Lag Putting MasterClass
Hope you all had a wonderful New Years Eve, and hopefully you got a round in over the last couple of days. I know I did. Because I know I won’t be sniffing the course today lol. I don’t recommend going anywhere near a golf course on New Years Day unless you want a 7 hour round. Not joking.
Anyway, I’ve decided one of my New Year’s resolutions is going to be improving my lag putting - and I think it should be one of yours too. It’s an easily forgotten about skill, that is relatively easily to build, and will save you SO many strokes over the course of a round. Unless I guess you’re just so good that you never leave yourself with more than a 10 foot putt. But if you’re reading this, I’m going to assume that’s not you.
You know the feeling. You stripe a drive down the middle, hit a decent approach shot, and now you’re on in regulation on a Par 4. Nice. All you need to do is 2 putt for a par. Just like a pro. Except your ball is 45 feet from the hole. And you immediately feel that little knot in your stomach because you know deep down, that there is a very good chance you 3 putt this.
You take a timid jab at it. Ball rolls out maybe 20 feet. Great. Now you’ve still got a 20 footer and you’re already in your head about the last putt. You now run that one 4 feet past the hole because you’re trying to make up for the first one. And of course you miss the 4 foot come backer. Nice. You’ve now just 4 putted and made double bogey. After being on in regulation.
Why do I play this game?
Here’s the thing though: knowing how terrible of a lag putter you are and acknowledging it is your first step to recovery! It is true that lag putting is probably costing you more strokes than any other single part of your game. The average amateur three-putts on almost 20% of holes. One in five greens, you’re just handing away a stroke because you can’t get a long putt anywhere close to the hole.
Tour pros? They three-putt under 3% of the time. THREE PERCENT. THATS INSANE.
That gap is where a ton of strokes are hiding. It’s in your inability to lag a 40-footer inside three feet instead of leaving it 15 feet short or blasting it 10 feet past.
And the worst part is you’re probably not even practicing it. You spend all your putting practice working on 6-footers - which, ya, those matter - but you’re ignoring the skill that would actually prevent you from having half a dozen of those nerve wracking 6-footers per round in the first place.
The One Thing You Need to Understand About Lag Putting
Ready for this? Here’s the part that REALLY matters.
