Ernie Els putting practice
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World Number Five Ernie Els is planning a major assault on his putting stroke this week.
The Big Easy blames his lack of putting touch on the greens at Royal Birkdale for his disappointing performance in The Open last week.
And he’s heading over to the Butch Harmon School of Golf at Rio Secco golf club in Las Vegas this week to spend a couple of days working on his putting stroke with coach Butch Harmon.
“I want to work on my short game and especially my putting to see if I can get it sharp,” Els wrote in his weekly diary on ernieels.com. “These past couple of years I’ve tried different putters and different methods, but that hasn’t really worked out for me. I think it’s time to get back to basics. There’s a method that worked for me in the past and I think I’ll look to go back to that.”
Despite his troubles on the greens Els put in a commendable performance to finish seventh in last week’s Open Championship.
“I was told that I was one of only two players in the field to break par twice in this year’s Open (the other was the champion Padraig Harrington),” wrote Els. “On such a tough golf course, and in such brutal conditions, I guess shooting a pair of 69s says some positive things about my game. And it got me into a tie of seventh place. But driving away from Birkdale on Sunday night, this felt like a major of missed opportunities and to be honest, that doesn’t feel good.”
With Els under his wing, Butch Harmon now works with three of the top five players in the world – Phil Mickelson and Adam Scott are the other two. Other pupils include LPGA Tour player Natalie Gulbis and PGA Tour stalwart Stewart Cink.
