Natalie Adams – PGA Teaching Pro

Here we are going to look at the benefits of having a putter with an insert in the putter face. Now here we’ve got a putter and you can see that there is a black area within the mantle and this has an insert. Now inserts are much softer and will give you a lot more feel than just having a solid steel headed putter, now you can have putters that have milled faces such as this one. Now milled face really guarantees that the face is completely flat but the process for milling the putter head is very costly so it makes these putters quite expensive.

So the reason that inserts came along was to give you an alternative and a much cheaper option but while still retaining the feel. If putter heads are just made out of steel a very solid and very dead when the ball comes off the face you don’t get a lot of feel of them at all. So manufacturers came up with this idea of taking the steel out of the middle of the putter and replacing it with a much softer material, which is the insert into the face. So this gives you a lot more feel of that putter face but a much better price much more value for money.

The other advantage of using an insert putter as well is that because the lighter material of the insert is in the middle of the putter there’s a lot more weight around the outside so the putter becomes a lot more stable as well. If you are hitting the ball of center the putter head is able to resist the twisting effect that’s imparted onto the face. So the putter head stays much more table and the face remains pointing up the target for a lot longer. Not only do you get a lot more feel with insert putters you also get a lot more stability and a lot more consistency from them.

So what I would work on is if you are using an insert putter the insert also will give you the sound that you need of the ball as you strike it and the sound and the feel are very related to each other. So work on this following drill listen to how you are hitting the putt because you’ll be able to hear the sound it sounds crisp off the putter face it’s not dead at all and you’ll be able to link that to the feel and improve your distance control.

The drill I’d suggest you do is go on to the putting green maybe go on to one edge of the putting green so you’ve got a good 20 or 30 foot putt and then work on putting balls totally across the green to the other side of the green. And get the ball as close to the fringe as you possibly can, if you practice doing that that will really improve your distance control and your touch and you’ll find that your Putting really improves especially with those longer putts and you cut the three put down.