Days 17 thru 20: China Hotel Room Putting & Chipping

In the August issue of Golf Magazine, there is a good 2 page instruction on putting by the games premier putting expert, Marius Filmalter where he states that keeping your right elbow tucked in like Jack Nicklaus gives you a perfect path every time. Marius states that the position of the right elbow used by Nicklaus and others is something he see over and over again in good putting strokes.

He goes on to state in the article that he sees a lot of amateurs trying to power their putting stroke with their arms – causing them to move their right elbow out and away (a la the ‘chicken wing’) – losing the right elbow/torso connection and resulting in the putter rising up off the ground making it difficult to strike the ball squarely. Elbow separation is not a good thing and also happens when you try to bring the putter straight back and through.

So how do you fix the ‘chicken wing’ right elbow?

Marius says, ‘When you set up, keep your arms close by resting both elbows against the sides of your torso. As you take the club back, use more shoulders than arms, and keep your right elbow tucked…As you start your forward-stroke, maintain that right-elbow connection all the way to your finish. By pinning your right elbow like this you’re in better position to trace the correct path back to the ball and into your release which should start the ball on the line you intended. http://www.golf.com/golf/video/article/0,28224,2000008,00.html

When I finally got to China and checked into my room, I found that I had a great hallway to practice. I set a rocks glass 18 inches from the door and counted off 10 feet. I placed a ball sleeve at that 10-foot mark, so I would always know where my 10 foot mark was.

Below is a photo of my 10-foot path.

The lower left portion of the photo shows the ball sleeve marking the 10 foot mark. The five balls near the door surround the rocks glass which is being used as the cup. I laid a hand towel down at the foot of door, so when I go long, the neighbors wouldn't have to hear the 'clank'.

I had 5 balls, so I took 100 chips with my 8-iron (the Leadbetter way, more of a bump-and-run) and 100 putts with my elbow in.

I was consistent with the chips and found out that I needed to aim about 1 cup right of the hole as there was a little break the last foot to the hole.

Here are 2 pictures of one of my 5-ball chips.

Here is a close-up to show you the actual proximity to the hole.

As you can see by the close-up, all are within tap-in range.

I also found out that I really liked the putting stroke with the right elbow tucked in. It is much more of a shoulder swing and I found that I got into a groove where I was really striking the ball well after about 25 putts. I look forward to trying this new stroke out on the course.

So the long and the short of it is this, every morning and night I took about 100 to 150 putts and 100 to 150 chips in between emails for 4 days. I became interested in how close I could get my first ball as that would be very indicative of what would happen on a course when presented with that same shot. By Wednesday night (Day 4), I hit the cup with my first chip and ran it slightly passed the cup with my first putt.