What is the Best Cure for the Putting Yips? (Video) - by Pete Styles
What is the Best Cure for the Putting Yips? (Video) - by Pete Styles

Great question this one about how we can cure the yips. Now honestly if I could cure the yips and I could market it and I could sell it, there would be a Ferrari parked outside there because curing the yips, you could sell that to a golfer who’s got the yips for a hundred dollars a time, I promise you because having the yips is the most destructive thing, soul destroying thing, mentally damaging, physically damaging, damages the skull. It is a horrible thing to have. The yips of people – people with the yips would miss this putt from here to here. They would miss that more times, than they hole it. Almost a physical involuntary action, they’ve lined everything up, they’ve got it all lined up nicely, and then something goes wrong with the hands. Their brain literally does not talk to their hands. And they get the yips, and the problem with it, the more you get it, the more you think about it, the worse it gets. And there is a few people who have given up the game because of the yips, or putted with one hand because of the yips or used a long putter because they’ve got the yips.

It’s a pretty horrible thing to have and it’s very difficult to get rid of. The one consideration I would have for a lot of people that have the yips or a version of the yips is that they decelerate too much when they hit the ball. So they have lined everything up nicely, they have had too big a backswing, then as they hit the ball, they slow the club down too much, and it has too much chance to wander off and change angle or change speed, too much variation. It would be better, if you have the yips, you would be better on working on quite a short backswing, and then quite a good positive acceleration and pop into your stroke. So from this side around, what we would look at is a one third backswing and a two thirds follow through. So one-third backswing, two-thirds follow through, let the club accelerate through impact rather than having two-thirds to one-third where it decelerates. I’m not suggesting that would cure every case of the yips, but if you could accelerate and be more aggressive with your putting stroke you would certainly iron out a few little variations of the yips. 2015-03-31

Great question this one about how we can cure the yips. Now honestly if I could cure the yips and I could market it and I could sell it, there would be a Ferrari parked outside there because curing the yips, you could sell that to a golfer who’s got the yips for a hundred dollars a time, I promise you because having the yips is the most destructive thing, soul destroying thing, mentally damaging, physically damaging, damages the skull. It is a horrible thing to have. The yips of people – people with the yips would miss this putt from here to here. They would miss that more times, than they hole it. Almost a physical involuntary action, they’ve lined everything up, they’ve got it all lined up nicely, and then something goes wrong with the hands. Their brain literally does not talk to their hands. And they get the yips, and the problem with it, the more you get it, the more you think about it, the worse it gets. And there is a few people who have given up the game because of the yips, or putted with one hand because of the yips or used a long putter because they’ve got the yips.

It’s a pretty horrible thing to have and it’s very difficult to get rid of. The one consideration I would have for a lot of people that have the yips or a version of the yips is that they decelerate too much when they hit the ball. So they have lined everything up nicely, they have had too big a backswing, then as they hit the ball, they slow the club down too much, and it has too much chance to wander off and change angle or change speed, too much variation. It would be better, if you have the yips, you would be better on working on quite a short backswing, and then quite a good positive acceleration and pop into your stroke. So from this side around, what we would look at is a one third backswing and a two thirds follow through. So one-third backswing, two-thirds follow through, let the club accelerate through impact rather than having two-thirds to one-third where it decelerates. I’m not suggesting that would cure every case of the yips, but if you could accelerate and be more aggressive with your putting stroke you would certainly iron out a few little variations of the yips.