Putting Quotes
Putting Quotes help us to reflect from time to time on how our putting is stacking up. Sometimes we lose our way and need a simple thought to point us in the right direction.
Below is a random selection of putting quotes in no particular order. Some are directly attributable to a specific individual; others just form part of a large library of unknown authors.
- INSTRUCTION
- OBSERVATION
- PRACTICE
- MENTAL
- HUMOUR
Practice strokes take your mind off the line of your putt, your image of the ball going into the hole, your feel for the speed of the green.
Dave Stockton
Aim the putter, then align your body.
Tom Watson Getting Up and Down
Putting with one hand improves your ability to sink them with two.
Jackie Burke
It is important, regardless of the grip you employ, that your hands work as one.
If your alignment is poor and you have a faulty putting stroke, being a great putt reader is irrelevant.
A good putter keeps the body still and the blade square by never allowing the left wrist to break down. The putterhead never passes the left hand.
A pre-putt routine helps you stay nice and relaxed so you can make the best stroke possible.
Tiger Woods
About all there is to putting is to keep your head steady and the face of your putter square to the direction as you stroke the ball.
Tommy Armour - Classic Golf Tips
As I see it, the thing that hurt my putting most when it was bad, was thinking too much about how I was making the stroke and not enough about getting the ball in the hole.
Bobby Jones
As regards stance and manner of hitting the ball, it is for the individual to discover on the green the means that suit him best with the club that gives him most confidence.
Harry Vardon - How To Play Golf
Bad putting stems from thinking 'How' instead of 'Where'.
Jackie Burke Jnr
Believe it or not, I’m not really thinking about anything when I putt. I let my instincts take over. When I’m putting well, I feel like I can make everything.
Brad Faxon
Don't examine the line to the hole from both ends. It only confuses you. You see so many possible lines that you will end up by choosing the wrong one.
Don't for Golfers by Sandy Green 1925
Don't let your attention wander when your opponent is putting first. You will get valuable information as to the pace and slope of the green from watching the course of your opponent's ball.
Don't for Golfers by Sandy Green 1925
Don’t try too hard to hole every putt. A 'must make' attitude puts too much pressure on your stroke. Just do your best to get the correct line and speed and roll the ball at the hole on that line.
Ben Crenshaw
Every putt should be hit as if it were a straight putt. The ball will break according to the pace of the putt and the contours of the green.
Harold Swash European Putting Coach
Exactly what are the pros and top amateurs trying to do? They are trying to find some method of stroking so that the face of the putter when it meets the ball always will be at precisely right angles to the direction line they have chosen.
The Nine Bad Shots of Golf Jim Dante and Leo Diegel 1947
For me, putting is all about good fundamentals and he has a very good stroke and believes in himself.
Luke Donald about Rhys Davies after Madrid Open
Gripping the putter too tightly is one of the surest ways to miss a putt of any length, for it is proof in the first place that you are not relaxed and that you are over anxious.
Walter Hagen
I am very aware of the weight of the putter throughout the swing, and to promote this feel I hold the club very softly at its end.
Bobby Locke
I have never seen a good putter who stands with the ball well back in his stance, as this would lead to a downward hit, making the ball jump rather than roll smoothly off the putter.
Colin Montgomerie - The Thinking Man's Guide to Golf
I recommend a rather long and unhurried backswing in putting because it makes the stroke smoother and eliminates the putting yips which sometimes besets golfers who have short, compact backswings.
Billy Casper
I think the only times I did something wrong was on those couple of putts where I thought about the outcome. That's what you can't do.
Adam Scott's 62 at The Memorial 2007
If you're misaligned, if your posture is bad, any one of many different variables, your putter is not going to go where it should, and then you've got to make compensations.
Pat O'Brien, Zach Johnson putting coach
If you have a fundamentally sound setup you are going to have a stroke that's not only correct, but repeats.
Pat O'Brien, Zach Johnson putting coach
I'm not taking as much time over the putts as I have been doing. The quicker pace helped me relax my hands and stroke the ball better.
Omar Uresti, Turning Stone Resort Championship. 2010
It is easier to take what you learn on the green, and around the green, to the tee than it is to start with the full swing and bring that to the green.
Jim Flick – On Golf
It is preferable to leave oneself an uphill putt because then, the ball has to be struck with power and only the line needs judgement. Downhill or sidehill brings force and borrow into a delicate manoeuvre.
Michael McDonnell in Golf: The Great Ones (1971) describing Billy Casper’s philosophy of percentage golf.
It is virtually impossible to make a confident stroke if you don't feel that you have control over your distance.
Peter Kostis
It's Golf 101, keep your head still when you putt. If I could keep my head still, I might become a decent putter, because I'm a pretty bad putter, typically.
Will MacKenzie - US PGA Tour
I think the only time that it is of any use to pick out a spot on the green over which to roll the ball, is when one is making short putts. If the player will locate a spot on the line about halfway between the ball and the hole and hit for that, forgetting that his putt may turn off, he will putt infinitely better.
Bobby Jones
It has often been pointed out, in connection with putting particularly, that the best judgment in the world and the most careful consideration of hazards and other dangers, are of little avail if the shot is not well struck.
Secrets of the Master – The Best of Bobby Jones
There is no magic formula to better putting that anyone can offer you. Sound and consistent putting is only the result of the mastery of the fundamentals. Yet mastery of these fundamentals can only be accomplished if they are thoroughly understood by the student.
David Lundstrom Senior PGA Tour from Master the Art and Science of Putting by Kaluzne and Piparo
I treat a 100-foot putt the same way I treat a 3-foot putt. I choose a target where I want to start the ball, usually a little spot on the grass and hit it towards that target.
Stewart Cink
Just see your break line, walk up to the ball and put a good roll on it. Don't putt to sink it, putt to make a good stroke.
Jackie Burke Jnr
Mechanics are about 10% of putting - feel is 90%. But good mechanics lead to good feel.
Tom Watson
More three-putts are caused by pace control than poor alignment, so in order to control the pace of the golf ball, it is vital that the ball must come consistently out of the sweet spot of the putter face.
Dr Paul Hurrion Sports Biomechanist and Putting Coach
Nothing matters more in putting than it should be kept simple and positive.
Laura Davies Carefree Golf 1991
Putt Reading starts with the hole's location. At every location on the surface of the green, there is a separate 'local' fall line. The fall line crosses the lip of the hole thru its highest point and thru its lowest point.
Geoff Magnum, Putting Coach
Rhys has a good set-up, his eyes are very square to the target line. He has a good tempo in his stroke and hits the ball with acceleration and a good speed. All those kinds of things you need in putting.
Luke Donald about Rhys Davies at Madrid Masters
Such is putting! 2% technique, 98% inspiration or confidence or touch…the only thing great putters have in common is touch and that is the critical ingredient … none of them found it through mechanizing a stroke, nor do I believe they could maintain it that way.
Jack Nicklaus
Swinging a putter over a straight line and seeing that you keep on the line is a great help to straight putting.
The basic elements of putting – aim, setup, routine, visualisation, solid contact, pendulum-like stroke – all carry over into the full swing.
Jim Flick – On Golf
The best way I know of building both confidence and a positive attitude on the greens is through sound technique. If you have belief in your method, that sureness will transfer itself to your mind and body.
Hank Haney : No More Bad Shots
The best way to handle pressure is to establish a pre-putt routine and never deviate from it. It should be automatic, freeing your mind so you can focus on the task at hand.
Tiger Woods
The best way to putt is the way you putt best.
The first and foremost fundamental to learn about the putting stroke is: keep the hands even with or ahead of the head of the putter on the follow-through.
Harvey Penick's Little Red Book
The only purpose of the putting stroke is to move the putter through the ball square to the target. How this is done is of no significance, so long as the method enables it to be done consistently.
Adapted from quote by John Jacobs
The stroke itself is a minor, almost insignificant, part of putting. Much more critical are consistent setup, reading greens and—most important of all—aiming the clubface correctly.
Phil Mickelson
There are no points for style when it comes to putting. It’s getting the ball in the cup that counts.
Brian Swarbrick, Author
There is no 'right' way to putt any more than there is a 'wrong' way to putt. But there are smart and dumb ways to putt.
Walter Ostroske – Two-Putt Greens in 18 Days
These kids work so hard to get these swings, but their teachers don't help their putting. A lot of them think the stroke is right-handed. It's all left-handed for right-handed players.
Dave Stockton
Trust the line you've picked, commit yourself to that line, and just make a stroke.
Butch Harmon
Tai Chi taught me that you learn the feeling of the movements first and then perform them without thinking. If you are thinking, you are segmenting and therefore out of flow.
The Fairway Within by Peter Lightbrown
The man who hits at the ball rather than through it has no sense of rhythm.
Secrets of the Master – The Best of Bobby Jones
Under pressure, one of the most important things I have to remember to do is breathe.
Curtis Strange
When you have decided on what is best for you by way of preliminaries, and they should be neither too long nor too short, you must harden yourself to follow them through every time.
Laura Davies Carefree Golf 1991
When you make a decision on how you're going to putt, go ahead and do it. Even if it misses the hole, you win, because you've succeeded in doing what you decided to do.
Chris Hoy, Golf Teacher
When you step up to a putt, remember you've got to concentrate like a sitting hen. Everything else in the world must be put out of your mind.
Don Herold - Love That Golf
Would you like to know how to sink those putts? Just hit the ball closer to the hole.
Valerie Hogan to her husband Ben Hogan during Los Angeles Open in 1937
When a putt of four feet is missed it is rarely because of a mistake in choosing the line. The mishap is almost always caused by mishitting the ball, either by striking it off line, or by failing to strike it cleanly.
Bobby Jones
You can't keep your putter on line if you move your head.
Paul Trittler, Golf Digest Aug 2006
You do not focus your eyes on the ball when you putt. You pick a spot one inch in front of the ball that you want the ball to roll over, and that's where you look.
Dave Stockton Jnr
You've got to stand over every putt with the intent that you're trying to make it. If you're not going to try to make it, then why bother to hit it?
Ken Green, PGA Professional
About all there is to putting is to keep your head steady and the face of your putter square to the direction as you stroke the ball.
Tommy Armour - Classic Golf Tips
Too much looking from the ball to the hole, back and forth, simply tires the eye and is liable to engender doubt. One's first impressions are usually correct .
Walter J Travis
It is important that you check the lie of your putter to see that it lies flat to the ground at setup and as you stroke the ball. If the toe of the putter is off the ground at impact, there is a good chance that the ball will go to the right of your target.
Bill Koen's Golf Tip-A-Day
Work on the set-up routine has a high pay-off with more consistent putting.
The Long View of Improved Putting. Richard E. Heyl and Glen R. Apple
Theoretically the eyes should be directly over the ball to see a straight line to the hole. With the eyes inside the line there is a tendency to push the ball right and with the eyes outside to pull to the left.
Langer on Putting
The essence of putting is to bring the blade back to the ball in exactly the same position it was at address.
Play Golf with Player
The control of speed, or weight, is the vital factor in judging the amount of break the ball will take.
Golf in a Nutshell. John Jacobs
If you putt badly, it eventually gets to every part of your game. It hurts your confidence if you stop sinking them.
Gene Sarazen
My personal philosophy in putting is that there are no three-putt greens. There is only a poor first putt.
Earl Woods Training a Tiger 1997
Out here the game is all about putting, and putting is all about pace.
There are many individual ways to putt. However, there are certain key elements that must form the foundation of any successful putting stroke.
Aiming in putting is a challenge. If you don't believe it, stand behind people on the practice green sometime and see how few aim the face accurately to their target.
Gary Wiren, Golf Teacher
All players, both dubs and pros, put too much strain on their putting by not working hard enough on short-iron improvement.
Sam Snead The Education of a Golfer
Any time you win a tournament, you win with your short game. Whether it's chipping or putting, you win tournaments with your short game.
John Daly
As long as you live, the hole will never come to the ball.
Willie Park jnr
Bad putters are always looking for the instant cure.
Padraig Harrington
But no matter what, you still got to get the ball in the hole. No matter how well you play, if you're not knocking in those putts, it's hard to get the job done.
Justin Rose
Generally when your putting gets better, your scores get better.
Roger Maltbie On-course Commentator
Great golfers frequently disagree on certain principles, and that is perhaps one of the main reasons we keep everlastingly at it, grasping each new thought with the hope that perhaps we can solve the mystery.
Francis Ouimet - A Game of Golf
Golfers who try to make everything perfect before taking the shot rarely make a perfect shot.
I do hit it a long way. However, I don't care about that. I care about getting the ball in the hole the fastest.
Dustin Johnson
I just had a hard time with my pace. And if you have a hard time with your pace, it's hard to read greens.
Tiger Woods, World Match Play 2006
If a player can't aim the putter, then it doesn't matter how good the stroke is. There is a good chance that the putt is going to miss.
Mike Shannon, PGA Teaching Professional and Putting Instructor at Sea Island Golf Learning Center
If there's a key to being a good putter it's having a deep understanding of how to hit the ball squarely.
Paul Runyan, Golf Professional and Teacher
If you are not confident, you start dribbling putts to the hole because you are afraid of the 2½-footer coming back.
Lee Westwood
If you hit the ball to 20 feet, it doesn’t matter how good a putter you are, you are going to two putt nearly every green and you are going to walk off thinking you are rubbish. A good putter is somebody who hits the golf ball inside eight feet.
Padraig Harrington
In putting you are confronted by two truths difficult to reconcile. If you don't get the ball up it can't go in. But for each added bit of speed it has less of the hole to hit.
Paul Runyan
It's funny, when you feel good with the putter, the rest of your game starts clicking.
Robert Allenby after adopting the claw grip
I’ve come to realize that I perform best when I’m letting my subconscious mind hit the ball and my conscious mind is otherwise occupied.
Al Geiberger, Golf Professional
I've relied on my putting more than people think. I've never been too technical. Just see the hole and hit the putt..
John Daly
Most amateurs, when they have that 10-foot putt for birdie on the first green and miss it left, they haven’t got a clue. Unless they know the difference between a good and bad putt it’s pure guesswork.
Dr Paul Hurrion – European Putting Coach
No golfer has looked up on a shot and seen a good one. Remember this when you are putting.
Players these days rarely miss from short distance and if you do, you just can't compete.
Tony Jacklin 1969 British Open and 1970 U.S. Open champion
Putting is a fascinating, aggravating, wonderful, terrible and most incomprehensible part of the game of golf.
Arnold Palmer
Putting is like wisdom – partly a natural gift and partly an accumulation of experience.
Arnold Palmer
Putting is the department of golf which lends itself to experimentation and the exploitation of pet theories.
Harry Vardon
Putting is where it's at. You can drive it a mile, hook it on purpose, pitch it over a phone booth from 2 feet away, but if you can't roll it you aren't going to beat many people.
Don Law, Golf Teacher
Reading a green is like reading the small type in a contract. If you don't read it with painstaking care, you are likely to be in trouble.
Claude Hamilton
The easiest way to become less bad at golf is to become less bad at putting, and the easiest way to become less bad at putting is to become less bad at pitching.
As told to David Owen of Golf Digest by Dr Bob Rotella
The finest way to putt is the way that gets the ball into the hole. And confidence is half the battle. Without it, putting is not merely difficult; it is impossible.
Harry Vardon - How to Play Golf 1912
The guys in contention are holing putts and the guys who aren't, aren't.
Geoff Olgilvy
The only club in the bag specifically designed to get the ball in the cup is the putter. Why not learn it first?
Jackie Burke Jnr
The putter is very important. That's half the game in professional golf.
Mark O'Meara
There are three ways of learning golf: by study, which is the most wearisome; by imitation, which is the most fallacious; and by experience, which is the most bitter.
Robert Browning
There is no faster way to lower scores and raise confidence in golf than to become a better putter.
Doug Pike, Houston Chronicle
There is no similarity between golf and putting; they are different games one played in the air, and the other on the ground.
Ben Hogan
There is no tragedy in missing a putt, no matter how short. All have erred in this respect.
Walter Hagan
When all is said and done, and whatever the method and whoever the man, successful putting surely must be a matter more of nerve than technique.
Pat Ward-Thomas, Golf Writer
When you inject the word 'Try' into golf, you'll start to feel like you're brushing your teeth left-handed. It's been said a thousand times, and it's true: There is no place for conscious effort in golf.
Dave Stockton Jnr
Without any question or debate good putting has won more matches and poor putting has lost more matches than any other single virtue or fault in golf.
Grantland Rice The Subtle Art of Putting in The American Golfer November 1926
You can always recover from a bad drive, but there's no recovery from a bad putt.
Jimmy Demaret
You don't necessarily have to be a good golfer to be a good putter, but you have to be a good putter to be a good golfer.
Tony Lema
You know you’re a sad case when you spend your spare time reading books on Putting or going on YouTube to watch slow motion golf swings.
Hugh Grant - Actor
You take three putts through getting the distance wrong, not the direction.
The Best of Henry Longhurst 1979
The putting game becomes difficult when you try and consciously control the putter, think too much about what you’re doing, and take too long over the ball.
Cameron Strachan
You take any top player, make them No.1 for the week in putting and he will be tough to beat.
Hank Haney
Feel in golf is the ability to decide on a putt of medium strength and then hit the ball with medium strength.
Gary Player Play Golf with Player 1962
No matter your scoring goals, you can attain them faster by improving your putting.
Jack Nicklaus
Whatever the manufacturers say, nothing on earth can enlarge the sweetspot - but we can enlarge the area of forgiveness.
Andrew Greig - Preferred Lies: A Journey to the Heart of Golf
For most tour pros, good scoring comes down to making putts. Many players hit it great from tee to green. The winner's check usually goes to the player who is draining putts.
Going Low by Patrick Cohn Ph.D.
You can't read a putt until you know the speed you are going to hit it. Then if you don't hit at that speed, the read is no good.
Peter Kostis Putting Secrets of the Pros
In putting, for example, the best putters in the world rely on their vision, imagination, and experience. You can't reduce putting to a formula – it isn't like the problems you solved in high school physics or geometry.
Going Low by Patrick Cohn Ph.D.
Make a resolution to enjoy your golf. A positive attitude will help your putting.
Approaching a putt with doubt in your mind is nearly always fatal.
Bobby Locke
Bad putting is due more to the effect the green has upon the player than it has upon the action of the ball.
Bobby Jones
Generally speaking if pressure starts to become an issue it will show up in putting and chipping first and then work its way back to the fuller shots.
Peter Kostis
Good putters believe they are good putters.
Curtis Strange
I felt I was so mechanical I lost any type of intuition I had in putting. I had to get away from the mechanics of it and just roll the ball.
Joe Durant, Winner Funai Classic 2006
I honestly believe that with a strong mind, you can literally will the ball into the hole.
Ray Floyd
I need an attitude readjustment. I need to care a bit less about the game. You can't wait for the golf ball to make you feel happy because it ain't going to make you feel happy every day.
Graeme McDowell 2011 Open Championship
I never missed a putt in my mind.
Jack Nicklaus
I never pray to God to make a putt. I pray to God to help me react good if I miss a putt.
Chi Chi Rodriguez
I think good putters see the ball going in; bad putters see the ball staying out.
Chi Chi Rodriguez
I didn’t miss the putt. I made the putt. The ball missed the hole.
Peter Jacobsen
If you worry about the ones you missed, you are going to keep missing them.
Walter Hagen
It isn’t your game; it’s your bad mental reactions that can give you real fatigue. A missed 18 inch putt can be more exhausting than a well-hit 225 yard drive and the walk to the ball.
Don Herold
Never berate yourself on the golf course. It has disastrous results. Be your best friend out on the fairways. Staying positive can only do great things for your game.
Norman Von Nida - The Von
Never blame yourself. Tour pros realize it, and it's why they tamp down imaginary spike marks after missing short putts. Blaming outside agencies for a bad shot is much better for your frame of mind than telling yourself you're a lousy hack.
Dave Stockton Jnr
On the putting green, the mind can be a grave source of trouble.
Joyce Wethered
One thing I’ve learned from golf psychology is how my unconscious mind automatically follows where my conscious mind leads.
Andrew Fogg, hypnotherapist and NLP Master Practitioner
Putting is not mechanical, it’s a state of mind. The key thing for someone who doesn’t putt well is get them to see the ball going into the hole.
Dave Stockton Jnr, Putting Coach to Michelle Wie
The ball doesn’t care how positive you are thinking when you hit it with a putter moving and aimed in the wrong direction.
Dave Pelz, Golf Teacher
The finest way to putt is the way that gets the ball into the hole. And confidence is half the battle. Without it, putting is not merely difficult; it is impossible.
Harry Vardon - How To Play Golf
The prime requisite for putting? An abounding confidence in one’s ability.
Walter Travis, Renown Amateur Golfer
The putting game becomes difficult when you try and consciously control the putter, think too much about what you’re doing and take too long over the ball.
Cameron Strachan
There's an old saying, 'It's a poor craftsman who blames his tools.' It's usually the player who misses those three-footers, not the putter.
Kathy Whitworth, Golf Professional
To play well you must feel tranquil and at peace. I have never been troubled by nerves in golf because I felt I had nothing to lose and everything to gain.
Harry Vardon
We know so much about technique that the last frontier in golf is mastering the mind.
Gary Player
When a putter is waiting his turn to hole-out a putt of one or two feet in length, on which the match hangs at the last hole, it is of vital importance that he thinks of nothing. At this supreme moment he ought studiously to fill his mind with vacancy. He must not even allow himself the consolations of religion.
Sir Walter G Simpson – The Art of Golf
What separates great players from the good ones is not so much ability as brain power and emotional equilibrium.
Arnold Palmer
What we really want people to understand is that it is having fun putting and being creative and getting your mind out into the target rather than worrying about doing everything perfectly with your stroke itself.
Bob Rotella - Putt to Win
You can't improve your putting on off days by trying harder. The best move then is to ease up, lighten your grip and slow down the pace of the putter.
Freddie McLeod US Open 1908
You're only hurting yourself if you don't have an ultra-positive attitude about putting.
Raymond Floyd
It's so hard to get it close if all you're trying to do is get it close. You've got to try and hole every putt.
Ian Baker-Finch
It's difficult to try your hardest and not care about the results. They contradict one another.
Lee Westwood US PGA 2011
If you want to putt your best, you have got to love to putt.
While putting makes up 40 percent of our strokes, it makes up 80 percent of the anguish.
Dave Pelz
To maximise your performance on the course, never get over-excited after making a putt or distressed after missing a putt.
The Putter's Pocket Companion. Jim McLean and Fran Pirozzolo
Putt better and you'll gain confidence. Gain confidence and you'll putt better. It's a magic circle.
Chris Meadows – The Encyclopaedia of Golf Techniques 2004
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