Get in the hole!

Jack Nicklaus famously once said 'drive for show, putt for dough' which emphasised that accurate putting was the key to golfing glory.

Golfers all over the world are constantly in search of a solution that will knock shots off their game, and bring their handicap down. New research presented on Wednesday 18 March 2002, at The British Psychological Society Annual Conference in Blackpool, may hold the key to better putting performance.

Dr Dave Smith from Chester College, and Dr Paul Holmes from Manchester Metropolitan University asked forty experienced golfers to imagine practicing their putting under three different conditions: while listening to a tape of the sound of themselves putting successfully; while watching a video of themselves putting; and while reading about what they experienced when putting. In a fourth control condition, golfers read a biography of Jack Nicklaus.

These exercises were carried out daily for six weeks. During this time the volunteers performed a putting task twice a week. The number of putts holed, and the distance that the ball finished from the hole (if the putt missed) were recorded.

Before receiving training, the three groups demonstrated similar putting accuracy. After training, golfers in both audio and video groups showed great improvements in their putting performance, over the reading condition.

The research suggested that the proper use of mental and auditory imagery could lead to significant improvements in this difficult and important part of the game. Dr Smith commented 'if the average golfer normally takes thirty-six putts per round, improving by around twenty-five per cent could mean knocking nine shots off their total score, something that most amateur golfers would give their eye teeth for'.