Tiger Woods' Putting Advice He Learned When He was 3 Years Old Is Going Viral
Tiger Woods is celebrating his 50th birthday on Tuesday, Dec. 30. Inevitably, celebrating such a milestone birthday means a lot of great Tiger stories resurfacing all over the internet and on social media to honor the greatest player in golf history.
One such legendary story that's resurfacing is the putting advice Tiger learned from his late father, Earl, when he was just 3 years old. The advice surfaced in a Golf.com piece after the writer shared that their golf instructor, the Scottsdale-based Keith Bennett, was the one who conjured up the advice that will help golfers with their distance control, among other things.
The Brilliant Advice
As Woods tells it, he was just 3 years old when his father told him to putt to a picture.
"What he did was, every look I take from the ball is a 'picture,'" Woods says, explaining the advice during an American Express event back when he was in his prime.
Woods adds, "And then all I do is think about putting to the picture. And that really helps free up your mind."
Essentially, Woods looks at the hole he's aiming for and takes a mental picture, so that when he's preparing to take a swing, his mind has already locked in a picture of where he's aiming, which eliminates other distractions.
Tiger reiterated the advice in June 2022 during a Golf Digest segment of "My Game."
"Dad always described it as anytime you look at the hole, so whether it's walking around or anytime I look up, I'm painting a picture in my mind. At the end of the day, when I look back to the golf ball and I putt, I'm just putting to what I just saw. And that's all my looks, whether it's reading it or looking up. And the two looks that I normally give is I'm just putting to that picture I painted," he explained. "It frees up my stroke. But that doesn't mean that I get to get away with not doing all my drills and making sure my posture is good, my grip is good, my pressure is good, all of these other little things."
It's Not an Easy Fix
Bennett, the Scottsdale-based instructor at McCormick Ranch Golf Club, shared the Tiger clip on his Instagram Story, and followed it up with more advice, essentially preaching patience.
"Golfers! You have to do the drill for more than a week to see the benefits!" he shared. "In most cases they need to be done for months and years!"
Unless you're Tiger.