BODY / PUTTING B Test: Look to your knuckles How do you know if the claw is right for you? Without a club, allow your arms to hang naturally from your shoulders and look down at your knuckles. If they point directly away from you and your palms face your thighs ( photo, below ), you could benefit from the claw. If the knuckles on your left hand point towards the target and your palms face one another, you’re probably better sticking with a traditional grip or trying another way to hold the club.
Grip: Form a paddle Almost every player on the professional tours who uses the claw has their own version of it. I prefer my fingers make as little contact with the handle as possible, which quiets the right hand and puts more emphasis on the arms and shoulders in the stroke. Take your normal left- hand grip, resting the putter in the palm of that hand. Now straighten the fingers on your right hand so you’re e!ectively creating the look of a paddle ( photo, left ). Keeping the fingers straight and relaxed, slip the handle in between your thumb and forefinger. Apply some light pressure on the top of the handle with your index and middle fingers – just enough so that you can control the club – and make sure that the back of your hand and forearm form a straight line. This way, the putter will swing back and through on one plane, like a pendulum.
Why it works: Change can be good In addition to the claw promoting more of a torso- driven stroke and quieting the role of the hands (photos, right), it also tends to feel more comfortable for golfers with rounded postures who struggle to hit putts smoothly. It improves distance control by helping to negate that bad feeling of needing to give the ball a whack to get it to the hole. Also, switching to a grip so different than the usual way you hold the putter creates an entirely new feel and motor pattern – one that doesn’t come with all those bad memories about the putts you’ve missed.
32 GOLF DIGEST SOUTH AFRICA
JUNE 2024
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