Every so often, I’ll get an unsolicited email from someone representing a new technology or, perhaps a different bend on an already implemented idea that is advertised to improve your golf scores. There have been a few that have made it past my email in box and this is one of them.
When I took up the game almost 15 years ago, my first teacher’s philosophy was to start at the hole and work your way back to the tee box. Putting was first, then short game, mid irons, and finally, driver. Since putting was the easiest to practice, didn’t require a lot of strength, and accounted for about 50% of the strokes in round, it made sense to me that it was a good place to start.
Back at the end of September, I received a much anticipated package from Putting Technologies; they’d sent me the Precision Putting Trainer and asked that I ‘test drive’ it and if I liked it, maybe write a review.
This is Precision set up on my putter – it comes in two pieces. The first piece clips onto the putter shaft – the yellow bar, when parallel to the putter face, is a good visual aid for alignment. The rocker arm hinges two ways on the yellow bar – one helps with the putter head lie and the other with smoothness of stroke. It also came with easy set up and use instructions, a hard carry case for storage when you’re on the course, and two practice ‘bumperCups’. The larger cup is sized so if your ball even brushes the edge of the bumper, you’ve sunk the putt. The smaller bumper, a smaller target, is for more intense practice and incremental improvements.
My first practice was on our bedroom carpet. With this aid, the hinge on the yellow bar is supposed to align with the middle of the putter face – the sweet spot. So, when you’re standing over the ball, the hinge is between the middle of the back of the ball and the sweet spot of your putter face. At that point, it’s very easy to get your eyes set up directly over the ball. The first thing I noticed was my usual eye alignment was almost 2 inches inside the ball. The hinged rocker arm is red on the lower inside. The red is only visible if the toe or heel of the putter head is too high or too low. Once I corrected being set up 2 inches inside the ball, pushes and pulls were all but eliminated. On the carpet, I got pretty good and could ‘sink’ 8 of 10 putts from 6 to 8 feet. On the course is different but I am seeing a lot more putts within a foot which all but eliminates the dreaded 3 putt. I’ve even dropped a couple of 15 footers for birdie in my last couple of rounds.
So, the bottom line for me is it works. I don’t have to worry about mechanics or line (as long as I practice) – it’s now all about speed.
The weather today is awful and since I’m not really a cold weather player, I can spend time on the carpet and work on putting.
Putting Technologies has a great web site that will answer all your questions.
Remember, stroke it, don’t poke it.
