Putting Drill from Bobby Eldridge

Most golfers I come across could improve so much if they would work on their "touch" or "feel". Assuming that the greens you are used to putting on are slower than your garage floor, you can get an edge on your buddies by driving down to Home Depot and buying a twelve-foot long strip of indoor-outdoor carpeting. This is where the fun begins.

After you have laid the carpet out, mark a spot every three feet. If you can spend the next couple months rolling a few putts everyday on the carpet, you will not believe what it will do for
your touch and that's no joke. OK, here is a simple exercise that will take a few minutes to complete while your coffee is brewing in the morning.

Putt three balls to the first line (without) any of the balls rolling past the line. If you hit one or more balls past the first line, start over. Putt three balls to the first line until you stop all three short of the line. Next, putt three balls to the next line without any of the balls going past the second line.

Continue this exercise until you have stopped all three balls short of the end of the carpet. This exercise might take a month before you can complete this exercise without rolling any balls past your target. Be patient, your touch will come to you before you know it!

Check out Bobbys Putting DVD by Clicking Here

How to play long Par 3 holes (200+ yards)

Hello again

This week I will let you know how to master long par 3 holes (200 yards or more)

The key to playing the long par 3 holes is to determine whether you can hit the green 7 out of 10 times from the tee.

When you encounter a long par 3 (200 yards or longer), and it is bunkered, then this is the best strategy to use.

Ask yourself

Can I can hit the green 7 out of 10 times from the tee?

If the answer is no then do not take a club that will reach the the bunkers.

The hole is only 220yards or so long, and if you are more likely to hit the green in two shots, hit the ball with a 5 or a 6 iron 150-160 yards off the tee coming up short of the bunkers. This will normally give you a wider fairway to aim at and an easy 40-50 yard pitch shot to the green. This is easier than a 30yard bunker shot, or indeed any shot from a bunker, particularly if you are on the thin side of the green

The best round you will play is when you do not hit the ball into a bunker. The idea is to stay out of the bunkers, not play silly shots where the penalty is hitting the ball in a bunker 40 yards from the green.

For the player who can reach the green always aim to miss the green on the fat side, never on the thin side.

Good golfing

The Golf Helper

PS There's a new way of learning golf!

Bobby Eldridge at Purepoint Golf has spent the last few months designing a program that allows him to coach students personally online. He's looking for a few "testers" for the program. It's a really great program, and it's revolutionary for golf instruction. The first month is only $1.00 so you can make an informed decision to see if the program is right for you.

Check out Bobby's new lessons>>

Is it possible to play better with no practise?

I, like most golfers, am always looking to play better, beat my mates and get bragging rights. I have a lifestyle that is pretty hectic and spend a lot of time with my family. I have two boys and we are a soccer mad family. I coach one of my boys teams and my other son plays twice a week as well. So you can see I don't get any time to perfect my golf at all.

Recently I have been managing about a game every 4 weeks and absolutely no practice, so I have been in search of a way to help me enjoy my game with no practice, so I researched and investigated and came up with 2 things that I could do with out too much bother.

1. Course management
2. Pitching and Chipping strategy

Course Management I decided that I would concentrate on choosing the right kind of shot at the right time, then I would definitely get better scores. The golf course that I play at has loads of bunkers on every green, and I figured that if I went for the green with my approach shots that I would either be on the green or in a bunker. Now depending on how far out from the green I was also had a bearing on my shot. I decided that for any shot requiring more than a 9 iron I would actually play short/lay up and take my chances with my chipping and putting. As part of that decision process was also where to lay up to to give me the best angle to chip on to the green.

So my simple course management technique was really to avoid the bunkers at all costs and give myself a chance of an up and down from a green side chip.

Unless you can hit the ball from where you are onto the green at least 7 times out of 10 then you would be better off playing short. Pitching and Chipping Strategy I read the following tip recently

"You can vary the distance of your chips by using different clubs - try using your 5 iron, 7 iron or 9 iron and only ONE SWING instead of using your Sand Wedge and 3 different swings." Basically, the secret is to have the same length backswing, but use a different club to ship the ball either longer or shorter, and I adapted it to have two swings.

Well that made sense to me so before my round started, I thought I would do a little scientific research, so I went to the practice area and played chips with 2 different swings

Swing #1 Take the club back about 18 inches behind my back foot. The key is to go back the same distance every time

Swing #2 Takes the club back parallel to the ground

I spent 15 minutes testing out how far the ball went with each club using swing number 1 from my 5 iron up to my lob wedge to get a feel for the distance covered in the air and the total distance
I then repeated the exercise using swing number 2

I also used a simple setup routine for chipping and putting (you can get this set up routine from my website TheGolfHelper.com Now I didn't change any other part of my game, and just applying these simple methods improved my game without any practice (well actually about 15 minutes practice on the chipping range!)

As I said before these 2 things were the key to me winning our club A grade competition, and all done with 2 very simple techniques that anyone can do without remodeling your swing or taking a lesson, so that should give you some food for thought!

Note: Using the Simple Golf Swing, and The PurePoint Golfing Tuition DVD's helped me get to a handicap of 9.6.

You can do it too!