{"id":717014,"date":"2026-06-05T15:10:21","date_gmt":"2026-06-05T15:10:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/717014\/"},"modified":"2026-06-05T15:10:21","modified_gmt":"2026-06-05T15:10:21","slug":"how-to-cure-short-putting-woes-from-six-feet-and-in","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/717014\/","title":{"rendered":"How To Cure Short Putting Woes From Six Feet And In"},"content":{"rendered":"

Putt for the dough? I\u2019d have gone broke recently! I was on the lookout for a solution. It sounds simple enough, get a putting mat, roll a few putts at home, build confidence, take it to the course and show the results there.. But as with most things in golf, the reality is a little more complicated.<\/p>\n

Like many golfers, my relationship with putting has gone through phases. When I first started, it was predictably erratic. Then, over time, it became one of the stronger parts of my game, particularly when my long game was struggling, I leaned on my putting. I became the kind of player who was often putting for a single point and walking away satisfied. I was at one stage, what you might call a clutch putter.<\/p>\n

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Then things changed. A (long) dip in form led me to switch from a blade to a mallet putter<\/a>. I went through a proper fitting at PXG, found something that suited my stroke, and for a while, it felt like the late summer, my partner and I took a joint putting lesson. His struggles? Fixed. Mine? Not so much.<\/p>\n

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That\u2019s when I turned to a putting mat<\/a>. The idea was simple .Practise every day, build consistency, sharpen up. In reality, practising daily proved harder than expected. Life gets in the way, and motivation isn\u2019t always there, especially when you\u2019re rolling putts across the same strip of carpet night after night.<\/p>\n

But when I did practise, there were clear benefits. A putting mat <\/a>gives you consistency. The same line, the same pace, the same environment. And that repetition does start to ingrain certain habits, particularly around strike and distance control.<\/p>\n

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On that front, I saw real improvement. My ability to judge pace<\/a> over short distances became noticeably better. But there\u2019s an obvious catch. A putting mat is controlled, a golf course isn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

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\"Genelle\n<\/p>\n

(Image credit: Genelle Aldred)<\/p>\n

Out on the course, you\u2019re dealing with slopes, grain, subtle breaks, changing green speeds, pressure, and context. A perfectly flat mat can\u2019t recreate that. And that\u2019s where the limitation lies. If you rely solely on a mat, you risk becoming good at one very specific type of putt and not much else.<\/p>\n

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But, all was not a waste of time! Because I did see some progress and the biggest change was inside six feet. Those are the putts that used to cause me problems, the ones you feel you should make, but don\u2019t always. The frustrating misses from four or five feet. Even the occasional wobble from two, which had become more than occasional.<\/p>\n

After consistent practice on the mat, those putts started to feel far more comfortable. The repetition builds confidence, and confidence is everything at that range. Six feet and in, I\u2019m now noticeably more reliable. And that matters. Because those are the putts where you can leak shots.<\/p>\n

Over the past year, I haven\u2019t been a member at a single club<\/a>. Instead, I\u2019ve played across a variety of courses. While that\u2019s been great for the overall game, forcing me to think more, adapt more, and rely less on familiarity, it\u2019s also made putting more challenging. When you\u2019re not seeing the same surfaces week in, week out, it\u2019s harder to build that intuitive feel. And no amount of time on a flat mat at home can replace that experience.<\/p>\n

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\"Genelle\n<\/p>\n

(Image credit: Genelle Aldred)<\/p>\n

It might seem like I think the putting mat isn\u2019t worth it, I love the training aid so I do, but with a caveat. If your issue is confidence from short range<\/a>, a putting mat is a brilliant tool. It builds repetition, sharpens your stroke, and helps eliminate those costly short misses.<\/p>\n

But it won\u2019t fix everything like reading a green, changing conditions and it won\u2019t replicate the pressure of standing over a putt that matters. For that, you still need time on real greens.<\/p>\n

The real test came recently. After several putts stopped short by 2 inches, an important putt hovered on the edge of the hole, one of those moments that seemed to last forever, before finally dropping after 5 seconds. A small win, maybe. But an important one.<\/p>\n

Because not long ago, that same putt would have sailed past the hole by four inches. And that\u2019s the thing with putting. Improvement isn\u2019t always dramatic, it\u2019s incremental and subtle. Sometimes almost invisible. Until they start dropping.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Putt for the dough? I\u2019d have gone broke recently! I was on the lookout for a solution. It…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":717015,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[443],"tags":[49,48,622,82],"class_list":["post-717014","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-golf","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/717014","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=717014"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/717014\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/717015"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=717014"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=717014"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=717014"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}