WHY I
CHANGED
MY ROUTINE
How tweaking
my green-reading
process paidbig dividends.
“On at least half-a-dozen occasions
during a round, I used to have my former
caddie and current coach Colin Swatton
read a putt and I’d then ask him what he
saw. At the start of 2015, he suggested I
should read all the putts.
“At the time I was like, ‘What?!’ But he
told me he thought it would challenge me
to gather more information and help me
become more committed to my stroke.
“The point Col made was that if we’re
both reading putts, it’ll either confi rm
what I’m already thinking, or it will
create confusion. Obviously, you don’t
want the second one.
“We’re both good at reading greens,
but the di erence is Col had no idea
how I’m feeling standing over the ball
and how hard I was going to hit the
putt. If I hit it too softly because of
something I feel at address and leave it
short, it creates doubt. Was it my read
or his that was o? It’s not a knock on
Swatto; it’s him fi guring out something
that allowed me to take ownership and
be more committed. It’s given me more
confi dence because I don’t have any
doubts when I’m stood over a putt.”It’s always my driving and long game that seem
to grab the headlines, but it’s the quality of my
putting that gets me into contention week in,week out on Tour. Over the next few pages, I’ll
show you how to make it a strength of your
game, too.
HOW TO READ GREENS
LIKE A TOUR PRO
Identify your speed before you pick your line.
Y
ou won’t see me three-putt
very often. Last year, I ranked
18th on Tour in three-putt
avoidance with just 27 in 1,224 holes. I
was also ninth in one-putt percentage
at 42.57 percent. But the stat I’m most
proud of is that I ranked No.2 in the
PGA Tour’s ‘Strokes Gained – Putting’
category. On average, I picked up .770
of a stroke on the fi eld in every round
I played. Nearly three shots over four
rounds is massive.
The key to all of these impressive
putting stats is distance control. I never
want to leave a putt short because you can’t
make the putt if it doesn’t get there, right?
But that doesn’t mean I just blast away
at the hole. You have to hit it at the right
pace to take the break you want and leave
yourself simple, stress-free tap-ins if you
miss. I don’t want to see my putts fi nish
any further than a foot past the hole. That
is my entire philosophy on putting. Here’s
how I make it happen.
HONE YOUR FEEL
“There’s an art to putting. Much of my
success is built around feel. For example, if
I’m teaching someone how to putt, the fi rst
thing I’ll do is ask them to tell me what they
think is the most important thing in putting.
Hopefully, they’ll respond by saying, ‘Speed’.
Without knowing the speed of your roll,
you can’t pick the line to match it. If you
pick the line before assessing the speed,
you’re going to hit the ball harder or softer
from putt to putt if you subconsciously feel
you don’t have the right line. That leads to
inconsistency.”BE AGGRESSIVE
“So many amateurs leave putts short
because they’re afraid of hitting the ball
too hard. But all of the good putters you see
on Tour are, generally speaking, aggressive
on the greens. But you have to practise a
lot to develop this confi dence. On a regular
week o away from the Tour, I’ll spend
two hours a day working on my putting,
compared to maybe only an hour or so on
my longer clubs.”TRUST YOUR READ
“The biggest piece of advice I give to
amateurs about green-reading is to trust
your instincts and completely commit to
the speed and line you’ve chosen when
you’re about to putt. Second-guessing
yourself will lead to manipulations during
the stroke and you’re never going to putt
consistently well by doing that.”MY FAVOURITE DRILL
“To calibrate my speed and distance
control, I putt balls from 15 and 30 feet on
a fl at section of the practice green. It’s all
about feel from this range. You’re trying
to make every putt, of course, but you’re
also making sure the ball gets to the hole.
My goal is to ensure that the ball doesn’t
roll more than, say, six revolutions past the
hole if I miss.”golf australia | AUGUST 2019 73