Latest / Putting Is Fun / The Training Aid Episode: Putting Platforms, the Smittle Stick, and Se Ri Pak's 81 Putts | Ep. 10
Transcript
- speaker-1: you can find your center straight shooter train yourself to respect the three-footer speaker-0: Yeah. Yes it is, folks. Brian Manzella from New Orleans with speaker-1: John Ortega from Coasty Mesa. Coasty, toasty. was toasty this last week, but now we're living the life again. speaker-0: Okay. Gotta go back to the 75 for a high. That's what it's all about out there in Southern Cal. For sure. Thanks for joining us on the show today, folks. We've we've we've had a couple of good ⁓ episodes lately. We've had a lot of fun. We got some interesting stuff for you today. So let's get right to it. So the one thing that is I want to say mainstream, but more mainstream now than I ever thought it ever would be. is what I would call the category of Practice putting greens that have break and a projected image on it to show you your stroke and break and all of those things. Because I would throw these all in the same category, right? Not only the platforms, we're gonna talk about th those, but the ones that are just kind of rollouts too. There's some pretty expensive ones. i in that boy from Korea. in in the Secret of Choice involved in one of those, right? To a putt. Yeah. So this speaker-1: secret of Choi. and Torpedo. speaker-0: This this is either a platform, large device that you can multiple human beings can stand on, and then the platform is designed to be level. Correct, John, interrupt me. speaker-1: They start out level because if you're doing analytics you want to a straight butt. speaker-0: Right. And then they they they they can tilt by way of motors and it's very easy and it's all done in a nap or whatever remote control. And then there's greens that are you know, they don't have any motors in ⁓ but they have all the brakes and all that. And then the c component that puts them in the same category to me is a little projector someplace, short throw, flipping some lines and graphics on the ground to show you start line and curvature of stroke and all these kind of things. And it is really exploded. And I know we're a putting show, but in and then some of these have been integrated into things like Trackman. Both me and John's golf studios have Trackman. You can get a couple of the platforms to directly integrate with Trackman. So you're playing Pebble Beach and you're playing number six, you hit your T shot, and now you got a uphill shot on your second shot if you played from the forward T's and you hit it three hundred yards. And The whole platform would y you'd hit the ball off of it. But we're talking about specifically putting, but even putting, right? So if you putted on the putting platform or Zen, I think they're the two that integrated with Trackman, and I'm sure they that they integrated with other but we're trackman guys. If the if it's a right to left two percent break putt, uphill one percent, it platform moves there and you can actually put it to a real hole, which obviously increases the experience of playing ⁓ virtual golf. So first question for John of the day. Did you did you think that that that all this would get to this point this quick? speaker-1: No, the first thing that I ever had was the thing called a Dream Green. It was on a wood platform, pretty thin, maybe about, I don't know, six inches high. And it had these little adjusting pins and it would make the platform or the wood kind of elevate and you could hit brakes and it was breaking parts. It was cool. I thought that was magic, right? I'm guessing about $5,000, maybe a little bit more. speaker-0: How much was a dream dream in its day? Fifteen footer, ten footer, twelve footer? speaker-1: mostly 10 feet, mostly 10. They had some that had two holes. I think the one that we had had only one hole. But ⁓ they were pretty cool and they're well made and they're kind of like billiard tables. No, I didn't think that it'd be this speaker-0: They they they that one didn't have any sort of projected image on top of it. It was so what what was the what was the how f how long ago did you have that? speaker-1: ⁓ heck no. must have been 30 years ago. Yeah. Yeah. So the guy that's the director of golf at Costa Mesa, he buys like storage units, like when people don't pay their bill and say he had one that he had in a storage unit. So a friend of mine that has kids, he ended up buying it from him. So there's, it was really cool. I've seen one recently. I mean, one that I was using, I haven't seen that particular one for 25 years or more. But they're pretty cool. They're called Dream Greens. I think you can find them on eBay. And you probably pick one up for about $1,000. Maybe a little bit more if it's really well-kept. But I think that was the first thing that I saw of its kind. then after that, was what I think I saw with the putting platform, which is platform golf. That's the one that David Orr has. I saw a few of those. Preston Combs had one up in Santa Barbara. and Bill Smiddle, who we'll talk a little bit about later today, he has one right now. And that was probably the first motorized ⁓ platform. speaker-0: W di did it have the ⁓ projected image right away or that's speaker-1: No, no, no, no, that was later. I think that the first guy that was attempting to do the projected image was, ⁓ I'm not sure if it was putt view or the Sam putt lab guy, but both were kind of early adopters or early offers of that ⁓ kind of thing that would project lines. But there are other ones out there now. mean, like we were talking about earlier, tour putt does it. speaker-0: So your your original John Ortega putt lab platform was a perfect green that I put it on when I took a lesson from you, no? speaker-1: It was just flat the one the one that I have here still Yeah, yeah, the one that Biven I built. Yeah, so it was just flat It was the other building I was in the floor wasn't very level. So when I moved into this place I had this thing self level concreted So the floor was already, you know pretty darn level and then we brought it brought everything in over here and Got it pretty level and cool thing about this one, too. I get a little crazy I had a rim put around it and I put some self level epoxy so it kind of speaks a level like water and then you know so this thing you can put a level on top of it like a like a digital level and puts up zeros for the most part every once in a while you get a 0.1 but so this one that I have right now is just perfectly level that's all it is going to be and you know it's going to be going away pretty soon because I am going to be buying a Zen platform I don't know if I'm speaker-0: Which one does Michael Jacobs? speaker-1: He has a well putt, it's called the Big Tilt. Very nice. know, it's, you know, it's in the. speaker-0: Takes up his whole old golf studio. speaker-1: I think that one's 16 feet and it's probably eight feet wide so it's big. know it's big like mine's 15 by six and a half and it's sizable but you know the big tilt appears to be bigger especially since it moves around. speaker-0: So you've got okay, so the big players in this business are well put. Mm-hmm. speaker-1: platform goal. speaker-0: Golf. Platform golf. Had had done with those guys. Zen Zen Golf. I was on a commercial of theirs and Pudview. speaker-1: Putt View and ⁓ choice Tour Putt. speaker-0: Secret of Joy tour plot. Now, what about the science and motion guys? Didn't they do a platform or they speaker-1: No, I think that was platform golf that did that for them and they integrated their stuff with platform speaker-0: So all I know about the one that Mike has is You know, pool table smooth, right? You know, Chen gives his putting lessons in there and you know, he'll set you up. You wanna practice here, you know? And it projects the line, the ideal line. It projects the high, but it can still go in if you hit it a little easier. It protects the low, it could still go in if you banged it and got, you know, hit the middle of the hole. And it it'll project perpendicular to the start line. So that you can see what, you know, line up and you can put stance lines down and then it'll even go, okay, I gotta, you know, this much of a curve in my stroke. It'll put up all the almost like a a a a ⁓ Phil Canyon, you know, ⁓ putt map. They'll project it they'll project it on the ground. So ⁓ all I can tell you about it is I cannot imagine somebody becoming a good putter that speaker-1: Is he a putt speaker-0: had access to one of these things for a reasonable amount of time, you know, a week. ⁓ I i it's amazing that every one of these simulator places don't have one because I think they would have no problem. It's about the same price as a simulator bay, right? If you get a track man simulator bay put in any place, you're looking at fifty grand ish. Right. So okay, you could have one of those really good ones and I guarantee ya that you would you would if you know the the object of your your place is you're ⁓ you're just trying to have as many rent hours as you can. It just it it it's a fascinating way to work on your putty. Now from your standpoint, why are you going with this particular brand? speaker-1: Two reasons. ⁓ One, friend of mine is going to be connected with the company and that's not the main reason. I've putted on them and I really like their surface. Their surface is ⁓ apparently something like sheep's wool or something, lamb's wool, and it's like their secret. They're not going to tell anybody. It's like this recipe for cocoa. speaker-0: And what and what okay, it's different and so all the other ones to me are pretty similar. They're just pool table smooth. A little different. speaker-1: Right. Yeah, I think the well putt is pretty close. The well putt's, ⁓ like that's what I the carpet I have on mine right now is a well putt, but it's been used for too many years and seen better days. the well putt, putts pretty smooth. And the platform golf one putts very, very smooth. To me, I thought it was a little too fast, personally. I like a surface that doesn't putt too fast. Because if you have someone that rolls like say 13 on a step meter or something like that, I don't know that this is that fast, but you don't really get a good indication of what somebody's putting stroke is in my opinion. They might. speaker-0: So what is this what what's the what's the s kind of stock speed of this one you're going with? speaker-1: I couldn't say for sure, but I'd say it's somewhere between 10 and 11. It's what you find on most public golf course or even private courses that don't get their speeds up. I know Adam Scott said he has one. He said his was 24 feet, which I think the longest one they really make is 20 feet, but he's Adam Scott. So they probably make one 24 feet for him, right? speaker-0: Yeah, if you if you're Adam Scott, you y you just want one made, they'll they'll make it for ya. ⁓ but twenty four feet, yeah, okay. So he's got the right speaker-1: He said he liked it because he liked the speed of the green. He said that the ones that are too fast didn't serve his purpose as well. And I kind of feel similarly, you I think you want one that you have to make a pretty good stroke at to get the ball from A to B. speaker-0: How many so what's the dimensions of of the one that you're going with? speaker-1: I'm either going to get the 16 by 8, but I think I'm just leaning toward the 20 foot one because I've always been intrigued by having a putt that's nearly 20 feet that you can get dead straight. There's something about that number. If I could get one that was 30 feet, that wouldn't be too much money. And if I had enough space, I'd probably even do that. So think I'll go with the 20 footer. I think you can customize those, I think. I think Preston has a few more holes than they normally offer. speaker-0: How many holes? speaker-1: But I'll probably get, I think I've seen a standard offering. ⁓ If you look on YouTube and you look at some of Phil Kenyon's postings, think he has three that are like pretty far back on the platform, maybe like two feet from the end of it. ⁓ And then you could probably get some on the sides. I kind of like the idea of like putting sideways so you're not like using the rectangular nature of the board to help you align. So I like something that's a little bit more challenging. that you're offset to go right or left. think that's helpful. speaker-0: I think Michael Jacobs is ⁓ you said it's a well putt, right? Yeah. I I think it it has a hole in the in the the you know pretty close to the end, right? In the middle, and then it has two shorter than that as far to the sides as is practical. speaker-1: Yeah, and I think they have even two others that are kind of halfway so you could hit maybe a, you know, five or six footer. So I think they have multiple holes. if I'm allowed to, you know, customize mine, I'll ask for, you know, a reasonable amount of holes so you get different looks of putts. I think, you know, when the platform starts going up or down, like if they're closer and you have it tilted, it's probably going to have like more speed and just maybe a little bit crazier. Maybe it's a little bit much, but I kind of like having difficult things to try to make you know, when I put it in here, obviously it's mostly going to be for teaching but I think with respect to having you know people in town from different parts of the world if I can entertain them and we have a good time you know in the evening you know just do some some putting in the studio but not night putting I retired from night putting speaker-0: Yeah yeah. Game putting. Game putting games. Putting games. I got my the tiger sailor here, LSU Tiger Sailor, one of the first Clemson. Would you ever consider not green? speaker-1: So, speaker-0: I've seen a couple ⁓ the color. I I I've actually seen a couple lately online that you know from people that are golf pros that that went with like red or black or the carpet. speaker-1: ⁓ I think I consider it, but I don't think, know, given the choice, I'm kind of stuck with green. Like I'm printing some groove boards right now on a 3D printer and I've made some white ones. I made some, you know, don't know, orange ones and ⁓ I'm making green. Green and white just kind of appeals to me because putting green is green. speaker-0: My my whole my whole studio is a putting green with a mat on top of it that's green. So I it it doesn't offend doesn't offend me any. I like green. And in in a room that the the walls are blue and white and you know, it it's that's golf, right? You go out, you play golf, green grass, that they might have some brown in the, you know, trunks of the trees and light, light tan in the bunkers and Depending on if you're at Augusta or Snow White is your shirt and then and or your Augusta National Golf Club hat. And then you blue in the sky, right? So i I kinda that that was my kind of motif here. Now, what's interesting is, I'm sure there's a reason for it. Maybe it's because it's the brightest you can get the projector lines. All the projector lines are that one color. You know, like it's kinda like a bright green, yellowish, right? More green than yellow. Is anybody doing other colors? speaker-1: Not that I know of. haven't really investigated it that far because I'm just trying to get the platform first and I'm sure they'll try to talk me into getting the whole kit and caboodle which would be you the projected line. I guess they just came out with their own well putt. Excuse me, well putt too. Zen. So they have their own projector thing before they were integrating with think ⁓ Gwentech. Gwentech has like a ball roll know predictor if you want to call it that. But so I don't know if there's a different color, but I think as long as... speaker-0: No, I just I I just didn't know like you know, I haven't looked at ⁓ since the show and ⁓ it seems like that there's a reason for that. I think it's the brightness because you don't even see it. You know, it's like a short throw projector up a I think Michael's is on on the wall the opposite way that you walk into the room and it just looks like a box on a wall and you don't like in my studio, you walk in here, you That's a projector. This thing is just, you know, like it they they they kind of hidden. But there's something about, you know, teaching somebody to putt, and we've we've talked on the show about break and stuff like that, to be able to actually see the whole thing and then project the start line and this and that. And I just think it's it's invaluable. And I know Chen's putting is just, you know, really fabulously improved. And one of the things that was weird about Chen's experience of working on the stroke and then he's getting lots and lots of putts on it with a broomstick putter. Enough where he thought he might even, you know, I think he even tried it maybe. I don't know if he ever played in the tournament that way, but he could really putt that way too. But he said the last time I talked to him about it, that there was something about doing it and then learning the break and speed and the the real break, right? Because you know it's not just you're not just intuitively doing it out on a golf course. that it he he removed himself from the thought of it because he was putting with the putter that you know in a style that he doesn't normally do. And when he switched back it the the the learning went better. So I just think there are things that you can do with these putting platforms and all the projected images that you just there's nothing th there there would be no way to duplicate that any other way, except the like Secret of Choi with the ⁓ you know ⁓ a green that breaks and they know where all the breaks are and and ⁓ i I guess it can recalibrate if over time your floor is a little off or it was off in the first place and if you've never done it folks I I I can tell you it it is an eye opening you think you know how far you start a putt that breaks a certain amount you have no idea until you putt on one of these things and you will make a monkey out of yourself because you'll put it right through the dawn putt line every damn time. It's like It's it's it's amazing and what would be super interesting about about this and you'll get a shot at it for sure because you teach yet lots of youngsters, is you get a talented seven-year-old kid, you know, and they get all of that right in their head early, early on while their brains developing. They may be super putters at some point. speaker-1: Yeah, I had one of those come in just recently. young girl, she was ⁓ at the Drive Chip and Putt this year and she won it for her age group. So she moved here from New York. It's pretty funny. She did heavy flex on me. So not intentionally. So we did some putting in here and then went over to Costa Mesa and we're talking about brakes. We're talking about speed of putts. If it's faster, it breaks more. And she had already told me she had won the Drive Chip and Putt. So I said, have you ever putt on a really fast screen? She says to me, Augusta like ⁓ speaker-0: Ha ha ha ha. speaker-1: Big old flex on me. go, oops, I forgot. Yeah. But you know, you get more of those kids, you know, there's a guy in Long Beach, he calls himself the putting Institute. has a lot of kids coming into him and you got some young kids that are probably pretty good by now. And, know, so if you get these kids early and, you know, you expose them to, you know, all that we're talking about right now, you know, I think that they're going to be fantastic putters. I don't know why they wouldn't be. Why wouldn't they be? Right. So Just like with with the scores in the golf now, get these kids coming out of college like Koven, like what's the what's the one kid's name, ⁓ Thor Bjornsson. ⁓ speaker-0: Tommy Morrison. speaker-1: Blades Brown, all those guys. They come out hitting the ground running and they're shooting 20 something under for four rounds like it's nothing. So don't see any reason why this new technology and new way of people learning how to think about putting isn't gonna translate to better putting. speaker-0: So one of the tie ins to the next subject here is that What I thought the most fascinating part of using Michael Jacobs's putt, sorry, sorry, well putt people. You throw up the Phil Kenyon type, you know, lines, right? Of of where the you know, the the curve of the actual arc of the putter and the opening closing of the face. And I for whatever reason, the one that Chen put up for me the last time I was there, was a decent amount of curve and a decent amount of opening closing. speaker-1: Well put. speaker-0: And it's a putting studio. Obviously they have a bunch of putters laying around. And I Nicholas Response, I'm putting with the Nicholas Response, I'm putting with some old sixties putters. And anyway, I pick up a, you know, modern like zebra type, not a zebra, spider type putter, right? And it's got a line on it, you know, a big line. And it's, you know, symmetrical. Those putters are symmetrical. Well, you cut them in half and you put it in a mirror, they're the same on each side. And I found it visually tough to trace the the path and the opening closing of the face with a putter that was so square. So then I started I was fascinated by it. So I started picking up all kind of the response and Chen's ⁓ really good 880 modern Wilson 8802 that ⁓ that ⁓ that ⁓ Harrington got for him and and and that helped a little, but At some point I got my my hands on sort of like that Taylor well it was Taylor made and it was also Wilson, that TPA 14 that you know it has the it's not symmetrical. And this one was bent a little flat and it looks like you should take it back inside and close it. And I could do it because it looked like it matched what I was trying to do. That doesn't mean it would work on the, but I think would There's one of the things that I don't think anybody thinks about when they're buying putters or looking at putters is ⁓ okay. What what the putter looks like has to affect your overall putter path shape and face rotation. No. speaker-1: I think it could. mean, I haven't really thought of it that way. speaker-0: I the eighty eight ⁓ two would definitely seem to make you like open and close it to me more than if you got, you know, the squarest putter in the on the market, you know. speaker-1: I think I think what you're talking about with I think you're talking about the tailor-made 18 I think you're called it the 14 but the heel is kind of peeled back more than the toe so it gives you the impression like swing this way like yeah on the backswing this way swing on the follow through speaker-0: Didn't didn't Scotty have a putter with a a line that was curved? Like the putting arc? speaker-1: Yeah, the detour. Detour? Yeah, I love that name. When I was younger, we used to ⁓ people that were not particularly attractive. I didn't call him this guy. He called him detours because he said you want to go walk by him, you want to walk around him. speaker-0: Well, ⁓ though, right? If somebody asked me a radio, I did a radio show today on on LSU's football team, and God only knows when this plays, so I'm not gonna say what I said. But but I I do a lot of radio golf stuff, but I also do Louisville radio still. I'm sort of the SEC football expert, or at least LSU SEC football expert. If somebody asked me on a radio show, like the Jeff Warren show that I'm on a lot. Do you see more people who come to the studio and say, can you look at my putting? Do I see more people that open and close the face too much, or at least open it too much on the backswing? Or do I see the opposite? I see the opposite. Way more. I see many more people struggling with their putter enough to say, Hey, take a look. And it wasn't a putting lesson per se. And they're they're they're almost like closing the face going back. And you were talking to me ⁓ before the show. about our friend Bill Smittle and the device he has and some research that he was talking to you about. Why don't you enlighten everybody about speaker-1: Okay, so I had this discussion with both Bill and also Preston Combs, because I've been having a lot of kids come to me that have this like a curved backstroke, but the face stays really square. So let's say if the number of their curved backstroke is like their path is on the way to being six degrees to the right. So the Sam Plot Lab reports it as you're doing the 3D, like it's certain number of degrees to the right. That's me, you're curving it inward. Their face will be like. one or two degrees close to. speaker-0: Opposite of what Tiger used to do, right? When Tiger stroke basically fairly straight back, but he opened the face and closed the face a bunch. This is they're curving the the putter on the backstroke, but they're keeping the face kind of square. speaker-1: kind of turned under. So under curl some people have called it. So they're taking the club and going like this so they're facing the ground so they're delofting it a lot in essence. And on the way through to get it back... Yes, and then on the way through they have to reverse that out. So they have to hold it off, right? So that's been I've seen that a few times recently probably half dozen in the last month or two player comes in and that's what they do and and they miss left a lot and if they don't miss left They're swinging a lot to the right or doing something to not miss left. It's like every Every miss putt is gonna go left. They just pretty much know it in the back of their mind. So speaker-0: That's it. speaker-1: their strokes start to exhibit like this on the Sampot lab, they call it inverse. So the club's not arcing inward after the ball, it's swinging out to the right. So it's going much to the right of the hole. And that generally leads to some heel strikes and low heel strikes are terrible. So the speed control gets off. I've seen that it's somewhat, I don't wanna say it's prevalent, but like when people that are good golfers have difficulty with their putting and they hit it left, that seems to be a common. pattern that you see. So Bill, he invented this ⁓ training aid, it's pretty cool. I've passed out a lot of these, sold a few. They're called the Smittle Stick. So I'll show it here right now. speaker-0: It's a pretty good name. If your name is Bill Sm Schmiddle, Schmidtle? Schmidt Smiddle. With a saying right speaker-1: Smittle. S-M-I-T-T-L. Yeah, smittle. And then you put stick behind it and that's it. Smittle. speaker-0: Not Schmidtle. Schmidtle. Yeah, I mean what a great damn for a training aid if your name is Smittle. speaker-1: So here I've got a little mini clay long here and I'm trying to know steal a little bit from you I'll give you credit, you know get the short clubs when you're doing podcasts or any kind of Yes, let me see. So I'll put it on the putter right here speaker-0: And as Tom Bartlett reminded me today, keep all putters and or show and tells for the folks that watch on YouTube directly in front of the camera. Yeah. He was right. If you can't see it it's ooh, so it goes on the grip. speaker-1: Goes on the grip. So it's got this little clown's nose thing out to the top there. And then you got a little bit of alpha beta gamma here, maybe, huh? speaker-0: Yeah, so you got some you you you basically got ⁓ some ⁓ a stick behind the grip perpendicular to the putter face and then a alpha axis in in our world coming sh straight out the putter with a little pink looks like a pink ⁓ ping pong ball. speaker-1: Yeah, yeah, so he makes these in different colors. So the only ones I had left were the pink and green which I love I think these are these are great looking Yeah, most of the most the guys are a little bit concerned with their masculinity or like and I'll take the blue ones like Okay, so got the pink ones for the girls. I guess I like pink, know, so pinks pinks one of my favorite colors So yeah, so when you take this thing back to speaker-0: Just to give him just to give him a nice little plug here since we're not in the business of selling stuff but we'll pump everybody. Just look for smiddlestick dot com. ⁓ Really? Okay. Like a like a twenty dollar device or less or speaker-1: Someday I think it's about 30, but let's say I'm trying to hold this up to the speaker-0: Not straight straight away. Straight straight away. In front of your nose. Yeah, like kinda trying to cut Okay. speaker-1: We do it this way or the other way? I'll do it like this so people can see what they were. OK, so you have this thing on top. So suppose that these things match in the face, right? So let's say if I take the club back and I twist like this. Right. See how the little ball kind of shows up on the right side of the shaft? Yes, that'd be right. I'm going twist it around. I'm looking left. Or if you went like this, which most people were talking about do, like this, that ball, as they're looking down. speaker-0: And I'll try to describe it to the people speaker-1: The shaft would start to appear on the target side of the shaft. See how that would be? Yep. Got that? Yeah. So he invented this so that people could remove the club and have the club and the arcing of the head, or whatever you want to call it, how the club's curving, so that the face matches the arcing. So if you start twisting it, under twisting or over twisting the other way, you can see that. Now, the people. speaker-0: So let me let me let me do my best at explaining to the folks that are listening to this podcast and not watching it on YouTube. Okay. So just like the Jacobs 3D airplane, if you've ever seen me with the airplane, you put the wings are perpendicular to the club face, and then the alpha axis just comes straight up like the score lines on the face. Or in a with a putter doesn't have much loft, just like the top line. Okay. So this device is got the this this pointer. on the beta axis perpendicular to the club face and then a for lack of a better term, a pecker coming straight up off the grip with a little pink ball on it. And I guess the way you would describe it is if you hooded the shaft and watched it as you took it back, the ball would go from being on top of the shaft visually to to the golfer to being on the left side of the shaft. And if you conversely did it the opposite way and rolled Gamma rotated it for the fake folks that are thinking about Jacob Street airplane. You'd put the ball on the on the on the right side of shaft. So you you could make a practice stroke and visually see this out of tune with the arc and your vision butter rotation. Correct? speaker-1: Correct. That's it. Good. Yeah. So something like this would be very helpful for somebody that's having that problem. So the kids that came to me that had that problem, they left with this metal stick and they're super pumped and helped them. yeah. that, I thought that was a. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. speaker-0: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, cool. He's a good dude. And he's a good dude, you know? We like good dudes. They Looking for more good dudes in the world. speaker-1: He said when you, when the players that do that come to him, they typically have the path out to the right and hit off the heel. Now, conversely, if somebody opens the face more than, then the head is arcing. But usually when they open the face, they also go outside and then the face is, ⁓ open. So their solution is to swing across the ball. So they get the, these outside in typically, I mean, people could do anything for real, but, you know, if you're going to go. the majority, let's say, they take it outside, faces open, they swipe across it, and that somewhat keeps them in the ball game, they're usually toe strikers, right? So either of those two maladies, if you want to call them that, they lend themselves to off-center hits, which diminishes the energy, you have energy loss. And usually energy loss in putting is not good. speaker-0: Yeah, might go in. speaker-1: Even I know some people say well on a fast putt you want hit it off the toes like I Want to hit out of the center just hit it softer. Don't want to hit it off the heel or toe ever. I want to hit it out of the sweet spot I'll take my chances on swinging harder or softer. So anyhow, that's that's the smittle stick I thought that was pretty cool thing for people to see that, you know, maybe you're interested in becoming a better putter speaker-0: So that's gonna help you with eventually if you if you use this device, it's gonna help you with your line, right? For sure. For sure. So you got line in putting and you have speed. And we have something else to talk about and show you when it comes to speed. So a dear friend of mine, Manzella certified and ⁓ and and all that good stuff, used to be on the you used to be a a regular back in the Manzella Forum days, Matt Breda. has come up with a train and aid that is called the the gimme to what a great name the gimme towel so explain it first don't don't show it first explain it first and then show it. Let's do it that way the second for the second train and aid. speaker-1: The gimme towel. OK, so he teaches golf like Brian and I. so he was coming. Yes, think was that Oregon maybe? Yeah. Or was it Washington, Oregon? think it's Oregon. So he's a fan of the Richard Franklin ⁓ Discover Golf too. So I met him at one of Richard Franklin's get togethers. But ⁓ cool guy. So he had the idea that. speaker-0: Pacific Northwest, Pacific North. speaker-1: If somebody could hit a ball within a foot of the hole, not three feet, one foot, because a three footer is not a gimme, right? That's outside the leather. That's why you have to respect the three footer, right? You can almost disrespect the one footer, almost, but you shouldn't. But tap in, if you hit the ball at all, it's probably going in. So he came up with this gimme towel. the diameter is... or the radius, me, is one foot either side of the hole. So he has a towel that's circular like this. I'll cover myself up here. Is that centered enough? speaker-0: Yeah, it's the only way it could be shown. And and it's got like a little hole drawn in the middle of it, like speaker-1: Yeah, and I'll just go side to side. She has a foot on either side. Yeah foot on any side forward back, whatever So if you're anywhere on this owl You're within a foot. So I had a young girl yesterday we were hitting all the way across the green doing the cross-country putting and She was rolling a few up on the towel and the other ones that were on the towel. It's like cool These are gimmies anything else you got to get a putt so it's the cool thing about it for me is like if I see a target that's like a you know two feet across, 80 feet away. think, I can hit it. speaker-0: Looks looks reasonable. Yeah. It's not this little bitty hole. Yeah. Way the distance. Yeah, I think you're gonna need to tend that thummy Johnny. I can't see it. That's right. That's that white towel on the ground. speaker-1: I remember ⁓ Aizinger, he was talking about making a putt one time. I think it was in Las Vegas or someplace where he made a putt, like a longer putt, to win. He said when he would practice, he would take ⁓ like a bucket. He called it a fish bucket. It's probably just a regular bucket, but he used it when he was fishing. So he'd take the fish bucket and put it on top of the green and putt to the fish bucket. So he thought, well, shoot, I can hit that fish bucket, right? So if you hit the center of the fish bucket, you're in the hole, right? So he had a putt where he just visualized the fish bucket, right? And he hooped it, know, made a bucket, right? So I think, you know, from that perspective or that way of looking at this thing, I think it's very useful, especially for, you if you get a, you know, a beginning golfer, even if, you know, 10 or 15 foot or if they can hit it like a foot from the hole, that's a good start. speaker-0: It's does the towel slow the ball down a bunch, so you got a little margin for error? Very little. speaker-1: Yeah, yeah, it does. You know, if he remakes this, he might make it a little bit different. like right now it has like a rim on it. So maybe he'd make it so that it maybe the ball roll over. But I think just just in a very basic way, this this is a well thought out training aid or it's kind of cool. You can wipe your clubs with it and wash it later. But ⁓ speaker-0: Matt Matt Breder, B-R Y D A. speaker-1: Yeah, and it's called the GimmieTel. I think if you go to... Yeah, super cool. speaker-0: Me towel. That's something that Big Don would like. He would say, Yeah, put that towel on the ground, babes, and let me show you how to knock it right in that, you know, because at at the end of the day, I don't think people I think it could help you with break too, right? speaker-1: Yeah. I'm sure there's a lot of things you can chip to it. know, landing spot, there are a bunch of uses for this thing. I think it's cool. I'm a sucker for anything like that. People go, hey, what do you think about this? I'm like, well. speaker-0: Well people tell me all the time, you know, I I get people coming here, you know, and they've tried other stuff. I mean, it you don't get to the three hundred dollar an hour teacher without trying something else first. And They say, ⁓ you know, I look all your training aids. I have I have a few and I go, but I don't use any more and I say, Ben, look it just bring ⁓ over, you know. I'll I'll I'll make something else out of it. Like I I would use it I'll take a training aid that's but obviously that that's middle stick. Michael Jacobs will use that on every kind of golf club he he has in the studio because it it's a Jacobs three D airplane miniature, right? So ⁓ But it's it's a good thing. speaker-1: Yeah, you can repurpose things all the time if you've got some imagination. If you have a little imagination, you know. speaker-0: Yeah. So now not it now we're on the the training aid show. Putting is fun. But hey, that's part of it, right? Part of part of what makes putting fun is there are probably more training aids for putting than they are for anything, I would think. speaker-1: Pretty much, and a lot of them are good. They help you line up better, help you see the line better, like read, use it for nominating or guessing, I guess you could call it, the amount of break that you need to play on a certain putt. speaker-0: So let's let's stick to let's stick to the last train and aid idea where we describe it first, then show it. speaker-1: friend of mine ⁓ speaker-0: I want to hear the the the quick history of like what made you decide to do this groove board when you started doing it? What was the genesis of all of that? speaker-1: going Genesis on me, I love Genesis, I that band. Okay, so when I was making putters with Byron, our place was right next to a guy that would remodel kitchens. And so he had taken some wood paneling off the wall of the kitchen, and he'd thrown all these slats, whatever you're call them, in the garbage. So I was throwing the garbage out and I saw these wood slats or planks that had three grooves on it. And I thought, well, shoot, let me see if I take that inside. putt on our dream green to see if that would help somebody aim if that's even a thing or useful. So I took it in and I aimed it from behind using both eyes, binocular vision, whatever you want to call it. And I'm like, okay, that's pretty straight. And then I stood over the board and when I stood over the board, it looked like it was a foot to the left. I go, that's not straight. So I took my club and I started shimmying it until it was straight in my mind. So I put a ball on top of this plank of wood and putted and I missed the the hole by a foot. Like, what the heck? So I stood behind him, I'm man, that's pretty far to the right. So I went and I got some whipping cord, because we didn't have any string in the shop. So I went and got some whipping cord from when Byron used to do refinishing of wood woods. I taped it to the center line in the back of the board, and then I stretched it out to the hole, and I arranged it till it was dead nut straight, right? Then I stood over it, I'm like, holy smokes, this is crazy. Because this looks super far to the left. So I took it out to Costa Mesa and I had people try it, crude groove board at the time, and nobody could aim with the darn. And they were just like, this is kind of frustrating. It's like, well, I'm just seeing what you can do and they couldn't do much with it. So ⁓ we had a prototype made where it was made out of ⁓ thin aluminum, like maybe 1 1⁄6 inch thick, 4 1⁄4 ⁓ inches in width. speaker-0: Supposed to be supposed to be the weather of the hole. Although if you play public if you play bub public courses like I do and you catch ⁓ at the end of a week, it it gets shrinkier. speaker-1: ⁓ For sure the tiny yes, there's another piece to this whole puzzle that it counts for that. But in any case So we had some prototypes made up and they were thin four and a quarter inches wide and 32 inches long and then we'd had them anodized green and painted the long white lines and Started, you know training with that and so we took we took 50 of them to the trade show and at the time Byron wasn't too pumped on it He thought we had wasted money making these boards. We sold them out in the first day. He's like, ⁓ That's a really good idea that I let you make those. He let me make them. Okay, it was a good idea. Whatever. So after he and I split, I didn't have any left. I think I had one. people would say, where can I get one of these? I well, I don't know. This is the only one I have, so can't sell you any. So at the time, the guy was taking group lessons from me that made plastic parts. He made like fish tanks for boats. And so he's in know, aquamarine. industry. he said, well, I can get this ⁓ plastic that's like two parts, green on the top, white on the bottom, and machine off the green, and you'll have pretty much this thing out of plastic. And I go, let's see how that works. So I made some of those, and then I went back to making metal ones. But any way you make them or you machine them, they're super, super expensive to make and time consuming. speaker-0: Well I have a green ⁓ aluminum one. speaker-1: Yeah, they're really cool. The industrial ones, I'll make some more of those because they're really handy dandy. then there's something about that aluminum board that's like a next level up. But to do the same thing, to get the lines so you can see more correctly like I wasn't seeing before I discovered this. And then to learn how to use the board to help you read green. So you position the board where you think you need to start the putt to make the putt. And most of time, you're not going to be 100 % correct. And you keep adjusting it till you are. Then you can look from behind, like if you're going to use a ball line and put it on the ground, look from the other side of the hole and stand over the board. And you take those three pictures in your mind and you just go on from there. So you can use this also to verify your reads on Aimpoint or some of the different green reading systems like Vector. I forget what the other one's called. speaker-0: Phil Canyon two thirds rule I read today. speaker-1: Whatever you're buying into, you can see how well it works ⁓ when it comes to this. So back to making them now here in the studio, ⁓ Tyler Smith. So he's a very generous man. He bought me a 3D printer and he paid like 3,500 bucks for it, a little bit more, almost four grand. And so he just kind of whipped one of these up today. So this is the first one off the press. Whoa. speaker-0: 3D printer. to see the first one off the press. speaker-1: Number one, look at this. speaker-0: Wow. I mean that really looks good. Show show it sideways right to the right to the right to the middle so you can see that there's grooves, right? You put the ball on the groove in the middle and line the middle up at the hole. Why would you put the ball on one of the outside? speaker-1: ⁓ this like, let's say if it's a right to left putt, so I'm going to be breaking this way. So you're standing over here as a right-hander, right? So if you put it on the outside groove, you hit it more gently on a right to left, or if you're hit it more jam. If you're a really fast green, you could put the ball out here. This would be super die. This would be like super, super jam. speaker-0: Outside the board altogether, right? speaker-1: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, these are thin enough. These are thin enough and I can make some that are even thinner than that. You could just put it down, put the ball in front of there. And usually your club head is going to be hopefully higher than this off the ground with the time you hit it. So it'll be it'll be just like you're hitting it, you know, just straight away off the off the green person, you know, just without any interference, let's say, or. speaker-0: Sure. How much, you know, when you when you get that thing cranked up and it's making them all the time, how how much you think you're gonna be able to sell them for? speaker-1: We'll try to keep the price reasonable because it doesn't cost a lot to make, but the printer costs a lot. And I know I didn't have any money out of pocket, but still, know, over time I'm going to give Tyler something maybe. speaker-0: Even if it was fi even if it was fifty dollars, it's it's still a a a bunch less than you'd have to charge to do the aluminum or speaker-1: For sure. For sure. Yeah. So I'm thinking somewhere between 35 and 50. I'll have to do the math, but ⁓ it's, you know, it's, it's, it's a very useful tool. I'm not just saying that because I invented it. You know, I've had ⁓ people get really good results. The first person that ever used it was Sari Pak and she, she putted like amazingly well that, that week that she used it. She had, I think it was 80, 81 pots, 81 pots. Yeah. for 54 holes. was back when some of those events were 54 holes. It was up at Calabasas. Then after that, they just came running. All these girls came, you know, like, want to get one of those. to get one of those. Of I gave her hers, but it charged the other girls ⁓ for theirs. And there's one girl named Gloria Park, the first week she got one, she won the tournament. So they work really good. So I'm pretty pumped. You know, can control making, you know, one at a time, maybe, you know, two or three a day or... think this printer can make two, so when I go home at night, I just press the button, it makes two for me. And people that come to take putting lessons from me, it'll be part of their parting gift, and for anybody else that wants to get one. speaker-0: Absolutely fabulous. So of all the let's finish up with this. Of all the putting training aids you ever use that you didn't design, what is your favorite? That is not being made the the the one caveat is not being made anymore. I'll give you mine while you think. The putt band. And and the one I'd really like is the the original Jimmy Self putt band, which was just two furniture casters and one two bands. And you'd put the T in the furniture caster or put or indoors put something on top of the furniture caster and it would stretch the bottom band out and then you'd put the top band loop in your putter and you'd you and you'd keep the one band over the other. Then he made one that has a metal track and it just got expensive and and somebody thought that that was a good idea. ⁓ you gotta make something that's a hundred dollars. And this was, you know, thirty five years ago. It should have did the other one, everybody would have one. But it basically you were using resistance to an and on a line to get the putter to go straight back and straight through. And obviously you didn't have to get it to go straight back and straight through. You could curve it or whatever. But it ⁓ if anybody finds any of those laying around, just ⁓ drop us a note. I would love to have one, be able to give one to John. speaker-1: Yeah, for sure. Okay, ready? The head freezer. And it's not something that you'd figure would be a putting training aid, you it's like you saw him in Tin Cup, where you put the little thing on his head and he got like two lines like this and there was like two little beads. They look like abacus beads. When you look down through it, get like, instead of seeing two, you see four. So it kind of gets your eyes lined up. There's another one that Butch Harmon used to pitch. I think it was called the speaker-0: Yes. speaker-1: pro something or another pro aim. speaker-0: Didn't Pels have one like that that was laser? speaker-1: ⁓ Maybe, but the one that Butch pitched, I think it was called the ProAim. They were these glasses, they were like yellow, I think. They had like this little weird circle on one of the eyes and it did the same thing. It projected the little... like the head freezer. know, you got the two lines. Your eyeline. Yeah. Yeah, your eyeline. Yeah. that was my favorite one. It's pretty cool thing. ⁓ That's one that you can't find. I've typed that in on eBay a bunch of times. speaker-0: We're we're getting more and more people to listen to the show. So anybody has a ⁓ speaker-1: I'll trade three groove boards for Head Freezer. speaker-0: How about that? How about that? Well, as always, Mr. Johnny, it is awful fun. We have the best theme song in golf. speaker-1: or not. classic john rooter you can't find your center be straight shooter ⁓ yeah bunches and so many different models he was the man speaker-0: There were other genres. Thanks for listening in folks. speaker-1: It is. ⁓ speaker-0: It is.