How To Read Golf Putting Greens

Once you have mastered the general technique of putting and settled on a method that promotes feel, the next thing to conquer is how to understand the contours of the green and how these and the grass quality will affect your putting.

Reading a green is one of golf’s great challenges. You are unlikely to face exactly the same putt twice, and you are also unlikely to find a totally flat green, so the ability to read a green accurately is vital.

In most cases, you will need to aim either to the right or left of the hole in order to allow for the break, or borrow.

Accessing Borrow

This skill is gained more by experience than anything else. If you play most of your golf at the same course then you will learn over time the subtleties that exist on those particular greens and will master them.

If a borrow stands between your ball and the hole, then the ball will deviate from a straight path because of the slope of the green, and allowances will have to be made according to its severity.

Weather Conditions

The better the greens the more allowance that has to be made for borrow. Wet and windy conditions can also make quite a difference to putting. If the greens are sodden then the borrow will not have nearly the same effect as if they are dry.

As a rough guide, allow perhaps half the borrow you would normally. The hard and fast rule to observe is that the golf ball will always follow Newton’s laws. So if you are putting downhill or downwind, it is going to travel much faster than in the opposite direction.

The difference can be quite dramatic when the putt is both downhill and downwind. Approach such putts with extreme caution. Reading greens well is a skill that comes with experience of playing on a variety of different courses in all weather conditions.