[PHOTO: Maddie Meyer]
Lottie Woad, the No.1-ranked female amateur in the world, is defending her Augusta National Women’s Amateur title this week. To get ready, she said one of the aspects of her play that she’s keying in on is her putting. She said she’s working on big, breaking putts – because at Augusta National, you know you’re going to get a lot of those. And the key to putting well on long putts that move a lot is to have your speed dialled in.
“I’m really focusing on speed control, whether that be lag putting or even inside 20 feet,” Woad told Golf Digest in a recent interview. “If you’re really comfortable with the speed and you’re getting it consistently one-and-a-half to two feet by, you’re going to make more putts.”
To practise putting speed, Woad uses fake holes. They’re the diameter of a standard cup and lie flat on the green. If the ball rolls over the cup, it will have gone in. But more importantly, you can see how far the ball rolls beyond the hole.
“I can actually see the pace of the ball when I practise with these,” Woad says.
Being able to control your speed is crucial to putting well because if you’re putting with consistent speed, you’ll be able to read putts more consistently, too. Woad says when you’re putting with consistent pace – leaving the ball about 18 inches past the hole each time – “it’s easier to match your line to that”.
If you sometimes die the ball into the hole, and other times hit it three feet by, it’s hard to pick a good line. The one falling into the hole will break more than the putt hammered straight through the break. To know how to read the putt, you have to know your speed.
Here’s Woad’s advice: get a set of flat holes and set them up on a practice green. Try to putt over them from varying distances, leaving the ball a foot-and-a-half to two feet past, like Woad does. By doing this, you’re training yourself to control your speed. Even if you’re not playing Augusta National like the Woad, your putting will benefit.
