The other day, I had the pleasure of playing golf with my good friend Richard and his old golf coach and mentor Larry Campbell, PGA.
Gambling is illegal at Bushwood sir, so we were keeping it legal.
That didn’t stop Larry (my cart buddy) from sneezing in the middle of my backswing on my approach to a long par 5 I had hope to birdie. Hello house.
If you’ve never heard of Larry, he’s a local legend here in Oklahoma City. He used to play on the PGA Tour decades ago. When you first see him swing a golf club you will wonder how that ever happened. In fact, Larry hit his hat off his head a few times… he says his swing is off if that isn’t happening.
Larry’s backswing is wild and loopy, but he brings it all together on the downswing and makes a sweet impact position with the ball. His putting stroke on the other hand is a different matter. Smooth as silk.
Larry even uses one of those old school Bullseye putters. It’s marked up and dinged but gets the job done.
All day long, Larry was dropping in bombs and snuggling the little white ball next to the cup. It was pretty clear why he made it to the big league…. putting.
And that brings us to this today’s focus… improving our putting.
Jack Nicklaus says the most common fault in putting among amateurs is “moving the body around during the stroke.”
Setting the weight on the balls of your feet makes it harder to move around, because you are more conscious of the need to stay still to retain your balance. Give it a try if you’re not rolling those putts as well as you’d like.
Try the same technique on your full shots, particularly if you are excessively active with your body.Your weight will naturally move more toward your heels as you swing back and through, but setting up with it primarily on the balls of your feet with teach you a lot about address positioning and posture, as well as balance.
Hope today’s tip helps you develop a more stable putting platform. Your game will surely improve because of it.
