putting stroke was popular back in the 60s & 70s and before I'm sure. You still see many of the old-timers use it. It has something to do with it being more effective on slower greens, that weren't in the best shape, which was more the case back then. I have no idea why. Maybe one of our technique gurus can explain it better.

I have a smooth straight back & straight through putting stroke... at least in my head. But I don't know if I can trust that, because I think my full swing feels like Freddie Couples' too.

[Leaguegolf]

Originally Posted by Wazmankg

I have a smooth straight back & straight through putting stroke... at least in my head. But I don't know if I can trust that, because I think my full swing feels like Freddie Couples' too.

I hate to be the bearer of bad news Waz but while your swing isn't mine......it's not quite Freddie's either.

[mr3856a]

I never understood the straight-back and straight-through theory of putting - do you chip like that? Pitch like that? Hit full shots like that?

Doesn't make sense to me.

[Wazmankg]

Originally Posted by mr3856a

I never understood the straight-back and straight-through theory of putting - do you chip like that? Pitch like that? Hit full shots like that?

Doesn't make sense to me.

In reality it's more of a swing thought, than a precise description of the geometry of the stroke, especially on longer putts requiring a longer backswing. Probably if someone measured my putting stroke they'd find some arc but thinking straight back & through helps me keep the putter head square to my target through the hitting zone.

[alangbaker]

Originally Posted by Golfaddict

Do you "hit" it with the putter, using a shorter swing to give the ball a firm rap, or do you prefer a longer swing to "stroke" the ball? I've seen good putters use both techniques and I've seen poor putters use both techniques.

I believe that the "hitters" with the putter are more into mechanics, and the "strokers" are more feel putters. This is just a personal perception. I have a long putting stroke.

I definitely take a longer stroke at the ball. I've never felt as accurate with a poppier motion.

[coralpro]

I think actually a stroker is the mechanical compared to the popper. Both still require feel but the difference in the two is popping takes away the irregular turning of the blade on the longer backstroke. Tiger is a popper. Vijay is a stroker. Phil is a stroker and as you know strokers have a tendency of push or pulls more. In reality they both are mechanical but I love typing a bunch of junk for you to read.

[PA PLAYA]

I really don't get into the long stroke versus short stroke mentality. And I understand that the hardest thing to communicate to a golfer is distance control, because it's a "learned" aspect of the game, meaning that it can't really be taught in a traditional sense.

But just for the sake of discussion.... Let's assume that your standard full-swing PW goes 120 yards. You find yourself looking at an approach from 110 yards to the flag, which is in the center of the green. You don't have a GW, so you decide that the PW is needed for this shot.

We have two ways of governing distance to that target with the PW. (1)We can take a full swing and decelerate into the ball, and struggle with trying to manipulate the amount of clubhead speed (force) needed at impact to get the ball to fly that distance. Or (2)We can allow the length of the backswing itself determine the length of the shot, without the need of decelerating and without the need of guess work in manipulating the amount of force at impact to get the ball to the target.

I'm no teaching pro, but I know enough to understand that deceleration is never a good thing.... be it with a full swing, a pitching motion, a chipping motion, or a putting motion. It compromises rhythm and timing, extremely important factors in hitting a ball with precise contact and accuracy.

So when I'm facing a putt on a green, the only things I'm concerning myself with regarding distance are (a)the length of the putt (b)the slope of the surface the ball has to navigate and (c)the perceived "feel" of how quickly or slowly the putting surfaces appear to be running that day. Those things ultimately govern how long my backstroke is, because I'm wanting to maintain a consistent pace from the start to the finish of my putting stroke = smooth, rhythmic stroke sending the ball on the proper line at the proper pace.

The moment my backstroke gets too long, my hands send a signal to my brain, telling the brain, "Hey, I've really screwed up here. Help me out, or else we're looking at 6 feet coming back! Eject, Eject, Eject!" What happens? In that 1/10th of a second, my brain takes over. It's a natural reaction, a reflex. The problem there is that the hands are much quicker than the brain. So the hands are in this demilitarized zone, waiting on orders from headquarters. The brain is trying its best to send these signals to the hands, but unfortunately the signals aren't traveling at the speed of thought. So the hands realize that they're now on their own. And right before impact, they "ease off" the momentum of the putting stroke, still waiting on the feedback from the brain. Four feet short of the hole later, we've just uncovered one of the biggest cardinal sins in putting. Not leaving the ball short, because that's just the effect. But the cause -- deceleration.

And if we reverse the dynamics, what happens? Well duh! We get the exact opposite result. The hands tell the brain that there's not enough length in the backstroke to get the ball from point a to point b without applying a manipulative force at impact. Again, the hands are waiting on the proper response from the brain, which should be "back off the putt, you idiot" but we seldom do that. So in our finite wisdom of our putting prowess, we do the only thing left to do at that point, because we just gotta get the ball to the hole! We end up hammering the putt five feet past the hole.

But we've not only compromised distance control in this process, we've also compromised the accuracy part. Because the proper line of a putt is dictated by what? Speed. A ball that is stroked much too hard will not accept the break. A ball that is stroked with a decelerating stroke obviously invites the break to kill both the pace and the direction.

You can putt inside to out, outside to in, straight-back straight-thru. None of those things matter nearly as much as the pace you put on the ball with the putting stroke, and I'm of the belief (obviously) that if you're gonna take the pains to hit the ball with the proper pace, you might as well learn how to do that smoothly and give yourself a chance to sniff the hole.

[straightshooter]

Nice post PA Playa!

As for me:

For any putt requiring effort I make an effort to stroke the putt. I make a deliberate attempt to apply no sudden motion whatsoever to the clubhead from the start through impact (though there is some recoil at the end). I use an arc-stroke, and I use a heel-shafted putter suitable for that stroke. Why do I putt like that? To get the best results for me!

As for the short ones, I have no idea what I do, I might hit them.

[JPsuff]

.

I just make sure that my back stroke is shorter than my through stroke and I accelerate through the ball. The only time that changes is if I have an extremely quick downhill putt where all I really need to do is just tap the ball and let the green take it from there.


-JP