The Importance of Proper Putting Setup
Posted by Double Eagle in My Progress, Putting Tips
Over the years, I have always been a pretty decent putter. I typically have a lot of confidence and putts out in the 6-10 foot range are very makeable for me. At least I always believe they are, even though I don’t make them all.
Around seven years ago, I read Dave Pelz’s Putting Bible for the first time, and that kind of revolutionized my putting game. I adopted the pure in-line square (PILS) putting stroke, and I learned a lot of things about why we miss putts, why we make putts, and how to learn how to make more putts. I saw immediate improvement in my putting, even though I had never really struggled to begin with. I learned the value of simplicity and the importance of a repeatable putting stroke.
Fast forward to this season, and as my ball striking began to improve from the last few years and I began to hit more greens in regulation, I started to notice that I was three-putting a lot more than I had in previous years. Certainly, some of this was due to the fact that, because I was hitting greens, my first putts have been much longer than they would be when chipping on from a few yards off the green. I knew that I really needed to work on lag putting, just because I wasn’t used to putting from longer distances.
It was something more, though, because I started to miss 5-footers with more regularity. I could also feel that I wasn’t striking as many putts on the sweet spot of the putter face. This, obviously, makes distance control very erratic.
After devoting some extra time to practice putting, I noticed that I wasn’t really improving much. I wasn’t really making better contact, and I wasn’t making many more 5-footers. I also started to notice that I would pull a putt left and then hit another one from the same spot and then push it right. I had first suspected that my reads were bad, but at that point, I knew I was making compensations in my stroke.
I thought back to my reading of Dave Pelz’s Putting Bible, and recalled Pelz pointing out the importance of good training aids. One of his that I’ve planned on getting for quite a while is called “Elk’s Key®”. It’s an alignment aid he designed with Steve Elkington, hence “Elk’s Key” instead of “Pelz’s Key”.
As you can see to the right, it has a series of mirrors and lines to aid in keeping your eyes over the ball, to help with the the alignment of your putter face and just as importantly, the alignment of your shoulders. It’s very important that the shoulders be square to the aim line when putting. Otherwise, it’s impossible to swing squarely to the line in a pure pendulum motion, without making some sort of compensations.
That’s exactly what I was doing.
Shortly after Elk’s Key arrived, I went out to the driving range, set it up, and as soon as I looked down at the mirrors, I could tell right away that my eyes were well inside the aim line and my shoulders were significantly open. If you look at the photo, notice the white line running directly above the shoulders. When I set up to Elk’s Key, my left shoulder was well below the line meaning that my shoulders were aimed well left of my intended aim line.
Obviously, my next step was to properly align myself using Elk’s Key. I had set it up on a relatively level spot to a hole about 10 feet away. I took my stance, square to my intended aim line with the ball a couple of inches in front of center, as Pelz recommends.
The fun part happened as I went about squaring my shoulders to the line and getting my eyes over the ball properly. I kid you not, it felt like a game of Twister. With my eyes over the line, my shoulders square, and the putter face square to the aim line, it felt so very, very strange.
That’s a big sign that things were seriously amiss. In golf, when doing the right thing feels wrong, it means you’ve been doing the wrong thing for way too long. That rhyming axiom was unintentional, though appropriate. Feel free to use it yourself. It has a ring to it.
I began to hit some putts from Elk’s Key, each time twisting and wobbling to find the right position like a newborn calf, trying to walk for the first time.
Immediately, I noticed something cool: I was missing putts to the right, but they were all hitting the exact same spot and I was making very solid, repeatable contact. Fortunately, this was only happening because I hadn’t aligned Elk’s Key to account for enough break in the putt.
After aligning Elk’s Key again, I then lipped out the next putt. It ringed around the hole and everything. Wanting to make sure it wasn’t a problem with my stroke, I putted again and lipped out again. Then, I did it a third and forth time.
I finally got to the point where I was aligned so perfectly, that my PILS stroke was allowed to function as intended, and I was putting over the same exact spot, time and time again.
After another adjustment to Elk’s Key, I started draining ten-footers like they were tap-ins. I was only missing when I made errors with the length of the back swing, meaning the pace of the putt was off. When I took the same length back swing every time, I made the putt just about every time.
Before I fixed my setup, I shudder to think what compensations I was making simply to get the ball to go anywhere near the hole. Certainly, with my shoulders open, and attempting to hit a pure-pendulum motion originating from the shoulders, my putter would want to travel from outside the aim line to inside. I would have had to make subconscious adjustments to the putter face during the stroke to have a chance to make anything.
Throughout that practice session, I alternated hitting three balls from Elk’s Key and then three from somewhere else around the same hole from about the same distance out. I was amazed at the number of putts I was sinking from that distance.
Since then, I’ve felt a little more confident out on the course, but am not putting significantly better yet, because I haven’t had adequate time to work on grooving the correct setup. When I stand over a putt, I still feel awkward, but I’m also hitting the ball more solidly, so I know I’m moving in the right direction.
Over the next couple of weeks, I hope to get a number of putting practice sessions in so I can get the setup properly grooved. Given the way I’m hitting the ball, I estimate that I’m losing 5 strokes per round on the greens. Last time out, I had two three-putts and not a single one-putt, despite a number of realistic chances.
It became abundantly clear to me throughout this learning experience just how important setup is in putting. It’s almost hard to believe given some of the odd, quirky, putting strokes that some of the greatest players in history have used. Keep in mind, though, that those are the best of the best. The rest of us just three-putt way too much.
It’s difficult, if not impossible, to be a great putter without attaining as much consistency as possible in the putting stroke. Many of the greats did it with impeccable timing and skill. We mere mortals need to seek consistency through simplicity. The PILS stroke is the most simple, repeatable technique out there, in my mind, but it’s not going to do much good without a proper, consistent setup.
This also brings up the importance of training aids. In his Putting Bible, Dave Pelz implores the reader to use training aids, if not his, then any that work. Learning what we should do during a putt, or chip, or drive is easy. Knowing that we are actually doing it is not so simple. This is where training aids save the day. In my case, Elk’s Key pointed me in the right direction.
The moral of the story is, proper setup is critical for good putting, and a good training aid will help you get there.
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twadlund said:
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Allen Tyson said:
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Double Eagle said:
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