reading breaks on the green

[phil lowndes]

Sometimes I have trouble reading the breaks on the greens. I always seem miss judge the break. Does anyone know the best way to read breaks. Judging distance and the pace of the putt is not a problem. I seem to miss the hole on the low side.

[Mizunoman]

Re: reading breaks on the green

Phil,

You are almost all the way there if you can judge pace well, its 75% of putting. Just spend a little longer looking at putts and be positive about them, thinking you are going to hole them actually does help I have found.

My personal preference is to squat behind the ball and have a good look at the lie of the land then walk round the other side of the hole and have a look from that side as well. If in doubt check the lie of the land around you off the green if it all slopes one way then thats the way the putt will tend to drop, not always but its a good bet percentage wise.

Rules of thumb:

Putts always drop to the sea or a river or a lake.

Putts always turn towards the rising sun in the morning and the setting sun in the evening cos the grass follows the light.

Puts always fall to bunkers that are close to the hole because the sand out of them causes the grass grow a little tighter making the green faster there.

So if in doubt remember these rules. Usually a putt's break is pretty obvious tho.

Good luck.

D.

[LowPost42]

Re: reading breaks on the green

Rules of thumb:

Putts always drop to the sea or a river or a lake.

Putts always turn towards the rising sun in the morning and the setting sun in the evening cos the grass follows the light.

Puts always fall to bunkers that are close to the hole because the sand out of them causes the grass grow a little tighter making the green faster there.

Those are fantastic! I'll have to remember them when I play courses with faster greens (where these rules will more likely apply).

Thanks!

[Mr_Change]

Re: reading breaks on the green

I started using my putter as a plum line. this has helped me to lower my putting scores from 42 a round to mid to 37 putts. Std ill not good but it's 5 shots off the round, lately I also been doing it for my bump and runs and I have save at leat another stroke a game. gone from high 80s and low 90s to low to mid 80s. Shot 84 in the rain last week 82 my lowest score.

[ph_kingston]

Re: reading breaks on the green

Here's another thought. If you are consistently missing on the low side then you are not taking enough break when you hit the putt. This could be for two reaons: 1) You simpy mis-read the break 2) You read the break properly but start the putt on the wrong line.

There's some great tips posted on cause 1) already so I'd like to add a few things about cause 2).

If you can roll in the straight putts pretty well then there's probably nothing much wrong with your putting stroke. That's probably worth checking. From about 10 ft on a flat green stroke 10-15 putts and see how many you sink and if there's a trend in missing them one side or the other.

Ok, let's assume for the moment that you sink a good percentage of straight putts. Now ask yourself where you look when you hit a breaking putt. If you look at the hole then there's a good chance that you'll start the ball off on the wrong line and it will miss on the low side.

Instead find an intermediate target along the line you think the putt needs to be sent along to break towards and into the hole. The target should be along the length of the putt where the ball will effectively be running straight i.e. where the pace of the ball will counteract any break (this will take some experimentation). Now forget about the hole and putt towards that target; your happy with the pace of the putt so now let that ball and the green do the work.

This has made a big improvement in my putting and the greens I play on are scary (think 16th at Augusta).