Putting...Grip It Like You Play (A Follow Up)

I second the cross handed method, I too shall never go back. I also use fully extended arms without the so prevalent elbow bend, (the fewer angles the better). Straight back and through with a pendulum swing from the shoulders and never, never ever, break the wrists. No wrists, no elbows, only shoulders pivot. When it's on, on, on, it's a thing of beauty. 

Don's tips and suggestions have been unbelievably helpful to my game and making it more fun. This is my 3rd season listening to Surge. I love it when he says "you might want to try this" or "I've been having trouble with this myself".

 I had been struggling with putting this season. My lag putts were very inconsistent and I had little confidence on short putts. I kept trying different grips with little success. I'm over 60 now, so I thought it just came with the territory.

 I tried Don's "same grip" advice right after he posted it. I noticed my lag putts improved right away. Then, more short putts started to fall. And, as we all know, my confidence took over from there. I then started to use the same grip with chipping and I started to hit "my spot" more consistently. My "feel"  has never felt better. It seems to be working for me.

Thanks.....again, Surge.

Hope your work on the greens pays off Russty:)

 Robert I have been using the spot on the line and the center of the ball for putting and every other shot ever since Nicklaus wrote about it in "Golf My Way."

If your wife can see the line all the way to the hole it could be she is in the 2% of golfers who can actually line their eyes parallel to the aim line. You would be amazed how many Touring Pros are off a long ways.

If you change from a palm grip to a "regular" finger grip, the handle of the club gets closer to the ground, not further away. I do not understand how this change can make your putter more upright. Seems to me it would become flatter with a change to the putter grip being under the palm pad.

Hmmmnnn....  cool. Now one of your shouldrs gave you trouble, correct? Was that the left or right and what have done for it, surgery or not? Just wondering as my left is getting worse lately.

Russty a good tip for accelerating the putter through impact  (from Phil Mickelson's shortgame DVD)  is to think 30% for the backswing and 70 % for the forward swing.  I used to be more of a 50/50 % putter.  With a little practice to develop feel you can look at a put of any length and know how long the 30 % backstoke has to be for the 70 % through stroke to do its job.

Short puts are a lot easier with this method because you sense that with too long a backstroke the 70 % through stroke will be too aggressive.  Having too long a backstroke is a recipe for having a decelerating through stroke.

Thanks Dave
  For a long time now I've been using a mallet putter & using or attemping a pendulem swing. I seemed to miss shorter putts from deceleration to often & had too many balls going for the hole but run out of puff. Slow wet greens here in winter has,nt helped, but something had to change. Might try this piston stroke for a while & see what happens

Enjoyed your observations steve. Lefty? If you've told us before i missed it. Yet you play from the righty side. That may actually be an advantage and explains (as least in my thinking) why a draw is natural to you. your right hand low is the equivelant of the left hand low for righties and so that sounds good too.

I have the KEMaltby's( now my reserve set from 6 years ago). I've looked at his newer drivers. I'll look forward to your report and impressions after you put it together. Will you be spine/ FLOing it too?

On the School of Golf on the Golf Channel, Martin Hall just mentioned a putting tip that he says many pros use in their hotel rooms to practice.  Get a metal yard stick, place a ball in the hole on the end, and work on keeping the putter face square to roll the ball down the yard stick.  Pretty cool tip.  I tried it and managed to hit 24 of 25 putts perfectly straight.  The one that rolled off was the first one.

Swapped out the Enlow with the Jumbo Max, and played 18 today with it. The Jumbo Max has found a home. I find it more user friendly than the Enlow. The reverse taper is just too weird for my taste. I hit some fairly good drives and most of the fairways with the Jumbo Max.  I may order a second to try on the hybrids.

PMG

I have had success using the saw/claw grip the last few months. Then for the last few rounds it has become less consistent. So needless to was I am always open to give another method and another putter ago. I will try the normal over lap soon. who knows it may be what gains consistency for me.
Oh, one note, I have found that getting the lie on the putter correct (for you) can make a difference. Making mine a bit flatter has me pulling it less often.

Awesome Terry. I feel in love with  the Jumbo Max from the beginning too. I think if more golfers would try them they would convert too. In my opinion they just make sense. When we use normal tools like a hammer we don't use little grips, rather one that fits in a mans hand! I say "try it and you'll like it." Granted they are more expensive but seriously sturdy and well made to last. Very cool. I won't be surprised if you get them for your irons too:)

Here's the link for any who dare.

http://www.jumbomax.com/no_fla...

Don, When  you came down a few weeks to play and do a video I told you I had seen the video about putting with the same grip that I hold for all my clubs. It has made me a better putter. I now lag the long putts to just beyond the hole and the short ones I am making more of them. It works.
Thanks
Harold,

Today was a nice 111* day on the course. The best part was that I saw one other twosome in 18 holes. They sat on the 8th tee while I finished on 7 to let me play through. If I'd played better, it would have been great. 

On the good side, I hit 11 of 14 fairways, and one of the misses was a foot into the rough because I hit through a dogleg. Unfortunately, my mid-range (6-20 feet) putting really was off, so most greens were two-putts. That would have been fine if I had actually hit the greens with my approach shots. Everything is just a little off right now so I only had 4 GIR (one of them a beautiful 4 iron on a par 3 that landed ten feet short of the pin and rolled about 20 feet past). Lots of practice with flop shots, though. I kept hitting my approaches short-sided behind bunkers or trees (or both). I'm not really giving the shots the time and focus they need, or backing off when I realize that my footing is bad, or double-checking my alignment when the balls a foot above my feet on a hill and I know it's going to go left (one of those wonderful occasions when I ended up short-sided behind a bunker and a tree, and landed a nice flop shot that rolled 15 feet past--which was actually a GIR because it was a par 5 and the approach was a 3-wood from 250).

 Hi Russty,
School is going great.  Something I do when putting and looking at the hole is to imagine aiming with the tips of my right thumb and forefinger.  That may sound a bit weird, but they are already pointed in the same direction as the putter face, so it sort of makes sense.

I assembled my driver today after class and am looking forward to hitting it on Monday.  One thing I didn't do was cut down the shaft yet.  I'm going to mark it with some masking tape and a sharpie in increments of 14" and hit a bucket of balls with it to identify the best length.  Then I'll shorten it and add weight to the heel of the club to get the swing weight just right.  I like the Maltby changeable weight system, so I'll take advantage of it for an easier fitting.

Hit'em Long and Straight,
Bob

P.S.  The shaft came with the spine identified already from the company, but I used a button laser to check it.  It was spot on.

Hi Surge,

I will go with it.  Thanks!

Sounds like you had a nice round over all Robert. Especially off the tee and with your long irons. Seems the adjustments for the gapping on the lofts and lies is working out. As the weather becomes more endurable in a few weeks you'll be able to practice more and I'm sure it'll all start to come together along with the short game:)
So as I am not playing right now because of my shoulder bursitus flare up, Cindy has got my full attention as her coach and caddie. We ended up going for 18 at muni around 4 oclock. I pushed her cart as we walked, pulling clubs for her and lining up all shots along with more than the usual teaching on each shot. Normally we are too conscious of pace of play and each playing our own ball.Wow did she play well. She parred 6 holes and only double bogied one hole  along with 11 good bogies for an 87. She made three putts in the 15-25 foot range and several from 5-10 feet. Her misses left the ball in tap in range. It's really interesting what I learned while having zero attention on myself and 100% attention on her and her play (which she loved).
Today I discovered that I am much better at judging what a putt will do from the prespective of the one holding the flagstick. She is excellent at taking direction and I have her putting along her foot line so once we see the line and break, I simply give her gentle reminders as she sets up, " a little more right, okay just perfect", and bang in the hole!
A  couple other things to note:
we are using an alignment aid BEFORE every shot on the tee to green (not on the green). This assures perfect alignment every time. Of course we remove the stick before each shot. Additionally, this is the first time Cindy played the entire round from the ladies tees. They actually have super senior/junior tees that are a good 40 yards further up on many holes. So many of the par 4's now played like par 5's for her today and by that measure she did even better. It's only been about 4 months since I use to allow her to tee it up anywhere, anytime on her second and third shots. Of course now she only tees it up on the tee box. It has all been a gradual progression that we are real proud of based on Surges teachings. You can sometimes forget just how much there is to learn until you take someone who just two years ago had never played and teach them everything from scratch.
I know this reltionship is rare so I am grateful.

Thanks Bob
  Had a play around with the putter yesturday and tried out the looking at hole thing. The jury is still out on the long putts, but the ones 6 feet or under, all went straight in the hole. I was quite surprized and will have another go at the longer ones again. When you say piston stroke, does that mean a shorter back swing and faster stroke?. Thats what I've been trying to do the last couple of months to avoid that die putting, as Surge has called it

Hey Surge - would you recommend that one who uses a one-handed putting stroke use the back-most or forward-most hand? Been using the back-hand (right) for a number of years, and someone suggested that the left hand would be better. I considered that but quickly went back to the right hand. I take all your advice to heart and to the course most of the time (my fault if I don't and fall short) except for using the "extra" hand on the putter. The hoop drill and mind set has all but eliminated a 3-putt from my game. Thanks.

BTW - I just checked my grip pressure vs a full swing and they are all but identical - I'll keep an eye on it though since this tip makes complete sense. 

On the path and in the hole :-)
Jon 

Hi Guys and Gals,

I've made two changes in my approach to putting and am having good success.  Many putts are falling from ten to twelve feet away since I changed to a piston stroke and started looking at the hole instead of the ball after aligning my shot.  Looking at the hole helps me to picture the ball going in and it helps to smooth out my stroke and make it less mechanical.

Hit'em Long and Straight,

Bob

P.S.

My new driver components arrive tomorrow. Iordered a Maltby BM3 and can't wait to build it and try it out.

 Hi Russty

A piston stroke is powered by the hinge motion of the right elbow.  It does not use a pendulum motion.  Take a look at this video to get the idea of what a piston stroke is;  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...

Hit'em Long and Straight,
Bob

A few years ago my putting went way deep into the sewer. I spent an antire winter, and thousands of putts, to figure out what was right for me. I worked on ball position, grip, body position and stance. I switched to a cross handed grip. I made quite afew adjustments but the biggest was changing to the cross handed grip.It keeps my wrists out of the stroke. I will never go back. The bigest benefit is that after thousands of putts I know what is right for me in all aspects of putting. And I am very happy with how I putt now. Three putts are a thing of the past.

Thats interesting Bob. Have never hear that one before. Looking at the hole and not the ball. I guess with other ball sports we focus on the target and not the ball. I will be trying that out  the next chance I get. It should make for better judging of distance, and as you say, you wont get messed up with mechanics.
 Looks like your still having a great time at school mate. Keep it up

Bob,
Cool to hear how they spined it accurately for you. Be interested how hear how well you hit it too. As for the putting. I have tried the look at the hole method. It has merit for sure. Played with a kid a few months ago and he really did well with that method. I don't look at the ball now as i set up but on the line (actually spec on the ground on the line) only. My wife is one of those people that can see the line from her ball to the hole. She says it's like the "aim point" on TV. Wish  I could too but no way. I have to roll it excactly over my spot or it's not happening. We're all different. I'm still searching for the best formula. That's part of golfs big appeal, we can never perfect it.