I finally had time to hit the practice green and work on my short game. After about 15 minutes of chipping, I spent another 20 putting various distances and very few breaks. I was working on my setup, foot position, and aim points. After about 5 minutes of freelancing I decided to set up one of go-to putting drills. It works on my aim and distance control and forces me to focus on two important aspects of putting at the same time. Two very important aspects of putting the improves my making distance from six foot or less!

This putting drill is designed to improve my putting from 3, 6, and 9 feet. The drill is very simple and can be executed anywhere. I set up a gate with tees (two balls apart), place a third tee 2 feet behind the gate. The goal is to putt my ball through the gate with enough speed to rest against the tee, but never hard enough to have my ball travel past the tee. It is a great drill and I have found that success in this drill means success on the course.

Here is what the set up looks like from six feet:

The putting works like this:

As I worked through putting at 3, 6 and 9 feet. I found out several things about my short game. First, it is that my short game was very rusty; far more than I thought. My first 9 putts (three from each distance) were, lets say, not as expected. I hit more gate tees than than anything else. But, this is not a challenging start to my practice with this drill because it always starts this way.

Second, I needed work on my distance control through the gates. If I missed the distance part of the drill at the beginning by pounding the ball past the back tee. I have relied on hitting the ball harder than I want to sink most putts. This technique works out well on very slow greens, but on faster greens I would miss more putts than I would make.

Lastly, I found that alignment with my feet was off center. I was pointing to the left and putting to the right. My drill quickly pointed out this setup flaw and I was able to rectify my errors very quickly. Shortly after putting using this drill, I was able to right the ship.

As I continued to use this drill, I found my groove and my putting improved. I did notice something very interesting. At 3 feet, I was very successful. I had a 90% success rate getting through the gate and distance control to the tee. I shot 12 balls and only missed one on the gate and one for distance.

Moving back to six feet, my distance control wavered a bit more than hitting through the gate. My overall percentage of success dropped to about 60%. Stepping back to nine feet, my success percentage dropped to 30%. I think you can see the trend that precession of my putting drops as I moved farther back from the gate. This is not unusual, however I noticed that my success from six feet greatly improved the more I putted.

I used this drill for about 10 minutes and I noticed a significant improvement in my putting from six feet and closer. This is the critical distance when playing a normal round or in competition. Most par saves (in my game anyway) happen between three and six feet for my game. This drill sharpens my putting skills and has proven to be a real winner for my short game. It has been awhile since I used this drill, but I think it will be time to keep it using it in the future.

I am a grateful golfer! See you on the links!