The post One of the best-ever putters swears by placing a tee in the cup. Here’s why.  appeared first on Golf.

The post One of the best-ever putters swears by placing a tee in the cup. Here’s why.  appeared first on Golf.

Hit the tee. Or don’t. 

At the least, the advice is better than saying putt your ball harder. Or putt it softer. 

Brad Faxon is one of golf’s greatest putters, and the tee tip is one of his best putting drills. If you’re struggling with speed control on uphill or downhill putts, take that tee from your pocket or from behind your ear and wedge it into the back of the cup. 

On the uphill putts, try to hit the tee. On the downhill putts, don’t hit the tee. 

“With the Masters approaching, speed control is going to be really important to the winner of the tournament,” Faxon said on a video he shared on his Twitter feed. “I love this drill. On uphill putts, put a tee in the back of the hole. Practice hitting the ball hard enough so that you have enough speed so that your ball will hit that tee on the uphill putt. … 

“Now on the downhill putt, it’s the opposite. We’re going to put the tee on the other side of the hole, and when I go to putt the downhill putt, I want the ball to roll in and not touch the tee. This is a great exercise for you to practice hitting the putt with the right speed for putts that are uphill and putts that are downhill.” 

At the least, the advice is better than saying putt your ball harder. Or putt it softer. And … 

“If you can judge your speed during the Masters, you got a really good chance to win,” Faxon said. 

The post One of the best-ever putters swears by placing a tee in the cup. Here’s why.  appeared first on Golf.

The post 1 trick for removing tension in your putting stroke, according to one of the best putters ever appeared first on Golf.

The post 1 trick for removing tension in your putting stroke, according to one of the best putters ever appeared first on Golf.

To paraphrase the great Yogi Berra: putting is 50 percent mental … and the other half is mental.

No one moment in golf quite compares to the high-pressure putt, be it for money, for glory, or just for the sake of a good score. The best putters grind for hours on the green, working tirelessly in the effort of making the pressure-packed putt feel a little more comfortable. Of course, good putting mechanics help, but mechanics only go so far when standing over a three-footer with the match on the line.

Rather, it is helpful to have a system — a way of doing things that applies not only to the physical but also to the mental and emotional — that allows us to produce consistent results irrespective of the context. A system like the one legendary putter Brad Faxon laid out in a Twitter video on Monday morning.

In the video, Faxon reveals his theory of “continuous motion” — a core pillar of his overall putting strategy centered around avoiding tension. In essence, the idea is simple: if you build constant movement into your putting routine, it will keep you from building tension, which will in turn help you maintain your mechanics and produce a consistent, repeatable putting stroke.

As Faxon explains, his philosophy of continuous motion involves maintaining movement in four key areas: the putter head, feet, hands and head. To practice this yourself, listen to Faxon’s keys to movement in each of those four areas.

Putterhead: “Watch the putterhead. The constant motion, the tapping down of it, the adjusting of it, the moving side to side.”

Feet: “Now we’re going to change views and watch the feet, the feet are active here. Toes are tapping, you can’t see that, but feet are always moving.”

Hands: “Now the hands, watch the hands on the grip, the milking of the shaft through the fingertips, almost like you’re playing the clarinet. The fingers are moving on the shaft, then a little forward press.”

Head: “Now watch your head movement, the swivel of the neck, getting the eyes to focus on the target once, twice and then you go. If you can do this and have constant motion, you’ll putt better.”

Faxon is widely regarded as one of the best putters ever, owning the PGA Tour single-season record for putts per green in regulation and more recently advising many of the game’s best players on how to improve their own technique and consistency around the greens. He executes his theory of continuous motion in his own putting stroke, knocking out simultaneous movement in the span of roughly 10 seconds.

You can practice this yourself without even rolling putts. Simply stand over your putter and build a movement routine in each of the four areas until you have a consistent, repeatable motion. It’s likely to feel a bit awkward at first, but if you’re capable of ingraining movement into your routine, Faxon says, you’ll find yourself more consistent and more confident, no matter the situation.

Need help unriddling the greens at your home course? Pick up a custom Green Book from 8AM Golf affiliate GolfLogix.

The post 1 trick for removing tension in your putting stroke, according to one of the best putters ever appeared first on Golf.

The post ‘I didn’t have to say a word’: Brad Faxon recalls Charlie Woods’ first putting lesson appeared first on Golf.

The post ‘I didn’t have to say a word’: Brad Faxon recalls Charlie Woods’ first putting lesson appeared first on Golf.

Brad Faxon knows as well as anyone that life as a “putting guru” is a double-edged sword. Sure, there’s plenty to be gained from life as one of golf’s most trusted greenside experts, but there’s also plenty to be lost.

Not every golfer takes well to teaching. Not every golfer can overcome their putting demons. Not every golfer is capable of making dramatic improvements, and if they are, improvement typically comes at the end of a protracted effort. Sometimes, life as a putting guru can be trying.

But sometimes, life as a putting guru can be very, very easy. Like when Charlie Woods came in for a lesson, as Faxon explained on SiriusXM PGA Tour Radio Wednesday morning.

According to Faxon, after just a few minutes with Charlie, he spotted something special in golf’s most famous 12-year-old.

News

“I think a lot of people that have seen my little posts know I have a little workshop in the garage with all these putters, and Charlie, he knows who I am — he doesn’t really know much about me, but he knows I’m a good putter,” Faxon said. “He grabbed one of the Scotty Camerons that I had on the rack and he hit a few putts into this Scotty Cameron cup that I have.”

As Woods rocked a few putts in the garage, Faxon grabbed out his cell phone and began recording.

“I took a video of it,” he said. “I just kinda watched him. I was curious, ‘Charlie, do you know what your stroke looks like? Have you ever seen yourself putt?’ He says no.”

So, the two rolled back the tape. And what did Faxon fix?

Nothing. Charlie had already figured it out himself.

“I showed him a face-on picture and I said, ‘What do you think?'” Faxon remembered. “He said, Jeez, it looks like I move forward and my chest kinda guides through the ball.’ And I go, ‘Yeah, it does a little bit. How would you change that?'”

Faxon didn’t need to say anything more. As soon as the youngest Woods identified the problem, he’d also identified the solution.

“The next putt he made a stroke and absolutely changed it 100 percent,” Faxon said. “I showed it to him and he goes, ‘That’s better, I’m just going to do that.'”

It was a striking moment for Faxon. Woods had fixed his own putting flaw in less than five minutes, and had done it with stunning ease. He wasn’t yet a teenager, and yet he already seemed to possess a rare level of self-awareness — the kind Faxon had only ever seen in a rare group of pros.

“It kinda reminds me of what the great players have inside them, it’s almost an innate ability to fix what’s going wrong inside them while it’s happening,” Faxon said.

Sometimes, life as a putting guru is tough. Sometimes, it’s hardly work at all.

Need help unriddling the greens at your home course? Pick up a custom Green Book from 8AM Golf affiliate GolfLogix.

The post ‘I didn’t have to say a word’: Brad Faxon recalls Charlie Woods’ first putting lesson appeared first on Golf.

The post One of the best putters ever shares his 5-step putting routine appeared first on Golf.

The post One of the best putters ever shares his 5-step putting routine appeared first on Golf.

Brad Faxon, one of the best putters of all time, has holed lots of putts over the course of his career. And he knows what any good putter knows: That often, it’s your actions before you even hit the ball which will determine whether your ball will end up in the hole or not.

A good routine is one that settles the mind and body before executing the precise art of putting. A series of movements that should help golfers feel comfortable, confident, and ingrain a specific feeling they can use for the putt they’re about to hit. And all in a timely manner that doesn’t disrupt your flow.

If you’re wondering what a routine like that looks like to potentially adopt for yourself, Faxon shares a worm’s-eye view of his five-step process below.

Brad Faxon’s putting routine

Need help unriddling the greens at your home course? Pick up a custom Green Book from 8AM Golf affiliate GolfLogix.

The post One of the best putters ever shares his 5-step putting routine appeared first on Golf.

The post Greatest putters of all time? All-time great putter Brad Faxon shares his list appeared first on Golf.

The post Greatest putters of all time? All-time great putter Brad Faxon shares his list appeared first on Golf.

Sports fans are obsessed with rankings, and golf is no exception. Determining who bests whom in a skill category gives a framework for what happens between the ropes. Without these arguments, the game stops when the final putt drops each Sunday night.

Jack vs. Tiger is a popular debate among pundits. Are 18 majors worth more than 82 PGA Tour wins? How much does the era each man played in factor into this discussion? Will we ever get definitive answers to these questions? Unlikely. But that doesn’t mean it’s not fun to ponder.

Count Brad Faxon among those entering the rankings debate. However, instead of getting tangled in the messy Jack-Tiger discussion, he stuck to a subject he’s a bit of an expert on — putting.

Faxon, who was perennially one of the best putters on the PGA Tour during his eight-win career, released his (hand-written!) list of top-10 putters of all time, and although it contained some noticeable omissions (he only ranked male golfers on his list), it’s still a worthy crop of candidates.

Check out the top Faxon’s top 10 below.

10. Rory McIlroy

“Call me crazy.”

Although McIlroy has four majors to his name, he’s only ranked inside the top 40 on Tour in SG: Putting once in his career. Maybe Faxon sees something everyone else doesn’t?

9. Bobby Jones

“13 majors!!”

Jones played long before anyone had ever heard of advanced analytics, so there aren’t many stats to back up his place on the list. But with 13 majors on his resume, it’s likely a worthy spot.

8.  Billy Casper

“A lot like Locke.”

Casper was a three-time major winner and ranks seventh all time with 51 PGA Tour victories. Plus, anyone mentioned in the same breath as Bobby Locke is doing something right.

7. Jose Maria Olazabal

“So intense and simple.”

Simple is always a compliment when it comes to golf.

6. Jack Nicklaus

“Hope this doesn’t insult him.”

Most would rank Nicklaus higher on a list like this, but there’s no debating his spot as one of the all-time greats.

5. Bobby Locke

“Loved to hook em in.”

Locke coined the phrase “drive for show, putt for dough,” and that philosophy helped him win the Open Championship four times in his career.

4. Tom Watson

“Who can forget ’82 at Pebble?”

Faxon is of course referring to the 1982 U.S. Open at Pebble Beach, where Watson held off Nicklaus with some brilliant putting to claim his only U.S. Open win.

3. Seve Ballesteros

“Looked second best to Ben.”

Ballesteros’ touch around the greens was always his calling card, and those skills served him well on the greens, too.

2. Ben Crenshaw

“Looked the best doing it.”

Few would argue with Crenshaw’s place on this list. His languid stroke is still considered among the best of all time.

1. Tiger Woods

“Made every putt he had to.”

There are many assets that make Woods great, but his ability to will the ball in the hole at the biggest of moments might be his greatest.

The post Greatest putters of all time? All-time great putter Brad Faxon shares his list appeared first on Golf.

The post ‘It’s absolutely anchoring’: Brad Faxon sounds off against arm-lock putting appeared first on Golf.

The post ‘It’s absolutely anchoring’: Brad Faxon sounds off against arm-lock putting appeared first on Golf.

Arm-lock putting is swiftly gaining popularity on the PGA Tour these days. Some of the best golfers in the world — the likes of Bryson DeChambeau, Webb Simpson and Will Zalatoris — have found success arm-locking in recent years. But with the technique’s rise in popularity comes an army of detractors.

Billy Horschel made waves last week when he came out against the arm-lock putting at the RBC Heritage as he said that “guys are doing it too good.” With the putter “locked” against the arm, the face is more stabilized than when the grip rests in a player’s hands. Horschel argued that constitutes anchoring, which is banned under the rules of golf.

Horschel is not alone in that assessment as Brad Faxon, commonly referred to as one of the best putters of all time, added his voice to the anti-arm-lock brigade.

“In my opinion, we have to get rid of the arm-lock,” Faxon said on Sirius XM PGA Tour Radio. “It’s absolutely anchoring. If the USGA doesn’t think it is, then they need to look at themselves in the mirror.”

According to Rule 10.1, a stroke is defined as: “Fairly striking at a ball with the head of a club. The fundamental challenge is to direct and control the movement of the entire club by freely swinging the club without anchoring it. … The player must fairly strike at the ball with the head of the club such that there is only momentary contact between the club and the ball and must not push, scrape or scoop the ball.”

As Luke Kerr-Dineen detailed earlier this week, arm-locking escapes the wrath of the rulebook under that definition. Because the putter is resting against the arm, which is moving free and independent of the body, it is legal. There is no fixed point that the putter rests against.

Rules

Faxon doesn’t quite see things this way. He believes it goes against the spirit of the game.

“That is not swinging the golf club,” he said. “I don’t think that our founding forefathers of this game thought that you should be able to do that at all.”

No matter which side of the arm-lock argument you fall on, don’t expect the controversy to go away any time soon. As more players find an advantage arm-locking, others are likely to try it out, and more chatter around the technique is sure to follow.

Just don’t expect that to change Faxon’s view on the matter.

“I will stick with [that view] for the rest of my life,” he said. “Whether I’m a good putter or a bad putter.”

The post ‘It’s absolutely anchoring’: Brad Faxon sounds off against arm-lock putting appeared first on Golf.

The post Fully Equipped Roundtable: Scotty Cameron’s fascinating Tiger Woods and Brad Faxon story appeared first on Golf.

The post Fully Equipped Roundtable: Scotty Cameron’s fascinating Tiger Woods and Brad Faxon story appeared first on Golf.

On this week’s Fully Equipped, GOLF’s gear insiders Jonathan Wall and Andrew Tursky, along with True Spec Golf’s Kris McCormack, discuss a fascinating story about the correlation of Scotty Cameron’s work with Tiger Woods and Brad Faxon.

The post Fully Equipped Roundtable: Scotty Cameron’s fascinating Tiger Woods and Brad Faxon story appeared first on Golf.

The post Scotty Cameron’s fascinating story about Tiger Woods and Brad Faxon appeared first on Golf.

The post Scotty Cameron’s fascinating story about Tiger Woods and Brad Faxon appeared first on Golf.

There are few, if any, golfer-designer duos quite like Tiger Woods and Scotty Cameron. Woods has used a Scotty Cameron putter to win each of his 15 major titles, and both men are legends in their own right.

When you think of the Woods-Cameron dynamic, two putters likely come to mind: the Scotty Cameron Newport TeI3 putter Woods used to win the 1997 Masters, or the Scotty Cameron Newport 2 GSS prototype he’s used to win 14-of-15 majors. Those two putters are arguably the most storied and coveted flat sticks of all time.

In a previous GOLF.com story, though, I uncovered all of the different Scotty Cameron putters that Woods has used in competition throughout his career. One putter in particular on that list stood out to me. During the 1997 Buick Open, Woods used a Scotty Cameron Laguna putter that had a flow-neck hosel, rather than the plumber’s neck design he typically uses.

Putters

During a recent interview with Scotty Cameron himself – we mostly discussed his new Phantom X putter line updates – I asked Cameron about the one-off Laguna putter Woods gamed in 1997. Given how many putters Cameron has made throughout the years, I figured it was unlikely he’d remember one putter that Woods used in an event over 20 years ago, but it was worth a shot, right?

Well, it turns out Cameron did remember the putter, and the backstory might be more fascinating than the putter itself.

As Cameron tells it, Brad Faxon and Woods were both frequent visitors to The Putter Studio in San Marcos, at the time. Faxon and Woods, both of whom are illustrious putters, would come to the studio to hone their strokes and work with Cameron to design new prototypes.

At the time, and for years after, Faxon used a custom putter called “FaxDay.” The FaxDay putter was special because it had a Laguna head shape with a plumbers-style neck, rather than the usual short flow-neck on most Laguna models.

Woods’ ended up using a Laguna putter model in 1997, according to Cameron, because “Tiger loved [the FaxDay] putter, so he wanted to try it.” It wasn’t just the putter that Woods admired, though, and apparently the admiration was mutual.

Cameron says that when Woods would come in for putting sessions, he would ask to see the video and data parameters from Faxon’s recent sessions to see what he working on. Likewise, when Faxon would come into the gallery for his putting sessions, he would ask to see Woods’ video and data to see what he working on. Greatness recognizes greatness.

“[Woods] would always come in and say, ‘Hey, when was Faxon here?’ And we would say this date, this date,” Cameron explained. “He would say, ‘Can you pull that up? I want to see what he’s working on.’ Fax would come in, he would always say, ‘Hey, what is Tiger up to, can I see his last session?’ Those two always asked about each other because they admired each other’s strokes.”

Really, the story goes to show that every golfer, no matter how great, is just searching to improve in any way possible.

When I asked Cameron what amateur golfers can glean from Faxon and Woods, he said “putter length.” Cameron stressed the importance of getting your eyes directly over the ball, and having the putter head sit squarely on the ground. The toe or the heel of the putter shouldn’t stick up off the surface of the green. This will help with alignment, and hitting the ball flush on the center of the face.

So, whether it’s a Laguna, or a Newport, or a less-traditional mallet, make sure you get with a fitter to determine the correct length for your body and stroke. You may never be as good as Woods or Faxon, or have access to super custom designs, but you can always get the proper tools in your hand to putt your best.

Want to overhaul your bag for 2021? Visit the expert fitters at our sister company, True Spec Golf. For more on the latest gear news, check out our latest Fully Equipped podcast below.

The post Scotty Cameron’s fascinating story about Tiger Woods and Brad Faxon appeared first on Golf.

The post This 18 ball ‘skills’ challenge is approved by one of the best putters ever appeared first on Golf.

The post This 18 ball ‘skills’ challenge is approved by one of the best putters ever appeared first on Golf.

The post This 18 ball ‘skills’ challenge is approved by one of the best putters ever appeared first on Golf.

The post Is there a gear hack to becoming a better putter? Brad Faxon offers his take appeared first on Golf.

The post Is there a gear hack to becoming a better putter? Brad Faxon offers his take appeared first on Golf.

Everyone wishes they were Brad Faxon on the putting green. One of the greatest to ever stroke it — his 1.704 putts per green in regulation average during the 2000 season is the best ever recorded on Tour —Faxon has offered guidance to a number of high-profile names, including Rory McIlroy.

When you’re good at what you do, everyone wants to know your secrets. The thing is, Faxon freely admits there isn’t a hack to becoming a good putter. A lot of it has to do with two things: finding a putter you trust and learning how to read slope and speed.

Sticking with the same putter is a tough proposition for golfers who constantly place a bulk of the blame on the flatstick. The second things go sideways, it’s out with the old and in with the latest mallet or blade.

Putters

Someone once stole Brad Faxon’s putter and tried to sell it on eBay

Faxon has tinkered with other putters on occasion, but for the most part, his go-to wand has been a Scotty Cameron FaxDay that’s been in his possession since 1997. Instead of holding the putter responsible when things go awry, Faxon has taken a different approach during his career.

“I think it was the comfort of knowing that I was taking an attitude that the more I used it, the more I would be able to know what it feels like to hit a good putt and what it feels like to hit a bad putt,” Faxon said. “Frankly, any putter that I would use, you could make or miss with. I just said, I’m never going to blame my equipment. If I miss it, I need to have a better routine or stroke.”

Brad Faxon's faithful Scotty Cameron FaxDay putter.

Jonathan Wall

---

And his green-reading prowess? That comes from years spent observing putts as a caddie growing up in the northeast.

“I could watch balls roll and see how much they broke,” he says. “I think that I became a very good greens reader in an organic way. I didn’t have any tricks.”

If you don’t have a caddie gig, consider spending more time focusing on how your putts roll and break during practice sessions. At the end of the day, it’s the little things that separate an elite putter from the rest of the pack.

To hear more gear insights from Jonathan Wall and True Spec’s Tim Briand, subscribe and listen each week to GOLF’s Fully Equipped podcast: iTunes | SoundCloud | Spotify | Stitcher

https://soundcloud.com/fullyequippedgolf/mailbag-roundtable-edition

The post Is there a gear hack to becoming a better putter? Brad Faxon offers his take appeared first on Golf.