Putting: setup, stroke and what the studies found.

Setup

Jack Nicklaus described his putting fundamentals to GOLF.com in 2019. He keeps his eyes over the line, with the left eye over the ball and the right eye behind it, the shaft vertical rather than leaning toward the target, and his arms and shoulders parallel to the line. Foot width and foot alignment, in his view, matter less. He keeps the same grip pressure from setup through impact, and credits his coach Jack Grout with the cue of soft, relaxed forearms.

Parker McLaughlin, a GOLF Top 100 Teacher to Watch, calls eye position non-negotiable (GOLF.com, 2024). The eyes should start on, or slightly inside, the line of the ball. To check, drop a ball from your eyes at address and see where it lands.

Two other findings bear on setup. Dave Pelz's "Perfy" putting robot, as reported by Inside Science in 2015, showed that hands hanging under the shoulders produce a natural stroke. And Mark Smith of the University of Lincoln found that tour professionals spread their foot pressure more evenly from heel to toe and left to right than amateurs do.

The stroke: arc or straight?

Three GOLF Top 100 Teachers gave GOLF.com their views in 2023:

• Lou Guzzi: because the putter is set on a tilt, the stroke should arc to the inside on both sides of the ball, with minimal face rotation.
• Michael Hunt: most putts should arc, though straight back and through is acceptable on short putts.
• Joe Plecker: posture decides it. More forward bend gives a straighter stroke and a taller stance gives more arc.

Hunt and Plecker both leave room for a straighter stroke in some cases. We found no peer-reviewed study comparing arc and straight-back strokes, so this remains a matter of coaching judgement.

Tempo and distance

Physicist Robert Grober, formerly of Yale University, studied the strokes of great putters (reported by Inside Science in 2015). Their backswings took about twice as long as their downswings, and Grober describes the stroke as a pendulum. At a constant tempo, backswing length sets the distance, and doubling the length of the backswing sends the ball about four times as far.

Inside Science also reports that Dave Pelz's "Perfy" robot showed that keeping the putter face square through impact is critical. The 2005 biomechanics review by Patria Hume, Justin Keogh and Duncan Reid adds two general recommendations for putting accuracy: grip lower on the club, and use a slower, shorter backswing.

Quiet eye

Joan Vickers was the first to compare where expert and novice putters look (1992). The experts held a steady gaze on the back of the ball for about two seconds before the backswing, kept it there through contact and for a moment afterwards. Vickers later named this the "quiet eye".

Samuel Vine, Lee Moore and Mark Wilson of the University of Exeter tested whether it could be trained (Frontiers in Psychology, 2011). They randomly assigned 22 elite male golfers, with a mean handicap of 2.78, to quiet-eye training or a control group, and recorded their putting over ten competitive rounds before and after.

• Quiet-eye duration predicted 43 percent of the variation in putting error.
• After training, the trained group took 1.92 fewer putts per round (27.6 against 29.9 for the controls), while the controls showed no significant change.
• In a pressure test, the trained group holed 60 percent of putts against 36 percent for controls, and held their quiet eye for about 2.8 seconds against 1.4.
• In the test without added pressure, the difference in putts holed was not significant.

How often tour players hole out

Two widely quoted sets of make rates disagree. They come from different seasons and methods.

The GOLF.com figures (Dylan Dethier, 2019) do not state which seasons they cover. They continue beyond 10 feet: 30.1 percent from 11 to 15 feet, 18.3 percent from 15 to 20 feet, 12.5 percent from 20 to 25 feet and 5.5 percent beyond 25 feet. Broadie's figures, from his strokes-gained work, come from The DIY Golfer's review of his book "Every Shot Counts". On both sets of figures, tour players hole only about half their putts from 8 feet.

The yips

Aynsley Smith and colleagues at the Mayo Clinic surveyed 72 golfers with the yips (Sports Medicine, 2003). Their mean age was 52 and mean handicap 6.7. 55 percent described physical symptoms such as involuntary jerking, and 22 percent psychological ones. The researchers placed the yips on a continuum running from performance anxiety to focal dystonia, a neurological condition.

In 2018 Charles Adler and colleagues, from the Mayo Clinic and Arizona State University, tested 27 golfers with apparent yips (Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise). Five showed a neurological cause, dystonia, sometimes called "golfer's cramp". Nine had the yips without a neurological cause, and thirteen showed no yips during testing. In the dystonia group, the yips did not change when they putted with the right hand only; in the other yippers, the yips and the co-contraction of forearm muscles rose sharply one-handed.

Both studies link at least some cases of the yips to dystonia, a neurological condition. A persistent involuntary movement is a medical question for a doctor, not something a page like this can diagnose.

Putting and the Rules

Under the 2023 Rules of Golf, in effect from 1 January 2023, Rule 10.1 says a stroke is made by swinging the club freely without anchoring it. Rule 13.2 lets you choose before each stroke whether to leave the flagstick in, have it removed or have it attended, with no penalty if a ball hits a flagstick left in the hole. Rule 13.1c lets you repair most damage on the green, including ball-marks and shoe damage, but not natural imperfections such as aeration holes. The R&A says the next edition is due on 1 January 2028. More is on the putting green page.