SeeMore Putters Blog

Putting Alignment www.patobriengolf.com (6/22/10)

Below is an awesome post from Pat O'Brien.  You have to take time to read this and share with your friends. Let us know what you think?

This is an article I wrote for a Korean magazine called Golf Guide. 

Understanding Alignment in Putting

This is the third article in a series on putting.  This month’s topic covers how to aim your putter properly.  It is very difficult to have a quiet mind and putt with confidence if that little voice in your head is questioning your alignment.  I want to present to you a clear cut way to know where you are aiming, so you can make a free stroke.

There has been much discussion about eye dominance in putting and how it relates to aim.  It has been my experience that there simply is not a direct correlation between the two.  I have seen right eye dominant people misalign both to the left and right, as well as left eye dominant people.  It may make for an interesting topic of conversation, but it does not factor into my teaching.  What I focus on is eyeline and how to look at your target properly.

In this first picture, I want you to notice how unbalanced my body looks. 

There is more weight on my right leg, my shoulders are tilted too much and my nose is behind my sternum.  In this position, my eyeline is pointed to the right of my intended target line. 

 

In these next two pictures, notice how symmetrical my body looks.  My weight is evenly balanced and my spine is level, not tilted to the right.  Because of this, my nose is right over my sternum. 

My eyeline is now parallel to my aiming line, as well as my body lines.

 

CLICK HERE TO SEE MORE PICTURES AND INSTRUCTION  

Pat O'Brien Blog Post (6/1/10) - Zach's Grip - www.patobriengolf.com

Below is a great post from Pat O'Brien's Blog www.patobriengolf.com.  He talks about Zach's grip and Pat's teaching on the grip.  If you have a few minutes take a look and let us know your thoughts.

June 01, 2010

Zach's Grip

By now, you have heard from most commentators about Zach's grip and how he angles the shaft slightly behind the ball at address.  I want to thank Ian Baker Finch, Nick Faldo and Jim Nantz from CBS for taking the time to talk to me about it.  I appreciate that it is unusual, and I will explain why.

This is a picture I took of Zach's grip Wednesday of Colonial.  Little did I know that I would be commenting on it again by Sunday!  I took it because he made a small adjustment on his off week, where he placed a little sliver of his left heel pad on top of the grip.  This gave him a "locked in" feeling, without tension of course, and I wanted to document it for future reference.

 

My left heel pad is more on top, and my right heel pad covers more of my left hand fingers.  I believe you have better leverage with the left hand this way, and the left wrist is less likely to break down through impact.  The right hand is less likely to dominate as well.  For more, go to earlier post on the grip and have a look at my DVD.

The main similarity between the two is that both of us have our forearms square to our target line.  Zach turns his right hand more under to achieve this, and it matches the feeling he has in his strong full swing grip.

CONTINUE WITH STORY

Pat O'Brien Blog Post - www.patobriengolf.com - 6/01/10

Below is a great blog post by Pat O'Brien.

Pat O’Brien is the teaching professional at Lakewood Country Club in Dallas.  He’s the putting instructor to 2007 Masters Champion and numerous other professionals and accomplished amateurs. Pat developed his passion for learning and teaching through his friendship with the late Payne Stewart.  He can be contacted though his blog at www.patobriengolf.com, or by calling 214-316-5303.  To learn more about O'Brien's teaching, you can purchase his

Pat O'Brien On Putting DVD.

ZACH IS BACK

Congratulations to my long time friend Zach for his victory at historic Colonial.  It is so cool to have his name up on that Wall of Champions, and also cool that he is only one of eleven people to ever win both the Masters and Colonial.  It is a pretty impressive list to join!

(I apologize for the quality of the picture)

It was obviously great to be there and witness Zach in action.  When I spoke to him before the round on the putting green, I could tell he was calm and ready to go.  When he hit a nerveless flop shot from 30 yards out of the rough on the first hole to about 6 feet, I knew that he would be in the mix.

All week, we talked about being calm and to start allowing things to happen, especially on the greens.  He has been guilty all year of trying to make putts.  There has been nothing wrong with his technique; he just wants to make the Ryder Cup team so much and he also knows that he is hitting well enough to contend often.  So, even at that level, guys get too results oriented and don't let the game come to them. 

He has received the same message from everyone on his team- Mike Bender, his swing coach, and Morris Pickens, his mental coach.  As I have said before, I feel very blessed to be part of such a great team, with Damon Green, his caddy, and Chris Noss, his strength coach.  We are all on the same page with our message, and no one is more important than the other.  It is very refreshing.

Remember, there is no try in golf.  Try equals tension.  There is only allow.  The calmest guy is the one who usually wins on Sunday.  You could see that in Zach.  That man has no fear, and he absolutely wants the ball at the end of the game, so to speak.  When you get under pressure, be aware of the tension and anxiety that you are carrying and let it go.  Don't think about being calm, FEEL it.  The flag says it best-

CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE PAT O'BRIEN ON PUTTING DVD

 

2007 MASTERS Champion Putting Drills on Golf.com

My Favorite Putting Drill
In a GOLF.com exclusive video, 2007 Masters champion Zach Johnson demonstrates his favorite putting drill and talks about his philosophies of putting.

Link to Video source www.Golf.com

Pat O'Brien Teaches PGA Carolina Section at Annual Meeting

This past Tuesday Pat O'Brien had the great opportunity to talk in front of 130+ PGA members in the Carolina Section at their annual meeting held in Myrtle Beach, SC.  He talked about his Putting Philosophy and the SeeMore system.  

In the last two years, Pat has visited a number of the 41 sections in the PGA to talk about his putting philosophy.  He is the putting instructor that everyone is looking towards when they need instruction help.  He teaches the PGA member how to teach putting by giving them a simple system.  This is why he is gaining some many top tour professionals, top college golfers and amateurs.  If you would like to gain more information about Pat and his teachings visit Pat O'Brien Golf.

Lastly, Pat and the SeeMore staff would like to thank Ron Schmid and his staff for the great efforts in putting everything together at the Carolina Section meeting.

Below are some pictures along with video coverage from Pat's seminar:

  

 

Pat O'Brien - A Simple Drill

 by Pat O'Brien

This drill is one of Zach's favorites.  Place a shaft 18 inches behind the hole and start with 3 balls 5 feet away from the hole.  The goal is obviously to make the putt; however your secondary objective is to get the ball to the hole but not touch the shaft.  When you achieve this with all three balls, move out to 10 feet. 

If you come up short on any of the three, or hit the shaft, you have to go back to the previous distance.  After you are successful at 10 feet, move out to 15.  You can go in any increments you want.  When Dr. Mo and I want to really challenge Zach, we go 10, 20 and 30 feet.  Mo has found that this really sharpens Zach's focus and makes his practice productive.  He really dials in his speed while tapping into his competitive nature.  Try it!

 

 

Breaking the "Rules" of Putting - www.putterzone.com

 

by Sean Weir - PutterZone.com

Much is made these days about the concept of putter fitting, in which the length, loft, lie and weight of a putter are carefully matched to your personal physique and mechanics.

But before you get fit for a putter, you may want to consider the putting philosophy of the person doing the fitting. For example, some putting instructors advocate that you get your eyes directly over the ball, while others suggest that your eyes should be inside the target line.

So what one person considers a good “fit” for a more upright setup will be different from a good “fit” according to someone who advocates a more bent-over, eyes-over-the-ball setup. Indeed, the former requires a longer putter, while the latter requires a shorter putter.

So the putting theory changes the fit—an interesting topic, and one that’s not discussed enough.  

On that note, we reached out to leading putting instructor Pat O’Brien to talk about his own approach to putting, and specifically some of the old putting “rules” that may be on their way to becoming exceptions.

We’ll start with the notion that your eyes should be directly “over the ball” and thus right over the target line, a bedrock of traditional putting instruction. Here’s what Pat has to say on the subject:

“There’s been a paradigm shift in the last 20 years or so. Greens are now more manicured and faster. Back in the day, greens were slower and more grainy, so the style was more of a wrist stroke, or pop stroke. Go back and look at old footage from the ‘60s and even ‘70s, and guys were more bent over, and they popped it, and the ball wouldn’t go too far past the hole because the greens were slower.

Well, the easiest way to get yourself in a position to make that stroke is to get your eyes over the ball, because then your hands and arms are trapped underneath your chest, so you can’t swing your shoulders very freely, and it’s more of a small-muscle stroke.

But if you look at the best putters of the past 20 years, and the guys that come to mind would be Greg Norman, Brad Faxon, Tiger Woods, Zach Johnson, these are guys that stand up to the ball. They have good posture, they are very athletic. And I would venture to say that their eyes are anywhere from the heel of the putter to an inch or two inside of that.

CLICK HERE to continue with Story

Technical Questions about SeeMore Putters - Loft, Lie, Arc Stroke, Pendulum Stroke

Very quickly the SeeMore Putter has become the choice when golfers are looking to improve their putting stroke.  Each day more and more are contacting us about questions on the putter.  Golfers wanting to improve their putting google us on the internet and learn very quickly why SeeMore helps in all areas of the putting stroke - alignment, set-up, posture and grip.  Learning this simple system leads to confidence when using the putter - which leads to lower putting strokes per round - which leads to lower scores.

Below are some technical answers that we have been asked from golfers on The Hackers Paradise, Golfwrx.com, PutterZone.com, MyGolfSpy, Twitter, FaceBook and may other golf blogs.  If you have any other questions please feel free to contact us at info@seemore.com.  We will be happy to help. 

Our putters are around 2.5-3.5 degrees of loft, which is the angle of the face when striking the ball.  These lofts will make sure you put optimal roll on the ball when you have your hands in the right place as mandated by the SeeMore putter (hide the red dot!).  

On the lie angle, that is a different angle, that of the shaft to the head...and 70 degrees is usually a perfect lie angle to start with which is our standard.  

On which types of putters for different strokes, in reality the arc and the pendulum go hand in hand, the arc meaning that the putter head goes slightly open and to the inside on take away, comes through square and impact, and releases slightly closed and to the inside of the line after impact.  This is the natural arc.  

The pendulum refers to the tempo of the putt, meaning on short putts the putter head travels back and through at the same pace and the same short distance back and then through..a one...two tempo...but on longer putts the putter travels back further along the arc, then travels further past the ball on impact...always staying on the arc..so the putter head is always square to the arc.  All of our putters are ideal for this type of stroke, it is personal preference, but we would say blades tend to work best.  

The other type of stroke golfers refer to is the straight back and straight through...which we believe and most believe is simply not possible to achieve...without significant wrist action as one would need to close or hood the putter on take away, and would need to slice open the putter as the stroke moves through..because turning on an arc so to try to keep the putter square to square involves this type of complicate manipulation...so one might think you are putting this way but it will be a struggle for sure. After reviewing many, many putting strokes the above explanation is our meaning of each type of stroke. 

  

We encourage you to do some research on Pat O'Brien, who instructs many tour players..at PatOBrienGolf.com, or you can link to him through SeeMore.com.  Your putting will improve, and you will understand all of the great benefits of SeeMore.  Call us at the office and we can get a putter custom built for you that will greatly improve your putting.

 

Lastly, this past Sunday was the 10 year anniversary of the passing of Payne Stewart.  Here is a great link that we would like to share with you - Remembering Payne Stewart 10 Years Later.  Do you remember where you were when you heard the news??

Congrats to Skip Berkmeyer - www.patobriengolf.com

Below is a post from www.patobriengolf.com

Allow me to brag a little on one of my students who has had a remarkable year.  Skip Berkmeyer of St. Louis, MO, won the Missouri State Amateur and the prestigious Crump Cup at Pine Valley this summer.  In the State Am, Skip made an 8 foot birdie putt on the 36th hole to extend the match, and then birdied the two playoff holes to finally win.  In the Crump Cup, Skip birdied the 18th hole in front of about 500 people to win 1up.  He is obviously not afraid of pressure!

Skip also won The William McMahon Award at this year's Porter Cup, another prestigious amateur event.  This award goes to an individual who shows a true passion and commitment to amateur golf.  Well deserved, Skip!

Click HERE to Continue with Story 

Skip is our sales representative in St. Louis, MO.

Pat O'Brien - Golf Better @ Edwin Watts (podcast)

GolfBetter host Tom Brassell and Edwin Watts Golf technical specialist, Kenny Nicholson talk with Pat O'Brien, putting instructor to Zach Johnson and others and SeeMore ambassador, at the Southlake, TX Edwin Watts store.

CLICK TO LISTEN TO INTERVIEW