How Long Should Your Practice Putts Be?

This will be a short post but the tip I found may also streamline your putting practice.

Over at golf.com Peter Kostis has done an article called These 3 Moves Will Shrink Your Handicap Fast. It's the third tip I want to focus on here... and it's a putting tip, which means it doesn't require any special techniques.

Here's part of what Kostis says:

Let's look at Tour putting stats from 33 feet. Why that length? Because from 33 feet, the pros two-putt 88 percent of the time, while three-putting and one-putting an identical 6 percent of the time. Therefore, when they go beyond 33 feet, pros are more likely to three-putt than they are to hole it. The lesson: Even the best struggle from long distance, so get good at distance control from 33 feet—and don't bother practicing from farther out. Also, spend plenty of time rolling three-footers. If you can consistently two-putt from 33 feet and drain most of your three-footers, you'll have the third key to posting better numbers than ever.

Working on the three-foot range is no surprise, is it? Most of us struggle a bit with that length, primarily because we feel that we SHOULD make those and it gets in our heads a bit.

But when Kostis said not to bother practicing beyond 33 feet, that caught my attention. That's the make-or-break distance for two-putting according to the stats he cites, so if you can putt it well enough from that distance to two-putt most of the time, you're golden!

And it makes sense that those two lengths should be the most critical since a good first putt from 33 feet would leave you something around three feet. (Hopefully, anyway!)

So this tip from Peter Kostis should help simplify your putting practice considerably. If you develop your touch from three and from 33 feet, there aren't many putts that are going to stump you on the greens.

Of course, you'll want to read the rest of the article to get the other two tips also. But it's a quick read with easy-to-apply guidance, well worth your time.