Atitude is Everything

I'm confident that I'll make every putt. I don't aim for a circle six feet in diameter because I believe the human body responds better the more precise the target. I read a long time ago that Dave Pelz says the ideal speed is that which rolls the ball 17" beyond the hole if it misses, and though I don't like the putting stroke he preaches, I took that to heart.

That knowledge combined with my "reactionary" approach to a putt's speed and my pre-round warmup that focuses primarily on gauging the speed has led me to become a putter who nearly always gets the speed just about right. True, I'll occasionally leave a 20-foot putt a little short of the hole, but I rarely shove one six feet past. Whether the putt is five feet or fifty-five feet, "trying to make the putt" never leads to hitting the putt harder than is necessary.

A lot of golfers attach a lot of significance to their putts, particularly the short ones. While I admit that it stinks that a missed three-foot putt counts the same as a 280-yard drive down the heart of the fairway, I realize that your control of the situation stops the instant the ball leaves the putter face. If I do everything conceivably possible to hit the putt on the line and with the speed that I believe will result in the ball falling in the cup, what happens after that is out of my control.

In other words, I consider any putt I have a success if I start the ball on the line I chose and with the speed I chose. If I make an error in reading the break or speed, I learn from it. If I make an error in execution, I forgive myself (and practice until that fault is cured if it occurs too frequently).

I believe that application of the "every shot counts the same" mentality is crucial to good putting. Lots of people are better par putters than they are birdie putters, and are even better bogey putters than par putters. Even Tiger Woods is a better par than birdie golf putters.

But birdie putts and bogey putts still count for one stroke apiece. Many people get tentative with birdie putts because they think "par is still a good score - I don't want to three-putt." Such thinking introduces a negative - three-putting - and tentativeness. Last time I checked, negativity and tentativeness aren't conducive to good putting with the Odyssey White Hot XG 2 Ball F7 Putter!

Someone asked in the forum what length putt they were 90% confident they could two-putt. This thinking is flawed in two ways. First of all, 90% confident implies 10% unconfident. Also, two-putting is a negative in my opinion: I am trying to make every putt I look at.
 

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