The Soul of Golf

[Dark Saint Alaick]

Now, no player should be allowed to go more than two or three feet
from the hole until he has learned to hole out puts at that distance
with accuracy and confidence. By the time he is allowed to leave the
putting-green, he will have acquired the habit of attention.

It will be clearly seen that, starting now from the edge of the green
with his chip shot, he is much more certain of striking the ball and
getting it away than he would be were he put on to the more uncertain
stroke in the drive; so by a gradual process of education the player
would come in time to the drive, and by the time he arrives at the
most complicated stroke in the game--the stroke wherein is the
smallest margin of error--he has cultivated the habit of attention,
which includes keeping one's head still.

[Dark Saint Alaick]

Of course, this is a counsel of perfection which one does not expect
to find carried out, although a similar course is followed by all good
teachers in every trade, profession, science, or game, but as I have
said before, in golf there is a tremendous amount of false teaching
which is generally followed. It is, however, a certainty that any
beginner who has the patience, perseverance, and moral courage to
educate himself on these lines, will find golf much easier to play
than it would be if he had started, as nearly everybody wants to
start, with "the swing." It is bad enough that putting should be
relegated to the position it is, but the attitude of the great
writers, or perhaps I should say the great golfers who have written
books about golf, aggravates the offence, and forms what is to me the
greatest mystery in connection with golf literature.

I shall give here what Braid, Vardon, and Taylor have to say about
putting. Let me take Vardon first. At page 143 of _The Complete
Golfer_ he says:

For the proper playing of the other strokes in golf, I have
told my readers to the best of my ability how they should
stand and where they should put their feet. But except for
the playing of particular strokes, which come within the
category of those called "fancy," I have no similar
instruction to offer in the matter of putting. There is no
rule and there is no best way.

[Dark Saint Alaick]

The fact is that there is more individuality in putting than
in any other department of golf, and it is absolutely
imperative that this individuality should be allowed to have
its way.

And now comes a very wonderful statement:

I believe seriously that every man has had a particular kind
of putting method awarded to him by Nature, and when he putts
exactly in this way he will do well, and when he departs from
his natural system he will miss the long ones and the short
ones too. First of all, he has to find out this particular
method which Nature has assigned for his use.

Again on page 144 we read that when a player is off his putting

... it is all because he is just that inch or two removed
from the stance which Nature allotted to him for putting
purposes, but he does not know that, and consequently
everything in the world except the true cause is blamed for
the extraordinary things he does.

[Dark Saint Alaick]

Let us now repeat what James Braid has to say on the important matter
of putting. On page 119 of _How to Play Golf_ he says:

It happens, unfortunately, that concerning one department of
the game that will cause the golfer some anxiety from time to
time, and often more when he is experienced than when he is
not, neither I nor any other player can offer any words of
instruction such as, if closely acted upon, would give the
same successful results as the advice tendered under other
heads ought to do. This is in regard to putting.

Further on we are informed that "really great putters are probably
born and not made."

So far we must admit that this is extremely discouraging, but there is
worse to follow.

Let us now see what Taylor has to say about putting. At page 83 in his
book, _Taylor on Golf_, and in the chapter, "Hints on Learning the
Game," he says:

Coming back to the subject of actual instruction. After a
fair amount of proficiency has been acquired in the use of
the cleek, iron, and mashie, we have the difficulty of the
putting to surmount. And here I may say at once it is an
absolute impossibility to teach a man how to putt.

[Dark Saint Alaick]

Even many of the leading professionals are weak in this
department of the game. Do you think they would not improve
themselves in this particular stroke were such a thing within
the range of possibility? Certainly they would. The fact is
that in putting, more than in aught else, a very special
aptitude is necessary. A good eye and a faculty for gauging
distances correctly is a great help, indeed, quite a
necessity, as also is judgment with regard to the requisite
power to put behind the ball. Unfortunately, these are things
that cannot be taught, they must come naturally, or not at
all.

All that is possible for the instructor to do is to discover
what kind of a putting style his pupil is possessed of,
offer him useful hints, and his ultimate measure of success
is then solely in his own hands.

It is easy to tell a pupil how he must needs hold his clubs
in driving or playing an iron shot, but in putting there is
hardly such a necessity. The diversity of styles accounts for
this, and in this particular kind of stroke a man must be
content to rely upon his own adaptability alone.

[Dark Saint Alaick]

Now in the same book on page 240, in the chapter on "The Art of
Putting," we read:

The drive may be taught, the pupil may be instructed in the
use of the cleek, the iron, or the brassie, but in putting he
must rely upon his own powers of reducing the game to an
actual science. The other strokes are of a more or less
mechanical character; they may be explained and demonstrated,
but with the ball but a few feet distant from the hole there
are many other things to be considered, and hints are the
only things that can be offered. The pupil may be advised
over the holding and grip of the putter, but as far as the
success of the shot is concerned it remains in his own hands.

In passing, I may remark that it seems to me that in this latter
respect the put is not vastly different from any other stroke in golf,
or indeed, for the matter of that, in any other game.

Continuing, Taylor says:

Putting, in short, is so different to any other branch of the
game that the good putter may be said to be born, not made.

That this is really the case is proved by the fact that many
of the leading players of the day, professionals and amateurs
alike, are very frequently weaker when playing with the
putter than when performing with any other of their clubs.
Speaking solely of professionals, is it at all probable that
this would be so were they capable of improving themselves in
this particular department? Certainly not.

[Dark Saint Alaick]

Now it will be admitted that this is a very gloomy outlook for him who
desires to learn how to put. He is thrown entirely on his own
resources. I must quote Taylor once again with regard to putting. He
says:

And yet it is none the less true that to putt perfectly
should be the acme of one's ambition. Putting is the most
important factor of success, for it happens very frequently
that a man may meet a stronger driver, or a better performer
with the iron clubs, and yet wrest the leadership from him
when near the hole.

There can be no doubt whatever of the truth of what Taylor says in
this last paragraph--"Putting is the most important factor of
success"; yet we are confronted with the amazing statement made by the
three greatest masters of the game, men who between them have
accounted for fourteen open championships, men whose living depends
upon playing golf and teaching it, that "the most important factor of
success" cannot be taught. There is no possible doubt about their
ideas on this subject. They deliberately tell the unfortunate golfer,
or would-be golfer, that good putters are born and not made, that
putting cannot be taught, and that each person must be left to work
out his own salvation.

[Dark Saint Alaick]

It is admitted that putting is practically half the game. It has been
well illustrated in the following way:--Seventy-two strokes is a good
score for almost any course. The man who gets down in two every time
is not a bad putter. This allows him thirty-six strokes on the green,
which is exactly one-half of his score. Now what does this statement
which is made by Braid, Vardon, and Taylor amount to? It is an
assertion by them that they are unable to teach half of the game of
golf, and _that_ the most important half, for, as we have seen, Taylor
says that it is "the most important factor of success." Now surely
there is something wrong here. As a matter of fact it is the most
absolute nonsense which it is possible to imagine. Putters are not
born. They are made and shaped and polished to just as great an extent
as any metal putter that ever was forged. Putting is the simplest and
easiest thing in golf to learn and to teach, and it is positively
wrong for men of the eminence in their profession which these players
enjoy to append their names to statements which cannot but have a
deleterious effect on the game generally, and particularly on the play
of those who are affected by reading such absolutely false doctrine.

There are certain fundamental principles in connection with putting
which cannot be disregarded. It is quite wrong to say that the first
thing to consider is some particular idiosyncrasy which a man may have
picked up by chance. The idea of Nature having troubled herself to
allot any particular man or men, or, for the matter of that, women or
children, any particular styles for putting is too ridiculous to
require any comment. Needless to say, very many people have
peculiarities which they exhibit in putting, as well as in other
matters, but in many cases it is the duty of the capable instructor
not to attempt to add the scientific principles of putting to a
totally wrong and ugly foundation. The first duty of one who knows the
game and how to teach it is to implant in the mind of his pupil the
correct mechanical methods of obtaining the result desired. If, after
he has done this, it be found that his natural bent or idiosyncrasy
fits in with the proper mechanical production of the stroke, there is
no harm in allowing him to retain his natural style; but if, for the
sake of argument, it should be found that his natural method is
unsuitable for the true production of the stroke, there is only one
thing to do, which is to cut out his natural method, and make him put
on the lines most generally adopted.

[Dark Saint Alaick]

Nor is this difficult to do, for it stands to reason that anyone who
is a beginner at golf has not already cultivated a style of his own.

The statements of these three great golfers are absolutely without
foundation--in fact, they are indeed so far from the truth that I have
no hesitation whatever in saying that in at least ninety per cent of
the cases which come before a professional for tuition, if the subject
is properly dealt with by an intelligent teacher, putting is, without
any shadow of doubt, the easiest portion of golf to teach and to
learn. In the face of the mischievous statements which have been so
widely circulated in connection with the difficulty of learning the
art of putting, one cannot possibly be too emphatic in stating the
truth. In doing this, let it be understood that I am not stating any
theory or publishing any idea which I am not prepared fully to
demonstrate by practical teaching. It is a curious thing, but one to
which I do not wholly object, that those who read my books seem to
consider that they have a personal claim on my services as well, and
it is no uncommon thing for me to receive visits from men who are in
trouble about their putting, their drive, or their approach, and I
have not, as a rule, any very great trouble in locating the seat of
the difficulty.

[Dark Saint Alaick]

The pernicious influence of such teaching as that which I have just
quoted repeatedly comes before me. I know men who seem to consider
that the chief art of putting in golf is bound up in another art,
namely, the art of the contortionist, whereas, of course, nothing
could be further from the truth. Putting, as I shall show later on, is
an extremely simple operation. In fact its simplicity is so pronounced
that little children, almost without instruction, do it remarkably
well, because they do it naturally. It is only when people come to the
game possibly rather late in life, and perhaps with habits acquired
from other games, and in addition to this are told that they must
evolve their own particular style, that we find the difficulty, for
the style which is evolved is, in the vast majority of cases, no style
at all, and the stroke is played unnaturally.

That is what I have to say with regard to the "difficulty" of putting.
I shall, later on, deal with the principles involved in putting. It
will, in the meantime, be sufficient for me to consider and criticise
these statements generally. If this were my own uncorroborated
opinion, it is possible that the definite statements of three men like
Braid, Taylor, and Vardon might outweigh what I have said, although I
do not believe that even in that case they would; for what I have
quoted is such obvious nonsense that it would indeed be to me a
mystery if any golfer possessed of ordinary common sense could accept
any view of the matter other than that which I put forward.