 
The Putting Assassin presents ....

Putt like a Tour Professional

### Putt like a tour professional by Tom Lyons

Copyright 2010 Tom Lyons

Smashwords Edition

"I never hit a putt until I was absolutely sure that I was going to make it."

Nicklaus, in his prime, responding to a reporters query as to why he stood so long over a putt before finally pulling the trigger.

Putt like a Tour Professional

Table of contents

Nicklaus - the famous picture of him sinking putt on the 17th hole, Sunday, 1986 Masters

Title Page

### This is a serious golf instruction book 3

### Why is putting well so important? 5

### The story of Bob 8

### Putting is individualistic 11

### Know the distance of the putt 15

### What's my line? 18

### The basic putting stance 23

### Proper eye line 24

### Keep your head and body still, eyes soft and quiet 25

### Putting grip 27

### You stroke it to the left ... then you ... 28

### Utilizing tools at your disposal 29

### Mid round adjustments 31

### Putting and the mental game 33

### Free will 37

### Confidence 43

### Staying in the present moment 45

### Confidence and letting go of results 52

### Trust 54

### Commitment 57

### Awareness skills 59

### Non judgmental awareness 65

### Visualization 67

### What's my target ? 73

### Pre putt routine 77

### Zen, putting, and Tiger 83

### Fear and putting 86

### Putting potpourri 97

Picture of author after he made 7th career hole-in-one

### California State Senior Amateur in 2009

### I have no idea where my putter is aimed ... 98

### What's my target? 101

### Putt to a tee 103

### How to make the dreaded four foot putt 104

### 3 putt greens – how to avoid them 107

### Putting stroke exercises 109

### Mental exercises – conquering monkey brain 112

### Pranayama 115

### Use only one swing thought at a time 118

### Count your putts after the round 119

### Handling pressure 122

### The "Yips" 124

### Apologies to Johnny Miller 127

### Resume of a true golf fanatic 129

This is a serious golf instruction book, written by a serious golfer, one who putts well, and one who wants to help others putt well. The importance of good putting can not be underestimated. Poor putters do not win on any of the professional tours; poor putters don't win any college events, or top amateur events; in fact, most times, when a golfer putts poorly he/she doesn't enjoy the game at all.

Why would you read this book? If you can take only one, or two, of the dozens of ideas that are presented here and use that information to take a stroke or two off your scores, each round, so that you were able to get a lot more enjoyment out of the game of golf ... well, then, reading the book would be worthwhile. We'll cover the important physical and more importantly, the mental fundamentals that all great putters practice and use. I'll quote tour pros, great golfers from the past and the present, sports psychologists, famous golf writers, and I'll cover time tested and proven ideas for putting success that have been developed over the years.

Who can benefit from reading this book? Just about every golfer, I believe. If you are a beginner, then learning better putting fundamentals will help you improve. You'll learn more quickly than you could without proper instruction. If you are a weekend golfer, a mid to high handicapper, think how great it would be to be able to sink a couple of crucial putts late in the round to win that Andrew Jackson from your friends? (Between friends, there's a lot to be said for bragging rights.) Hell, just getting on your friend's case and telling the story over a beer, about making a clutch putt and having a couple of yucks about the whole thing makes it worthwhile. Priceless. If you're a top college player thinking of turning pro, 1-2 stroke improvement per round can be life changing – the difference between making it on a pro tour or finding another way, besides playing golf, to pay the bills.

I figure that if I can save one shot a day it changes your whole year.

Bo Van Pelt, tour player, 13th on PGA tour money list for 2010

Golf professionals who play this game for a living will also benefit from the instructions contained in this book. One stroke per round improvement in pro tournaments is huge. Aim Point Technologies, the company that provides the computerized Aim Point lines that we see during golf tournament telecasts on the Golf Channel, has qualified how much more money tour professionals would make simply by lowering their score once stroke per round, by simply sinking one extra four foot putt per round. Check out this link for all the dollar info.

<http://aimpointgolf.com/howmuchisoneputtworth.html>

The difference is astounding.

More importantly, when you consistently miss putts that you should make the game tends to be not so enjoyable, for beginner and expert alike. Putting well energizes your entire game. So here's hoping that you can get a couple of ideas from this book that will improve your putting so that you will better enjoy this great game of golf.

Thanks for reading!

"I mees, I mees, I mees, I mees, I make."

Seve Ballesteros, responding to a reporter's question as to how he 5 putted the 16th hole at Augusta National during the 2003 Masters.

Why is putting well so important? That's an easy one. Putting is roughly half the game. 30-50% of all your strokes during an 18 hole round. On a regulation par 72 golf course "old man par" is 36 full shots. 3 shots on a par 5 to reach the green in regulation, 2 shots on each par 4, 1 shot on each par 3 ... for a total of 36 shots. 2 putts per green times 18 holes equals 36 putts and 72 strokes, or even par. However, if you take 2 putts per hole that is not going to win you much of anything and you won't shoot a good score. You want to win on the PGA tour? Winners on all the professional tours take an average of approximately 26-27 putts per round over a 72 hole tournament. Every Sunday while we watch the top pros on TV, the leaders make putt after putt. The pros who miss putts drop off the leaderboard; they get little TV time. Yet the leaders continually make putt after putt; they make all of their short putts from 5-6 feet and in; they make the more than half of their putts in the 10-15 foot range; occasionally they make a couple of bombs coming down the back nine and viola! They score well; they win or finish in the top ten. Bear in mind that on TV on Sunday we only see the pros that are playing well and making putts; the guys and gals who don't make a lot of putts don't make it to weekend TV.

Ben Hogan in his prime was a great putter, however in his later years on tour he developed the yips. (There is, however, the little known fact that his eyesight was damaged by injury from the effects of the near fatal car accident he was involved in 1949) His putting deteriorated to the point where he often did not keep score in the traditional way, instead he played a game of fairways and greens hit in regulation, instead. In his later years Hogan did not like to putt; he thought excellent ball striking was the most important part of golf.

Jack Nicklaus had amazing success in the majors from the years of 1962 thru his Masters win in 1986. One of the reasons why? He was always a good putter, a great one under pressure. While on the senior tour he remained a great putter and is a great putter to this day, at the age of 70 in 2010. The late George Archer had one of the most famous quotes when he described the Golden Bear back in the 1970's. (See below next picture) George was one of the great putters of his generation despite being 6 foot 5 inches tall, bending way over the ball to putt with a short shafted blade putter.

1969 Masters Champion, the late George Archer

"He knew he was going to beat you, you knew he was going to beat you, but the worst part was that he knew that you knew that he was going to beat you." Archer talking about Nicklaus.

Think of Tiger winning all of those majors in his glory years from 1997 through 2008. Making all of those putts, like the 15 footer at Torrey Pines to tie Rocco on the 72nd hole of the 2008 U.S. Open. Or the 24 footer that he walked in the hole in the 2000 PGA where he later beat Bob May in a playoff. He has made putt, after putt, after putt.

Contrast that with the fallen Tiger in 2010, struggling in the majors that year. Sure his ball striking was not as good as in earlier years, but what failed him most was his putter. Here was a guy that virtually didn't miss a 3 foot putt on tour for the entire 2008 season; yet in 2010 he missed more short putts than he had missed in his lifetime, or so it seemed. (Tiger made some ridiculous number of consecutive 3 footers on tour .... something like 350 in a row.)

Even a modest improvement in your putting, say from 35-36 putts per round to 32-33 putts per round can have a profound effect on your scores. It can also have an astounding effect on the rest of your game, as well. Good putting takes pressure off of the rest of your game; soon you're firing at flags with confidence because if you miss the shot you feel like, on the greens, you can sink anything. Using the ideas in this book will help you take those 3-4 strokes per round off of your scores. It doesn't matter if you're a beginner, an amateur, a weekend golfer, or a top college player wanting to be a touring professional. Better putting is the key to that success.

And since putting can be 30-50% of the game of golf it makes good sense that you should spend 30-50% of your practice time working on your putting. And reading about how to improve your putting is not such a bad idea, as well.

It's time well spent.

The story of Bob

When I played high school golf in New York in the late 1960's, I had a friend named Bob who played on the same HS team. When I went to college and played on the golf team, the following year Bob showed up at the same college and played, as well.

Bob was a good player back then, about a 6 handicap. Bob moved to California in 1975. When I moved to California in 1983 I looked him up and we'd find ourselves playing golf together. We fell out of touch for many years after that, but through the magic of the Internet he found my real estate website in 2004 and once again we took to the links.

When we played in 2004 Bob was still a good player, now a 3 handicap. He took the game seriously. But whenever he had a short putt, say a short 3-4 footer a dramatic change came over him. Literally, you could see every muscle in his body tense. His entire preshot routine changed too. He'd stand over the ball, freeze, unable to pull the trigger. When he finally hit the putt, he'd hit a miserable one; a wristy kind-of chop stroke where his entire body would move forward before his putter hit the ball; he wouldn't come close to sinking it. The 3 handicapper turned into a 36 handicapper in the blink of an eye.

Finally, after not being able to watch that kind of self flagellation go on any longer I mentioned that I knew of a book that might help him. Perhaps he'd like to read it? Bob agreed. The next month we played again and he had the same poor results. The guy simply didn't have a chance to make any short putts. Land mines were going off in his head. His head was not in the right spot; he put too much pressure on himself; he was afraid of short putts. So I asked him:

"Did you get a chance to look at that book that I gave you?" It happened to be Dr. Joseph Parent's excellent book on golf called Zen Golf which deals with the mental side of golf. A change came over Bob and he straightened up, looked me in the eye and said:

" _Please don't give me any books on golf, they insult my intelligence."_ (True story) _"I'm an expert golfer, a 3 handicap, I've been playing golf for forty years and I don't need help with my putting. But thanks anyway."_

He then proceeded to miss a couple of more short putts as the round progressed. I was flabbergasted; he had completely closed his mind to learning something new. As a 3 handicap he figured that he knew all there was to know about golf and putting.

The Zen concept of beginners mind came to my mind. It goes like this:

A young man once went to a Zen master to ask him about his teachings; the young man proceeded to tell the master everything that he had understood from his readings on Zen. After a while, the master suggested that they have some tea. The young man continued, telling the master that he understood all there was to understand about Zen. The master began to pour tea into the young man's cup; when it was full he kept pouring. The master kept pouring until the tea spilled all over the floor. The young man shouted at the master and asked him to stop.

"Stop! All the tea is spilling on the floor!"

The master simply said: _"Just like this cup, your mind is full of your own opinions and preconceptions. How can you learn anything unless you first empty your cup?"_ 1

This is the beginner mind concept. As it applies to golf one should always think of oneself as a beginner. Be open to learning. Keep your mind open. Empty your cup.

"In the beginners mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert's mind there are few."

(Doubtful that this Buddha knew much about putting ...)

The use of "the beginners mind" has been extremely helpful to my own golf game. Back in 1997, while preparing to qualify for the Senior (It was called the Senior tour back then, not the Champions tour) tour, (See author bio at the end of this book) I was a 2 handicap. I adopted the "Beginners Mind" theory ... I told myself that I was not an expert and that I was a beginner. I sought out instruction and advice from the best players and teachers; I searched out and took in golf instruction like I was a beginner. I used the good tips that I thought would be helpful; I threw out the info that wouldn't help me. I opened my mind to learning; my handicap improved to a +2 (+ means better than scratch) by the time I went to my first senior tour Q school in 1999. (Tons of practice helped too ...)

So the first idea to grab a hold of is this .... keep an open mind to learning. Practice "Beginners Mind."

Don't be a Bob.

Putting is individualistic; there is no one correct way to putt well. Though there are a number of physical fundamentals that must be adhered to, think of all the different, but successful, putting strokes that we have seen over the years...

  * Bobby Locke, the South African star of the early 1950's who won 4 British Open Championships was the golfer who coined the phrase "Drive for show, putt for dough." He purposely hooked his putts. He'd hit the putt with an inside out stroke, hood the putter on the backswing, turn the toe over through impact to impart overspin and hook the putt. He is considered one of the best putters of all time. Here is an excerpt of Locke's writing from his book on putting.

"Now for the actual putt. In the first place, the weight is evenly distributed on both feet. I place the feet about four inches apart, with the right foot three inches behind the left in relation to a straight line from the hole to the left toe. I adopt this stance to prevent myself from cutting across the ball and imparting any side spin. I position the ball directly opposite the toe of the putter but actually strike the ball with the centre of the blade. I do this to avoid cutting the putt. If one addresses the ball with the centre of the putter blade, there is a tendency to swing outside the line on the backswing resulting in a cut and the ball not running true. By addressing the ball near the toe of the putter blade it is easier to take the putter back 'inside' the line of the putt, and in this way one is able to impart topspin at impact. Never hit a putt with the heel of the club. That puts check on the ball and it will not run as far as you expect.  
I now start the backswing, keeping the putter very low to the ground, almost brushing the turf. I am careful to take the putter back on the 'inside', and there is no wrist work at all. Throughout the swing, the putter blade stays square to the target. I want to emphasize that the blade does stay square to the target. At the completion of the backswing, the putter, left hand and left arm to the elbow, are in one piece. To make sure that the clubface does not open, the back of my left hand keeps pointing to the grass. I have now reached the 'hooding' position. By 'hooding' I mean keeping the putter face dead square, or if anything slightly closed, in the backswing. This will make sure of getting true topspin on the ball, provided the putter returns to the ball on the same line.  
At impact, I keep the left wrist firm in relation to the forearm; the position of the left hand in relation to my putter is exactly the same. This means that the putter blade is kept square to the target. My head is kept well down until the ball has been struck. There is still no wrist work in the accepted sense. I am concentrating all the time on keeping that club head square to the target and on keeping my head well down. It is only necessary to follow through as far as the club went back in the backswing. The putt is now completed. My method of swinging the putter is the same as the swing of a clock pendulum. The club goes as far through in the follow-through as it goes back in the backswing. Though my head turns to watch is happening to the ball, it is still in the same position in relation to the body. It cannot be too much emphasized that the putting action must be slow and smooth, and above all the grip must be loose to maintain the most sensitive touch.  
My putting is based on the fact that if a ball has true topspin, there are three entrances into the hole, three chances, providing the speed is right. There is the front door and there are two side doors. Obviously it is safest to use the front door, but with my method if the ball catches the felt side of the hole it will fall, and if it catches the right side it will also fall. By thinking of these three entrances, I always feel that I have three chances of sinking every putt."

Not exactly the putting fundamentals that are taught today, especially the part about hooding the putter blade by keeping the back of his left wrist pointed at the grass. But, Locke, undeniably, was one of the best putters of all time.

  * Billy Mayfair, though recently he tried to change his putting stroke to a more conventional one, had the most success when he used his "cut putting stroke." (oddly enough the opposite putting stroke of Bobby Locke's) He'd open the blade on the backswing and deliberately took the putter outside the target line; on the forward stroke, just before contact, he's square up the blade and follow through towards the hole. He won the USGA Amateur and has also won 5 times on the PGA tour.

  * Chi Chi Rodriguez, the swashbuckling tour player of the 60's and 70's and senior star of the 80's and early 90's would hit down on the back of the ball when he was putting. He'd chop down on the back of the ball with a wristy stroke so that it would jump in the air. "That way it would start to roll end over end more quickly." Chi Chi would say.

  * Billy Casper, 7th all time with career PGA tour wins with 51, hit all of his putts with a wristy, hands breaking down, stroke.

  * Gary Player, one of only 5 men to win the lifetime Grand Slam (All 4 major championships) used to putt, successfully, with a pop stroke .... Where he would accelerate his stroke – gave it a good whack, then he'd stop abruptly with a short follow thru; often he had no follow through at all.

  * Nicklaus, in his prime, used to push all of his putts toward the hole with his right hand and shoulder.

Mark Calcavecchia and Chris DeMarco use the claw grip. Bernard Langer, Scott McCarron, Rocco Mediate, and others use the long putter. Stewart Cink, Vijay Singh, and others use a belly putter. Jim Furyk, Matt Kuchar, and others use a cross handed, or left hand low grip. Johnny Miller won the 1994 AT&T tournament (the old Crosby held at Pebble Beach) by looking at the hole, not the ball, when he hit a putt. Sam Snead in his later years on tour hit his putts side-saddle.

You get the point.

There are lots of different ways to putt effectively.

There are, however, a number of fundamentals that a golfer must do correctly in order to putt consistently well. In no particular order, with regards to importance, here they are:

  * Know the distance of the putt

  * "What's my line?" or ... how much is this puppy going to break.

  * Basic putting stance

  * Keep your head and body still while putting

  * How far should you stand from the ball – your eyeline over the putt

  * Putting grip

  * The importance of the practice putting stroke

  * Putting stroke techniques

  * Utilizing all of the help you can get

Let's get started.

Know the distance of the putt

One of the most overlooked fundamentals of putting (not used even by all tour pros) is being aware of the exact distance of the putt you are going to hit. Knowing the exact distance of the putt you're about to hit takes much of the guesswork out of the shot. Let's go over why this can help.

Jack Nicklaus is credited with being the first touring pro to know the exact yardages of the shots he was going to face. Prior to Jack doing this, back in the 50's and earlier, tour pros "guessed" at distances .... Or they "eyed them up" and made an educated guess, but no one paced off the distances until Jack came along.

Nowadays pros and amateurs know exact distances. They know the exact distance to the flag; they know the exact distance to the front of the green and to the back of the green. They know how far they have to hit it to get it past the tree at the corner of the dogleg. They know how far they have to carry it to get over the trap at the front of the green. Bushnell laser guns are in everyone's bag. Frankly, knowing the exact distances of the shots you are going to hit is a big plus. It makes it easier to pick the right club and trust what you are doing.

Then, Dave Pelz, NASA engineer turned short game guru came out with his "Short Game Bible" which showed golfers how to hit wedges and scoring clubs exact distances by controlling the length of their backswing and follow thru. He taught pros how to hit the 3 o'clock to 9 o'clock 52 degree wedge ... and the 4 o'clock to 8 o'clock 56 degree sand wedge. Pros, top amateurs, and nowadays most golfers now know the exact distance they need to hit with just about all of the shots they play.

Why not do the same thing with your putts?

Harvey Penick was the one who first gave me the idea, back in 1992, when I read page 104 of his "Little Red Book."

In it he said: " _A good drill to develop touch is to putt a ball from 30 feet. Then practice from 25 feet, then 20 feet."_ 3

So here is the system that, over the years, I worked out. I practiced hitting 30 footers at first, measuring the length of my putter's backswing, and measuring the force, or acceleration, that I had to hit the putt to travel exactly 30 feet. Then I practiced it until I had it down pat. (Took a ton of practice.) Now when faced with a 30 foot putt I know exactly how to hit it. I knew how far to take the putter back, I knew how hard to hit the putt with the forward stroke. Then I applied the same methods to all putts, in increments of 5 feet. Soon I had exact strokes on how to hit any putt from 15 to 70 feet, marked off in increments of 5 feet. If I had to hit a 53 foot putt? No problem. I'd shave a smidge off my 55 foot stroke, or add a smidge to my 50 foot stroke. Pretty soon I was pacing off the distances to all of my putts, my stride being exactly equal to 3 feet, or one yard.

Guess what happened?

My distance control on putts became more accurate and more consistent, 3 putts were reduced, I made more than my share of long putts, and my scores came down. I became a better golfer. I shot lower scores.

Over the years I keep refining my system. If the putt is uphill I might add 3 feet to the distance so if my ball is 25 feet from the hole, I might then hit the putt 28 feet. If I want to hit a 20 foot putt 2 feet past the hole, I add a smidge to my 20 foot stroke. If I am on the fringe 5-6 feet off the putting surface, but still on the first cut, I might add 3 feet to the distance that I hit the ball. I'd make similar adjustments for slow and fast greens.

When warming up on the practice green before the round I hit uphill and downhill putts, in addition to level putts, to determine what the speed of the greens might be for the day. I hit putts into the grain and with the grain. Then I make my "distance" adjustments before going out on the golf course.

Try it and see how well this might work for you. We'll discuss this more in the rest of this book. But for now, suppose you knew, exactly, that the putt you were now facing is 36 feet ... that you didn't have to guess. Most golfers, when attempting to guess the distance of a putt, under evaluate the length; that is, they might think that a 30 foot putt is only 23, or 24 feet long. In putting miss-judging the distance of a putt by any more than 3 feet is a big (add a stroke?) mistake.

Measure your putts for the exact distance, then see how comfortable you feel over the putt now that you have removed all doubt about the distance of that putt.

Check out Curly's socks...

"What's my line?" or ... how much is this puppy going to break.

Good putting is mostly a function of having your head in the right spot. You have to be committed to the line and speed, you need to be confident, you have to kick all doubt out of your mind, you have to conquer a number of different fears about putting, as well as subconscious ones. Then you have to stroke the ball with confidence. This is not a big secret. So we are not going to say a whole lot about reading greens. I will, however, give a number of ideas that you can use.

  * Is the putt uphill, or downhill?

  * Is there any side slope from left to right, or right to left?

  * Is the pin cut near or over a bunker? Over the years the sand splashed out of a bunker by players hitting sand shots builds up under the green. Putts where pins are near of just over bunkers tend to run away from the bunker.

  * Most greens slope from back to front. They are designed that way to better receive shots into the green. Putts below the hole tend to be slower, faster from above the hole.

  * Lots of brown spots on the green? This means less grass faster conditions.

  * How about the general surrounding terrain? Is this green near a mountain, lake, stream? Remember gravity.

"Even at our level, the pros under read the breaks on the greens." – Paul

Azinger while broadcasting the 2010 British Open on ABC.

What Azinger says is accurate. Most of us, even the experts, tend to under read the breaks on the greens. Want proof? Next time you play golf count up the times that you miss your putt on the high side of the hole, then count how many times you miss on the low side. Try that for a couple of rounds and check the results.

Reading greens correctly is the result of practice, experience, trial and error, plus having a good eye and an even better memory. Here are a couple of general rules.

  * Play short putts inside the hole and hit them firm to take the break out. Just watch the pros on TV and see how they do this. Very rarely, do they play a short putt anywhere except the center of the hole. On a relatively straight 3 foot putt, if you hit it hard enough to finish one foot past the hole, the putt will not break. " _Don't worry about anything but the line. You'll hit the ball hard enough."_ 4

  * Concentrate on the line with short putts. On long putts concentrate on the speed.

  * Commit to the line and speed of the putt, before you address the ball. If you have not committed to the line and speed of the putt and you are already over the ball ready to hit the putt, well, then, you will miss more putts than you will make. . If you are wrong, worrying about it won't change anything. So commit!

  * Many players see the amount of break the ball will take, but underestimate where to start the ball and miss the putt anyway. For a putt that will break 2 feet to the left, you may need to start the putt on a target line 4 feet to the right. Mathematically you must start the ball on a line tangential to the arc it will travel, not at the peak point.

  * The quicker the green speed, the less the ball will break. Conversely, the slower the green speed, the more the putt will break.

  * As the ball loses speed near the hole, the putt will break more.

  * Hit downhill putts softer, they will also break more. Hitting uphill putts harder takes some of the break out of the putt.

  * When reading greens pay close attention to the general terrain of the green, the hole, and the entire golf course. Is the course located adjacent a lake, river, mountain, or ocean? Guess which way the putts will break, even if you can't see the break. (It's called gravity!) Looking at the way a green sits, or the way the entire golf course sits in relation to the land, speaks volumes on the general way that putts will tend to break.

  * Pay attention to the way that water runs off each green. If you look closely you will be able to identify this. Water will always run towards the low point of the green. Identifying drainage characteristics of each green will help you determine how the putt will break.

  * Learn to read the grain associated with different types of grasses used on the green. For example, when playing a course for the first time I will always ask the pro in the shop what kind of grass is on the greens. Poa annua greens tend to get bumpy later in the day and if you let a putt lose its speed it can break either way, depending on the bump that it hits. Bermuda greens have strong grain that grows towards the setting sun as the day wears on and can greatly influence a putt. Different grasses have different putting characteristics.

  * Use your feet to help you read greens. If you step off the distance of your putts as described in the previous chapter, then you will walk from your ball, to the hole, and back. Feel the gravity, the slope, on the soles of your feet. If you do not step off the distance of your putts, take the time to walk up to the hole and feel the greens slope with your feet.

  * Learn to plumb bob and use this technique to help you read greens. (Google plumb bob putting and you will get hundreds of hits)

This is not Camilo Villegas...

There is a reason why tour pro Camilo Villegas gets into his famous "Spiderman" position to read putts.

The real Camilo Villegas

Getting low to the ground, like Camilo, gives you a better view of the slope on the green. Check to see if one side of the hole is higher than the other. Look for slope the entire length of the putt. Is the slope constant or does it vary? Be on the lookout for "donut" situations, where the greens keeper might have mounded the cup while removing the hole cutter. If the cup is higher on both sides than the grass then putts hit left will break left at the hole .... Putts hit right will break to the right at the hole.

Finally, Aim Point Technologies provides the graphic overlay on the way a putt will break that we see on Golf Channel telecasts. Think of it as "Reading Greens with 21st Century technology." They teach players green reading concepts for every green they will ever play. Their system and knowledge of reading greens is beyond the scope of this book. They boast many PGA tour stars as current clients. For those who are interested in this, please visit their website. <http://www.aimpointgolf.com/index.html>

The basic putting stance

Golfer with odd putting stance at the 1927 Ryder Cup

Again, there is a lot of leeway here for individual style. Tour Pro Briny Baird hits all his putts from an extremely closed stance with his back to the hole. Two time USGA Open champion Andy North, who stands 6 feet 3 inches tall, bends way over the ball and uses a very short (28 inch shaft) putter. This idiosyncrasy allows him to keep his arms straight, a technique that helps him.

The most widely used and accepted stance, however, is one that squares the feet and shoulders towards the intended line of the putt. A square or slightly open putting stance. The head is set slightly behind the ball to allow the golfer to see the line of the putt more clearly. There is a lot to be said for seeing the putt's train tracks, or its chalk line, and using that visual as an alignment aid before hitting the putt. Later on we will speak more about visualizing the line. For now it is important to note that a proper putting stance is one that is square to the line, it allows the shoulders to swing freely by bending over slightly at the waist, and if the head is set up slightly behind the ball at address it is easier to visualize the line of the putt. Enough said.

Proper eye line

How far away from the ball should you stand to properly hit the putt and give it the best chance to go in the hole? Your eye line needs to be directly overlooking the golf ball and slightly behind it. An easy way to test if your eye line is in the correct position is to, take your stance, place another ball between your eyes and drop the ball to the ground. If it lands on top of the ball, or slightly behind it, then your eye line is correct. If it drops inside the ball, then you are standing too far away. (The most common mistake)

Note golfer's eyes directly over ball.

Courtesy Hank Haney Eyeline Golf Dual Plane Putting System _

_ Having your eye line directly over the ball (with your head slightly behind) is important. It places you in the best position to look straight down the target line and this will help keep your putting stroke on the correct path straight back and straight through to the target line, the train tracks, or chalk line .... Or whatever visualization technique to see the line that works best for you. In addition keep your eyes still and quiet.

Keep your head and body still, eyes soft and quiet

Enough said, as well. How can you expect to hit the putt in the center of the putter face if your head is moving or if your body is moving? How can you expect to hit the putt on line towards the hole? Sinking putts means hitting the putt on a very precise line, on the center of the putter face, towards a very small target. You can not achieve that unless your head and body are still. Just your arms and shoulders move; they rock in a pendulum motion that allows you to strike the putt on your intended line. Keep your eyes still and quiet as well. I've seen guys who keep their heads still as they put, yet their eyes dart back and forth in their heads too much. Your head needs to stay still through the putt and your eyes need to stay still and quiet as well. What are quiet eyes? Eyes that are relaxed. Focus your awareness on your breath, then direct that breath and awareness to your eyes; you'll discover that your eyes will relax in their sockets; this is quiet eyes.

There is a guy at my club, Castlewood Country Club in Pleasanton California, an 80 year old guy who consistently shoots his age and carries a 6 handicap. Once a month we get together to work on this game, because even at the age of 80 he is constantly trying to play better golf.

Inspiring.

Last time we met, I saw that his legs were moving while he putted, almost like a mini golf swing. We corrected that and he then proceeded to shoot his age the next 5 times he played!

Like I said.

Imagine yourself at 80, still playing golf, still trying to improve. _Inspiring_!

Putting Grip

The "claw" grip

What do the following terms have in common: claw grip, fat grip on putter, left hand low, cross handed grip, long putter, belly putter, side saddle, etc.

Answer: Grips and putters used by tour players and amateurs alike to solve putting woes. The main reason why they are used is _to keep the small twitchy muscles of the hands and fingers out of the putt ...especially on pressure putts!_

It's best to hit your putts with a pendulum stroke initiated by your larger shoulder muscles, but unfortunately, you have to hold the putter with your hands. That brings the small quick twitch muscles into play.

Try and keep your fingers off of the grip as best you can. (Grip it mostly between the palms. No single finger down the shaft grip ... you don't see a single tour professional putt with a grip like that.) They will grip the putter with palms facing each other in an attempt to keep the small twitchy muscles of the hands and fingers out of the shot.

Under pressure, or when you tighten up on the greens a smidge, these small muscles usually take over and the result is often a very ugly putting stroke. Keep the wrists out of the stroke as well. Using the wrists too much will also cause an ugly result. There is nothing good to be said about the stroke of a player who uses the wrists too much, or, uses the twitchy muscles of the hands and fingers, as well, to hit a putt.

You stroke it to the left .... then you stroke it to the right ...

We're not going to say a lot about the actual putting stroke. Why you say?

Good putting is mostly a combination of proper mental discipline and the proper use of a routine that focuses on the process, not on the results. These are the areas where we are going to give you the best ideas on how to become a great putter. Later we will talk about a technique for developing your own personal way to stroke your putts. (Repeatability being the key issue.) But, suffice to say that we do need to pay a bit of attention to the actual putting stroke. Here are a few basic fundamentals.

The practice stroke is e _xtremely important_. Muscle memory stays with the human body only a minute or so. So if you were to take 3-5 practice strokes, mimicking the _exact_ distance of the putt you are going to hit, then the chances of you repeating that stroke when you do it for real are greatly enhanced. Not paying attention to the practice stroke this way .... By simply standing up to the putt and just hitting it, is a recipe for inconsistent putting. Take the time, have the discipline, to incorporate it into your routine ... take several exact practice strokes before you hit your putt. If you don't make a couple of exact practice putting strokes before you hit the real deal, then you do not develop the muscle memory needed to hit the putt the right distance.

Try and use a pendulum stroke, using mostly your arms and shoulders; try to minimize the use of your wrists, hands, and fingers. Use a straight back, straight through (the target line) stroke. Hit the ball on a slight upstroke in order to impart a good roll on the ball. How do you know that you are putting a good roll on the ball? Use the putting tool described in the next section to put a complete circular line around the equator of your golf ball. When you hit the putt correctly, the line will roll smoothly, with little or no bobble. That is what you are looking for ... the line of your ball to roll smoothly to your target. (Kind of the way a bicycle wheel rolls when the front wheel doesn't wobble.)

The length of your putting backswing is determined by the distance of the putt you are facing. Make sure that you utilize the "pacing distances" concept described earlier in this chapter so that you have an excellent idea (should be ingrained actually) of how long your backswing should be.

Try and keep your putter low to the ground on your backswing and low to the ground on your follow through towards your target. (Much, much, more to follow on the importance of being target oriented later in this book.)

This last item, however, is the most important part of the putting stroke. Make sure that your putter head is accelerating when it hits the ball. Much like the feeling when you are driving your car and you punch the gas to merge into freeway traffic. Feel how your car picks up speed? This is what your putting stroke must do through impact with the ball.

Accelerate!

I can't tell you how many times I've seen golfers decelerate when they hit the ball, or quit on the putt, or not hit the putt with enough _"punch"._ The results are always the same. A poor putt. A missed putt. Usually short of the hole and on the low side. They never give the putt a chance.

Utilizing tools at your disposal

Nowadays, most of the men and women touring pros use lines on the ball and track lines on their putter as an alignment aid. Think of the golf ball close up shots on the green of Tiger's ball as he prepares to hit his putt. He uses the lines religiously. As do most tour professionals and top notch amateurs. I prefer the Pro Putt 360, designed for a number of different useful reasons, but this tool puts a perfect line around the entire equator of your golf ball.

The concept is simple.

Align the line on your golf ball with your intended target. Then simply line up the line on your putter with the line on the ball. Just about every putter that you can buy has an alignment line on it.

If you read the putt correctly, and if the placement of the line on your ball is correct, then you are aligned exactly where you need to be to sink the putt. This idea is extremely helpful with short putts; if you do this correctly you will be amazed at the number of short putts that you will consistently sink.

Plus, as an added benefit, think of the confidence that this instills in you as you stand over the putt, knowing that you are aligned perfectly. On short putts you will be able to stroke the ball more firmly right straight into the center of the hole.

Takes all the guesswork out.

Having put a line the ball also gives you feedback on how well you stroked the putt. This feedback comes in the form of the ball rolling smoothly line-over-line right along the path of the ball. That feedback is the basis for how you can develop your own putting style. Having a consistent stroke is the most important part of whatever style you use. Spend time on the practice green to develop your stance, grip and style to make the ball roll line-over-line (like the bicycle wheel) on every putt you hit.

Mid-round adjustments

I also believe that a good putter must be aware enough, during a round of golf, to make important adjustments.

Let's say that on the first couple of holes you've left a couple of makeable putts 2 feet short of the hole. Or say you've pulled (or pushed) a couple of putts early. I like to see a golfer go through a mental check point early in the round and make adjustments. One of the most important things is not to let a couple of poor putting strokes affect your confidence for the rest of the day. We'll talk about that later. Who was the famous tour pro that said: "99% of the putts left short of the hole do not go in?" So if you've left a couple of putts shorts early in the round, make sure you get the next one 18" inches past the hole. Actually, even if you hit it 3 feet past the hole it is okay. _As long as you make the adjustment to get the ball past the hole._

If you are pulling, or pushing, your putts, I prefer to see a golfer do the following. Instead of trying to "fix" your putting stroke mid round, I'd rather see a golfer make a slight alignment adjustment instead. If you are pulling your putts open the blade just a tiny smidge. If you are pushing your putts make a slight adjustment the other way. Save the "fix the stroke" stuff for the practice green later.

Harvey Penick best addressed the concept of small adjustments.

" _When I ask you to take an aspirin, please don't take the whole bottle. In golf, a tiny adjustment can make a huge difference."_ 5

When you make a putting adjustment to your alignment during the round please take a baby aspirin.

Putting and the mental game

"Competitive golf is played on a five and a half inch course ...

the space between your ears.

Quote attributed to Bobby Jones 1902-1971

Putting well is mostly mental. If you doubt that all you have to do is recall the pressure putts that Tiger Woods has made over the past 13 years, (1997-2010) especially the ones he made to win majors. How about the 15 footer that he made to tie Rocco Mediate at the 72nd hole at Torrey Pines in 2008 to force the 18 hole playoff the next day? (Which Tiger won) Or the walking-it-into-the-hole-with-pointed-finger 24 footer that he made against Bob May in the 2000 PGA championship. (Which Tiger won, again) Or the countless other pressure putts that he drained over the years to win tour events. Everyone that watches golf on TV has seen the Tiger show; we know why he was consistently able to sink those putts. He's tougher mentally than anyone else; better mentally, perhaps, than anyone who has ever played the game. We've marveled at how great the guy is mentally.

To putt well you have to think well, plus you have to have your mind in the right spot.

During the 2000 PGA, while playing with Bob May during the final round, Tiger had a tricky 15 footer for par on the 15th hole. Miss it and he could have trailed May by 3 strokes with 3 holes to play; May might have won in regulation.

" _All in all, Tiger spent nearly two long minutes studying the putt, and not once, not even for a second, did he take his eyes off the green."_ 6

" _A brass band could have marched across that green and it wouldn't have made a difference."_ 7

_I've seen a similar look in the eyes of Jack Nicklaus or Martina Navratilova, but neither of those had Tigers incredible ability to be so in the zone."_ 8

Remember what happened? Tiger made the 15 footer for par. May missed a 5 foot putt for birdie, the difference stayed at one stroke with 3 holes to play. Tiger eventually tied May at the end of 72 holes of regulation play (with another clutch downhill eight footer to tie on the last hole) and won the 2000 PGA championship, in a playoff, for his 3rd straight major title.

At the time, when it came to making pressure putts, there was no one better mentally than Tiger Woods.

Compare that to the 2010 version of Tiger, the one who played most of the year while going through a divorce. The guy who missed a 2 foot putt at the Masters on the 14th hole on the last day; missed a 20 incher during the third round of the Barclays. The one who finished the worst tournament of his professional career on the day that he signed his divorce papers. He had too many other things on his mind; his mind was not in the right place to play great golf. Mentally, not the same guy.

You don't see the top tour players miss a lot of short putts coming down the stretch, nowadays, when they have a chance to win. It still happens though, the pros tighten up, and they miss short putts. All the top players have their mental coaches in tow; they talk to their sports psychologists prior to teeing off; many of the top mental coaches, like Dr. Bob Rotella, Dr. Gio Valiante, or Dr. Joseph Parent, are on site on tournament days. Today's top tour pro knows where to place his mind over important putts.

Quite a bit different than the way it was in earlier years on tour.

Doug Sander missing the 2 foot putt on the 72nd hole that would have won the 1970 British Open.

We remember the Doug Sanders story on how he missed the 2 foot putt, on the 72nd hole to win the 1970 Open Championship eventually won by Nicklaus the next day in a playoff.

Nicklaus, consoling Sanders the next day after the playoff.

Sanders admitted, many times over the years, that he was distracted by the moment; his mind was not in the right place when he famously missed that gimme.

"I would say conservatively that missing that putt cost me $200 million over my lifetime. Over the last 40 years I've thought about that putt more than anything. I used to joke that I could go as long as five minutes without thinking about it" -- Doug Sanders in an August 2010 interview.

Much has been discovered about the mental side of putting since; the players of today have a wealth of information on how to think properly while putting.

That is what this section of the book is about. The mental side of putting.

Here are some of the topics that we will discuss.

  * Confidence – how to find it, how to keep it, during a round of golf.

  * Trust – How to trust and commit to the line and speed on every putt.

  * Stay in the present – Keep your mind in the present while putting. Why this is so important.

  * Routine and Process – The backbone of mental preparation.

  * Awareness skills – What are they? How can they help you putt better?

  * Visualization exercises – Learn the visualization techniques of the world's top golfers.

  * Target oriented putting – How it works. Why this is so effective.

  * Negative thoughts – How to catch yourself thinking poorly. How to use mental triggers to change the way you think.

  * Fear – the most crippling emotion of all when you are putting. How to eliminate fear from putting.

  * Doubt – While we are at it .... Let's go over ways to remove all the doubt from your mind when you are putting, as well.

  * Self Talk and Criticism – Ever putt well, consistently, while criticizing yourself?

Then we'll discuss exercises that you can use to "putt better than a tour pro."

Our goal is to help weekend and casual players think properly on the greens so they will shoot better scores and enjoy the game more. Second, these ideas will help top amateurs shave a stroke or two off their scores. Third, here's hoping that we'll be able to help pros and touring pros, as well, putt better under pressure.

As always, thanks for reading!

Free Will

I'm fortunate to be able to play most of my golf at a great country club in Pleasanton Ca. Castlewood Country Club. Castlewood has a wonderful reputation for producing outstanding junior players and tour players. On the LPGA side, USGA Open champion Paula Creamer, Pat Hurst, former LPGA tour winner Dana Dormann, and former LPGA tour pro Jeannie Zedlitz are Castlewood members, and The Golf Channel's Big Break II standout, Ashley Gomes is a current member as well.

On the men's side, tour player pro and former Stanford University standout Joel Kribel and current PGA tour player Todd Fischer play at Castlewood.

Todd and I happen to be friends and we get to play together occasionally when he is not competing on the Nationwide Tour.

PGA tour pro Todd Fischer – 2010

Todd has been an outstanding golfer his entire life. He turned professional in 1993. He stayed inside the top 125 on the PGA tour money list and kept his playing card for 5 years. In 2008 he lost his playing status on the PGA tour and as of 8/2010 he has a full exemption to play the Nationwide Tour for 2010.

Todd has an outstanding short game and is an excellent putter. The main reason why he lost his PGA tour card is because he does not have the length, off the tee, that younger tour players now have. On a 480 yard par 4, where today's tour player may hit a drive and a nine iron to the green, Todd has to hit a solid drive, then a 4-5 iron into the green. Tough to attack the flags and compete on the PGA hitting 4 and 5 irons when the kids are hitting shorter scoring clubs.

Earlier this year Todd came to me and asked me for help with his putting. I felt honored that he asked. We spent a couple of hours on the practice green discussing the mental side of putting. He has a great stroke, a wonderful eye and great pair of hands for putting, but Todd had developed a fear of missing short putts. We went over a couple things relating to confidence and picking out precise targets while putting.

On 8/23/2010, Todd's 41st birthday, he was at the club and we played about 11 holes together. At the time he joined our group I was 2 under through 7 holes. We talked about his game and how he was playing; he just came off of a top 10 finish on the Nationwide tour and was putting better, but still had some trouble on putts that break away from him, the left to right putt. On the 10th hole I mentioned to Todd that I was writing a book on putting: "A serious instruction book," I told him. "The kind of book that can help amateurs and tour players alike." I added.

Well, right then and there I tightened up and started putting poorly. I stood over putts thinking that I had to putt well since Todd was there. What would he think if he saw a guy that couldn't putt to save his life ... and that same guy just mentioned that he was writing a book on putting! While we played the 11th hole he took a phone call from Tommy Armour, the Senior tour player who had just finished in a tie for 5th place at the 2010 Tradition, a senior major, in Bend Oregon.

I missed a couple of makeable par putts, then 3 putted the 13th hole from 39 feet above the hole. I hit the first two putts just miserably, Todd conceded my bogey putt, otherwise I might have missed that one too.

By the time I figured it out, I had gone 4 over for 5 holes and looked like a 20 handicapper. Walking to the 15th tee was when it hit me. I had gotten out of my routine; I was worrying about what Todd would think about a guy that was writing a book on putting who was, basically, putting like a high handicapper. (Mind you, I've played with Todd a lot over the years; he knows I putt well.) I started worrying about the results, instead of working hard on the process, or my putting pre-shot routine. I worried about what Todd was thinking of me.

Once I figured it out I laughed at myself for being such a dunce. Then I used a couple of the "getting rid of negative thought triggers" that I've developed over the years; relaxed; then made a couple of putts coming down the stretch. (We'll discuss the 'triggers' later) Still Todd took me for $10; he made a thirty footer for birdie on the 18th.

Tour Pros!

The moral of the story is that I chose to think those negative thoughts. I allowed the negative thoughts to take root and flourish. If you allow negative thoughts to take root in your mind, the longer you leave them there the deeper the roots grow, the more difficult they are to weed out.

We are all blessed with free will, whether we realize it or not, we choose what we think about.

Free will is the ability to make choices free from constraints. Another definition is: The ability or discretion to choose; free choice. Or, the power of making free choices that are unconstrained by external circumstances.

We all have the freedom to choose exactly what we think about as we are standing over a putt.

Doctor Bob Rotella in one of his wonderful books, first opened my mind to the concept of free will as it relates to putting.

_I believe that every human being has the ability to choose how he thinks about himself and how he acts_.

Now I'm not a PhD like Dr. Rotella, or like Dr. Gio Valianti, (author of Fearless Golf), or like Dr. Joseph Parent (Author of the Zen Golf Series). I'm just your average schmo and golf fanatic who loves to read. Twenty years ago, I decided that I wanted to putt better under pressure. Twelve years ago, I decided that I wanted to get out on the Senior tour. So I read all of their books, starting with Rotella's because his were published first, in the mid 1990's. Turns out that I read each of his books five to ten times. I memorized what he wrote. The evening before an important round of golf I would read key parts of the book again because over the years I discovered:

No matter how many times you read them, even if you commit them to memory, when you play an important round of golf and if you want to putt well the ideas in the books have to be fresh in your mind. In order to be consistently sharp mentally, you have to constantly work on it.

So when I was playing with Todd Fischer on 8/23/2010 and I chose to think poorly because I was worried about what Todd may think about a guy who wanted to write a serious book on putting (and that guy was putting like crap.) Instead of staying with my pre shot routine and mental routine that made me an outstanding putter, I chose to think poorly.

_Plain and simple_.

We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then, is not an act, but a habit.

Quote attributed to Aristotle

Free will plays a huge part in putting. Much will be said about free will in these pages. We have the freedom to place our minds in a confident spot over every putt. If you have doubt in your mind about a putt; this was your choice. You chose not to trust your line or your speed. You chose not to commit. Hence the doubt. Sure, if you make a couple of good putts during the round it is easier to feel more confident. Or if you are familiar with the green or the putt you are about to hit you may feel comfortable. Or if you have been putting well it may be easier to feel confident about your putting. Conversely, it is also easy to doubt your ability to make a putt after you've made a couple of suspect strokes. In this part of the book we'll show you ways to feel confident, regardless of how many bad putts you may have just hit, regardless of how your putting stroke feels on any given day.

Consider this quote made by famous golf teacher Jack Lumpkin when talking about Davis Love Jr., father of Davis Love III. When Davis Jr. played the tour he averaged about 27 putts per round of golf on tour.

(Yes, DLIII's father did play the PGA tour.)

" ... _he was a great putter. I once asked him. 'Davis what would you do if you took 17 putts on the front side?' I wanted to know what kind of adjustment that he would make. And Davis said: 'I average 27 putts per round and I've already used 17? I'm going to have some serious fun on the back nine.' Then he goes out and takes 9-10 putts for 9 holes. He was famous for that."_ 12

So it doesn't really matter if you've putted poorly recently, on the front nine, or on the last hole. As Davis's quote shows, you have the freedom to place your mind wherever you want to. Regardless of how poorly he had just putted Davis Love Jr. chose to remain confident.

You can do the same.

The father of American Psychology, William James (1842-1910) summed it up in one sentence. James was one of the first to place into written words the concept of free will. Dr Bob Rotella speaks of James frequently in his golf books.

James was once asked what psychology had established about a persons mind. _"People," he answered, "tend to become what they think about themselves."_ 13

Combine that last sentence with what Aristotle said that was mentioned earlier in this chapter. " _We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then, is not an act, but a habit."_

Want to become a great putter? Combine the two before mentioned thoughts. First, constantly think of yourself as a great putter, regardless of your recent results. Second, make it a habit by constantly repeating that thought to yourself until the thought becomes a belief.

Confidence

I don't care that the ball didn't go in the hole ... I made that putt!

Jack Nicklaus's famous quote after hitting a good putt that didn't go in the hole.

Confidence is described as freedom from doubt, belief in yourself and your abilities. Trust and faith in a person or a thing. It's a state of mind that says 'I can do this.'

Consider Nicklaus's quote above. In his prime golfing years his confidence was so strong he wouldn't acknowledge that he missed a putt that he felt he hit well. Instead of thinking that he had missed, instead of letting that cause doubt to creep into his mind, he chose to believe that he made the putt. Instead of the fear, or doubt, that a person can feel after missing a putt, he convinced himself that the ball went in the hole. He'd let nothing shake his confidence, hence, he made more pressure putts in major tournaments than anyone who has ever played the game. He used his free will to choose to remain confident regardless of the results.

But for the rest of us mere mortals what comes first, the chicken or the egg? How can you feel confident on the greens if you have not made any putts? Does confidence come first, or do you have to make some putts first in order to feel confident? For most of us the latter is the truth. We have to make a couple of putts, during the round, then we start to feel confident. But it doesn't have to be that way. For world class putters it certainly isn't. They could miss putts all day long and still feel confident about the next one they look at.

Let's take a look at this emotion called confidence; let's see how we might be able to help. Here are a number of thoughts that can cause a crisis in confidence; thoughts that can run through a golfer's mind as he/she is preparing to hit a putt.

  1. Is this putt going to break one foot to the right? Or is it going to break more? Or less?

  2. Jeez, this is really a long putt. Is it 40 feet? Or maybe 50 feet?

  3. Is this putt fast? Or is this green slower than the others?

  4. How could I have missed that 3 foot putt on the last hole? What's wrong with my putting stroke today? Why have I not made any putts?

  5. I hope I make this putt, I don't want to lose this bet.

  6. If I miss this putt, I won't break 90. I always break 90 and I sure don't want to miss this one.

  7. What if I read this wrong? Suppose it breaks right instead of left?

  8. If I miss this putt I lose the match.

  9. How can I feel confident after the poor stroke I just made on the last hole?

  10. Jeez, all the guys are watching me. I just missed a short putt on the last hole. I hope that I don't make a fool out of myself, in front of my friends, again.

Not uncommon thoughts for golfers. These thoughts run through the minds of good players as well.

Do you see the common thread that runs through all of the above statements? The one thing (besides promoting a lack in confidence) that they all have in common?

None of these thoughts have anything to do with what is going on in the present moment. They are either concerns, worries, or fear about things that happened in the past or concerns, worries, fears, about things that may happen in the future.

Staying in the present moment

Staying in the present moment is one of the big challenges that golfers face; the ability to do so successfully increases your ability to hit a good putt. Yet golfers struggle with this on the golf course. They struggle, perhaps, because worrying about the past or future is such a normal part of everyday life nowadays.

  * How am I going to be able to pay the mortgage? Or the rent?

  * I hope that I can find a decent job so I can pay my bills.

  * What happens if I get sick and can't work?

  * How are we going to pay for our kid's college education?

  * Why didn't I take that last exit on the freeway?

  * I hope that I don't lose my job.

  * I hope that my boss thinks that I did a good job on that last project.

  * How are we going to be able to retire?

  * And on, and on, and on.

Worrying about the past (we'll abbreviate this to WAP) serves little or no useful purpose. We have no control over what has already happened. None. The past is the past. Nothing we can do about it. It is what it is.Yet people worry about it all the time. On the golf course as well. If you've missed a couple of putts early in the round worrying about them now does you no good at all. All worrying does is increase your chance of hitting more bad putts. What you did on the last green, whether you hit a good putt or a bad putt, has nothing to do about the putt you are preparing to hit.

Worrying about the future (WAF) is just as futile. We can't control what will happen in the future, it has not happened yet. The only thing we can control and influence is where we place our minds in the present moment. This is called "staying in the present." When you think about it, not much exists except the present moment.

Here is an example of what it means to stay in the present moment. Think about music. Music that you like. When you listen to music most of us think about things that may have happened during the day, our minds think about other things besides focusing on the music. (In Zen terms this is called 'monkey brain.' More on this later.) Now instead of thinking about a million things or letting your mind wander, try and focus on each and musical note that is played. Get into the music. Focus your attention on every note; when other thoughts enter your mind, and they will, simply acknowledge them, push those thoughts gently from your mind and go back to the task of listening to each and every note. Focus your awareness on the music. Soon, your mind will begin to settle down, less 'monkey brain thoughts' will jump through. Then guess what? Your mind and body will begin to relax; everyday worries will slowly disappear. When you are able to accomplish this, even for just a little while, you are training your mind to stay in the present moment. You can also train yourself to stay in the present moment by substituting breathing control for music. Focus your awareness on your breathing. Pay attention to your breathing in and to your breathing out. Slow your breathing and focus your awareness, focus your attention to what you are doing. Soon, you will have the same result. Your body and mind will begin to relax, everyday worries about the past and future will begin to disappear. We'll soon cover ways to stay in the present moment on the golf course, ways that will relax and energize you, ways that allow you to make better putting strokes to sink more putts. But first, let's go back to our list of everyday worries and call them what they really are.

  * How am I going to be able to pay the mortgage? Or the rent? (WAF)

  * I hope that I can find a decent job so I can pay my bills. (WAF)

  * What happens is I get sick and can't work? (WAF)

  * How are we going to pay for our kid's college education? (WAF)

  * Why didn't I take that last exit on the freeway? (WAP)

  * I hope that I don't lose my job. (WAF)

  * I hope that my boss thinks that I did a good job on that last project. (WAP)

  * How are we going to be able to retire? (WAF)

  * And on, and on, and on. (WAP) (WAF)

We've attached (WAP) worrying about the past, and (WAF) worrying about the future, abbreviations, to each of the above thoughts. As you can see, none of these thoughts have anything to do with the present moment. Why concern yourself, why worry about things in the past, or the future? Things you have no control over.

Now let's take our list of putting thoughts that we listed earlier.

  1. Is this putt going to break one foot to the right? Or is it going to break more? Or less? (WAF)

  2. Jeez, this is really a long putt. Is it 40 feet? Or maybe 50 feet? (WAF)

  3. Is this putt fast? Or is this green slower than the others? (WAF)

  4. How could I have missed that 3 foot putt on the last hole? What's wrong with my putting stroke today? Why have I not made any putts? (WAP)

  5. I hope I make this putt, I don't want to lose this bet. (WAF)

  6. If I miss this putt, I won't break 90. I always break 90 and I sure don't want to miss this one. (WAF)

  7. What if I read this wrong? Suppose it breaks right instead of left? (WAF)

  8. If I miss this putt I lose the match. (WAF)

  9. How can I feel confident after the poor stroke I just made on the last hole? (WAP) (WAF)

  10. Jeez, all the guys are watching me. I just missed a short putt on the last hole. I hope that I don't make a fool out of myself, in front of my friends, again. (WAP) (WAF)

So, one of the first ways to keep your confidence on the putting greens is to do a better job keeping your mind in the present. All of the confidence destroying thoughts listed above have nothing to do with the present moment, the present moment being the moment to focus all your mental facilities on the putt that you are about to hit.

"Never did I let a negative thought enter my head. Never did I give up." Tiger Woods after making birdie on the 72nd hole to win the 2001 Bay Hill Invitational.

Here are some thoughts on how to train your mind to stay in the present moment.

Train yourself to do a mental 'checkpoint' early in your round in order to identify any negative thoughts. Check for any WAF or WAP thoughts. If you catch yourself thinking about any of these confidence destroying thoughts, use the thought to 'trigger' a correct response. Negative thoughts grow like weeds in your mind. The longer you let them grow the deeper the roots dig in. So one of the key things to get your mind back to working in the present is to 'catch' negative thoughts as quickly as you can so they are easier to 'weed' out, before the 'roots' get too deep, and they can then take over your mind for your entire golfing day.

When I catch a negative thought about my putting I use that thought to trigger the response. I like to visualize, or see in my mind's eye, the ball going in the hole and I use that exercise to rid myself of negative thoughts and get my mind back to the present moment.

Here is how it works. LPGA hall of famer Nancy Lopez once said: "I like to see the ball go in the hole about 500 times before I play an important tournament ..."

Who says that you physically have to see the ball go in the hole? Why can't you simply visualize the same thing? Use your minds' eye to see the ball go in the hole. Use your minds' eye to watch the ball roll towards the hole and then watch the ball drop in the hole. Repeat this in your mind; observe what happens. First, the more proficient you become doing this mental exercise, the clearer you will see the ball drop in the hole. So it takes practice. But as you visualize you will notice your body starting to relax and your mind will clear of distracting thoughts as your primary focus is to watch the ball go into the hole. The sight of the ball going into the hole will replace the negative thoughts, the WAP and WAF thoughts.

Another idea is to use the breath control exercise as discussed a couple of pages earlier.

Pay attention to your breathing in and to your breathing out. Slow your breathing and focus your awareness, focus your attention on your breathing.

Kick those bad thoughts out of your mind by focusing on the views on the golf course that you are playing. Study the birds, trees, creeks, lakes. Focus on the sounds around you, sounds made by running water or the wind. Watch and observe and take it all in. It will then become easier to return your mind to the present and the task at hand, which is the next putt that you are going to hit.

Try this putting routine to help you stay in the present.

  * Focus your attention on your breathing throughout your routine.

  * Pace the distance of the putt. Make sure that you know the exact distance and that you are comfortable with it.

  * Decide on the break. Decide on the speed of the putt based on the distance.

  * On short putts focus on the line. Don't stress about hitting the putt hard enough. On short putts (2-3 feet) you'll hit it hard enough.

  * On long putts focus on the distance, or length, and mentally rehearse your putting stroke for the distance of this putt.

  * Commit to the line and speed. Trust that your decision on length and speed is correct. Do not address the putt until you have committed to the line and speed of the putt.

  * Visualize the putt going into the hole. See the ball going into the hole with your minds' eye.

  * If you have any negative thoughts come into your mind, 'catch' them and throw them out.

  * Do not allow yourself to think about what happened in the past. (On the golf course)(WAP)

  * Do not allow yourself to think about results, (see next section) or what might happen in the future. (WAF)

  * Address the putt. Make sure that you 'see' the train tracks, the intended line of the putt.

  * Take several practice strokes practicing the exact distance of the putt you are going to hit. Ingrain this feeling into your muscle memory.

  * Hit the putt. At this point you have done everything correct. All you have to do now is hit the putt and make sure that you hit it with an accelerating stroke.

During a round, and while you are evaluating your putting after the round, focus on the makes not your misses. Develop 'selective memory.' During a round of golf let's say that a golfer may miss one short putt over the course of 18 holes. But, he/she has made several other short putts, a couple of six footers, plus one 20 foot putt that also went in during that same round of golf.

Why then, do most golfers focus on the miss and allow that one miss to undermine their confidence? A better idea is to remember all of the good strokes that you made; forget about the one you missed; that is in the past.

Like Jack Nicklaus, develop selective memory. While speaking at a function in front of hundreds of people years ago he mentioned that he had never missed a short putt on the last hole of a tournament. Instantly a man rose up from the crowd and challenged him.

"But Jack," he said. "Last month you missed a short putt on the 72nd hole to lose the USGA Senior Open to Weiskopf." Others in the crowd, remembering the recent TV telecast, nodded agreement.

"Sir," Jack replied. "You are mistaken. I have never missed a short putt on the last hole to lose a tournament."

The point is not whether, or not, Jack Nicklaus had ever missed a short putt on the last hole to lose an important pro tournament. Of course he did! But Jack was so good mentally on the greens that he took those misses, threw them out of his mind and convinced himself that he had never missed a short one on the last hole. Missing a short putt never happened in Nicklaus's mind. Selective memory.

Confidence and letting go of results

We are a results oriented society. So many things in our lives seem to be measured by the results that people use to measure their success.

  * "I have a better job than my neighbor."

  * "We have the nicest home on the street."

  * "Well, our neighbor sends their kids to the most prestigious schools."

  * "They belong to the Olympic Club. Nicest, most expensive club in the SF Bay Area."

See what I mean?

It's not different, for most golfers, on the golf course, as success is measured solely on the score that they shoot.

  * If I miss this putt I shoot 45 for nine holes. (WAF)

  * What a horrible day, my handicap is going to go way up. (WAF)

  * If I don't make this putt, I lose the match to Joey. I never lose to Joey. (WAF)

  * What happened to my golf game? (WAF) WAP)

  * Just last week I shot 79. Why can't I do that today? (WAF) (WAP)

These results oriented thoughts have nothing to do with the present moment. Stop worrying about the past! Stop worrying about the future! The only thing we have control over, on the putting green, is where we choose to place our mind as we prepare to hit the putt. Worrying about results is stressful. Muscles in your hands and forearms tighten, your putting grip tightens without you really being aware of it; the chances of you hitting a poor putt magnify exponentially when you focus on the results of the putt.

Let it go. Make a conscious effort not to think about, or worry about, the results of the putt. The technique is simple but not easy. You simply decide to let go of your attachment to the goal; (sinking the putt) don't worry about whether it goes in. Make a decision that for some reason, if the putt doesn't go in the hole, you will still be happy, your wife and kids will still love you and your dog will still think you are the greatest thing in the world. Once you are no longer attached to the result of shooting a certain score, or making a certain putt, those thoughts will cease to have power over you.

Focus on the process, your physical and mental pre shot routine; give up worrying about results and your confidence will improve. So will your golf scores.

Instead of measuring results on the golf course by the scores that you shoot, rate your success by other measuring sticks.

  * Rate your success by how many times you perform your putting pre shot routine correctly. If you get out of your routine 3, 4, or 5 times during a round of golf, try harder next round. Rate your success by the percentage of how many times you successfully stay in your routine.

  * Rate your success by the percentage of putts you correctly accelerate through the ball. If you hit 20 putts with correct acceleration and hit 15 without the correct 'pop', measure your success by this. Strive to improve your percentages.

  * Awareness skills play a very important part in putting success. (More on them later) Measure success on the greens by the number of times you focus your awareness correctly. Strive to improve the percentages.

  * Play one shot at a time on the greens. You want to give your best effort to that single moment in time. Measure, on each putt, how successful you are with regards to giving your best effort on each putt.

Trust

" _A golf trophy is merely proof of good putting."_

Shelby Friedman – writer

Castlewood Country Club is unique; we have approximately 2 dozen guys who are scratch players or better. 10 of these are senior amateurs, over the age of 55. In the San Francisco Bay area, perhaps only the Olympic Club boasts such a high number of good players.

One of CCC's good scratch players is a guy that we call Mighty Mouse. (Here I come to save the day!) He's not a big guy, standing 5'5". ("Why don't you stand up when I'm talking to you," the joke goes. Might Mouse answers: "I am standing up.")

He earned his nickname from the sheer distances he hits the golf ball. Now 53 years old, he's blessed with a flexible athletic body that allows him to quickly spin his hips and get under the shot, adding leverage and distance. He hits his drives, on occasion, over 350 yards. When he's 150 yards away from the green and the rest of us old guys are hitting 7-8 irons into the green (maybe even the occasional 6 iron) MM usually hits a wedge. Stupid long.

Every week, however, MM has a different putter in his hands. One week it's a long putter, next week it's a belly length, the following day he is playing with a conventional putter with his left hand low. "This is it Tommy," he'll say to me. "I'm committing to this putter for the rest of the year." Yet, invariably, the next time I see him he is using a different putter.

Our golf schedules conflict; we only get to play together perhaps once a month. But when we do the same thing always happens. On the first hole, MM always has about a 4 foot putt to save par. Every time. And every time, regardless of the putter he uses, or the style he employs, he yips the putt, misses it, and has a complete breakdown, mentally, on the greens.

Mighty Mouse doesn't trust what he is doing on the greens.

Not trusting what you do on the greens happens to all golfers, even to the top PGA tour pros. Each and every day, if they want to stay sharp the top players in the game enhance their ability to trust while on the golf course. It's a constant struggle a never ending war that golfers constantly fight in order to mentally perform at top levels.

Have confidence of faith in what you are doing.

Believe, feel confident about something.

Have complete confidence in a plan.

Trust is both an emotional and logical, chosen act.

These are the most basic definitions of trust. Simply stated in order to putt consistently well you must choose to trust everything that you do.

"Why am I using a new putter today? Because the old one doesn't float too well."

Craig Stadler – 1983.

Trust everything, use your free will to trust, regardless of past results, or how you feel about the putt you are preparing to hit. Trust that your stance is correct, trust your putter, trust your stroke and trust your read concerning the line and speed of the putt. It doesn't matter if it is a putt that you have faced on your home course a thousand times in the past. Or if it's a putt that you've never seen on a tough course that you have never played before. Choose to trust what you are doing.

Because the very first second that you choose not to trust, doubt will rear its ugly head and jump right into your mind. Then you are dead meat. Chances are you'll hit a lousy putt.

Stay in the present moment to enhance your ability to trust. Fear, (which we devote a lot of space to later in this book) and doubt will break down your ability to trust. Anytime that you worry about results, or worry about what happened in the past, or worry about what might happen in the future, your chances of hitting a good solid putt are _greatly_ diminished.

Commitment

" _It's better to commit to the wrong thing than to be uncommitted to the correct thing." - The late Payne Stewart._

Commitment:

  * The act of committing to a task

  * A pledge to do something

Trust and commitment go hand in hand, like Abbott and Costello, Martin and Lewis, love and marriage.

Committing to the line and speed of a putt helps your mind; your mind feels less cluttered; committing creates less worry, and raises you to higher levels of confidence. When trusting is difficult, and let's face it, we all stand over putts where it may be difficult to trust what you are doing, commitment to the line and speed of the putt is paramount.

Constantly changing your mind, which can be considered the exact opposite of commitment, takes you further away from achieving your goal, which is to sink the putt. For a moment imagine yourself standing over a 6 foot putt for par and while you are getting ready to hit the putt you are constantly changing your mind as to the line and speed of the putt. Not a pretty picture, right?

Use your free will to commit to the line and speed of every putt you stand over. Honor that commitment when other thoughts begin to creep into your mind. Commit to the line and speed come hell or high water.

" _I'll shoot my age if I have to live to be 105."- Bob Hope_

Awareness Skills

"To be a student takes a lot of trust, but not in the teacher. To be a student takes a lot of trust in yourself." – Maharaji

Awareness skills help you putt better. They promote a mindset that helps you stay in the present moment and not worry about results. W. Timothy Gallwey, in his ground breaking book, 'The Inner Game of Golf' published in 1979, was one of the first to write about the mental side of golf. In his book he calls awareness as "a call to attention to a particular area."

The Eastern philosophy, or Zen Buddhist, counterpart to awareness is _wakefulness_ which is described as "being alert to the present moment without allowing past experiences or fears of future to cloud judgment." Another Zen term for awareness is _mindfulness_ which is described as "a state of enhanced awareness of one's sensations, thoughts, and actions."

Gallwey states: " _If you want to change something, first increase your awareness of the way it is. See if you can feel what is happening_."

Suppose you could be aware of what was happening in your putting stroke, if you could be aware if you were hitting all of your putts long, or short, of the hole. If you could _feel_ if you had hit it correctly. With this heightened awareness adjustments are easier to make. It's a mode of learning free of doubt and fear.

Here are exercises you can do to " _tune in_ " to your awareness skills to hit better putts.

Hit a couple of putts from 10-15 feet, but don't pick your head up or look at where the putt is going. Instead, see if you can _feel_ what is happening. You'll find that this creates an entirely different mindset. Do you feel that you pulled the putt? Or pushed it? Did you hit it on line?

Did you hit it the right distance? Did you hit it short of the hole? Or past the hole? Again, don't look, but rather see if you can _feel_ what happened. After you have tuned in to your feeling, then look. Determine how accurate your _feeling_ was. This is how you tune into your awareness skills. In other words if you feel that you hit the putt short, but the ball actually went past the hole, then your awareness of what happened is incorrect. If you feel that you pulled the putt and hit it too hard, then when you look you discover that you did hit it too hard and pulled it, then you are doing a better job of tuning into your awareness. If you feel that you pushed the putt, then when you look at the ball you actually see it go into the hole .... Well, then, your awareness is inaccurate, as well, even though you sunk the putt!

Practice this exercise from different distances. Hit 5 foot putts, 10 footers, 20, 30, 40, 50 footers as well. Tune into your awareness and _feel_ what has happened before you look. Your goal here is to increase your awareness; you measure your success by the number of times your _awareness_ of what happened is correct. (If you think, or feel, that you have pulled the last 10 putts and you did pull all ten of them, then congrats! You're doing the exercise right.) As the accuracy of your feedback improves, your results will get better. You will hit better putts. But as with all mental exercises, this one requires practice. So next time you hit a couple of practice putts devote time to developing awareness skills. Don't worry about your stroke, stance, whatever. Don't worry about sinking putts. Focus on improving awareness.

Here are more awareness exercises. When you are ready take them for a spin on the golf course. You'll be pleasantly surprised by how _worry free_ putting will become. The doubt and fear that you can feel as you are standing over the putt will disappear. You'll have more fun playing golf.

  * Call your attention to the center of your putter face. Be aware of hitting the putt in the exact center of the face. See how often you can capture this feeling.

  * Focus your awareness on the roll that you put on the ball. Hit the putt, don't look, see if you can _feel_ the way the ball is rolling towards the hole. Try to feel if the ball is rolling "line over line like a bicycle wheel not wobbling" towards the hole.

  * Become aware of putter head acceleration. This is an important awareness skill to feel. Hit the putt, don't look at where it is going, _feel_ if you hit it with the correct acceleration to travel the correct distance to the hole.

  * Use your awareness skills and hit putts of varying length. Hit putts from 20, 30, 40, 50, 60 feet from the hole. Hit the putt, don't look, see if you can _feel_ if you hit it the correct distance. Use the feedback to improve your awareness skills.

  * Take it a step further and play a round of golf and use your awareness skills on every putt. Measure success not by how many putts you sink, but by how many times you successfully focus your awareness. It's easier to practice and 'tune in' to awareness skills on the practice putting green. When you feel brave enough to take it on the course for a spin, measure your success by how many times you can successfully ' _dial up'_ your awareness skills on each putt.

  * To sharpen your awareness skills while on the course you can practice "mindfulness and wakefulness" on other things besides golf. Focus your attention on sounds you hear. Listen to running stream water or to birdsong, or wind rustling through trees. Kick other distracting thoughts out of your mind. Observe the relaxing effect this has on your mind and body.

  * Perhaps one of the best ways to develop your awareness skills while putting is to pick out a small precise target on the green, as small as a single blade of grass, then see if you can capture that ' _snapshot_ ' in your ' _minds eye_ ' before you hit the putt. The goal here, again, is not to sink the putt, but to measure how aware you can become of ' _seeing_ _'_ such a precise target in your _'minds eye'_ before you hit the putt. After capturing this mental photo, putt the ball to the target. Much more on becoming target oriented later in this book. But for now, this exercise will help keep you in the present moment, develop better awareness skills, and ultimately, help you sink more putts.

  * ' _Listen'_ to short putts. Hit putts from the 3'-6' foot distance to the hole. Don't look. _'Listen'_ for the ball to fall into the hole. See if you can determine that you will hear the ball fall into the hole before it actually does. Measure success not by how many times you sink the putt, but by how many times you listen, correctly, for the ball to drop in the hole.

Remember, that the only time that we can change is the now. And we can only change the now if we consciously choose to do so.

"Those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything."

George Bernhard Shaw – famous author and playwright.

Not looking at the hole while putting is not new. Gary Player, perhaps, copying what fellow South African Bobby Locke did in the '40's and '50's, would often putt and not move his head until he _listened_ for the ball to drop into the hole. In more recent years Nick Faldo used the same method. He wouldn't pick his head up until the ball was well past the hole or he had heard the putt drop into the hole. Player and Faldo used this technique with putts in the 3-10 foot range; on putts of longer distances they would keep their head down but would look at the ball to see where it was going before it got to the hole.

Tiger uses a similar style. How often have you seen him hit the putt, keep his head still and down for a moment or two after, then look at the ball when it is well on its way towards the hole?

What do you think Tiger, Player, and Faldo are thinking about when they do this? I believe that they are tuning in to their awareness skills to _feel_ how they hit the putt. They're engaging awareness skills to learn. They are trying to _feel_ if they hit the putt on correctly. Stress and worry free putting; when you employ this technique you are not aware of the pressure on any important putt. In fact since pressure is self imposed engaging awareness skills instead of choosing to stress about the putt reduces pressure you may feel. (Your wife, girlfriend, your kids and the dog will still love you if you miss a short putt. Why stress about it?)

Doubt and fear disappear. In Tiger's case he's trying to determine just how well he is putting _'to a picture'_ , a technique taught to him by his father when Tiger was an infant. (More on this later)

Tiger has talked about how the Buddhism concepts of mindfulness and wakefulness have helped his golf game. Think about all the pressure putts we have seen Tiger make coming down the stretch. Tiger has become proficient in a form of meditation called _Shamatha_ , which leads to increased and sustained periods of concentration by developing a heightened state of awareness.

" _Buddhism plays a major role. It has given me the inner peace and calmness I probably would not have achieved at such an early age. I owe that to my mother."_ 15

Again, perhaps Bobby Locke was one of the first to use the technique of not looking at the putt he just hit to better develop his awareness skills. He confirmed its' effectiveness, for him, when he said: "If I hit the putt and miss it, why would I want to watch that?"

Non Judgmental Awareness

In his wonderful book on the mental side of golf "Winning the Battle Within", published in 2006, Northern California golf coach Dr. Glen Albaugh talks about the power of suspending judgment.

In the book he states: " _One of the major keys to promoting steady improvement is to suspend judgment. The major challenge most of us face is to become more non-judgmental about our games and ourselves. The great players of today know this._

When you play golf how often have you said to yourself ...or have you heard others say about their games ...

" _How could I have hit such a bad putt?"_

" _How could I be so stupid!"_

" _That is the worst spot that I could have hit that to!"_

" _How could I have hit such a horrible shot!"_

These are all examples of people making a judgment which is defined as "The process of forming an opinion or evaluation by discerning or comparing." Or it can be construed as "stating something believed or asserted", or "an utterance of an authoritative opinion."

Either way, whatever your definition of judgment is, this kind of self talk and criticism of your golf game is destructive. Thinking correctly while standing over a putt is based on focusing on the things you can control and not thinking of things you can't control. Judging your results is potentially destructive to your putting stroke because: first, judgments are a way of criticizing what has happened in the past, so when you are making judgments about golf performance it has nothing to do about the putt you are currently trying to hit; it has nothing to do about staying in the present moment. And second, self judgment about so-so golf shots is a breeding ground for doubt and fear. The more you judge yourself the easier it becomes for negative thoughts of fear and doubt to invade your mind. Better to steer away from that as well. Let's look again at the comments listed above.

" _How could I have hit such a bad putt?"_ (WAP)

" _How could I be so stupid!"_ (WAP)

" _That is the worst spot that I could have hit that to!"_ (WAP)

" _How could I have hit such a horrible shot!"_ (WAP)

As you can see all of the above judgmental statements are nothing more than worrying about past results, or WAP. (Worrying about the past)

Instead, make a conscious choice not to judge - to let it go - and suspend judgment instead. One way to do this is to simply accept the results of every putt that you hit regardless of the outcome. The result is the result; there is nothing that you can do after you have hit the putt to change the result, why worry or make a judgment about it? Accepting results is a way to "let go of the importance of results"; it's a way to help you stay in the present moment and focus on the things that you can control to hit good putts.

Visualization

"I never hit a shot, not even in practice, without having a very sharp, in-focus picture of it in my head. First I see where I want the ball to finish then the scene quickly changes, and I see the ball in flight, its path, trajectory, and shape. Then there is sort of a fade out and the next scene shows me making the kind of swing that will turn the previous images into reality." - Jack Nicklaus

Imagine that you are in one of your favorite vacation spots, let's say ... Maui Hawaii. You're walking on the beach listening to ocean wave's pound sand, you smell ocean salt breeze and you're listening to birdsong coming from nearby swaying palm trees. Later in the day you plan to swim, or snorkel, or simply relax with an umbrella drink near the pool. Sounds comfy ... right?

See how your everyday worries disappear while you're thinking of this?

_You were visualizing_.

The same thing happens when you visualize about making putts on the golf course. Everyday worries about missing putts disappear as visualizing helps your mind stay in the present. You putt better.

If the greatest golfer who ever picked up a club, Mister Jack Nicklaus says that he never hit a shot even in practice that he didn't visualize before well, then, incorporating some visuals into your putting is probably not a bad thing to do.

Visualization is a powerful form of suggestion. The subconscious mind is unable to distinguish between something that is real and something that is imagined. The more vivid the subconscious picture, the more vivid the visualization; which is defined as a receptive state of relaxed focus. Another way of describing it is that visualization is _seeing,_ or _feeling_ , with your _mind's eye_.

I find the most effective way of visualizing exercises for putting is simply to watch the ball go into the hole with your mind's eye.

"Before a big tournament, I like to see the ball go into the hole about 500 times."

Nancy Lopez

Nancy Lopez would head towards the practice green, hit putts until she got a clear picture of the ball going into the hole.

But who says that you actually have to hit the practice putts and see them go into the hole? Can't you simply do the same thing in your mind? Watch the ball go into the hole with your minds' eye?

_Of course you can_.

Watching putts go into the hole with your mind's eye can be just as effective as real practice; (if you allow it to be) again, the subconscious mind is unable to distinguish between something that is real and something that is imagined.

Back in the mid 1980's when I had a regular 9-5 Monday to Friday job, plus a family and a young son it was difficult for me to find the time to practice and play golf. But I would try and take a couple of minutes at lunch hour to hit a couple of putts. No matter where I was in the San Francisco Bay Area I knew where all the golf courses were so I was able to find a practice putting green. I remember that I had just started a job with a company and they sent me to LA for two weeks for training. I had to stay in training 9-5 each day with no lunch break for me to poke around and find a practice putting green. So I started visualizing while in class; when I got to the golf course I was amazed at the results. Here is how it works.

I picked out anything, literally anything, in that training classroom and pretended that it was a hole on the green. Water glasses, flower pots, telephone poles outside windows, ceiling lights, papers on a desk, anything that would fit the bill in that classroom; you name it; they all became golf holes in my mind. Then I watched the ball roll into the hole. If I hit a long putt, say thirty feet, I _watched_ the putt roll the entire length and then _watched_ it disappear in the hole. Same thing with short putts; I _watched_ the ball the entire length of the putt. Did this for 15-20 minutes every day. Second part of the exercise would follow; where I'd visualize, actually _see and feel_ , the exact putting stroke that it would take to sink that putt. Practiced this, as well, for 15-20 minutes every day. Call it brain putting, if you like.

Two weeks later I was able to go out and play a round of golf. I was amazed at what happened; I remember it as if it were yesterday even though it happened 25 years ago. Before I hit each putt I did a quick visualization and _watched_ the ball roll into the hole, then felt and saw the actual stroke it took to sink the putt. Over the course of that round of golf, I made 6 putts in the 25-30 foot range. 6 long putts in 18 holes! Since then I've been a big fan of visualizing; I've also discovered that the more time I spend visualizing the better I putt.

Try it and see if it helps.

It will be difficult to incorporate all of the ideas and exercises that are in this book into your golf game. But rather, think of the ideas presented here as a sort of smorgasbord. Pick and choose a couple of thoughts, try them, and see which ones work best for you. Here are some additional exercises you can try on visualization:

  * When we want to create or achieve something we create it first in thought form. Practice visualizing yourself as a great putter, making clutch putt after clutch putt. Use affirmations (which means to 'make firm') and tell yourself over and over again what a great putter you are. _Believe, at your deepest levels,_ what you are telling yourself. (Remember what the psychologist William James said? " _By and large, people become what they tend to think about themselves_.")

  * Change does not come about easily or quickly. It involves work, effort, time, a strong desire to get better, plus a deep unshakeable belief in yourself that you can do it. Visualize watching the ball roll into the hole often. You can do this just about anytime, anywhere you are. _Watch_ the ball, closely, from the time it leaves your putter until you _hear_ the sound it makes when it drops into the hole.

  * Create a clear picture in your mind of exactly what you want to happen. Focus on it often. _Feel_ in your minds' eye the exact putting stroke you would use to sink your mental putt. Continue to work with this until your achieve your goal.

  * It is important to relax your mind and your muscles in order to get better results with visualization. _Warm up_ your visualization skills with deep breathing techniques.

  * Finally, I think it a wonderful idea to use visualization as a way to rid the mind of negative thoughts. Negative thoughts bombard all of our minds, constantly, on the golf course. Perhaps no sport is better suited, than golf, for massive amounts of doubt and fear to jump into our heads at inopportune moments. The trick is to quickly _identify_ those negative thoughts before they take root and take over your mind for that round, or day. The best way is to _immediately ID_ the negative thought, replace the negative thought with mental visuals of the ball rolling into the hole. Again, the subconscious mind is unable to distinguish between something that is real and something that is imagined. So mental visuals of the ball rolling in the hole and mental visuals of the exact stroke that you need to sink that putt will quickly take over your mind and replace the negative thoughts.

"Golf is a game invented by the same people who think music comes out of a bagpipe." – Lee Trevino

"Putts get real difficult the day they hand out the money." –Lee Trevino

Perhaps one of the greatest lessons ever given, on putting, about the power of visualization techniques was the one given by Earl Woods to a ten month old Tiger. _"He didn't know an inch from a mile; he was a child, so I couldn't tell him that he had a ten foot, or two foot putt. He wouldn't know the difference. Instead I taught Tiger to putt to a_ _picture_ _. I taught him to look at the hole until you get a_ _clear picture_ _of it and how to hit the putt."_ 17

Inspirational teaching. To this day, thirty years later, when he is having trouble making putts Tiger Woods works on the visualization techniques taught to him by his father. Putting to a picture is probably one of the main reasons why Tiger was able to sink pressure putts over the years.

Arguably, the two greatest golfers ever to lace up spikes are Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods. Each used visualization, or heightened states of awareness, to achieve golf greatness. Given their success with visualization shouldn't we all consider doing the same?

What's my target?

"I picked out a spot and tried to hit a good putt." Rickie Fowler (on the importance of picking out targets) after making a 20 foot putt on the last hole to halve his 2010 Ryder Cup singles match with Edoardo Molinari.

Too often while putting golfers forget, or they just don't think about, probably the most important part of consistently holing putts, namely... What's my target?  
_Golfers, perhaps more than players of other sports don't focus on a target as much as they should_.  
Basketball players focus their eyes and their attention on the rim of the basket. We've all seen the focus and determination of top NBA players as we watch them on TV.  
Baseball players especially pitchers focus on the catchers' glove as their target while they pitch. Hockey players focus on a small spot inside the net before they shoot. Tennis players are taught to watch the ball hit the center of their racket.  
Why then is there so little emphasis, in golf, towards the target? Especially in putting where picking a small precise target is so important?  
Success on the greens becomes much more attainable if the golfer chooses to focus on a small precise target. Notice that I said "chooses to focus" as free will is involved. The golfer can choose, or choose not to, pick out a small precise target. Small precise target is the wording here simply aiming at the entire hole is not going to get the job done. That target is too big. Like trying to hit a bull's eye with a scattergun. I like to see golfers pick out as small of a target as a blade of grass at the front or rear of the hole and I like to see them pick out _what side of the blade of grass_ that they are aiming for. That's a small precise target, a target which gives the golfer a better chance of sinking the putt.

Consider the following story from the book "Zen in the art of Archery." By

Eugen Herrigel.  
Four of the finest samurai archers were assembled in Japan for an archery contest. Hundreds of people were assembled on a sunny windy day to watch and cheer on their favorite archer.  
The target was a fish mounted on a white wooden board and located some 75 yards away.  
The Zen master approaches the first archer and asks: "When you look at the target, what do you see?"  
The young archer responded: "I see the sun and the clouds and based on the wind direction I will try and figure out where to shoot my arrow."  
The Zen master asked the second archer the same question and he responded: "I see my friends and family cheering me on. Because of them I will try extra hard to make them proud of me."  
Then the third archer replied: "I see the fish mounted on that board far off in the distance."  
Shaking his head, the Zen master then asked the fourth archer who said: "I see the eye of the fish."  
The Zen master nodded. His question had been answered correctly and the fourth archer was declared the winner, before any of the archers loosed an arrow.  
Moral of the story?

_While putting pick out precise targets, the smaller the target the better_.

Your target needs to be an exact tiny spot. If you're facing a long putt, one which breaks several feet, your target is not the hole but can be a couple of precise spots. It can be a spot where you want your ball to roll over halfway to the hole. It can be a spot right in front of your ball where you want the putt to start out. Or it can be a spot by the hole where you want to start the putt rolling which takes into account the break of the putt.

Pick one small precise target commit to it and trust what you're doing.

The best golf instructors have written about the importance of picking small precise targets while putting. In "The Golfers Mind" written by Dr. Bob Rotella, he writes: " _When a player is properly into his target it's as if there were a laser beam linking his mind to the target ...you want the smallest possible target that you can see without squinting ... that kind of focus on a target greatly improves the prospect that the ball will, indeed, go to it_."

The Mythical golf pro Shivas Irons says: "...the thrill of the ball flying towards the target, flying into the target, _have ya felt it_?"

Harvey Penick's most important piece of advice (by his own admission) in his Little Red Book states: " _Take dead aim_. I can't say it too many times. It is the most important advice in this book. _Take dead aim_."

"I'm not going to get the ball close. I'm going to sink it."

Tom Watson, before chipping in on the 71st hole, 1982 U.S. Open

I've developed a pretty darn good target awareness routine, one that has been sharpened by fifty years experience of playing golf and tempered by occasional success at Senior tour Q-schools, the U.S.G.A Senior Amateur, and numerous California State Senior Amateur Championships.

First as you are preparing to hit your putt visualize, a couple of times in your mind, the ball rolling into the hole. Tune into your awareness skills and see your precise target (blade of grass) in your minds' eye. Then after you have hit your putt follow these mental steps.

  1. Forget about the result of the putt you just hit. Especially if you've hit a not-so-good putt. Just say "Forget about it." (To yourself.)

  2. Don't worry about it. Just say that to yourself.

  3. Then ask yourself this question; "What's my next target?

  4. That's the routine short and simple. _Forget about it; don't worry about it, what's my next target?_

  5. Practice this mental routine until you have it down pat and can repeat it anytime on the golf course in any situation.

Pre putt Routine

Charles Barkley not playing basketball

At Castlewood, in September of 2010, we held our annual club championship. The championship division consisted of match play, bracketed by the top 16 seeds all of whom were scratch players or better.

One of the guys who won two matches and made it to the quarter finals is a friend of mine named Tommy M. We call him Sooch for short. A year ago Sooch's handicap was a 5; through hard work, practice and dedication he dropped his handicap to zero this year.

In the quarters, however, this kind of pressure was new to Sooch; he doesn't have a ton of tournament experience; he was nervous. He rushed shots; he left 4 foot putts short of the hole. Sooch quickly went 6 down over the first 8 holes. The match was basically over. He lost 5 and 3.

After the match, which I was able to watch, I talked with Sooch. I'd been helping him with his game for the previous 6 months so he was eager to share. I mentioned that he was out of his routine all day; some shots he rushed, hit them very quickly without proper preparation. On the greens it was the reverse; he took much longer to hit the putt than he normally does. He tightened up over many of those putts and left them short.

"You were out of your routine Sooch." I told him.

He looked at me with a deer-in-the-headlights-look-in-his-eye and said: "What routine? I don't have a pre shot routine."

Therein was the problem.

Having a sound, repeatable, pre putt routine is the backbone, or rock, of your golf game. Especially for your putting. Kind of like Linus's security blanket, if you will.

Your putting pre putt routine should be a well thought out combination of both the physical and mental parts of the putt you are about to hit. You need to be able to set a stopwatch to it. In other words it needs to be the exact same routine; it takes the exact same amount of time each and every time, and has a kind of cadence and rhythm to it like a piano metronome .... Tick, tick, tick, tick.

Allow me to explain.

With a routine that takes the same amount of time; your thought processes follow the same path, you think about the same things, in the same sequence, in the same timeframes. You train your brain (via practice) to think of the same things every time. A 1 and a 2 and a 3 and a 4 and a 5. You work on it, during practice and on the course until it becomes a habit; so much of a habit that you don't have to really think about it, it just happens. When you do this it allows you to perform better; by filling your mind with the same sequence of events in the same timeframe each time _reduces_ the chances of doubt and fear entering your mind. Placing your mind in the same sequence of events lessens the impact of distractions; in fact by proper focus and concentration you should be able to eliminate all distractions while immersing yourself in your pre putt routine.

A sound putting pre putt routine helps take the doubt and fear out of the shot. It frees you up to hit better putts.

Players of all sports use pre putt routines to rid themselves of stress, free their minds of worry, and to trigger outstanding performance. When shooting foul shots pro basketball players follow their own individual routine. They either bounce the ball a couple of times; spin it in their hands, whatever. But they do the same thing each time; each time you can set your clock to it. Baseball batters do the same. After each pitch they will step out of the box, tug at their jerseys, fool around with their batting glove or take a couple of practice swings, then get back in the box and go at it again. The same is true of tennis players as prepare to serve, or baseball pitchers as they prepare to throw their next pitch.

"The goal of a pre putt routine is simple. It's designed to get you into the best possible mental state each time you swing at the golf ball. The most important part is the commitment it produces. By commitment I mean a complete absence of doubt." Dr. Bob Rotella

Getting out of your pre putt routine can create a breeding ground for doubt. At the top levels of the game pros are not immune to this. Take the case of Justin Leonard during the 2009 President Cup Matches held at Harding Park in San Francisco. During the foursome matches on the first day Justin teamed with Jim Furyk as his partner and they were playing the International team of Retief Goosen and Y. E. Yang. On the 18th tee the Americans were one up. All they had to do was halve the last hole to win a full point. The 18th at Harding is a par 5 and, that day, Justin hit the green in two shots while Retief's second shot missed the green right. At this point all Justin had to do was two putt. He hit his first putt three feet short of the hole; just outside the length of a gimme in match play, but the type of putt that PGA tour professionals sink 99.9% of the time. Retief hit his third shot short of the hole; he lost track of where the match stood and took off his hat in a gesture of sportsmanship, thinking the match was over. It wasn't. Justin still had to hole the short putt to win the match. When Goosen took off his hat Justin looked puzzled, he thought his putt was conceded, but it was not; Retief did not concede the putt, all he did was take off his hat. That little distraction was all it took to get Leonard out of his pre putt routine. Flustered a little, he hit a weak putt that never touched the hole. The European team then made birdie, won the hole, and halved the match.

_Moral of the story_?

Staying in your pre putt routine reduces the impact of distractions; your routine allows you to stay in the present moment, reduce doubt, and ultimately, your routine helps you sink more putts.

Your pre putt routine can be a simple as you would like it to be or it can contain as many basic and mental fundamentals as you can comfortably handle.

Here are some of the basic physical fundamentals that you may want to incorporate. Think of this list as a kind of buffet; pick and choose and use as many, or as few, of the ideas that you would like.

  * Measure the exact distance of the putt; factor in green speed, whether or not the putt is uphill or downhill into your distance calculations.

  * Determine the break of the putt. _Commit_ to your decision.

  * Decide on the speed of the putt. _Trust_ your decision.

  * Determine the line of the putt ... the line where you want the putt to start. _Commit_ to your decision.

  * Take several practice strokes. Make the practice strokes _exactly_ like the real putt you are going to hit in order to ingrain the feel.

  * When you hit the putt focus on the acceleration with your putting stroke and commit to doing that correctly.

  * This last fundamental is kind of non-negotiable, meaning you should always include this as part of your pre putt routine. Whatever happens, if you hit a good putt, if you sink the putt, or if you hit a poor putt, even a miserable putt .... _Accept the results_. Don't worry about the results. Accept the results regardless of how you hit the putt. Instead ask yourself _"What's my next target_?"

Here's a list of the basic mental fundamentals that you may want to make part of your putting pre putt routine.

  * Commit to all of your decisions about the putt you are about to hit.

  * Focus your _awareness_ on one thing. You can choose to focus your awareness on the line if the putt is a short one, or on the speed if the putt is a long one. You can choose to focus your awareness on the proper acceleration of your putting stroke or you can focus your awareness on a small target in your minds eye. But the mind can only be aware of one thing at a time, so pick one item to focus your awareness on and commit to it.

  * Visualize the "train tracks" which is the path your ball must take to sink the putt. Visualize all the way from the hole back to your ball, then extend the tracks behind your ball so you can _see_ where your putter's backswing should be.

  * Visualize the ball going into the hole. Visualize; actually feel, in your mind, the actual stroke that it would take to sink this putt.

  * If feeling of doubt or fear creep their way into your mind, use that thought as a mental _trigger_ to get yourself back into the present moment. Replace the negative feelings with either visualization, or deep breathing techniques.

My own pre putt routine which I've practiced and refined is fairly simple, easy to repeat, and the entire routine takes about 30 seconds to complete from start to finish. Here it is:

  1. I pace off the exact distance of the putt. While pacing I try and feel the break of the putt with my feet.

  2. I pick an exact line where I want to hit the putt and I commit to it.

  3. I pick the exact speed that I want to hit the putt and I commit to it.

  4. While looking at the putt I try either, to deep breathe, or visualize the putt going into the hole.

  5. I stand over the putt and take 3-5 practice strokes, mimicking the exact distance I have to hit the putt in order to ingrain better muscle memory. (This kind of muscle memory stays with you for only 30 seconds or so.) That is why it is best to take your practice strokes right before you hit the actual putt.

  6. I take my stance over the putt and line it up with a small precise target that I've picked out.

  7. Before I hit the putt, I make a conscious decision to focus my awareness on either the exact target, or on the proper acceleration for my putting stroke. (pick one and commit to it)

  8. After I hit the putt, regardless of the results, I accept them. I choose to not worry about the results if I've hit a poor putt, and I immediately then focus on my next target.

  9. That's it! Short and sweet. Plain and simple.

Practice your pre putt routine until you are comfortable with every aspect of it. Practice it until it becomes second nature and you are able to repeat it at will. Incorporate any, or all, of the items listed above; make sure that your entire routine does not take that long to complete (about 30-35 seconds is max); make sure that you can set your stopwatch to the time length of your pre putt routine. By following the same sequence of thoughts in the same amount of time each and every time, you will make great strides in your ability to rid your mind of doubt and fear.

Zen, Putting and Tiger

Tiger Woods Caddyshack commercial

"Forget the fact that I was going for three straight majors. I had to stay in the moment." – Tiger Woods

I think it worthwhile to write a couple paragraphs about how Zen practices can help you putt better. Tiger is the proof. In making all those pressure putts over the years he made a believer out of us all. How could he deliver the goods time after time after time? How could he sink all of those pressure putts? We sat there, glued to the TV, wondering how he could keep sinking all those putts. But he kept making them.

I believe that the Zen principles that he learned as a child, taught to him by his Buddhist mom, played a big role in helping him make those putts. In the history of golf, perhaps, there have been no greater examples of how staying in the present moment can help you putt well under pressure. Here, I believe, are some of the Zen principles that Tiger has employed over the years to help him win all those tournaments.

  * As a child Tiger learned how to meditate. One of the goals of meditating is to train the mind to think of only one thing at a time. (More on this later) With our minds constantly active, with literally dozens of thoughts invading our consciousness every minute, this can be a challenge. Yet, arguably, the ability to focus on just one thing at a time could be considered a real strength when putting.

  * His putting to a picture putting method, taught to him by his father when he was an infant is a great example of what the mind can instruct the body to do when focused on one thing at a time.

  * Tiger's always played and learned (and relearned) the game with the 'Beginners Mind' concept. He's always been open minded to learning new things about his game and about his putting. " _In the beginners mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert's there are few_."

  * Tiger, throughout his career, has embraced the concepts of mindfulness and wakefulness to cultivate and strengthen awareness to get to a desired state of alertness and optimum arousal. (Now I know what you are thinking, I can hear you snickering, but we are talking about his golf game here.)

Before the infamous Tiger car crash on Thanksgiving 2009 there was a popular TV commercial in which we were urged to "Be a Tiger." Those commercials have since disappeared from the TV landscape, but their meaning is still good advice, at least when it comes to putting. Copying and using the Zen techniques that Tiger Woods learned and used to become one of the best clutch putters of all time could certainly help all of us putt better.

"My dad once told me, 'no matter what anyone says or writes, none of those people have to hit your little four foot putt. You have to do that yourself.'" – Tiger Woods

Fear and putting

"I refuse to give in to fear, either real or imagined. In order to be truly successful in any endeavor you have to adopt a no-fear attitude." – Tiger Woods.

The famous shot of Tiger Woods, and Cigar Guy (right side of picture) at the 2010 Ryder Cup in Wales.

Throughout this book I've shied away (purposely) from mentioning negative words that are commonly associated with golf and putting. Words like miss, pull, push, yip, hammer hands, choke, doubt and indecision. (Plus hundreds of other not so nice names.) The reason? Negative words bring up negative visuals. Allowing negative words to invade your mind increases the chances of hitting poor putts. Hence we've concentrated on positive words only; words like confidence, trust, commitment, awareness, and visualizing.

Fear is one of those negative words, but feelings of fear can be so overpowering while playing golf that scores of books have been written to help golfers deal with fear. One such book is "Fearless Golf" by Dr. Gio Valianti, first published by Golf Digest in 2005.

We humans, when faced with the unknown, or something simply out of our comfort zone (whether it's a difficult putt or anything else in life for that matter) our first feelings are often feelings of fear. The reason why fear is the first thing that jumps into our bodies in these situations is rooted in our evolutionary past; it's buried in our DNA; it's part of who we are. It's a natural response.

It's called the 'fight or flight' syndrome.

Thousands of years ago when our ancestors first learned to stand upright and walk on two legs life was different than it is today. Danger and quick death lurked behind every tree and rock. Men were the 'hunter gatherers'; they ventured out into the wild to find food and provide shelter for their women and children; women were the 'nesters' who took care of the home (or cave) and the children. Danger was everywhere whether in the form of a wild animal like a saber tooth tiger or hundreds of other lethal animal species. Simply hunting for dinner was dangerous as your dinner was just as likely to eat you as you were to eat it. Your neighbors over the next hill where just as lethal; they envisioned you simmering in their pot over the fire.

Our ancestors were faced with these issues. Do I stand and fight? Or is this situation too dangerous? Do I run as fast as my two legs will take me? Our fight or flight reflexive impulse has been around as long as humans have inhabited our planet. Fear was the first thing that jumped into their minds.

Stress is an automatic response to fear; tension in the legs, torso, arms and hands increases. A person can break out in a cold sweat; your heart can go bonkers in your chest; blood pressure can rise like a hot air balloon.

It's no different for most of us when faced with a tricky downhill four foot putt. Especially when you're not 100% sure about the line and the speed of that putt. Feelings of fear attack our bodies just as fear attacked the bodies of our ancestors. Our heart rate goes up; we can break out in a sweat; blood pressure can increase and tension can increase in every part of our body. Not a good thing when putting. So do we give in to the fear and run as fast as our two legs will take us? (And miss the putt) Or do we stand and fight and conquer our fears and sink those short putts.

There are all kinds of fears that are associated with putting.

  * Fear of missing the putt

  * Fear of missing short putts

  * Fear of hitting the putt too far, or not far enough

  * Fear of playing too much break, or not enough break

  * Fear of missing short putts .... again

  * Fear of looking like a fool in front of your peers

  * Fear of losing a bet to a golf partner

  * Fear of failure, fear of success even!

  * Fear of the green being too fast, or too slow

  * Fear of not knowing how hard to hit a long putt

By now we know what these fears really are, namely worrying about things that are either happened in the past, or may happen in the future. (WAP, WAF) Worrying about the past or future are areas that we cannot control. Because we choose to focus on them and not consciously place our minds in the present moment (the one thing we do have some control over) is how our fears get the better of us on the golf course.

It happens to the best of golfers. Imagine that you think that you've just hit a mid iron close to the hole and when you arrive at the green your ball is not close to the hole but rather forty feet away. For many this triggers the fear impulse. Then you hit that forty footer six feet short of the hole. OMG! The next one is not a tap in! Once again fear can kick in as the thought of a three putt, an extra stroke to your score and bounces like an out-of-control-pinball inside your head.

To conquer putting fears you have to decide not to be afraid of the putt you are about to hit. You need to make a conscious decision (using your free will) not to be afraid. You also have to make a conscious decision to; first, not to worry about results; second, to narrow your focus on playing the next putt and finally, to place your mind in the only spot that you have some measure of control, namely the present moment.

In other words, relax, don't worry about what just happened, what's my next target? Sound familiar?

Valianti's concepts about dealing with fear on the golf course have become so popular with PGA tour pros that his pupils boasted 8 tour winners in 2010 including: Matt Kuchar, Camilo Villegas, Heath Slocum, Stuart Appleby plus other tour winners from previous years such as VJ Singh, Davis Love III, Justin Leonard, and Bryce Molder. His teachings speak to being "fearless in the moment", plus the idea that "you are not playing against a score or a particular opponent, but rather you are playing a golf course, one shot at a time, in the best way you know how to."

I'm a great believer in the fact that the power of belief helps trump any fears you might feel on the golf course. Here are some examples: pro golfer Eric Compton has undergone 2 heart transplants, currently is living with the third different heart in his chest. Yet he qualified for the 2010 U. S Open held in June 2010 at Pebble Beach. Think that Eric gives in to his fears on the golf course?

Back in 1986 an unknown black golfer by the name of Charlie Owens won twice on the Senior PGA tour during a space of three weeks. Charlie walked with a pronounced limp, the result of an army parachute jump gone bad; he broke both knees and one ankle in the fall. Plus he hit all of his shots, drives, irons, everything ... using a cross handed grip. Talk about believing in yourself.

Other examples include Ken Venturi winning the U.S. Open at Congressional in 1964 despite being physically sick and dehydrated by 100 degree plus temperatures. Or Tiger winning the 2008 U. S. Open at Torrey Pines on one leg; his other leg having a torn ACL knee ligament and stress fracture. Hard to win the U. S. Open using only one leg if you don't believe in yourself.

Perhaps Ben Hogan is the greatest example of pro golf success using the power of belief in your abilities. First, as a child of nine, he had to live through (and possibly watch) his father shoot himself in the chest. Then in a horrific car accident in 1949 where Ben suffered a double compound fracture to his pelvis, a broken collar bone, a badly broken left ankle, plus broken ribs ... he came back in 1953 to win what was then called the 'Hogan Slam" where he won the Masters, U.S. Open, and the British Open during a 4 month span. The fourth major that year, the PGA championship, was played as a match play event at that time and Hogan feared that his legs were not strong enough to play a number of long matches on consecutive days so he decided not to play in the PGA that year.

Perhaps, for these men, the fun truly was in the journey, not in reaching the destination because each of their individual journeys has been interesting to observe. Each overcame large doses of fear to succeed on the golf course.

"The wise man learns more from the fool than the fool learns from the wise man."

Quote attributed to Roman Marcus Aurelius

As far as fear rearing its' ugly head while you are putting let's see if we can't come up with a couple of solutions to help combat fear. Better players learn to manage their fear; the better the putter the more they've figured out how to eliminate fear. Average putters tend to be crippled by their fears. So it stands to reason that one of the ways to improved putting performance is to do a better job of ridding your mind of fear.

The first thing to accomplish is to quickly identify the fear before it can do damage to your golf that day. Fear leaves telltale signs. Doubt or indecision on how to hit your putt is a sign. If you are unsure about the putt you are going to hit; fear can jump through your body. Feeling tension is also a sign. Tension is the biggest killer of putts; it's also a manifestation of doubt, indecision, and you guessed it - fear. What to look for in the way your body feels? Tension in your arms, legs, torso, or hands. Shaking is another red flag. Ever stand up to an important putt, say on the first hole, and you can't stop your hands or your putter from shaking? It's okay to feel nervous or excited that simply means that you care about what you are doing; it's not okay to shake because of indecision or doubt on how to hit the putt. Try and make a distinction between the two. If you've got a case of the shakes yet you've committed to the line, speed, and the execution of the putt chances are that you're good to go. The nervousness should go away. But if you've got a case of the shakes because you've got no idea on how to hit this next putt? That's a big red flag that shows your mind is not in the right spot.

The first step in getting rid of the fear is to first acknowledge the fear. In other words during a round of golf as you are preparing to hit a putt ... if you're having feelings of doubt and indecision ... acknowledge that you are feeling fearful. As Doctor Phil loves to say on his TV show. " _You can't fix what you don't acknowledge_." The sooner that you realize that you're dealing with fear the sooner you can rid your body of it.

Use fear as a trigger. That's right. Use fear to your advantage. When you feel scared standing over a putt, first acknowledge it, then use that fear as a trigger to start corrective action. _First make a conscious decision not to be afraid_. Then you use one of these ideas to help.

  * Lean on your pre putt routine. Use it as a crutch to get rid of fear. A well practiced pre putt routine should consume your mind for the 30-35 seconds it takes to hit your putt. It should leave no room in your mind for negative thoughts to enter. It should be nothing else besides positive thoughts about trust, commitment, line and speed, topped off by in-the-present-moment-thoughts about awareness, visualization, and acute target awareness. If you follow this recipe your fears will dissipate like fog in warm sun.

  * Breathe tension away. Pay attention to the tension levels in your body; listen to what your body is feeling. When you feel tension that is associated with fear use deep breathing techniques (described in detail in the exercises section) to breathe the tension away.

  * Visualize the tension and fear away. Watching the ball roll into the hole with your mind's eye is a great way to get your mind wrapped in the present moment. Once you are fully engaged in the present moment fears will disappear.

  * Focus your awareness on either a small precise target, like a blade of grass; or focus your awareness on the acceleration of your putting stroke. When awareness skills are engaged there is no room in your mind for feelings of fear.

  * Make a conscious decision not to worry about results. After all golf is just a game; in the grand scheme of all things what's the big deal, really, if you miss a couple of putts?

"When the student is ready the teacher will appear."

So says Big Belly Buddha ...

Humans can rise to incredible heights to rid their minds of fear. It does not necessarily need to be golf related. Take the case of Victor Frankl.

Victor Frankl – 1905-1997

Born in 1905 Victor was a psychologist during World War II. He was also an East European German Jew. Shipped off with the rest of his family to various concentration camps he eventually wound up incarcerated in the death camp Auschwitz. The hardships and cruelties that he had to endure would strike fear through the heart of anyone. 1500 souls were forced to live in a shed that should have accommodated 100 at most. Imagine how that must have felt. He was forced to live on 5 ounces of stale bread given to him once every 4 days. From one day to the next he didn't know if he'd be sent to the gas chambers or allowed to live. The decision for life, or death, was made by the camp Nazi SS commanders by the simple flip of a thumb; go left and you went straight to the crematorium which was labeled "showers." If he pointed his thumb pointed to the right, that meant that the Germans had some use for you and you were allowed to live longer before being lined again a couple of days later to go through the same ordeal again. Put yourself in their shoes and imagine what those people must have felt. Victor was a trained physician who could treat and care for German prison guards as well as prisoners; that is why in his view they allowed him to live. Mostly he cleaned latrines and disposed of human sewage. For 6 months he was not allowed to change clothes. Imagine that smell. His pregnant wife, both of his parents, and his brother were gassed in the chambers.

Frankl and other prisoners at Auschwitz

Under such fear, deprivation, and undernourishment most people gave up; if they were not gassed they died either from sickness or disease. Through this Victor discovered a number of truths about dealing with his fears. First, he discovered that those who gave up, lost faith, or felt that they were doomed did not survive. If you gave up mentally you died. Second, to combat the unbelievable dehumanizing fear he discovered that he had an inner freedom to choose how to respond to his captors and the situation. _He used his free will to change his attitude._ He decided that no matter what his Nazi captors did to him he would not give in to the fear; he would not allow them to take away his inner strength and his will to live. He used his free will to preserve his independence of mind.

Surviving the concentration camps he wrote about his experiences in his gut wrenching book entitled "Mans Search for Meaning."

In it Frankl wrote that you cannot always control what happens to you in life but you can always control what you will feel about it. _Humans have the freedom to choose how we will respond to fear_.

Not many of us alive today can remember the horror from the concentration camps of World War II, except from what we read in books or see in movies like Schindler's List. But almost certainly Frankl's message about how humans can internally deal with fear is well received and understood.

Believe it or not there is some small correlation between what Frankl wrote about controlling fear and putting in golf. We can choose not to be afraid while we stand over a four foot putt. To recap here are some of the best ways to rid your mind of fear while putting.

  * Understand that one of the first things that you may feel when you look at a putt are _'fight or flight_ ' feelings of fear, so make a conscious decision not to be afraid of any putt.

  * It's okay to feel nervous or excited over a putt, it's not okay to let yourself feel indecisive about the line or speed of the putt. Deep breath, or visualize, away any tension that you may feel about the putt you are going to hit.

  * Choose not to worry about the results. Remember that worrying about results means that you are either worrying about something that has happened in the past or worrying about what could happen in the future and that you have no control over either.

  * Lean on your pre putt routine to rid your mind of fear. Allow your pre putt routine to keep your mind in the present moment, which is the only thing that you have control over.

  * Utilize one, or all, of the following concepts to better keep your mind in the present moment. First, pick out a small precise target and focus on that. Second, engage your awareness skills, and third, visualize, or _see in your mind's eye_ your ball rolling into the hole.

  * Remember that the fun is in the learning, the fun is in the journey.

Putting Potpourri

Ben Crane's famous exercise video spoof - The snake shaker."

What does it take to win in golf? How do you separate yourself from the pack whether you are a pro, college player or amateur? On the PGA tour it doesn't matter (as much) if you are 50th or 80th in driving accuracy, or if you're 20th or 40th in driving distance or sand saves. It's on the greens where players differentiate themselves; the better putters are the ones who win.

Here are a number of exercises and practice routines that can help you putt better. They are being presented in a 'cafeteria' style format; you pick and choose the ones you want to use. We'll start with a couple of physical exercises that you can do; the bulk of this section will then be devoted to the all-important mental exercises that may help you.

I have no idea where my putter is aimed ...

Unfortunately, for many golfers, this is the truth. Aim Point Technologies (http://aimpoint.com) which we see on Golf Channel broadcasts of the PGA tour asserts that 90% of the golfers can not correctly aim their putter inside the hole from ten feet. Even the best putters are not immune to this; as most think they are aimed at a certain spot and they're not. Their putter is aimed at a different spot than they think it is. You can fix this. Inexpensive aids can draw a magic marker line on the ball. The Pro Putt 360 is one of these aids. The Pro Putt 360 (or similar aids) is available at most golf stores.

Draw a line on the equator of your ball with the Pro Putt 360

Ball with line drawn on equator of golf ball

First, draw a line on the equator of your ball. When you place your ball on the green simply point the line to the exact spot (or blade of grass) of your intended putt. Use a putter with an alignment line already drawn on the putter.

Just about every putter has an alignment aid

Once your ball is correctly 'pointed' to your intended path align your putter with the line on the ball. Putter and ball are now lined up correctly. Knowing this does wonders for your confidence; utilizing this one tool alone can help you sink more putts. The line also gives you feedback on how well you stroked the putt. This feedback comes in the form of the ball rolling smoothly line-over-line (like the bicycle wheel) along the path of the ball. That feedback is the basis for how you can develop your own putting style. Having a consistent stroke is the most important part of whatever style you use. Spend time on the practice green to develop your stance, grip and style to make the ball roll line-over-line (like the bicycle wheel) on every putt you hit.

Here's another alignment aid that top players use. For a cost of around $5.00 you can go to Home Depot and buy a contractors chalk line.

Snap a dead-straight blue chalk line from your target back through your target line and extend it behind your putter head. By chalking the line in this manner you now know the path your putter must take back and through the ball in order to roll your ball to your intended target. Then place your ball (with the Pro Putt 360 line on it) on the chalk line. Line up the chalk line with the line on your ball and the alignment line on your putter.

Ben Hogan's famous one iron shot – U.S. Open, 1950 at Merion Golf Club

Next is the hard part. Just as Ben Hogan famously replied over sixty years ago to the question: "What's the secret to your golf swing?" To which Hogan deadpanned: "The answer is in the dirt." Practice, practice, practice is how you learn to step up to each putt and make sure that your alignment is correct. Use one of the techniques described here and practice it until it becomes second nature. After it becomes second nature practice more.

Perhaps a word about practice here would make good sense. 99% of golfers practice the wrong things. Practicing the wrong things ingrains bad habits; practicing the wrong things does not make a golfer better. The same thing is true with putting. If you practice putting but your alignment routine is incorrect then all you are doing is learning how to ingrain poor putting habits; you learning how to be a lousy putter.

By using the ideas presented above you can practice the right things in order to become a better putter. Enough said.

What's my target?

We've discussed how important it is to pick out a small precise target when putting, say, a target as small as a blade of grass by the hole or on your intended path. We've also discussed a couple of mental exercises that you can do to sharpen your target awareness. Later on in this section we will go over more mental exercises that you can incorporate into your putting routine.

There are a couple of physical exercises that you can do to sharpen your target awareness as well.

When professional basketball players shoot foul shots, or jump shots for that matter do you ever see them look at the ball while shooting? No, of course not. Their eyes are focused on their target, the rim. If they looked at the ball when they shot they would shoot mucho airballs.

Yet not looking at your target when you are putting is what golfers do when they putt. Try this exercise and see if it helps you with your target awareness. Go through your entire putting routine the same way that you normally do. Address the ball; take your practice strokes. Line up your putt. Then right before you pull the trigger pick your head up and focus on your target instead of looking at the ball. Stroke your putt towards your target while looking at the target in the same way that a basketball player shoots at the hoop. After you get the hang of it you may be pleasantly surprised at how you are able to sink putts. First, since your mind (and eye) is engaged in the present moment at the target you will probably feel less stress. You won't worry about results. Don't fret about hitting the putt solid. Trust that you will. Second, you'll be amazed at how your body will react and how it will help you to stroke the putt at your target.

This concept is not new; current NBC golf announcer Johnny Miller used this technique when he won his last tour event on the regular PGA tour, the 1994 AT&T (which old time west coasters still call the Crosby)

Johnny Miller in 1981

Miller had been putting poorly in years prior to 1994; in fact he had the yips. He had tried all sorts of remedies to eliminate the ''yips,'' the term used for nervous putting. (We will address the yips later in this 'potpourri' chapter) Prior to 1988, Miller had been using a putter with a 48-inch shaft, which he kept tucked high under his right arm to keep his club steady and straight. Miller used his elongated putter to sink an 18-footer on the last hole to win the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am in 1987. When he was standing over that putt, he later said, he pretended to be somebody else (cause he didn't trust himself to make it) in order to help him sink it. He pretended that he was his son. (A form of visualization.)

By 1994 his putting yips had become so bad that they had pretty much driven him off of the PGA tour. He resorted to looking at the hole when he hit his putt. It worked; his yips disappeared and he recorded the last of his PGA tour victories. This unorthodox putting method helped him become more target oriented.

I'm not saying that you should putt this way in your next important match, but I am saying that next time you hit practice putts try it to see how it sharpens your target awareness. Then when you do play it will be easier to see your target in your minds' eye when you go back to conventional putting methods.

Putt to a tee

Next time you get a chance to spend time on the practice green stick a tee into the ground and putt to it instead of the hole. A golf hole is 4 ¼ inches wide, the golf tee, perhaps, is 1/8th inch wide. Putting to a tee improves your putting awareness. Practicing this way forces you to pick out a small precise target and it forces you to concentrate correctly on hitting that target. Once you get the hang of it you'd be surprised at how many times you can hit the tee with short putts in the 3-5 foot range. Once you're able to consistently hit the tee sticking out of the ground you will find it tons easier to sink putts on the course.

How to make the dreaded four foot putt

Perhaps nothing in golf can strike fear, like a poisoned arrow, through the heart of a golfer as the four foot putt. A golfer can hit the ball 300 yards center cut down the fairway, then lace a five iron to four feet and you've taken two strokes to get there. But miss the putt and you add another two strokes to your score: "If I miss the short putt it counts for 2 more strokes to my score! As many strokes as the 440 yards that it took to get here! It's not fair! All for a lousy four feet!"

For many it can make or break a round of golf. Sink a couple of four footers early in the round and a golfer is filled with confidence; he, or she, feels that they can take on the world - or at least they can take on a few tough pins. But miss a couple of short putts? This is enough to start the unrelenting downward spiral of lost confidence; there goes this round of golf out the window - and you feel that you've wasted your day because of a couple of missed short putts ballooned your score.

By utilizing a couple of fundamentals there is no reason why you should not make 90-95% of your short putts. Even the top tour pros miss a short one every now and then; with a little bit of practice and by applying the correct fundamentals there is no reason why your success rate shouldn't be as high as a pro's.

Most short putts are missed because the player fears missing the putt; consequently all kinds of things go wrong. They line up the putt incorrectly. Or because they don't trust what they are doing they hit the putt with an incorrect (usually decelerating) stroke. Fear and tension take over, hand and arm muscles tighten, which often promotes a poor stroke. Golfers tend to think about the _wrong_ things when the one dominating thought in your head should be to simply stroke the ball into the hole. Amateurs tend to play too much break, they line up the putt outside of the hole, which is incorrect most of the time; they miss the putt.

Here are some thoughts plus a system that when used should help you make all of your short putts.

If you hit the putt hard it takes most of the break out of the putt, golfers should basically hit the ball harder and play the putt straighter. Hit the putt dead towards the center of the hole, or maybe just a little off of center, like a blade of grass left, or right, of center cup depending on the break you read. Remember that if you hit the putt hard it will take the break out of the putt. This is why when you watch pros on TV they usually take little time over short putts; they simply play it dead straight and hit it hard. Seldom do you see a PGA tour pro miss a short putt.

Line up the line on the equator of your golf ball with your intended target. Remember that your target with a short putt (for most short putts) should either be the exact center of the hole or slightly off center depending on the break. Line up your line with a _precise_ target, one as small as a blade of grass. Then simply line up your putter with the line on the ball. At this point you do not have to worry about the line of your putt. Trust that you are lined up correctly - because you are.

Clear your mind of negative thoughts. If you allow doubt or fear or indecision into your mind remember that is your choice and whether you realize it or not you are choosing to possibly fail. Chances are that you will miss the putt; nowhere in the game of golf is fear and as destructive as when you are standing over a short putt and you choose to have doubt cloud your mind. Entertain zero thoughts about results, don't worry about your score, or the match you are playing, or any bets that you might have. Trust and commit to the line and speed of the short putt you are about to drain. Choose to keep your mind in the present moment. Focus your attention on hitting the putt with an accelerating stroke to help keep your mind in the present moment.

You've just lined the ball up correctly so trust what you've done and commit to the stroke. The stroke itself? Visualize the path of the putter, see the _train tracks_ to your target, straight back behind your ball then thru to your target. Once you visualize the path in your mind, hit your putt on that path.

As Harvey Penick said: _"A four footer that is basically straight will always go in the hole provided you stroke the ball in the sweet spot of the putter face and you are aimed at the center of the hole. Don't worry about the speed of the putt. You will hit the ball hard enough."_ 27

Once you are ready to hit the putt all you have to do is focus your awareness on hitting the putt with a little 'pop'; make sure that your putter head accelerates through the ball. Focus your attention on that. That keeps your mind in the present moment and helps eliminate doubt and fear. If you follow this routine you'll make just about all of your short putts. During the 2008-2009 PGA tour season Tiger Woods made a ridiculous amount of short putts in a row. I think the number that he made consecutively was something like 350 short putts in a row on tour. By following the above outlined routine there is no reason why you should not have similar success.

3 putt greens – How to avoid them

Nothing in golf is as destructive to your score as the three putt green. There you are, playing an okay round of golf, scoring reasonably well and you three putt a green or two. Basically, what you've done is turn two strokes (which is the worst total of putts a golfer should take on any given green) into three strokes. We won't talk about the four putt green here .... for obvious reasons.

_Ouch_!

Most times when a golfer three putts a green the first putt is a long putt; most times over thirty feet.

_The number one reason why golfers three putt is because they hit the long first putt the wrong distance_. Their first putt comes up 4, 5, 6, feet (or more) short or long of the hole. On a long putt, say 30-40 feet, if you hit the putt the correct distance, even if your putt is slightly of line you next putt will generally be a short one that is relatively easy to make. So the first step to eliminate, or reduce, the number of three putts you might take in any given round is to do a better job hitting that long first putt the correct distance.

This is why I think that knowing the distance of you putt is so vitally important. If you know that you are facing a forty foot putt instead of estimating the distance it takes all the guesswork out of the equation. _Knowing the distance helps you with your confidence_. Then, if through correct practice, you've developed different strokes to accurately hit long putts exact distances you'll be able to snuggle all of those long putts right near the hole and tap the next one in easily.

Go back and read the section on " _know the distance of your putt_ " which starts on page 15. Following this basic putting fundamental will help you reduce the number of times you three putt a green.

Yesterday, 11/26/2010 I played golf at our club, Castlewood Country Club in Pleasanton California. The day after Thanksgiving, it was cold and windy, plus the fact that I'm nearly 62 years of age and the sum of all that was that my ball striking was not very good; all day long I was faced with 30, 40, and 50 foot putts. By following my own advice that I've written in this book I was able to make one 50 foot putt, one 30 foot putt, and was able to two putt all the other long ones that I had except one. On the 6th hole I had a 35 footer for birdie which I blew 7 feet past the hole. I missed the comebacker for a bogey. I hit the first putt the wrong distance which lead to a three putt. Still I was able to post a 73. By knowing the length of all those long putts I was able to apply a specific stroke to each putt to avoid the dreaded 3 putt from long distances on the green.

No reason why you can't do the same thing as well to improve your golf scores.

"The more I practice, the luckier I get." Golf great Gary Player

Putting Stroke Exercises

As outlined in an earlier chapter in this book there are lots of different ways to hit a putt. Lot of different putting strokes out there. Think about the contrasting styles of Bobby Locke and Billy Mayfair whose putting strokes were described earlier in this book. Locke purposely hooked all of his putts and Mayfair cut his putts into the hole. There is no set way on how to "putt your ball" correctly. Over the years though here are a couple of exercises that I've found that work for me when my putting stroke goes a little "askew."

I like to keep the putter low to the ground on the backswing and the follow thru. Picture Tiger Woods as he takes his practice putting strokes. He keeps his putter as low to the ground as he possibly can. Keeping the putter low to the ground like this promotes a shoulders only pendulum putting stroke. More importantly, it takes the small twitchy muscles of the hands and fingers out of the putting stroke. _That's the important part_. Sometimes as part of my warm up routine I repeat this stroke 100 times before actually hitting a practice putt. It's a great way to groove your stroke. Other times I'll take another 100 practice putting strokes prior to hitting a practice putt solely using my shoulders in a pendulum motion back and thru, again, keeping the putter head as low to the ground as possible. Take it a step further and place a towel under both your upper arms, close to your armpits, then practice your shoulders only pendulum stroke. Keeping the towel from falling to the ground helps your arms and torso stay connected, it promotes the shoulders only pendulum stroke. This stroke also helps take the small muscles of my hands, wrists and fingers out of the stroke. This practice regimen works wonders when you get on the course and start hitting real putts. Another key is to keep your head still but more important than a still head is to keep your eyes still, quiet, and soft. Soft eyes are a result of being properly relaxed over the putt. Soft eyes are a result of having little, to zero, tension in your body and mind about the putt.

We've all read the stories about Mickelson making 100 three foot putts in a row before ending his practice session; if he misses one he starts over until he gets it right. Obviously, this is a great practice regimen. Let's take it up another notch. In addition to sinking a prescribed number of short putts in a row how about hitting 20-30 thirty foot putts consecutively with the goal that not one of them end up further than two feet from the hole? Then repeat the exercise with even longer putts. Hit twenty fifty foot putts with the goal of not one of them being further than three feet from the hole? Now you're talking.

I'm also a big believer in mid-round putting adjustments, but I think that the adjustments that you should make should be very small. After you've played the first couple of holes take a minute to evaluate your performance on the greens. How did you hit your putts on the first couple of holes? Did you leave them all short of the hole? Or was there one predominant miss? Did you pull every putt? Did you miss a short putt? And if so, how did you miss it? A pull or push? Or did you let some doubt seep in your mind like what happens to so many golfers when faced with a short putt early in the round.

If you've pulled or pushed a couple of putts early I generally advise golfers not to try and "fix" their putting stroke during the round. Getting too wrapped up in mechanics can sometimes reap havoc on your putting for the rest of the round. There's plenty of time to work on your putting stroke after or before the start of your next round. Instead I'd rather see golfers just tweak their alignment a little. That is if you've pulled a couple of putts early in the round simply 'tweak' your alignment a smidge to the right, keep the same stroke, then trust that fix as you hit your next putt.

If you've hit the first couple of putts short of the hole make sure that you focus your attention on getting the next putt past the hole regardless of the distance of the putt. Make sure that you hit the putt with an accelerating stroke. Nothing ruins a day on the golf course more than leaving putts short of the hole all day. If you leave a couple of putts short early in the round and don't make the proper adjustments, well, then, sometimes it can get so bad for a golfer that by the back nine they've tightened up so bad that they can't get the putter back properly and every putt they hit comes up short of the hole. So as soon as you leave a putt short make the adjustment. Get the next one past the hole.

The key to these mid-round adjustments is to do a mental putting check early in the round then make your adjustments and trust your fixes.

Mental Exercises

Conquering Monkey Brain

Monkey brain, in Buddhist terminology, is this; random thoughts jump through our brains automatically; sometimes as many as 200-300 different thoughts within a single minute of time. First, we're thinking about work, then the kids, then thinking about work again, then what we're going to have for dinner, then about the chores you have to do when you get home .... and so on and so on and so on. Like a bunch of monkeys jumping from tree branch to tree branch, to tree branch. Hench the monkey brain moniker. Most have a difficult time focusing their attention for more than a few seconds before the mind wanders. Many live their entire lives this way as this is the way their brains function most of the time.

Meditation is used to train the mind to think of only one thing at a time. Meditation is how we rid ourselves of monkey brain. Until recent years the practice of meditation was not very well understood by the Western World. Meditation is now viewed as just as important as physical training to maintain physical health. The benefits of meditation are numerous. It helps reduce the stress of everyday life. (Who wouldn't benefit from that nowadays?) It's been proven that daily meditation can help lower blood pressure and many medical organizations have patients meditate to reduce anxiety and pain and the length of a hospital stay associated with surgical cases.

Imagine how having the ability to focus on one thing at time would be able to help with putting. If you could focus your mind (without the constant internal 'monkey brain' chatter) on such important putting concepts such as target awareness, or by being able to consistently focus your attention on accelerating your putter through the ball.

Meditating, in addition to training your mind to think of only one thing at a time also sharply focuses your mind in the present moment a mindset that is extremely important to good putting. Many of the ideas presented in this book are a form of meditation.

  * Visualizing is a form of meditation. When you visualize your ball smoothly rolling into the hole you are practicing meditation. When you visualize yourself making the correct putting stroke to sink that putt you are practicing a form of meditation. Same when you visualize and _'see the train tracks._ '

  * When you focus your awareness you are also practicing a form of meditation. All of the exercises described in this book regarding focusing your attention and your awareness are a form of meditation. Focusing your awareness on the acceleration of your putting stroke; focusing your awareness on a small precise target such as a blade of grass; focusing your awareness to better improve your putting distance control are all forms of meditation. So is focusing your awareness on the sights and sounds on the golf course, like listening to the wind or birdsong, or feeling the breeze or hearing the sounds of nearby running streams; these are all forms of meditation.

  * Affirmations are also a form of meditation. When you tell yourself what a good putter you are; or when you tell yourself that you are going to sink this putt, you are practicing a form of affirmations and meditation.

Tiger meditates.

And as of January 2011 so do a number of PGA tour pros, pros such as Vijay Singh, Laura Diaz, Will MacKenzie, Cameron Beckman, Ted Purdy and others. They know that meditation helps with their mental attitude and their ability to focus which, in turn, helps their putting. Mental trainers such as Dawn Grant, Les Bolland, Adnan Qaisar, and other clinically trained psychologists now help tour pros perform better by strengthening their mental approach via guided meditations.

In fact, Tiger has practiced meditation since he's been a child and I think his ability to focus on one thing at a time while putting ... namely the picture of the hole in his head taught to him by his father when he was an infant is one of the key reasons why he was able to sink so many pressure putts to win majors and other important tournaments. He and his mother would travel, every year around his birthday, to a Buddhist temple and it was there that the Zen masters taught Tiger how to meditate. Over the ensuing years Tiger consulted with other Zen masters to help with his meditative technique.

So you gotta admit .... If meditating sharpens Tiger Woods's focus and target awareness to help him make pressure putts to win golf tournaments, then there must be something to it. We too could improve our putting by learning similar techniques and then applying those techniques to our putting.

There are a number of different meditations that you could do to help you with your putting but we will start off with the simplest and easiest one to learn - breath control meditations.

Pranayama

In Yoga the method for breath control is called Pranayama (Mind follows the breath) Pranayama refers to any technique that you might use to breathe _consciously_. It also can be called breathing _awareness._ We're going to combine Pranayama breath control techniques with a simple breath counting meditation to produce a tool that will help you focus on one thing at a time, which in turn, will help train your mind to stay in the present moment when putting.

Most hard core Yoga practitioners believe that in order to perform breath control correctly a person needs to be in the correct sitting position, or correct Asana. (These can be somewhat painful) For the purposes of our exercises all you need to do is get comfortable sitting in your favorite chair. You can also be simply lying down in bed. Breathing for the most part should be through the nostrils only, but I've found that filling the lungs and chest cavity with breath can be done just as effectively by breathing through the mouth. Breathe in slowly and fill your lungs with air. Focus your awareness on your lungs filling up with air. Force the breath down into your diaphragm until you feel it pushing against the bottom of your stomach - pushing against your internal pelvic area. Push the breath down and continue to take in air until you feel your rib cage expanding. Your mind will probably be invaded by other thoughts. (monkey brain stuff) Thoughts of your job, career, things you have to do today, normal everyday stress. This is to be expected. When you catch an outside thought like do this. Acknowledge it. Watch it float through your mind. Then kick it out of your brain and return your mind to the task of breath awareness in your body. When you've taken as much air in as your body can possibly take in hold it for a second before exhaling. Control your exhale by exhaling slowly. Feel your body relax as you exhale. Feel your core relax, your pelvis relax, and your legs relax. As you exhale you will begin to feel your face relax as the muscles in forehead, eyes, cheeks, and mouth react to the slow steady exhale of breath.

Again, when distracting thoughts about your everyday life enter your mind and they will, simply acknowledge the thought, watch it drift through your mind until it disappears then return to the task of watching your breath make it's way through your body.

You've now completed one cycle. One inhale and one exhale. One complete breath. Start breath cycle number two. Then number three after that. Breathe this exercise for fifteen minutes. You will discover, as you get more into the breathing routine, that your mind is doing a better job of thinking of only one thing at a time.

When you are finished you will feel relaxed, alert, and mentally refreshed. Just as if you'd taken an afternoon power nap. With regards to putting once you've attained this mind / body relaxing state you are now _in the zone_. The zone is the name for the mental state all golfers strive for in order to shoot their best scores. Your mind and body are now optimized to stay in the present moment, optimized to focus your attention on a small precise target, optimized to make putts.

Practice makes perfect. Well, that's not exactly right when it comes to meditation. It's impossible to become 'perfect' at meditations. But the more you meditate the better you will become at training your mind to think of only one thing at a time.

As an alternative meditation you can also count your breathes. Same MO as before. But instead of tuning into your body awareness you focus on the number count of your breath only. With each intake focus on the number one. When distracting thoughts enter your mind, well, by now, you know the routine. Focus on the number one with your first exhale breath as well. Then on to the number two, then three, then four. After four I recommend going back to number one and recounting to four. Perform this meditation for fifteen minutes as well.

Just as there is no substitute for practice in order to become an expert putter, the same is true with training your mind to focus on only one thing at a time. To get rid of your monkey brain practice your meditations regularly. Serious practitioners meditate daily; they continually train their minds to focus on only one thing at a time. With practice it becomes easier to conquer monkey brain. With monkey brain gone 'bye-bye' you'll discover that it becomes easier to place your mind in the right spot to putt better. Not to mention all of the other health benefits that you will receive from your daily meditations.

Say 'goodbye' to monkey brain ...

Use only one swing thought at a time

In keeping with the meditation heading, where we are training our minds to do a better job of thinking of only one thing at a time, it's interesting to note that the mind and body can only process, effectively, only one swing thought at a time. Focus on one swing thought for any given swing, or putt, and the mind can instruct the body correctly; often the body can then carry out the task successfully. But give the body two swing thoughts at the same time? Like trying to walk and chew gum at the same time. It just doesn't work well; it's often a recipe for disaster, or a bad shot or putt.

No one really knows why the mind / body connection works this way, it just does. For example, in a full golf swing, should you try to rotate your torso correctly and in the same swing you add another swing thought - say to keep your left arm straight and firm to create some width to your swing, well the result is often a poor shot. The mind simply can't give the body the instruction to do the two things correctly at the same time. But try and focus on one swing thought? Like keep the left arm straight? Or rotate your hips? It's easier to complete the task correctly.

The same holds true with your putting. If you try and focus on your path and at the same time you try and focus on rocking your shoulders in the correct pendulum motion chances are you'll hit a poor putt. Pick one thought to focus on while putting and stick with it for that particular putt. You can change your thought on your next putt if you feel that you're using the wrong swing thought, but stick to trying only one swing thought at a time.

Count your putts after the round

After your round of golf count the number of putts that you took during the round. For the times when you were on the fringe and not the green - and you used your putter, officially this does not count as a putt. Get an idea of how you performed on the greens for any given round of golf. I know a tour player who keeps a running total in his head as his round progresses as to how many putts he takes. I don't think that this is a good idea. Because if you're not putting well that day counting your putts mid round reminds you that you are not doing well and can hurt your confidence and concentration. That's what happens to this tour player friend of mine. Some days he hits all nine greens in regulation on the front nine and he two putts every green. I've seen him stomp off the ninth green saying: "I've already taken 18 putts today ... I'm putting so lousy!" That is not always the case. When you hit a lot of greens you may not hit it as close to the hole as you would when you miss a green then hit a short chip towards the hole. So hitting a lot of greens in regulation can sometimes skew your putting stats for the day. It's not an accurate indication as to how you are putting that day.

_When reviewing your putting focus on your makes, not your misses_. You may have missed a short putt that day, but made 5 other short putts plus a couple of 15 footers. Focus on the ones you made, those were excellent strokes, these are the positive feelings that you want to ingrain. In the above situation you may have missed one putt but made 7-8 others. This is the area to focus on.

If you hit 4-5 greens in regulation and take 36 putts in most cases you'll shoot around 90. (If you don't make too many snowmen ...) But take 30 putts and your score may drop to 85 or lower. If you hit 10 greens in regulation and take 36 putts you'll shoot around 80, but if you take 28 putts instead of 36 then your score will be somewhere around even par.

Good putting is the key to good scoring.

By reviewing your putts after the round you can uncover which areas that you need to work on. For example, if you 3 putt 3-4 times during a round then it's time to work on distance control as most 3 putts are caused by the first putt being hit the wrong distance.

All good players pay attention to their putting stats. They use them to uncover needed areas of improvement so that they can practice those areas and become better putters.

Handling Pressure

Everyone who is reading this section probably remembers Hunter Mahan in the 2010 Ryder Cup. During the last day singles matches his was the last match (against Graham McDowell) and Europe was closing in on the win. McDowell made an improbable birdie on the 16th hole and Mahan had to win the par 3 seventeenth or Europe would clinch the Ryder Cup.

We all remember what happened. McDowell hit first and hit a clutch shot on the right hand side of the green virtually assuring himself of at least a par. Hunter was on the tee knowing that he had to birdie the hole. Talk about pressure! The weight of the entire nation of USA was on his shoulders.

Well, he couldn't handle it. He hit his tee shot fat - a sign that he felt the pressure - my guess is that instead of staying in the present moment and sticking with his mental routine he let himself think about the situation and he worried about the future. _I have to birdie this hole otherwise we lose the Ryder Cup_! Next he had to sink his chip shot which was approximately 20 yards from the hole. Not good odds as a PGA tour player can sink a chip like that maybe once every couple of rounds. Again Mahan let the moment get to him and his chipping fundamentals broke down, he duffed the chip like a 20 handicapper, his ball barely got to the fringe of the green and Europe had won the cup.

Upset about his poor performance under pressure Hunter Mahan cried for hours afterward.

Obviously Hunter faced more pressure on the golf course than any of us will ever face. But it still illustrates the point what can happen if you get out of your mental pre shot routine or if you begin to worry about results, or you worry about what might happen in the past or future instead of simply playing one shot at a time and staying in the present moment and tightly focusing your awareness on a small precise target.

Let's switch sports, to baseball, and see how modern day pitchers handle pressure situations. Elite relief pitchers, or the best closers, pitchers like the great Mariano Rivera of the NY Yankees, or Brian Wilson of the 2010 World Champion SF Giants can actually give us an idea on how to handle pressure putts by the way they pitch to close out a tight game.

First neither of these two guys would be in the game unless the game was close and there was a lot of pressure to throw strikes and get batters out. They thrive on pressure. In fact, they seem virtually immune to it; if they get behind in the count, no worries, their next pitch is a 95 MPH cutter that splits the outside corner of the plate.

How do they do that?

Well most of them have been working with their respective teams psychologists. They've been taught to think about and throw _only one pitch at a time._ They don't worry about the situation whether it's the 9th inning of the 7th game of the World Series or whether it's a spring training game. And they are taught to focus on and _throw to a small precise target_. That's why you see the catcher move his glove just before the pitch to the exact spot where they want the pitch. _Elite relief pitchers don't care who is at the plate batting, in come cases they don't even know who is batting, they simply throw their pitch to a small precise target, one pitch at a time._ They don't worry about the last pitch that they made was a ball, nor do they concern themselves about a future pitch, cause the game may be over by then.

Sound familiar?

In order to perform well under pressure on the greens a golfer has to adopt that same mentality.

Feeling pressure or stress over a putt is self imposed. All pressure that we feel is self imposed; we choose, or choose not to, feel the pressure and stress with any life situation including stressing over a four foot putt. Do you think that Tiger Woods would feel any stress about making a four foot putt to win the two man scramble at your local golf course? Hardly. But you might if it is you hitting the putt and trying to win a local tournament or simply trying to beat a couple of your friends. The only difference about the situation above would be that Tiger would choose not to feel any pressure ... you might. The golf ball, your putter, people not playing the golf course that same day .... they don't feel pressure. _You choose to feel it._

Yet learning how to perform under pressure on the golf course is a learned skill. You have to put yourself in pressure situations and learn how to handle them correctly. The reason why people are successful when others are not? To be successful you have fight through massive amounts of failure, massive amounts of rejection. The more you fail the more you learn; by learning from your failures you eventually figure out how to succeed.

So if you want to learn how to putt well under pressure put yourself in pressure situations as often as you can and learn how to handle the heat. _How you handle the heat is to use your well practiced pre putt routine to stay in the present moment, not worry about results, the past, or the future, plus you visualize and focus your awareness on a small precise target_. You play one shot at a time in the same way that Mariano Rivera throws one pitch at a time. Rivera doesn't worry about his next pitch or if the batter he is pitching to hits him hard.

Accept your results; don't worry about anything, what's my next target?

Even golf greats such as Jack Nicklaus had to learn how to handle the stress of making short putts before he learned how to consistently win. The 1960 US Open held at Cherry Hills in Denver Colorado will be remembered as the Open that Arnold Palmer shot 65 in the final round to win by two strokes. Not many remember that during the final 36 holes, played on the same day, a strong 20 year old amateur by the name of Jack Nicklaus was paired with a limping 48 year old Ben Hogan. With 9 holes to play Nicklaus was 5 under and in the lead. Then he began to unravel. At the 13th hole he three putted, missing a critical eighteen inch tap in because he didn't know if he could repair a ball mark in his line. (It could be repaired) Too embarrassed to ask the great Hogan the rule, his ball struck the ball mark indentation and missed the hole.

"Then I three putted 14 and missed a short putt on 16 as well." Nicklaus said. "Then I bogeyed 18 and lost to Palmer by 2 strokes."

Afterward the great Hogan said: " _I played 36 holes with a kid today, if he had a brain in his head, he would have won by ten strokes_."

Nicklaus had missed three short putts on the last nine holes. He had not yet learned how to make short putts under intense pressure. That was, however, the one and only time that Nicklaus would let a major slip away because of missing short putts. He had learned his lesson.

The Yips

Quiz time. What do Harry Vardon, Ben Hogan, Sam Snead, Johnny Miller, Chris DiMarco, Bernhard Langer, Tom Watson, and a host of other tour pros have in common?

They all had (or still have...) the yips. In Hogan's case though, you could build a good argument that he didn't have the yips but that he suffered from blurry eyesight from injuries of his near fatal car crash in February of 1949. Snead's yips were so bad that he invented the 'side saddle' style of putting that you sometimes see today.

Let's start with my opinion. The yips are 100% mental. No, let's change that. If you suffer from the occasional yipped putt the cause is 1000% mental, 1000% between your ears.

Yips are caused by doubt, fear, and indecision. You worry about the line, you don't trust the speed, you think about your score and the money you are about to lose to your friends. You miss the putt. After a couple of rounds doing the same thing the tension in your arms builds up - you worry some more \- you worry about all the short putts that you've missed over the last few weeks and you think about all the short putts that you've missed over your lifetime. (Okay, maybe that is too extreme, but it is still worrying about what happened in the past) As you continue to work yourself up and get psyched out about the next short putt that you have to hit your mind degrades to the point that bombs go off in your head; you black out as you hit the putt; you don't remember that you even hit it as the natural _flight_ syndrome in the human _fight or flight_ reflex kicks in full force. _Run for the hills_! The resulting stroke is a quick, wristy, outside in short backswing chop with a decelerating forward stroke put in there for extra measure. You miss the putt low and short from a distance of two feet; often times you miss the hole completely. Once you've yipped one it's in your head for the rest of the round; chances are you'll yip the next short one you face; and as luck would have it that will probably be on the next hole.

As I said 1000% mental. Between your ears.

_The underlying cause of the yips are uncontrolled fear, doubt, and indecision that has taken root and that_ _you_ _allowed to snowball to the extent that a golfer's brain does a complete mental short circuit when standing over a short putt_.

The cure?

For many this is where a different putter or putting style can be of help. Yips are the main reason why long putters, belly putters, cross handed putting grips and the claw grip have become popular. Using these kinds of putters can help in taking the small twitchy muscles of the hands and fingers out of the putt. But even by using other methods besides a conventional putter and conventional putting stroke may not work consistently well unless you:

_Change the way you think_. It takes time and is not always easy to change but the nanosecond that you detect a negative thought come into your head about a short putt you've got to catch it and throw it out of your head. It doesn't matter what kind of putter or what kind of putting grip you use if you can't place your mind in the correct spot.

I had the yips myself back when I was in my 40's. Often I would 3 putt from 2 feet, not once touching the hole; each putt a horrible tension filled yip stroke. I had them for 3-4 years, they drove me crazy; luckily enough one of Dr. Bob Rotella's first books came out and I read it until I was blue in the face and had learned how to correctly program my mind as I stood over a short putt.

So to cure the yips you have to change the way you think; you have to replace those feelings of doubt, fear and indecision. Here's what you replace them with. If you've read this entire book you know what comes next.

  * Stay in your pre putt routine. Use your pre putt routine to rid your mind of negative feelings. Immerse yourself in the process of making the putt. Your pre putt routine is your rock.

  * Focus your awareness on a small precise target. Go back and read the section in this book about making 4 foot putts.

  * Keep your mind in the present moment. If you yipped a putt earlier in the round it has nothing to do about the next putt you have to hit. Use target awareness, visualization skills, and basic awareness skills to keep your mind in the present moment.

  * Focus on your recent made putts; don't focus on your misses.

  * The nanosecond a negative thought creeps into your mind, catch it and throw it away. Use your awareness, visualization, and meditative skills to throw that negative thought away and put your mind back in the present moment.

  * Make sure that you accelerate your putting stroke through the ball. Focus your attention on this key fundamental. A yip stroke is a decelerating stroke, one where the putter head is _losing speed through the hit._ By accelerating your putting stroke through the ball you will not yip a putt.

  * Practice all of the above on the putting green to the point that this is a natural habit to you once you get on the course.

Ever see Tiger Woods or Jack Nicklaus yip a putt in a tournament? I can't remember ever seeing either man ever yip one. And I've seen each hundreds of times on TV or in person. Both Tiger and Jack know that the reason for the yips is between the ears; they know where to place their minds over a putt; they use their _free will_ to focus their attention in the right way so that they don't yip a putt.

Apologies to Johnny Miller ...

Golf legend and NBC lead golf announcer Johnny Miller wrote a book published in 2004 titled "I Call the Shots." In the book Johnny devotes an entire chapter (Chapter 2) to choking. He goes as far as categorizing what he terms the 'stages' of choking into stage one, stage two, and stage three choking. In this chapter he talks about being fearful of things like water, hazards, out of bounds, and, especially, fear of four foot putts stating: " _Choking is stress manifesting itself mentally and physically. The truth is the yips are the biggest reason why I don't play the Champions tour._ " Later in the paragraph he adds: " _Why be in denial about it? I've been fascinated by choking and have been studying the subject for thirty five years."_ 31

Yet through out the entire chapter he writes that whenever he hit a bad shot, shank, or missed a short putt that he couldn't get it out of his mind and continued to think about it. Miller continues: " _Most of the time your weakest link is short putts, because you've convinced yourself that under pressure that's what you do wrong. Maybe I'm going to miss a short putt like my buddy did last year .... And you remember where a lot of guys miss their short putts..."_ 32

How does worrying about what your buddy did last year have anything to do with the four foot putt you are about to hit!!

Sounds like Mister Miller worried about what happened in the past. He even worried about what other players did. As if that had any impact on the next short putt he had to hit. _Not!_! No one said that learning to keep your mind in the present moment is easy. It takes work. It takes practice. If you read Miller's words you see that his mind is often occupied with what happened in the past with regards to his fear of short putts. I submit to you, for your consideration, that Mr. Miller did indeed use his powers of 'free will' when he stood over a short putt. _He chose to be afraid of them based on his past performance_. I don't know if Johnny ever consulted a sports psychologist or someone who could show him how to train his mind to stay in the present moment in order to rid his mind of fear. I also understand that the 'yips' have driven Miller and other PGA tour pros right off the tour and into a straight jacket. Like I said, for some learning to keep your mind in the present is easy; give them the mental tools and instructions and they can do it. Others can't. For them learning to stay in the present moment is difficult. These are the guys that are still in a straight jacket.

My apologies to the great golf icon Johnny Miller but I disagree with his philosophy about choking and the yips. I believe that by using the ideas in this book that any golfer can learn to think correctly. Each and every one of you can learn to putt better.

### Resume of a true golf fanatic

(Or ... about the author)

Picture of author after he made 7th career hole-in-one

California State Senior Amateur in 2009

At the time of this writing I am a 61 year old man living in the East Bay area of San Francisco in Northern California. I've been golfing for over 50 years and I've been fortunate enough to have become a good player. Here's my golf story.

I grew up in Queens New York, part of New York City. Back in the 1950's much of New York City was concrete and asphalt. This is where I started playing golf. My brother and I (Bobby is a year younger than I) watched golf on TV; we purchased a couple of $2.00 Kroydon 7 irons from a long defunct sporting goods store, bought a couple of used golf balls out of a bin, then took to the streets.

_Literally_.

We'd run to the corner, roughly 300 yards from our house (and more importantly 300 yards from our dirt driveway) place the balls in the middle of the street, then whack them between all the parked cars towards our house. Once we arrived in front of our house, the hole took a 90 degree left turn up into our dirt driveway towards a small hole dug out of the dirt with a garden spade. _Our golf course_. Sometimes, as you would expect, a parked car would get in the way of our errant shots; we had no idea where the ball was going; we only knew what great fun we were having fun trying to beat each others brains out with this strange game called golf. The year was 1958 and I was 9 years old.

Soon all we had to play with were plastic golf balls (Mom's rules after we'd 'dimpled' a couple of parked cars) ... the soft kind with holes in them .... It would travel no further than 30-40 yards if picked squarely from the concrete.

Nevertheless, the plastic ball didn't stop me from breaking numerous windows in our house, as I tore up our entire backyard of grass with my obsession at trying to get the ball in the air, while hitting these same 'harmless' plastic balls towards our house. "Hit down on the ball to get it in the air", I had read in the weekly Arnold Palmer lesson printed in the Long Island Press. The obsession of a lifetime was firmly planted.

While Tom Kite and Ben Crenshaw were learning how to play the game from Harvey Penick in Texas, I was sitting in my house in New York City, praying for the winter snow to stop, wishing the ice would melt, so I could bang plastic golf balls with holes in them down the concrete streets in New York City. The point being that we had no one to teach us how to play; by the time I first played a real golf course I could barely get the ball in the air; and when I did get it airborne all I could hit was a huge banana slice. It would start 50 yards left of the fairway, (God forbid if the fairway was tree lined) would end up 50-60 yards right of the fairway and though it traveled over 250 yards in the air, since most of that air flight was sideways ... the ball would come to rest barely 160 yards forward of the tee box.

Marvelous.

Nevertheless I was hooked.

I played three years of high school golf at an all boys Catholic High School; (In the girls wing of the school they were instructed not to wear patent leather shoes 'cause the shine would act like a mirror and those 'nasty' boys would look straight up your skirt.) I played two years of college golf, then graduated with a degree in finance in 1972. I was probably about an 8 handicap. I played every chance that I had; when I was not playing .... I dreamt of playing. Still, I never had a golf lesson; I had no idea what a real golf lesson was, actually.

Armed with a finance degree I should have been ready to go out into the world and get a real job, but instead, I became an assistant golf professional at a private country club in Long Island. I wanted to go on tour.

"My boy, he's gonna be bringing in some tournament money." My dad said proudly. Little did I know that 8 handicaps did not get to play on the PGA tour. Even back in 1972. At least now I got a couple of lessons. The head pro that I worked for was a cigar smoking old guy named Ben Roman. He had played in the Masters once back in the early 1950's. One of the assistant pros was a guy named Ed Kuna, who shared the first round lead in the 1965 PGA tournament with a 65. Not like getting lessons from Harvey Penick, but it was a start. Soon, I became a 4 handicap and was ready to play in pro tournaments, or so I thought.

In September of 1972 I traveled to Connecticut to play in a Monday tourney for assistant pros and promptly started off 8-8-8 ..... barely getting the ball airborne in the first 3 holes. I three putted each hole. Then a guy in a golf cart drove out, told me to call home, told me that my father had an accident. Turns out that my father had died from a heart attack. Dad, who was a World War II Navy veteran who chained smoked Lucky Strikes and drank himself silly each night with Irish whiskey and beer had been playing golf with my younger brother. He passed away on the course we often played, which happened to be Bethpage Black in Farmingdale N. Y., site of the 2002 and 2009 USGA Open. He had a heart attack while playing the par 4 10th hole; he stumbled over to a bench by the 11th tee and passed away. He was 50 years old.

Six months later I still had aspirations of making it on tour when Mr. Roman asked me to work with him, for the winter, at Harder Hall in Sebring, Florida. Back in those days when east coast courses up north closed for the winter pros headed to destinations in Florida to work. Mr. Roman told me that I'd be an assistant golf pro giving lessons on the range.

Yippee!

I jumped at the chance. When I arrived in Florida I found out that my job was not to teach, but to shine shoes in the shoe room. I had to live off the tips I earned.

While at Harder Hall I met and play a round of golf with Ben Crenshaw. He had come to Harder Hall for a college golf tournament. At the time he was a junior at the University of Texas and was a bona-fide golfing phenom. Six months later he would tie Tom Kite for individual medal honors for the 1972 NCAA Division I tournament. The following year Crenshaw would win the first PGA tour event that he entered as a professional. While I still started most of my drives 30 yards left of the fairway and played an over-the-top, big banana slice, Ben played a big old roundhouse hook that started out well right of the fairway but bounded a good 60-70 yards forward after it hit the ground. Consequently he was out driving me by 75 yards. (This was 5-6 years before Tom Weiskopf famously said that Ben should wear an orange flak jacket when playing so observers would be aware of his long, but errant tee shots.) I tried to hit it harder to keep up with him but every time I did that all I succeeded in doing was to hit a bigger slice that went no farther than the other slices that I'd hit. But playing with Ben was the beginning of my education of being a good putter. Because even back then, Ben could roll his ball. So I watched him and soaked it up like a sponge. Until Harvey Penick wrote his famous Little Red Book in 1992, I still had no idea that Ben had been getting golf instruction from Harvey at a young age. In it Harvey wrote: " _I remember when Ben Crenshaw was six years old, two years before he took his first lesson from me ...he'd go around, and around the putting green. Ben was developing the touch and stroke that made him one of the finest putters in history._ "

It took was a couple of months for me to realize that I was not really cut out to shine shoes for a living, so I quit, drove back north to New York in the middle of winter.

You would think that by this point I would have used my college education to get a job and start a career .... instead I took a job with a major sporting goods store. (Anyone remember 'Herman's World of Sporting Goods?') And worked ... you guessed it - - in the golf department. Over the next 8-9 years I became the store's golf manager, got promoted to the golf manager of their flagship store in Roosevelt Field Long Island, got promoted a couple of more times until I was in charge of all the golf departments for the 23 store chain which was located throughout the Tri State Area. I had over 200 golf crazy employees report to me and I was responsible for over $50 Million annually in golf equipment sales. (That's a lot of plastic balls with holes in them.)

In my spare time I played golf; I'd improved; I was a 3 handicap. True, I still cut the ball more than most 3's, I knew nothing about proper swing path and swing plane, but I was good around the greens and could putt well. However, when something important was on the line, such as a trophy, or some money ... or just plain bragging rights I would fold like a cheap suit, gag, and miss every short putt that I stood up to. I had not learned how to putt well under pressure. It was now approximately 1982 and it would be another 17 to 18 years before I would learn how to really putt well under pressure.

Baby steps.

Bear with my story, if you will. By explaining how big of a part that golf has played in my life, it will be easier to see I finally blossomed into a decent putter ... and I'd figured out how to write (through trial and error) and write these words in order to help golfers putt better. _Soup that simmers on the stove for a long time can taste a whole lot better; my golf knowledge on putting has been 'simmering' for 50 years; hopefully this added info can help your game too._

By the Winter of '83 I had enough of glacially cold east coast winters ... and after watching (for the umpteenth time) The Bing Crosby Tournament played in February in sunny warm California, I packed my clubs and my clothes, stuffed it all in my car, drove across country, and arrived at San Ramon California. The main reason why? I wanted to play golf 12 months out of the year.

Plain and simple.

Soon I'd met a pretty girl, got married, fathered a son, and had a series of normal jobs. Golf had to be put, to an extent, on the back burner. Thru the 1980's and early 1990's I never let my handicap get much higher than a 4 .... If it did, or if I went out there and shot a couple of 80's, I turned into a mental basket case, unable to relax until I worked on my game and my scores dropped. But I was a golf fanatic in every sense of the word. I watched every tournament on TV.

Jack in the 86 Masters on the 17th hole during the last round

When Jack famously won the '86 Masters using that huge headed putter, by 10 AM the next morning, I had purchased one of the monstrosities and was practicing on a local putting green.

I started reading all the instruction books available, especially some of the mental instruction books that were now starting to find their way to the bookstore. One of the first being Dr. Tim Gallwey's "Inner game of Golf", first published by Random House in 1981. So began the long (many years actually) curve of learning where to place your mind over each and every golf shot that you take.

In 1991 I became a real estate agent ... more because I wanted to be my own boss and make decent money, but I discovered that I had many weekday afternoons to myself.

Guess what I did with them?

Right again.

To the golf course! (I did make sure that I was in the office every day by 7 AM in order to get my work done early in the day)

Throughout the 1990's I occasionally played in local top amateur tournaments. The NCGA, or Northern California Golf Association, has approximately 200,000 members and they host a series of tournaments each year, for which tournament points are awarded. Each year hundreds of top California amateurs compete in these events to see how well they stack up against the top amateur players in the state. A number of famous tour pros came out of this system, including Ken Venturi, Johnny Miller, Mark O'Meara, Bobby Clampett, more recently Aaron Oberholser, Matt Bettencourt, Todd Fisher, and others.

When I played in one of these tournaments one thing always seemed to happen. When faced with an important putt I would choke my brains out. I'd miss 12 inch putts. Or I'd double kiss a 9 inch putt. I could rope a two iron 230 yards right next to the hole (okay, maybe I sliced it in there a little) but if I missed the first putt and left the ball two feet from the hole, I was an even money to gag on the next one.

_Not good_.

Before I knew it I was getting close to 50 years of age and just like 25 years earlier, I figured that I was now good enough to go out on the Senior tour and take them all on. After all, just because Tom Kite, Ben Crenshaw, Tom Watson, Hale Irwin and all the other famous tour pros could beat the tar out of me (on the golf course) when we were all 25 years of age, that didn't mean that they could still beat me when we are all 50.

Or so I thought.

In 1997 when I was 48 years old I began to prepare for the Senior PGA tour. (It was not yet named the Champions tour) Oddly enough, 1997 was also the year that Tiger hit the PGA tour in full force; it was the year that he won his first major - the 1997 Masters. Tiger's influence on my game will be detailed in a moment.

Starting in 1997 I practiced. I found the time to putt and chip every day. It wasn't too hard to find 15 - 20 minutes, per day, to do something that was important to me. I exercised 3-4 times per week; alternating cardio, core strengthening, weight work, and yoga. I watched my weight; there are not too many overweight success stories on the Senior PGA tour. Though I started meditating in the 1980's as a way to better quiet my mind and visualize putts going into the hole; I intensified the meditations starting in 1997. This is where the Tiger factor came into play.

Numerous books came out about Tiger and the way he learned to play golf. One book that caught my attention was one that described how his Mom's Buddhist upbringing influenced the way Tiger thought. How Tiger was able to put himself into a confident, in the present moment, meditative state whenever he needed to pull off a great shot or sink a crucial putt astounded not only me, but the entire golfing world. Asked about his mother's influence on his serene demeanor Tiger once said " _Buddhism plays a major role. It has given me the inner peace and calmness I probably would not have achieved at such an early age. I owe that to my mother_."34

So I read about Buddhism. If it was good enough for Tiger it was good enough for me. One of the ideas that I learned was "The Beginners Mind" concept, as detailed in Chapter 2 of this book "The story of Bob". Utilizing this idea was how I was able to reduce my handicap from a 3 to a +1.

In addition to all of the practice and exercise, I became a voracious reader of golf psychology. Here is a partial list of the books that I read (some as many as 4-5 times)

  1. The Chosen One (about Tiger) by David Owens.

  2. Golf and the Kingdom by Michael Murphy

  3. All of the wonderful Dr. Bob Rotella books

  4. Fearless Golf by Dr. Gio Valianti

  5. The little red book and the little green book by Harvey Penick

  6. Zen mind, beginners mind by Suzuki

  7. The cosmic laws of golf by Printer Bowler

  8. Tiger Virtues by Tresniowski (A little known gem of a book)

  9. Zen Golf by Dr. Joseph Parent (Zen putting, as well)

  10. Zen and the art of Archery by Eugen Herrigel

  11. Every shot I take by Davis Love III

  12. Creative Visualization by Shakti Gawain

  13. Dave Pelz's short game bible and Pelz's putting bible

  14. A feel for the game by Ben Crenshaw

Over the years I've also read every golf bio ever written, from Jones to Hogan to Nelson, Palmer and Nicklaus, Snead and Miller, plus every word ever written about Tiger.

I like to read.

These are but a few, as the list of golf books that I've read goes on and on and on. But, hopefully, you get the picture. I'm a golf nut. I can be really out there. At the time I wanted to improve so I could go out on the Senior tour and beat all those guys that I grew up idolizing. That, though, didn't quite happen the way that I pictured it, what happened instead is that I became a better golfer, a better person, and I learned how to putt well under pressure. I had figured out how to 2 putt (rarely 3 putt) every green. Learned how to make a bunch of 10-12 footers; learned how to make just about all those dreaded four footers, especially under pressure. I also learned how to make more than my share of long 30-50 foot putts; I learned how to optimize line, speed, and direction to my advantage and turned putting into the strength of my game.

_Cool_.

When I turned 50 in 1999, I attended the first of 4 Senior Tour Q-schools that I went to between the years of 1999-2003. Because I was a better player than when I was younger I now thought (and believed .... thanks to guys like Dr. Bob Rotella) that I could now beat all those PGA tour winners of the 60's and 70's who were now eligible for the Senior Tour.

Wrong again.

Though I had learned to putt and chip as well as any of the tour pros my ball striking was not quite as good as theirs; at any time (usually under pressure) my over-the-top, quick tempo, and way too steep chop swing would rear it's ugly head. I was just as likely to shoot a 78 as I would a 70-71. Shooting 78's doesn't quite make it on any tour, not even the junior AJGA events for 10-11 year olds.

Nevertheless, cause of my short game skills and never-say-die positive attitude, I nearly advanced out of the first stage senior tour qualifying in 2001 out of Lompoc California. Missed it by two shots. And over 72 holes on a hilly golf course with lightning fast greens and tons of tricky breaks I did not miss a putt inside of 5 feet.

_Way cool_.

Proper preparation was the reason for that performance. Simply put, I practiced my ass off. I practiced putting every day for more than two years. Usually from anywhere from 20-40 minutes per day. I wouldn't leave the putting green until I was 100% sure that I was not going to miss one single putt. I practiced the mental exercises and routines outlined in this book. In fact, while practicing, it was more important to practice the mental routines, than it was to actually make the practice putts. To top it all off, before I jaunted off to Q school I would force myself to make 50 consecutive 4 foot putts before I ended my daily practice routine. If 40 straight putts found the bottom of the hole, then I missed one, I would start over and finish the job right.

Shades of Phil Mickelson.

Lots of practice.

Looking back (from a distance of ten years) on those Q school experiences I realize that I was fortunate to have had a chance to compete in an arena like that. First, I've always believed that if you play with better players and if you watch what they do, you can learn. During my Q school experiences I was fortunate enough to play with a number of guys who had played on the PGA tour in the 60's and 70's, household names on TV back then, but now just normal guys who had aged and were simply still trying to make a living playing golf. I played with Peter Oosterhuis (The Golf Channel announcer and 6 time Ryder Cupper) in 1999 in Palm Desert California in the second round of that first stage qualifying. Plus I played with a dozen, or so, other good players and tour winners from decades gone by. I watched and learned and my game got better.

But, realistically, looking back now from the perspective of 10 years later I never had a good chance to get out on the Senior tour. Though I also competed in 30-40 Monday qualifier 4 spots (120 guys qualifying for 4 spots) the closest that I ever got to getting out there, even for one weekend, was when I shot a 73 at the now defunct Raley's tournament in Sacramento California in 2000 and missed getting on the senior tour for the weekend by one shot.

But it was sure a lot of fun trying. The fun is in the journey, not in reaching the destination.

Jack, paying off a bet to Arnie, circa 1968

The next level in my golf education was approaching. In 2003 I reapplied to the USGA for my amateur status. (The USGA didn't make me wait too long before they reinstated me, it was not like I had accomplished much, or even won a plug nickel as a pro) In 2004 when I turned 55 years of age I was eligible to play in the wonderful USGA and NCGA (Northern Calif. Golf Assoc.) senior amateur golf tourneys.

Over the next 4 years of playing top-notch senior amateur golf excellent putting was the key to my successes. Some highlights of my senior amateur career were:

  * Tied for 5th in the 2006 California State Senior Amateur (219 for 54 holes)

  * 3rd in the 2006 NCGA Senior Amateur (141 for 36 holes)

  * Member of NCGA Senior Cup Team for 2006, 2007, 2009 (Top ten senior amateur golfers in Northern California)

  * Qualified for 2008 USGA Senior Amateur at Shady Oaks Country Club in Austin Texas, (Ben Hogan's home course)

  * 1st alternate for California for USGA Senior Amateur 2006, 2007

  * Winner of numerous senior amateur 36 hole tournaments

  * Played in 7 consecutive California State Amateur tournaments

  * Plus, over the course of my golfing career I've made 7 holes in one and 5 double eagles (That's right .... 2's on par fives)

Jack and Tiger at the 2001 PGA Championship – the best ever and the heir apparent

Okay, I know what you're thinking. The guy really didn't win anything really big, so who is he and how can he help me putt better?

At the age of 61, I still carry a + handicap (better than a scratch) and have a reputation for being a pretty good putter. So when a friend of mine at Castlewood Country Club in Pleasanton California suggested that I write a book on putting by saying "Tommy, you've forgotten more about putting than most of us will ever know ..." I thought about it for a while, then decided that he may be right. I decided to try and help other golfers putt better.

2010 USGA woman's champion Paula Creamer grew up playing

golf at Castlewood Country Club in Pleasanton Ca.

I hope that you will find the information in this book helpful.

Thanks for reading!

Tom Lyons - August 13th 2010

 Zen Golf by Dr. Joseph Parent – 2005, page 3

 Zen Mind, beginners mind – Shunryu Suzuki –1970, page 21

 Little Red Book by Harvey Penick –1992, page 104

 Little Red Book by Harvey Penick – 1992, page 107

 Little Red Book by Harvey Penick – 1992, page 27

 Tiger Virtues by Alex Tresniowski, page 44-2003

 Quote attributed to David Feherty while watching that putt. Tiger Virtues by Alex Tresniowski- 2003

 Quote attributed to Bobby Clampett while watching that putt. Tiger Virtues by Alex Tresniowski - 2003

 Wikipedia

 Courtesy of Answers.com

 Life is not a game of perfect – Dr. Bob Rotella, page 39 - 1999

 Every shot I take – Davis Love III, page 148, 1997

 Life is not a game of perfect – Dr. Bob Rotella, page 38 - 1999

 The Inner game of Golf, W. Timothy Gallwey, 1979, page 68

 Tiger Values, Alex Tresniowski, 2003, page 76

 Winning the Battle Within, Dr. Glen Albaugh, 2006, page 12

 Tiger Values, Alex Tresniowski, 2003, page 97

 The Golfers Mind, Dr. Bob Rotella, 2004, pages 49-51

 Golf in the Kingdom, Michael Murphy, 1972, page 51

 The Little Red Book, Harvey Penick, 1992, pages 45-46

 The Golfers Mind, Dr. Bob Rotella, 2004, pages 116-117

 Zen mind, beginners mind, Shunryu Suzuki, 1970, page 21

 Paraphrased from Fearless Golf, Dr. Gio Valianti, 2005

 Fearless Golf, Dr. Gio Valianti, 2005, page 91

 Summarized from Ben Hogan, An American Life, James Dodson, 2004

 Summaraized from Mans Search for Meaning, Victor Frankl, 1959

 The Little Red Book, Harvey Penick, 1992, page 107

 Tiger Virtues, Alex Tresniowski, 2005, page 37.

 Ben Hogan, An American Life, James Dodson, 2004, pages 462-463

 I Call the Shots, Johnny Miller, 2004 pages 11-27

 I Call the Shots, Johnny Miller, 2004 pages 11-27

 I Call the Shots, Johnny Miller, 2004 pages 11-27

 Harvey Penick's Little Red Book, 1992. Page 42

34 Tiger Virtues by Alec Tresniowski, 2005. Page 76.

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