Switching
Putters

Switching putters is a habit that can harm your putting since it gets you to focus on the wrong thing.

Why do touring professionals switch putters, sometimes on a week to week basis? The answer is the same as 'Why do babies put their feet in their mouth?' It is because they can.

Should amateur golfers follow the pros' example and change their putter every time their putting goes pear-shaped? Nine times out of ten this would be a bad decision.

Tour players get their equipment for nothing. Chopping and changing between putters is easy and comes without personal cost. Manufacturers are only too happy to custom-build their putters to an individual player's specification.

This is because there is no greater marketing reward than have a player win a tournament with their latest offering. They may even offer cash incentives to induce a change.

Where golfers make the classic mistake is to associate a make (model) of putter with the ability to putt. If their putting is lousy, they believe that it is their putter that is causing the problem.

This reluctance to accept blame gives advertising copy greater appeal. 'Tests with this putter show that its improved weight distribution and soft-feel insert improve ball contact leading to truer roll'.

This may be plausible to the desperate golfer searching for a better game, but in reality it is mostly sales hype.

To play on any tour you can't be a bad putter. You may not be an excellent putter, but you can out-putt any amateur. Switching putters for a tour player is not about how to putt, but more about confidence.

For example, while a new putter won't give a better read, it may bring a renewal in confidence. That said, the really good putters stick with one putter throughout their career. The streaky putters are always on the lookout for something new.

For the weekend golfer the best putter is the one that is most forgiving of any stroke errors. This is the putter that minimises the effect of a mishit or a faulty stroke path, and at the same time is simple to align to your target.

The choice of shape is typically between a Mallet and a Ping Anser styled putter. It is best to avoid a blade putter unless you have a low handicap.

I believe that the easiest putter to use is a Mallet putter and it is interesting to note the number of tour players making the switch.

As an average golfer you probably have acquired several putters over the time you have being playing. I suspect that most of them would have been an impulse buy. Could it be that the practice putting areas in golf shops have been subtly altered so that the ball funnels towards the hole? You pick up a putter that is on special, try a few putts, and wonders of wonders they all go in the hole. You have been suckered.

Switching putters for tour players are for reasons that are not relevant to you. Find a putter with the right shape, custom-fit it, and then go out and learn to putt.

As Robert Browning in his A History of Golf stated 'There are three ways of learning golf: by study which is most wearisome: by imitation which is most fallacious; and by experience which is most bitter'.

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