Long Putt, Why Do I Over Hit So Many Putts (Video) - Lesson by PGA Pro Pete Styles
Long Putt, Why Do I Over Hit So Many Putts (Video) - Lesson by PGA Pro Pete Styles

So if you’ve been over hitting your golf putts we’ve got to consider why would that be happening, why is it that when you have got a reasonable length of putt like this why are you hitting it too far? And I would suggest there is probably two major long putt issues here and one slightly more minor issue. The first one the slightly more minor issue is possibly because you are not reading the putt very well, you are not concentrating whether it is a downhill or down green putt. So, if it’s downhill and down green you need to make the relevant adjustment for that.

The bigger issues are going to be either you are too aggressive so your mindset isn’t right or you have actually got a flaw in your technique that causes the putt to go far. So if we look at the mindset idea quite often we see people when they are making mid to longer putts, mid range longer putts they are just aggressive. They are trying force the ball in, they are trying to ram the ball into the back of the hole but at all cost. So I have got so aggressive at that putt I have now got a very long putt coming back which I may miss I have been too aggressive with my first putt I was too keen to get it in. We need to therefore approach this idea of lagging putts, so mid to long putts we need to lag them up to the side of the hole to make sure we two putt. Because don’t forget golf isn’t about getting the long putt in it’s about getting the putt in with the fewest number of shots. So if this one doesn’t go in I want to be able to make sure I can tap the next one in rather than this rolling so far past and to aggressive I then miss the return putt. So change the mindset make sure mid to long putts are lagged up close to hole and tapped in. The other difference that you might have the other reason why you might be over hitting putts is simply a technical flaw. So, technique flaws that might mean that you are hitting putts to hard could encompass too long a back stroke, too much body action and probably too much wrist hinge. So we see golfers that have too big a back stroke, too much leg action effectively they are turning their whole body to turn through to the target like you would do when you are chipping or hitting full shots. Or too much wrist hinge so flicking the wrist on the way through that mean the ball goes too far. If you could control your back swing make it shorter control your follow through, so I’m not asking you to decelerate and slow down its controlling your follow through, less wrist hinge, less leg action. And so the follow through is one third back, two third through rather than one third back and then a great big smack through so you want to control that follow through. That should help you get you putts rolling towards the hole nicely. Now if we can ideally position a ball, we’d position it in or just pass the hole so I’m not asking you to leave or your putts short but we also don’t want to go so for past that we disregard the return putt that we have. And hopefully if you can consider those three elements you can improve and not be so aggressive with your putts, hole a few more and certainly cut out three putts and make more two putts. 2014-10-08

So if you’ve been over hitting your golf putts we’ve got to consider why would that be happening, why is it that when you have got a reasonable length of putt like this why are you hitting it too far? And I would suggest there is probably two major long putt issues here and one slightly more minor issue. The first one the slightly more minor issue is possibly because you are not reading the putt very well, you are not concentrating whether it is a downhill or down green putt. So, if it’s downhill and down green you need to make the relevant adjustment for that.

The bigger issues are going to be either you are too aggressive so your mindset isn’t right or you have actually got a flaw in your technique that causes the putt to go far. So if we look at the mindset idea quite often we see people when they are making mid to longer putts, mid range longer putts they are just aggressive. They are trying force the ball in, they are trying to ram the ball into the back of the hole but at all cost. So I have got so aggressive at that putt I have now got a very long putt coming back which I may miss I have been too aggressive with my first putt I was too keen to get it in.

We need to therefore approach this idea of lagging putts, so mid to long putts we need to lag them up to the side of the hole to make sure we two putt. Because don’t forget golf isn’t about getting the long putt in it’s about getting the putt in with the fewest number of shots. So if this one doesn’t go in I want to be able to make sure I can tap the next one in rather than this rolling so far past and to aggressive I then miss the return putt. So change the mindset make sure mid to long putts are lagged up close to hole and tapped in.

The other difference that you might have the other reason why you might be over hitting putts is simply a technical flaw. So, technique flaws that might mean that you are hitting putts to hard could encompass too long a back stroke, too much body action and probably too much wrist hinge. So we see golfers that have too big a back stroke, too much leg action effectively they are turning their whole body to turn through to the target like you would do when you are chipping or hitting full shots. Or too much wrist hinge so flicking the wrist on the way through that mean the ball goes too far.

If you could control your back swing make it shorter control your follow through, so I’m not asking you to decelerate and slow down its controlling your follow through, less wrist hinge, less leg action. And so the follow through is one third back, two third through rather than one third back and then a great big smack through so you want to control that follow through. That should help you get you putts rolling towards the hole nicely.

Now if we can ideally position a ball, we’d position it in or just pass the hole so I’m not asking you to leave or your putts short but we also don’t want to go so for past that we disregard the return putt that we have. And hopefully if you can consider those three elements you can improve and not be so aggressive with your putts, hole a few more and certainly cut out three putts and make more two putts.