Putting Tip: A Surefire Way To Position The Ball Properly And Hole More Putts

If you are our a right-handed golfer there is about a 70% probability that you miss most of your putts to the right. What can you do about it?

Everybody knows that people come right handed or left handed with a very few that are truly ambidextrous. But did you also know that people come right eye and left eye dominant? About 10% of the population is left hand dominant, and about 70% of the population is right eye dominant. There is no real connection between handedness and eye dominance.

The dominant eye is the eye that looks directly at an object. The non-dominant eye looks at the same object at a slightly different angle, which is the way we get depth perception. That works great for seeing the world in 3-D but it does not work so great for most golfers who are lining up their putts carefully, making a perfect stroke, and missing the hole (usually to the right) because of this optical illusion.

You can immediately improve your putting so that you can hole more putts for pars and birdies without ever even picking up a putter if you do these two things:

Go get a large index card or a piece of paper, fold it in half, and cut out about a 1 in. square from the folded end. It does not have to be exact. All you need to have when you end up is an index card or a piece of paper with a square hole in the middle.

Drop a golf ball on the floor and take your regular putting stance over the ball. If you do not have a golf ball handy a quarter will work as well. Stretch your arms as far down toward the ball as you can so that with both eyes open the ball is visible in the hole in the center of the index card. Now slowly move the card up toward your nose keeping both eyes open and the ball in the center of the hole. When you get to your nose the hole in the index card will be over one eye only. That is your dominant eye.

Now that you know which is your dominant eye - again take your regular putting stance. With the index card in position, stretch your arms toward the floor as far as you can and with your non-dominant eye closed shuffle your feet slightly left of right so that the ball becomes entirely visible in the hole in the index card. Your dominant eye is now directly over the ball. Using your belly button as a reference point make a note of how far left or right of your belly button the ball will have to be positioned on the putting green to be directly under your dominant eye.

If you happen to be on a rug or on a golf course where you can actually take a few putting strokes then try it out. Position the golf ball directly under your dominant eye and make a few strokes. You should feel like you are making pure contact with the ball every time.

When you stand behind your ball to line up the putt twist your head left or right to give your dominant eye the feature view of the line. You can even close your non-dominant eye if you want, but I think you may be giving up a little too much in depth perception.

Mark the line in your mind and trust it when you putt.