The Best $50 You Will Ever Spend
I’ve always preached ‘it is the Indian not his arrows’ however, it is vital that your putter is correctly matched to you.
If you’re having a difficult time on the greens, it could be because the model of putter you’ve chosen doesn’t match your putting stroke. Missed putts aren’t always down to a bad read or an inconsistent stroke. I’ve had many golfers come to me believing that putting was their biggest weakness only to discover that the putter they were using was unsuitable. Book a putting session with your local PGA golf professional and have them check your set-up, determine your type of stroke and most importantly check the putter that you are using to see if it’s helping or hindering your chances of draining those putts.
Your putting stroke will fall into one of the following:
– Slight arc
– Strong arc
– Square to square
Once determined which of the above strokes you employ, your golf professional will suggest whether you are best suited to use a putter with either no toe hang (face-balanced – for square to square stroke), moderate toe hang (slight arc), or significant toe hang (strong arc) (see pics 1, 2 and 3)
He or she will also consider many other factors in your ‘set-up’ when custom fitting a putter to you. Some golfers like to stand up tall when they putt; others prefer to crouch over. Some like to set-up open to the target; others prefer to be closed. Some want their eyes over the ball; others want their eyes inside or more rarely outside of the ball. Many of these choices are based on comfort level and/or the physical characteristics of a player, and that will occasionally require further modifications to the putter.
Amateurs don’t hesitate in regularly upgrading their driver at great expense in the hope that extra distance will lower their scores. It amazes me that the putter is not valued with the same level of importance given the fact that it is the club that every golfer uses the most but actually hopes to use the least.
Investing $50 into a putting session with a PGA professional could well be the best money you’ll ever spend on this game – even if they end up telling you that your putter is perfectly suited to you already. I’m yet to see someone win a tournament putting badly and remember how the mantra goes? Drive for show – putt for …….?
