Wristy Putting Stroke Cause And Cure Golf Tip (Video) - by Pete Styles
Wristy Putting Stroke Cause And Cure Golf Tip (Video) - by Pete Styles

So one of the most soul destroying things as a coach to see, is to watch one of your players go through a period of flicking a putt. Particularly when they’ve got this lovely little pretty shot routine, nice and smooth, and then they set up to the putt and they just give it a bit of a flick. It’s almost like they’ve started to get the yips in that putting stoke. And the problem here is that a risky putting stroke is never going to deliver the consistent speed and line of the putter that we need to deliver the consistent speed and line of the ball. So we’re always trying to work with golfers on making sure that putting stroke is a shoulder’s led, and dominated action, and never a hands and arms flicking sort of action. And for a lot of golfers the flick actually comes from almost anxiety and lack of confidence in their own ability.

So we need to make sure we’ve got a couple of things right first. We need to have read the putt correctly. So I’d encourage you to get back down behind the ball, look at the line, get down nice and low read it from the other end if you need to. Make sure you pick the right line, then make sure you pick the right length. So you would look at the putt from side on, you look at the uphill, you look at the down hill. Look at the area around the hole particularly because the ball will break more around the hole if it slows down. Once you’ve decided on your line, once you’ve decided on your speed, you then take a little set up to the side and you just practice rocking the shoulders with the right length of stroke. There is no point making a really long swing for a really short putt or vice versa. So we load in the exact stroke that we want and when we’re happy that we’ve got exactly the stroke we want, we set straight up to the ball and pull the trigger. Try and avoid using your hands and arms to do that. This has to come as a shoulders motion rocking backwards and through. And if you can accelerate confidently with a good positive stroke your stroke should be less wristy, and should be more positive, and it should be more consistent in terms of the line and the speed of your putts in the future. 2014-03-28

So one of the most soul destroying things as a coach to see, is to watch one of your players go through a period of flicking a putt. Particularly when they’ve got this lovely little pretty shot routine, nice and smooth, and then they set up to the putt and they just give it a bit of a flick. It’s almost like they’ve started to get the yips in that putting stoke. And the problem here is that a risky putting stroke is never going to deliver the consistent speed and line of the putter that we need to deliver the consistent speed and line of the ball. So we’re always trying to work with golfers on making sure that putting stroke is a shoulder’s led, and dominated action, and never a hands and arms flicking sort of action. And for a lot of golfers the flick actually comes from almost anxiety and lack of confidence in their own ability.

So we need to make sure we’ve got a couple of things right first. We need to have read the putt correctly. So I’d encourage you to get back down behind the ball, look at the line, get down nice and low read it from the other end if you need to. Make sure you pick the right line, then make sure you pick the right length. So you would look at the putt from side on, you look at the uphill, you look at the down hill. Look at the area around the hole particularly because the ball will break more around the hole if it slows down. Once you’ve decided on your line, once you’ve decided on your speed, you then take a little set up to the side and you just practice rocking the shoulders with the right length of stroke. There is no point making a really long swing for a really short putt or vice versa. So we load in the exact stroke that we want and when we’re happy that we’ve got exactly the stroke we want, we set straight up to the ball and pull the trigger. Try and avoid using your hands and arms to do that. This has to come as a shoulders motion rocking backwards and through. And if you can accelerate confidently with a good positive stroke your stroke should be less wristy, and should be more positive, and it should be more consistent in terms of the line and the speed of your putts in the future.