Golf Smarter number three eighty two, published on April thirtieth, twenty thirteen.
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The most important thing is to separate out the elements, and this is what most people don't do in their putting routines. When you've taken your practice stroke and you're ready to address the ball, you have to be done with thinking about how you're going to make that stroke. You have to be finished with that and say, Okay, that's the stroke I'm going to put on it, and I give some ideas in how to make every put
of how to go about finding your best stroke. Then when you set the putter and you've taken your stance, you have to be done with direction. You don't want to be pushing or pulling any putts, so you make a commitment to use your stroke to send the ball on the line where that hutter's pointing at address No Push, No Pull. There's a chapter called every Putt starts as a straight putt, and that's really what you want to do.
How to make every put With Zen Golf author doctor Joseph Parrot.
This is Golf Smarter sharing tips and insights from golfers and golf professionals to help blower your score. It's worked for your host, Fred Green.
Welcome back to Golf Smarter. Doctor Joe.
Hi, Fred, great to be here.
It is great to have you back because we've had you many times. You are the most regular of our regular guests, and it's mainly because that your first book, Zen Golf, led me to this podcast. Honestly, I mean, what it meant to me and on the bigger picture made me think in a whole different way and launched this podcast and the questions behind this podcast. It was definitely from Zen Golf.
So again, well thank you, Fred. It was a pleasure being on that first podcast, and I appreciate how much you connected with Zen Golf. Every time we've talked, you've really shown that you understood it and understood where I was coming from. And it's been very gratifying how many golfers have really appreciated Zen Golf. I get a lot
of emails thanking me for writing the book. And it's been eleven years since the book came out, and it has stayed pretty consistently in the top five of all golf books throughout that time, which is remarkable for a little book on the Eastern wisdom and Western psychology principles of getting out of your own way and playing your best golf as much as you possibly can.
And that is why it's probably the most successful golf mental book in history.
Right it seems that way, certainly in the last decade, and it's really been a great, a great phenomenon that I really didn't expect when I first wrote it. But it's been consistently in the top five in mental game golf books and in all golf books for the last decade. So that's that's been great. And you know, it came out eleven years ago and it's still near the top
of the chart, so awesome, got lasting power. I really appreciate your your how much you connected with it and how much it meant to you and how and the feedback that I've gotten from people about it.
Yeah, that's great. Well, there's a new book out, and as soon as I saw the title, I went, We've talked about this, the title the new book, how to Make Every Putt the Secret to winning Golf's game within the game. So how to make Every putt is a line that you have said on this show. You know you made the putt, you just didn't hold it, right? Is that where we're going with this?
That is the basic principle, you know, a cup. I've gotten some very nice reviews about the book already, and a couple of them mentioned they say it's a presumptuous title or it's a you know what, what does that mean? How to Make Every putt? And I made that the title because I wanted to intrigue people and say, is that possible? Well, it's possible if you change the definition of making a putt and separate out making and holding.
So if you got the putt started just the way you want it, and we know what that feels like when it leaves the putter face and we say, oh, yeah, I really like the way I got that one started, then you made your putt if it's on the line you chose, at the pace you chose, with a good roll coming off the sweet spot of the putter. Then you made your putt, then you see what happens, and if it goes in, then you hold your putt. So
we separate making and holding. It's highly unlikely that you're going to hold every put but you can make every putt, and you want your confidence to be based on your execution, not so much on the outcome, because we're not dealing with a perfect surface. You know, on the PGA Tour average, and this is a group of the best golfers in the world, the PGA Tour average from eight feet is only fifty percent amazing. So if you say, you know,
these guys, they're not that good. They miss half their putts from only eight feet away.
I can do that.
That doesn't sound very That's not a confidence builder. So and to have your expectations. I have a chapter in the book about lowering your expectations. If you think that you should hold every putt from eight feet, you're going to be pretty frustrated since the best golfers in the world only hold half of them. Yeah, well, your expectations and focus more on building your confidence based on how you get the ball started. And then if you get
the ball started the way you want to. The only thing you need to adjust is how well you read the putts and how well you gauge the field of the pace.
And that's what this book is about.
That's right. Yeah.
I mean I think that there's a bigger picture to all of this, and that is that our expectations on our game is always probably set a little too high and leads to disappointment and frustration.
Probably true, and more with putting than anything else. I don't think we really compare ourselves so much to the pros when it comes to t shots, and not many people I know hit the ball three hundred yards, so it's not too realistic to compare ourselves to the pros
hitting greens. Well, most of what we see on TV are pros that do hit the greens, but we have to remember the clubs that they hit into the greens are usually shorter than the ones that the average middle to high handicap or plays, So we really can't have that much expectation. But putting, come on, there's the ball, there's some grass as a hole doesn't take that much, it doesn't take strength, it doesn't take that much skill er coordination. That's where we start to compare ourselves to
the pros. And the problem comes in with telecasts. Golf telecasts. Mostly we watch golf on TV, and if you watch golf on TV, you see mainly the guys who are leading and mainly the ones who are sinking putts.
Right, let's go back to thirteen. Now is sixty footter, and of course it's a replay of something that's already happened, so they've already vetted that shot. They're not going to show you. They'll show you a miss if it's two feet, but they won't show you a miss if it's eight feet.
So they'll show you the leaders. And then if you see a guy who's not in contention, and as you said, as about a sixty foot or across the green, bet your friends that he's gonna hold it, because the only reason they're showing the guy is because they're going to
show him holding a pot. Right, So you see puts going in all the time on TV, and then when yours don't go in at that frequency, you start to get frustrated, be more realistic and focus more on how how good it feels to get the putt started, and realize on a twenty footer you know, maybe one out of one, out of ten or twelve is all at the pros hole. So when yours goes in, get excited when it gets close, feel like, hey, I did a good job. I rolled a good putt there right right.
And it's interesting because you know, when you talk about a level playing field with the pros, it's the place. I feel that putting is the place that if somebody's interested in getting started playing golf, that's where you should take them. Is a practice putting green, not a driving range, because the driving range can be so frustrating because you're not hitting the ball. But even a five year old can put the ball in the cup, right.
I like to teach. When I teach beginners, I do something that Harvey Pennock said the same thing. And you know the objective of the game is to get the ball in the hole, So start with that and work your way back.
Well, I taught Harvey everything he knows.
That's good, so we do want to I like to teach it backwards, so you work starting with a two foot putt, in fact, a tapin there's a chapter in How to Make Every Putt called turning knee knockers into tap ins, and I put something similar in zen putting, and that is that you're little tap in strokes. It's free of worry, it's free of care. You just make a little swipe, you know, a little back and through with the putter, and often it represents your best putting stroke.
So when you get four feet away from the hole, you make your tap in stroke. It's usually enough to get it all the way to the hole. You'll find you're making your best stroke that way. So we start with a tap in and work our way back, and
then you work to long putts. And then if I'm teaching somebody golf, then I start teaching them with osay an eight iron from just off the green, but I have them make a putting stroke with that, and they begin to see that the ball goes in the air without them helping it in the air, just by making a putting stroke along the surface with their eight iron and then a pitching wedge, and then they start to get the idea, Oh, I just send the club through
the grass under the ball, and that's what lists the ball in the air. I don't have to help help it up. Because helping the ball in the air is the most common cause of fat shots and top shots.
To me, the ball going in the cup. That's what I call the happy sound. I mean, that's what I'm looking for. I got to hear the happy sound. I'll tap it in.
Don't give it to me. In fact, I tell people in their warm ups for going out before they play, the last thing they should do is cut a few two footers because you're not going to miss too many of those, and so you'll have a feeling of confidence of both making your put and holding your putt, and you get to hear that sound again and again and again, and it's very reinforcing and confidence building.
Yeah. Absolutely, I mean I should have I wish we would have had that conversation last week because I should have done a couple more two footers before my round. I feel that I have a decent mental game because I'm a a practitioner of zen golf and all that you have taught me in your books. But when I get frustrated, you know, I can let it go. I can let it go. That's fine. Something happens, it's out of my control. I'll start laughing about it instead of
screaming and throwing things. But last week I was playing with a friend. Par three, I hit a great gap web shot right leaves me four foot from the cup. I was so excited because my friend put the ball in the water. Then he put one off the green. I three putted from four feet and I cannot let it go. That is the one thing I've been still frustrated about that round is I three putted from four feet.
Clearly you can't let it go. Right now, let me let me guess you didn't leave it short.
H No, the first one, Nope, on any of them.
I got it, So you know, you you might have decided, oh, I'm not sure if there's any break, I'm going to just aim at the hole and hit it a little extra firm and make sure I don't take out any break and then zoom it goes by. And then you try it again, and well, at least you didn't four putt. You know.
That's well, there you go, Okay. I feel so much better.
Now, you know. In Zen in Zen Golf, there's that chapter where I tell the story about the two monks walking around walking down the road and in their monastery they they've taken a vow of celibacy and also not to not to even make contact with women. But they meet this woman in a beautiful silk kimono who's trying to cross the stream, and one of the monks says, well,
climb on my back, I'll take you across. And he takes her across the stream and she thanks him and they go on their way, and the other monk is very very upset, and he's thinking, how could my brother have violated his vow and how could he do this? And am I going to get in trouble if I tell on him? And then I'm kind of a rat and I don't want to do that. But if I don't tell him and people find out, then I'll get
in trouble. And he gets all worked up and upset it and upset, and about half a mile down the road he screams out, how could you do that? And the other the first monk says, do what he says? That woman? He said, oh her, her? I set her down when we crossed the stream. Why my brother, are you still carrying her? I want you to encourage, to encourage you. You know, what's done is done, and set it down at the end of that round, and it's
time to move on. Okay, I have a good friend who says, he says, you know, we think about the past, and we run it through in our minds again and again, as if we could change it, as if thinking about it is going to make it any different. Well, it's not right. So you have to say, Okay, what can
I learn from that? What I can learn from that is I have to treat a four foot putt just like any other putt, And on any other putt, you don't want to run it four feet by you want you wanted to go at a pace that it's going to take it no more than a foot foot and a half past. Got it? I do.
I appreciate it, and I promise from now on I'm going to be putting in a great silk kimono.
A good plan.
Let's talk about some of the chapters in this book. Let's talk about the things that we can learn from this book that we're going to take away from this book. And before we do that, I just want to commend you on this awesome element that you've included at the end of every chapter. You have QR codes that when you scan it with your I something or your pocket phone pad whatever.
Whatever we use smartphone or.
Smartphone or device tablet. When you scan that, it'll pop up a video that shows you basically what the tip you've been trying to give in that chapter.
That's right. We don't have for every single chapter, but many of them have these QR codes, and in a lot of the chapters, the way the chapters are formatted, they most of them have a challenge. It talks about one of the challenges of putting and the solution that I provide, and often an exercise, a drill, or a demonstration. So these drills or demonstrations are what we have videos of on my zenngolf dot com website and they're also
on YouTube. And what will happen is when you scan the QR code at the end of the chapter, it'll take you immediately to the video on our site. It'll take a little bit to download. So what I recommend is people scan it in first, then read the chapter. By the time they're done reading the chapter, it'll be loaded on their computer and they'll be able on their smartphone or device and they'll be able to play it and see me demonstrating that particular tip, that particular drill
for that chapter on the ebook. I don't think we're going to have the QR squares because you have your e book right there, but it will have a link to that very same video.
Oh fabulous. And how long are the.
Videos anywhere from thirty seconds to a minute. I think a minute and a half is the longest one. So they're very short. Yep. You know. The book is written for our modern generation. No chapter is more than two pages, so I make the point, I get to the point, and then go to the next one. And the videos are the same. They're just very brief drills and administrations of what's in the chapter.
Sounds like the keeping the which I appreciate greatly. Keeping the chapters short, that that was something that you thought well in advance to make sure that you did.
That was a planned part of the format. And I had to edit some of them down and it was a great exercise because it really it made me take out any extra stuff, any fluff. You know. It's just really the key points, raising the questions that golfers have about putting, answering that question, giving them drills and exercises to do so. One, two, three, and move on.
And this book is not just a zen golf type of putting instruction book you give actual, you know, physical things to do beyond what's in your head to make you a better putter.
Yeah, we include some elements of the stroke in here, and I develop those in conjunction with people working on the mechanics of putting. But also, you know, I work with a lot of different instructors and a lot of scientists who worked on the mechanics through I think there's all these putting monitors that they have nowadays that they and they've come up with really what some of the key elements are. So I include a few of those, but I also include options because it is really more
of an art than strictly a science. So when we talk about the grip, I include lots of different ways of holding the putter and talk about the fundamental motions.
They're not that different. But the key is that you want the putter face to be sending the ball directly on the line perpendicular to the way that face is set up at address and whatever gets the putter back to that point that's not a glancing blow, but that the putter head is moving down the same line and the face stays square to that line at impact, before or after it's not as important as at impact that's going to send the ball where the putter's pointing, And
that's really a key element in the routine that I teach.
It's more than just the stroke. You get into elements. And what I'd like to do is if I throw out a topic, if you can just go ahead and run with it and I'll pull from the book. Yeah, I would love to do that. And we don't have a ton of time left for this episode, but would you be able to stick around and we'll do a member's only episode and we can get into a lot more depth of the book.
Absolutely, let's do a few now though, Okay.
Let's do it for a few now, and no.
Definitely want to get them going on the routine.
Oh, absolutely, so let's go ahead and do that. Let's talk about the shot routine.
Okay. The most important thing is to separate out the elements, and this is what most people don't do in their putting routines. You have to separate out the elements. So when you've taken your practice stroke and you're ready to address the ball, you have to be done with thinking about how you're going to make that stroke. You have to be finished with that and say, okay, that's the stroke I'm going to put on it, and I give some ideas in how to make every putt of how
to go about finding your best stroke. Then when you set the putter and you've taken your stance, you have to be done with direction. You don't want to be pushing or pulling any putts, so you make a commitment to use your stroke to send the ball on the line where that putter's pointing at address. No push, no pull. There's a chapter called every putt starts as a straight putt,
and that's really what you want to do. The third thing is to connect with the distance and only look for pace, for the feel for the distance, and take a good long look. Don't just glance at the hole and then guess how big a stroke to make. Let your visual connection with the distance imprint that distance as you look at the hole, or maybe you're not looking at the hole, maybe you're looking at a point on
the green that you're putting toward. And connect with that distance, how uphill or downhill, how slower fast the green is, and really let that sink into your eyes, and your eye hand coordination will tell your body how big a stroke to make. And that's really the key part of the routine. That you imprint the picture and then you roll it into the picture that you've imprinted, so you're
clear on your stroke. Then you're done with thinking about that, you're clear on your read, you're done with thinking about that, and then you only stroke it for the pace.
When I take a putt, I'll look at it from different angles, mostly from behind the ball towards the hole, and then I go to the other side and look from the hole towards the ball, looking for the angle that I'm looking at. And then one of the things that I do, and I'm going to ask you this, I kind of like I started the hole of the ball and I count how many steps and I generally think of each step as one yard. I count, you know, how many feet do I have? So I can get
that in my head too. Is that a hindrance?
Is that?
Am I over Is this overkill?
Well, that's a good question. I think it has to do with people's personality. Some people it gives them an assurance and they feel like, I know this butt, I know what. I know what A fourteen footer feels like, I know what a twenty two footer feels like now you have to make some adjustments for uphill or downhill. So it can get kind of complicated. But for some
people that might be very helpful and reassuring. Somebody I don't know, somebody who does a lot of technical work like editing and producing podcasts, somebody like that, it might be very helpful. But for somebody else it might add a complication, and they might it just might clog their brain and they're thinking about too many things. So if you're playing catch with somebody and you need to toss the ball to them, do you have to count Do you have to pace off how far away they are
before you toss the ball to them? No? Not really. What as you look at their glove or whatever their hands they're holding it holding up, and what your eyes see, your brain translates to a message to your muscles to throw it this hard, to carry that distance. That's really all we're trying to do with putting.
Well, when the golf hole is able to move around to catch my ball the way somebody with a glove can do, then I'll be happy not to count it out.
Well, you know, when when they're forty feet away and your and the hole is forty feet away. All you're trying to do is throw it somewhere close to their glove. And that's all you're trying to do is get it up there somewhat close to the hole. Now, really that's not my philosophy on long leg putts. I still want you to try to be holding it. I want you to roll the putt in a way that it's going to finish and you see how it's going to go
in the hole. Because you know, if if you just barely miss a four and a quarter inch hole, it's a pretty easy putt. But if you picture, you know, like some people teach picture of three foot circle around the hole. If you miss that, then you've got to then you got to face a little longer putt. So I'd rather try to get closer and you know, smaller targets, smaller misses.
Yeah, And the visualized visualization aspect of it is now we're getting back into the zen part of putting.
Right. You want to picture how the ball rolls and you can run your eyes. You know. I have a good friend Craig Farnsworth, who is a doctor.
Farnsworth un putting down and he's at Lakinta.
Yes, that's right, and he talks about running your eyes along the path that you see the ball is going to take in real time, which I really like that, and it imprints it more in your mind so that you have a picture, so you don't have just a snapshot. You have a video in your mind of the ball rolling out to the hole, and it includes a sense of how fast the pace needs to be when it starts.
You know, when you start a straight down hill putt, it doesn't have to be going very fast at the start, and it's going to hold its speed all the way to the hole. When you're looking at a straight uphill putt, you have to give it a pretty good, get good go at the beginning, and it's going to be rolling pretty fast the first part of the putt and then slow down as it gets to the hole. So you
have to be able to picture all of that. Once you can picture that, then you just give your body that message and let it re, you know, produce that picture and roll the ball into that picture.
Awesome. Well, I want to talk to you about in our next episode. We're going to talk about reading greens. Okay, we're going to talk about the best putting routine ever, which you kind of teased a little bit ago.
I gave you a little summary of it.
Yeah, yeah, And then I have questions about things that you said about, you know, laying the scorecard over the hole or looking at the hole versus looking at the ball. So I want to go. I want to get into those things for our members only episode, which we'll published up next. And I just want to thank also Gotham Book, that's your publisher, correct, Yeah, I want to thank them because they sent me two extra copies of the book.
I'm keeping one for myself, but I want to let our listeners know that the first two and that's all I can do here. The first two people to sign up for Golf Smarter for members only for the North American Plan B will not only get a box of Dixon win Eco friendly golf balls, but you for that same amount, you'll also receive the first two you'll receive a brand new copy hardback of How to Make Every put The Secret to Winning Golf's Game Within the Game by Doctor Joseph parent.
Is That okay, sounds great, sounds good?
All right, So thanks again and we'll have you back on our members only episode coming up next week.
Thanks very much, Fred, always a pleasure talking with you now.