7 Tips For Choosing The Right Putter
In this video, putter expert Martin Hopley explains the 7 key things you need to get right when it comes to choosing a new putter. It's the club you'll use the most during a round of golf and as a result, there are an awful lot of things to consider - including the length, head design, shaft and grip among others. If you've not given much thought to the putter you use, watch this video to the end as it will certainly spark some ideas in your mind as to how you could improve your putting.
Transcript
00:00 comes to choosing a new putter for your game it can be a bit of a minefield.
00:02 There's plenty of things to think about whether it's the head shape, head style,
00:06 the length of the shaft or the type of the grip and many other things in
00:09 between. So I've come here to the Black Bear Golf Club of Florida I'm going to
00:12 give you my top seven tips the things that you need to look out for when
00:15 you're choosing the right putter for your game.
00:19 So the first thing you need to decide is what type of head style you would like.
00:24 There's blade putters and there's mallet putters. Blade putters as the name
00:27 suggests are long thin heads they tend to be very good for people who like a
00:31 sort of shallower head front to back and these tend to be pretty forgiving but
00:34 not so much on the off-center hits. Mallet heads as the name suggests tend to be
00:38 much deeper they tend to have a square shape or sometimes a rounded shape at
00:42 the back and what makes these putters different is that the moment of inertia
00:45 or the twisting effect of the putter is much reduced and that's because there's
00:48 more weight out here in the edges of the putter and also at the back and that
00:52 means if you don't hit the putter in the middle then there's less resistance to
00:55 the face twisting open or close which will then send your putter offline. So if
00:58 you want a little bit more forgiveness and you like the look of them then the
01:01 deeper headed mallets is the one to go for. The second step is to get the
01:04 correct length of putter for your stroke and also for your posture as well. Putters
01:07 tend to range from about 33 inches right up to 35 inches and some of them can be
01:11 even longer than that. The key thing is really to get the putter that suits your
01:15 posture correctly. This is a 35 inch putter and if I was a short person and
01:19 it was too long for me then you can see here that the toe of the putter
01:23 raises up from the ground. Conversely if the putter is too short for me what I
01:27 might have is that my eye line might be outside the line of the ball. You really
01:30 want to have your eyes over the ball or just inside the ball and therefore
01:33 getting the right length of putter for you is the key thing. You want to have
01:37 the putter sitting flat on the ground, your eyes over the ball, arms in a nice
01:43 relaxed position and that will be the right length for you. Now the third
01:49 factor you look for is the type of hosel that you want because that is going to
01:52 have an implication on the amount of toe hang that you have. This is quite
01:55 important because toe hang is what will enable the face to open and close
01:59 as you go through the stroke. If you're somebody that has quite a straight stroke
02:03 then you want a putter with very little toe hang and if you have somebody with a
02:07 very arc stroke you need quite a lot of toe hang so that the face opens and
02:11 closes and squares the face at impact because that is the most important thing.
02:14 This putter here is what they call a high toe hang putter because as you can
02:17 see the toe hangs down quite a lot. It's about 60 or 70 degrees and the reason it
02:23 does that is because this is what's called an offset hosel. At the other end
02:26 is what you call a face balance putter. So as you can see here the face is
02:29 balanced because it's pointing straight at the sky when I hold it in my hand and
02:33 that's because that has a single bent hosel here. You can see it's a completely
02:36 different style of hosel. Now if you want something in between you still have
02:39 putters which have a little bit of toe hang. So you can see here this is still
02:43 another mallet putter which you might see on a face balance design with a
02:47 different hosel but by changing the hosel you actually get a little bit of
02:50 toe hang. So this is going to give you a very slight arc. Generally in the past
02:53 you will have had a mallet which was face balanced and you had a blade which
02:57 had a toe hang but now you've got every combination that can happen in between.
03:00 It's all to do with the type of hosel that you have. You put this type of
03:03 hosel into a blade putter then you can get a face balanced blade and conversely
03:08 if you put the offset hosel into a mallet then you can get a toe hanging
03:14 mallet. So the key thing is to go out and try and see which one suits your game
03:18 and the best way to judge that is being able to make a putt and try and make
03:22 sure your hands are relaxed. If you feel that your hands are having to maneuver
03:25 the head by trying to open it or trying to close it to keep the ball on line
03:28 then you probably haven't got the right hosel. If you can just relax your hands
03:32 and make a stroke without them having any influence on it then you
03:36 have the right hosel for your game. Now the fourth thing to think about when
03:39 you're buying a new putter is what type of face you want. Now there's two main
03:42 types you either have an all metal face or you have a face with an insert. But why
03:46 is this important? It really has to do with the feel of the putter and when people
03:49 talk about feel what they really mean is sound. The sound is what is important
03:52 because it allows you to judge the pace of the putter. It allows you to judge how
03:55 far you're heading at how hard you're hitting because it gives you that sound feedback and
03:58 that is what gives you the feel. Some people like all metal putters because
04:01 they tend to give a good sound feedback they're probably still gonna sound and
04:04 feel a little bit firmer but even within all metal putters you can get some that
04:08 feel softer than others and the reason they do that is because of the milling
04:11 patterns that they have on the face. This putter in particular has a deeper
04:14 milling pattern towards the heel and the toe than it does in the middle. All that
04:17 does mean is try to equalize the ball speed because there's more points of
04:20 contact with the ball in the heel and the toe and there's less in the middle
04:24 so in turn will affect the feel and also the speed off the head. If you want an
04:27 insert head then you can get various putters which have different types of
04:30 materials in the face of the putter. Now the reason they do this is partly for
04:34 feel but also partly for forgiveness because they can take weight out of the
04:37 center of the head and put it elsewhere in the putter and then the fill the
04:41 middle of the face with a material that is lighter than the steel or other
04:45 material that they've taken out of the face. So you can see here there's lots of
04:48 different options there's also different roles that you can get from this putter
04:51 because it all comes back to feel and sound. So get the feel and sound that
04:55 suits the ball you use and the type that you like to hear and the amount of
04:58 feedback that you want to get and that is the right face for you. Now the fifth
05:01 thing you want to think about when you're trying to pick your putter is
05:03 what type of alignment lines you like. Some people like some alignment lines
05:07 some people like nothing at all. As you can see here in this blade there's no
05:10 alignment lines at all and people like that if they just want to make a stroke
05:12 they don't want anything complicating their minds when they're doing it. You
05:15 can also get lines that point towards the target so if you use a line on your
05:18 golf ball or you just want some visual reference for that then these type of
05:21 putters quite good. You also get alignment lines which can then be
05:24 perpendicular to that so here this putter has a silver line which is going
05:29 this way which might help you align the face and then the line behind it will
05:32 point towards a target. You can also get putters which have circles or they might
05:38 have an open space which will be the width of the golf ball which again will
05:41 give you some sort of visual reference for the path of the ball going forward.
05:44 It really is personal preference have a try see which one suits your eye and go
05:49 without one. The sixth thing you need to consider is what type of shaft you want
05:52 in your putter. Now this might not be a decision much in the past because most
05:55 putters had a steel shaft like this one but what you're seeing these days are
06:00 some composite shafts so these are putters which are mostly graphite with a
06:05 steel tip. The point of these shafts is to actually make your stroke a little bit
06:08 more consistent. They don't keep the putter in line, what they help with is the
06:12 rhythm of the putter because it changes the swing rate of the putter a little
06:15 bit they might give you a slightly better feel. They do tend to be more
06:18 expensive so check them out and see if it works for you. Now my seventh and
06:21 final tip for picking the right putter is to choose the right grip. Not only
06:25 does it affect the performance but it's also how you feel the club because it is
06:28 the part of the club that you touch. Basically there's two types you've got
06:31 the pistol type grip which tend to be a little bit thinner here you can see how
06:35 the the butt of it is a little bit wider and it tapers down a bit so it would be
06:38 thicker at the top and narrow at the bottom. These tend to fit well in your
06:42 hand because the pistol part of it locks into the the palm of your hand and that
06:46 can help with stability. Also on the market you've seen the grips like this
06:49 which a little bit thicker and they tend to be the same width all the way down so
06:53 if you like to vary the height of your hands on the putter or even if you want
06:56 to use it as an arm lock putter where you're putting up against your arm then
07:00 these types of grip work very well because you can put your hands in any
07:03 place. They also come in various thicknesses as well this is one of the
07:06 narrow ones but you can get quite thick ones as well. Now the advantage of having
07:09 those thicker grips is that thicker the grip the less your hands are probably
07:13 able to move so if you've got quite active hands in your putting stroke and
07:16 you want to reduce that then you can try using a thicker grip because that will
07:20 stabilize the hands a little bit more and help you probably get a bit more
07:24 consistent as well. You tend to find that the more forgiving larger headed mallets
07:29 tend to come with these thicker grips anyway but you can change these grips
07:32 around but be careful when you do because some grips are lighter than
07:35 others and if you take a light grip off and maybe put a heavier rubber grip on
07:38 then you will change the swing weight of putter and the feel of it and that in
07:42 turn will have effect on the performance so if you are going to do it make sure
07:45 you get it professionally done so you get the right grip for your game. So there
07:48 you have it that's my top seven tips for helping you choose your putter. The
07:52 putter is a really important club in your bag it's the club you use the most
07:54 so you take the time to get the right putter and get it suited to the right
07:58 shape you like, the right alignment lines, get the right length and the right grip
08:02 and you will be rewarded with a club that will not only help you hold a few
08:06 more putts but also help you lower your scores.
08:11 you
08:14 you
08:16 (upbeat music)