Putting is one of the most exciting parts of golf’s next major tournament, The Masters. Gravity Golf Instructors Daniel Lee and Jim Edgin demonstrate a one handed driver putting drill to help you improve your stroke, feel, and overall putting.
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The thought of putting with the driver may strike you as a little odd, but there are a number of good arguments for doing it that are all science based. In fact, all of the unusual drills that we have developed at Gravity Golf are science based, and each drill is designed to aid a particular aspect of the golf swing, whether it be in the full swing or short game. As I’ve said many times before, the various drills magnify improprieties in power application, and allow the player to identify his/her technical weaknesses, as well as the solutions for curing them. Practicing putting with a driver is enormously beneficial toward the development of great touch and feel on the greens, and below are a few of the reasons why.
The driver, because of its length and lightness, is very prone to jumping off-plane when using it
for delicate shots, unless, power is being applied to it in a technically perfect manner. It
functions like a microscope or an MRI to identify the quality of your mechanics (or flaws).
Any driver will hit putts that are deadly accurate and have perfect roll and distance control when
it is handled by someone that understands ideal power application.
One of the first things it teaches is that powering a putt should be accomplished with a rotary
stroke, and not a back and forth, on the flight-line, stroke.
Putting with a driver dispels the age-old golf cliché that the eyes should be over the ball when
you putt (no science behind that idea whatsoever). Your eyes are not over the ball on a tee
shot, or any other shot, and they can all be hit as straight as a bullet. Why should we re-invent
the game to hit a putt? There are a number of factors that make a golf ball go on-line, and
having the eyes over the ball is not one of them.
Putting with a driver causes miss-hits and loss of distance control when power is not applied to it
correctly, much more than a putter does. It is far easier to identify proper rotary putting
technique with a driver, than it is with a putter. Once that is accomplished, it creates a superior
putting stroke automatically when you pick up a putter.
Because of its length, using the driver to putt, makes it is easy to learn the geometry of
alignment when applying power around a single axis. You can feel the proper relativity of the
ball to the post leg, and the proper angle of the clubface. These are both critical factors in
starting the ball on an intended start-line.
I can feel myself being sucked down the “rabbit hole” of how explaining one element of the swing demands an explanation of all of them, as well as how they relate to each other. All golf shots have an ideal recipe, with most of the mechanics relating to any type shot. There are slight differences depending on the shot, but the essentials of proper power application are common to them all. There are hundreds of ways to knock a ball in the hole with a putter. You want to know which method is the most reliable and will work under pressure. Putting with a driver does not give good results unless power is applied in an ideal manner, which is exactly why you should practice putting with it. Find the biggest green you can. Take your driver and putt the full length of the green until the ball rolls smoothly and accurately, with perfect distance control. Once you can do that, start cutting down the distance until you can consistently make three or four footers with the driver. After you become proficient at putting with the driver, you’ll be ready to take on the challenges of a putter, but with a far better idea of how to properly apply power to it. Send us a report on your progress!
David Lee
