Compass Drill
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Learn distance control and putting strategy with my Compass Drill.
Hey guys, so I had some questions about putting distance control.
Once you switch to this body driven, big muscle driven putting movement, I'm going to give you two things today that are going to really, really help you save a lot of shots on the green.
The first one is my compass drill, and that is simply finding the zero line putt that I talked about in the other video.
So I've got my zero line putt here.
Now everything on this side of the compass drill, so I've placed balls around the hole equally at 90 degrees from the hole from my zero line ball.
So I just go up to the hole, I go 90 degrees out, that's the next one, that's going to be my east ball.
This is south, north, and west.
Now from here, everything on this side on most putts will be uphill going in this direction, and everything on the north side, the northern hemisphere if you will, will tend to be downhill putts.
So what this does is it helps me start focusing on practicing feel from different points around the green.
Where I see a lot of people make mistakes is they just go and kind of find a level putt, and then just start slamming putts, and they think they're going to develop a sense of distance control like that.
Well you will on a flat putt, but how many times do you have a, you know, a straight flat putt on the green? What you need to do is practice from all four points on the compass, and that's what's where you're really going to develop a sense of true speed and distance control.
So you're going to hit 10 putts from south, this is going to be the easiest one, straight uphill, it's just going to help you feel, you know, groove your stroke for that day, and get a sense of feel for the distance.
Then you're going to come over here to the east ball, and you're going to start hitting the second easiest putt, which is right to left putts that are going to be potentially flat, or maybe slightly, it should be breaking, it can't go uphill or downhill, it can go either way, but you're going to hit five, six, ten putts this way, get a good feel for that.
Then you're going to go to the third easiest putt, which is pretty much just straight downhill, nobody loves downhill putts, but because it's straight, you're just going to get a sense of the feel for the grain that day, and these balls are going to tend to roll out a lot more, so you're going to start to practice that feel, and then these is the hardest putt, this is the one that nobody likes, and this is left to right putt, and it could be slightly downhill, because it's left to right, And we know everything on the southern hemisphere of our compass drill is going to tend to want to be downhill, because this is our zero line ball, we know that if this left to right putt is going to be working down the fall line, so if you miss this left to right putt, it's going to tend to end up down here, whereas the right to left putt, because it's breaking up, you're initially putting that ball uphill, and it's going to be breaking a little bit downhill, it's going to lose a little bit more speed than the left to right putt, so this is the one that you got to be careful with, and this is where you start practicing getting your good sense of feel, and as you go around the compass drill, your sense of distance control will be really easy, it's just because you switch to left hand low, and you're using your big muscles, it'll take a little bit of time, but this is the best drill to help you feel distance control, now distance control is only part of really becoming a really good putter now, that you've got a good stroke, The most important thing where I see more people make mistakes than anything else is putting strategy, and that's something that's not really talked about a lot, and I want to talk about it today, because it goes along with this compass drill, on this first putt, as you're sitting here, and let's just say you're hitting five or six putts, and let's just say you ram one by and you miss it, so now what do you have coming back? I know we don't want to think about three putting all the time, of course we want to think that we're going to make every putt, but statistically we're not going to, so we've got to prepare ourselves in case we make a mistake and we don't make the putt, what do you have coming back? Well in this case, I've got about a three footer going straight down the hill, now chances are statistically that I've got a pretty good shot of making most of those putts, but sometimes I won't, and so if I do that, now I've got an uphill coming back, but now we're putting ourselves in three putt range as you ram it up the hill, so on this first putt, while it's straight uphill and you want to be aggressive with it, you don't want to be crazy aggressive in case you miss it, So, you might use the old adage that you want to run the putt only 18 inches past the hole.
Because you don't want to leave yourself a three footer coming back down the hill.
Now let's go over to the right to left putt, this is the same deal, this is a go zone putt, you want to make this, you feel like you should make most of these from six or seven feet like I am here, But now what happens if I miss this on the high side and I'm just a little aggressive? And now I left myself a three, three and a half, four footer coming back left to right, now I've got a left to right slightly downhill putt potentially, this is no bueno, so in the case of this right to left putt, even though it was totally in the go zone and I wanted to really give this a good run, I need to be a little bit more defensive in my mind that in case I miss, I'm not going to miss it way past the hole, so maybe I only miss it there and now I can tolerate, you know, a little 18 inch to two footer coming back down the hill.
Now what about the left to right putt? This is the one we're all afraid of, right? I've got this left to right breaking putt, As it gets to the southern hemisphere, it's going to tend to break downhill and run away from the hole.
And let's just say that I missed this one on the high side again and I was a little aggressive, oh that was a little dainty there, let's hit it a little bit harder and miss it a little bit further.
So still not far enough, let's go a little bit further, let's just say I miss it there.
So now what I've got is only a four footer, which granted I don't want to be four feet after my second putt at any time and want to go, your goal should be about two, 18 inches to two feet past the hole, but you can tend to be a little bit more aggressive when you know that if you miss, that comebacker is not going to be that big of a deal.
So even in this case, like yeah, I don't want a four footer here, this is too much, but the chances of me making a right to left uphill four foot putt are pretty good.
That's, I'm not worried about.
So even though on the left to right putt, our tendency is to be kind of tensed up and like, oh, I'm just going to slightly dribble it down the hole and I don't want to run past the hole.
You're not going to make very many like that.
It's actually okay when you understand the compass drill, that you can be a little bit more assertive to help it hold the line a little bit better.
So let's say I'll hit this one a little bit firmer than I might normally want to.
That was still a little girly, but you get the idea.
And even though had I missed it and it could have ran a few feet by, I'm okay with that because I'm going to make a three footer going back up the hill.
That's right to left pretty much every time.
The go putt is the one where I see people make the mistake all the time, where they've got this right to lefter or even the straight uphill putt and like, oh gosh, I got to make this as the easiest putt in golf.
I'm just going to hit it straight up the hill and then they blow it by and they're like, oh, well crap.
Now, after I missed that putt and I missed it on this side, well, now I've got a slight left to right downhill, scary putt.
So I want to, wow, what did I do? And now, all of a sudden, you went from looking like a hero because you were going to make that four foot or six, seven footer for birdie.
And now you three putt and now all of a sudden you look like a chump.
And it was all because your putting strategy was off.
So let me explain it really simple.
The putts that you normally think you should be really aggressive on are oftentimes the one you want to be normal with.
You don't want to be real aggressive with.
You want to just take a normal shot at it, let it run about 18 inches past the hole max and that's it.
The putts that you tend to think you shouldn't be very aggressive on are the ones where people tend to get themselves in more trouble.
So example, this downhiller.
This is one where I'm like, Oh gosh, I just want to barely dribble it down here, but I don't mind if I miss it, try to miss it.
And it goes three, four feet down the hill because on this four footer, this is pretty much what I'm going to ram in the back of the throat every single time.
So what that means is on the putts that you tend to be more tentative on, you actually should be a little bit more aggressive, not telling you to ram eight feet by, But a little bit more aggressive on them because that will help them hold their line a little bit better.
And you're not going to get yourself in trouble if you run it three feet by.
The putts that you want to feel like you should be really aggressive on are the ones that you should take normal precautions on.
You only want to run it 18 inches by.
You don't want to go three feet by and leave yourself with a three footer.
So typically when you're doing the compass drill, it can vary either way, but the tendency is that the south putt, The one going straight uphill and the east putt and anything on this quadrant are the ones that you want to be careful on.
When you're going the further west you go, and even though it's more of a left to right putt, That's the one that you can be a little bit more aggressive with, because it's going to leave you with an easier.
Either straight uphill or slightly right to left uphill putt.
And even when you get to where you're putting downhill, you can be a little bit more aggressive with these than you generally think.
So south to east, even though they seem like they're really straightforward simple putts, be a little more careful with these.
As you go south to west and all the way up to north, You can tend to be a little bit more aggressive with these, and you'll start making more putts and making fewer three putts around the greens.
Mike
Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Paul
Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Sean
Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
mark
Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Steven
James
gordon
Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
ejm
Chuck
Dan