A simple, repeatable putting stroke starts with the appropriate address position. Many pros suggest a method that is consistent with their performance. As such, you see many grips and address positions being used successfully on tour. However, I have found the proper grip and address position are vital to a fundamentally sound putting stroke.
Putting Address Position
The grip is place in the palm of your bottom hand as then palms contain nearly 22 per cent of your body’s nerve endings below the neck, thus facilitating “feel” or distance control. Both hands are parallel to one another with the back of the hands on a line consistent with the target line.
The back of your forward hand points directly at your intended target and the back of your back hand points directly away from your target. I’ll speak more about the intended target and target line later in “Laser-like Alignment.”
Your feet, hips, and shoulders are on a line parallel to your target line with your eyes directly over the ball and your arms hanging straight down, directly under the center of the shoulders. In other words, your arms are as long as possible and hang straight down from your shoulders. Setting up square to or parallel to your target line allows you to stroke the ball with the best chance of rolling the ball along your target line.
Placing your eyes directly over the ball provide you the optimum position to properly view your target. If your eyes are either inside or outside the ball you will see your target, sometimes the hole, either left or right of where it actually is. I’ll speak more about this in “Laser-like Alignment.”
Finally, allowing your arms to hang naturally from your shoulders so that there is no bend in your elbows allows you to create a putting stroke that follows your intended target line back and through for as long as possible. I’ll speak about this more next time in, “A Simple, Repeatable Stroke” and why this is the most effective way of putting.
When you first try to set up with long arms you may find that your hands don’t grip the putter at the top of the grip – that your putter is too long. That’s ok. Grip down the putter if you have to or do like I did, have your putter shortened so that your hands fit perfectly at the top of the grip. My putter is only 31 inches long. Since we don’t have to hit the ball long distance while putting, a shorter putter does not compromise your ability to putt the ball the correct distance.
If you have any questions please leave them in the comments!
photo credit: Playadura*
