Disc Golf Putting: Get 1 Percent better with This Easy Tip!

Today’s disc golf putting tip will add to your game, especially if you read all the way to the end. In general, we will talk a little about the power of those 1% gains and how they can accumulate. Over time, by piling these 1% gains on top of each other, you can become a markedly better player. Here’s one such small tip to add to your bucket of many…

Have you ever watched even a hole of professional ball-golf on TV? If you have, there’s a minor, yet almost universal thing that all the pros do. There in lies our tip for the day and I’ll get to it very soon…

First, though, I want to recognize that each of those players on your screen have worked incredibly hard to get to where they are. With rising purses and dramatically increased interest from the many rises and falls of Tiger Woods, there are so many more players drawn to the game. More players means more talent. More talent in the field means you have to be that much better to make it.

As such, these players will go for any edge they can get in the name of improvement. Even if it’s far less than one percent.

The title of this post claims you’ll get 1% better. It’s an outrageous claim on the level of Dr. Evil’s father claiming he invented the question mark. Nevertheless, I think it has merit.

Who could possibly quantify such a thing? Who knows, maybe you’ll get 5% better? On the whole, however, I do think this tip will make you better and I plan to prove it.

In the book, Atomic Habits, the author, James Clear, talks about how over time these 1% marginal gains can stack up over time to make us appreciably better at anything we endeavor to try. You can read my post on how Atomic Habits can improve your disc golf game here.

This post is written in that spirit. It will not ask you to change one thing about your form. In the end though, I think it can give you added benefits, including confidence, that will make a difference in your score over time.

So Let’s get into it by revisiting our professional ball-golfers and learning from them.

The tip to make you 1% better at Putting

Okay, we’re back watching ball-golf on the screen. Let’s say the player you are watching is playing a par 4. It just so happens that they struck the drive right down the middle of the fairway and now they are looking at 150 yards to the pin.

They make their shot, and land the ball safely on the green about 25 feet from the pin. They turn to their caddy and hand them back the club that they just shot with. Then, rather than walking to their ball, they leave their hand out. And what does the caddy hand them?

The caddy hands the player their putter. Now, the player, putter in hand, starts walking up the fairway to assess their putt. And this brings me to today’s tip.

Tip to get 1% better: When your next shot is going to be a putt, get your putter out of your bag and hold it in your putting hand as you walk up to your disc.

Hear that? That’s the sound of readers swearing under their breath and clicking “close” never to be heard from again. But if you’re still here, I’ll explain why this works AND how it adds even more value for your overall game as well.

Why does this Putting Tip Work?

Remember, golfers have a reason for almost everything they do. The fact that so many of them do this is not a coincidence.

Basically, they are letting their body and brain calibrate as they walk up the fairway. Subconsciously, your body is getting a feel for the weight and feel of the putter. This gives you that much more familiarity and touch when you actually make the putt. Ultimately, this leads to better performance. It also leads to more confidence.

Now bring it to disc golf. Have you ever tried putting with someone else’s putter? Or, have you ever tried putting with a vastly different weight on the putter? It feels wonky! Your focus is drawn to all these differences and distracts you from the shot. Most likely, your confidence to perform the putt wanes as well. At least it probably does at first (Though this is also how people find new putters they like even more).

Pulling your putter out of your bag and walking up with it in your putting hand derives from that idea. Presumably you just threw a different disc to get within putting range. That disc presumably has different feel to it. So, get your putter out and let your brain/body calibrate a little.

In other words, let your subconscious start working for you…

Putting your Subconscious to work

We’ve all experienced the power of our subconscious before. Most commonly it happens when you can’t remember something. You get that tip of your tongue phenomenon but can’t quite recall a name or fact you are digging for. Reluctantly, you move on.

Then, later on, like a bolt of lightning, the answer hits you and you blurt out “Oklahoma!” That was your subconscious working behind the scenes to generate the answer you were seeking.

Quick aside, there’s probably no greater “cinematic” example of this than “Always Sunny in Philadelphia” when Frank Reynolds is trying to conjure up the name of a specific sharp object… You can watch him come up with it here.

But on a more serious note, the subconscious is a powerful machine that we can put to work in many applications on the disc golf course.

This article here (not written by me), gives lots of information on your subconscious and how it can be used in athletic ventures. It extols the virtues of positive self-talk, visualization and many other techniques to get the most out of your mental game.

Let’s look at a few of them and add a little more to our putting tip.

Adding On!

Getting back to our ball-golf example, you don’t see the caddie hand the golfer the next club nearly as much if the next shot is not a guaranteed putt.

Why? Because you don’t want the golfer to calibrate, then suddenly choose a different club at the last second. Then, they’d have to recalibrate on the fly. It would be counterproductive.

But, in disc golf, I would say there is a much higher likelihood that you will know what your next disc will be even if it’s not a putt. So, as soon as you do, pull it out and get your subconscious working for you!

And when that next shot is a putt, pull your putter out, but put your conscious mind to work as well. Start visualizing your putt going in. Do it again when you see your lie as well. Visualization is a powerful technique used throughout professional sports. Put the end result in your mind’s eye, and let your body perform it.

I talked about this in another putting tip that I posted about called The Disc Golf Putting Tip for Instant Improvement. Similar to this one, it does not ask you to change your form. Give it a look and keep adding to your game.

Little by little, by piling these tips on top of each other, we can keep adding to our game and seeing results out on the course.

1 Percent Better – the Disc Golf Putting Tip – In Summary

Specifically, in this post, we talked about how pulling your putter out of your bag and holding it in your putting hand as you walk to the location of your next putt can help your body calibrate to the shot.

Combining this with your visualization of making the shot puts your conscious and subconscious working together to give you the best chance of making that putt. In the end, by combining these ideas, you are going to be more confident and make more shots.

More generally, this idea taps into a broader idea of making ourselves incrementally better over a span of time. By practicing effectively and adding incrementally to our game, we can see dramatic improvement over the long haul.

I dabbled into this effect a little bit in a post that talks about disc golf and money. Essentially, with money, one of the things that we see in investing is that people disregard the 1% fees attached to mutual funds, for example, as meaningless. But, over time, that seemingly trivial 1 percent can add up to hundreds of thousands (even millions) of dollars over a lifetime of investing. You can read that post on disc golf and money here.

So it is with our disc golf performance as well. If we don’t trivialize the importance of marginal gains, and we look down the road a ways, we may look back some day and marvel at just how far we’ve come. This is my general plan for myself as I re-embark on a more concerted journey into the world of disc golf. I hope it helps you in yours as well…

Thanks for reading everyone! If you made it to the end (and didn’t click away) then I want to hear about it. Also, if you have any minor things you do on the course that give you that slight edge, then please put them in the comments below. Finally, please consider subscribing and getting all my content delivered free to your inbox. As I write this (5/22) this website is quite new. If, in your meanderings, you happen upon a post you like, please don’t hesitate to share it any way you know how. Your efforts and presence are much appreciated! Take care and keep disc golf’n around!