How To Use The Claw Putting Grip

Katie Dawkins explains the Claw Putting grip

Transcript

00:00Hello, I'm Katie Dawkins, I'm an advanced PGA professional and I'm here at West Hill

00:09Golf Club on their lovely greens to talk to you about the Claw Putter Grip and how it

00:15works.

00:16Made famous in 2003 by Marco Mirra who adopted the Claw Putting Grip to help to save his

00:22putting game and he won in Dubai, it's since become quite popular as other players have

00:27watched successes of other players who've had a go at it, it seems to be working and

00:31the recent Ryder Cup saw Tommy Fleetwood, Sergio Garcia, Lee Westwood all putting with

00:38the Claw Grip, so why does it work so well?

00:41The Claw Grip puts the shoulders in control, taking out that bottom hand and stopping any

00:47sort of handsy action, so anyone who suffers from the yips or suffers from missed short

00:52putts may well need to have a little go at this, here's how we do it.

00:56To actually apply the Claw Grip in your putting setup you need to take your top hand and stick

01:03the butt of the putter almost up into your lifeline and hold it very softly, the other

01:08hand comes in and almost like creating a little nodule in this area here or a little shelf,

01:15you hook that shelf in and underneath and these hands just rest very softly on the flat

01:22edge of the top of your putter grip.

01:24What you'll find from there is that this arm is kind of out of control, you're really putting

01:28just with this side and all that you're going to do is rock the shoulders back and through

01:33and give yourself a nice smooth action, the feeling of the stroke is light and really

01:40smooth, the roll on the ball is going to be much better than if you were holding it for

01:44dear life like this and getting a bit twitchy with it, it's definitely worth having a go.

01:49So what you'll find on the longer putts, especially on greens as beautiful as these

01:53ones at West Hill, is it's fine if the greens are nice and smooth and they're quite speedy,

02:02on greens that are a little bit shaggier and a little bit slower you will struggle.

02:07The other thing to bear in mind is that the Claw Grip is a big decision to make, in your

02:11golf game once you go Claw you never go back, it's very hard to make the change back to

02:17a traditional putting grip if you like.

02:19So if your putting isn't a problem, don't change it but perhaps the Claw is the grip

02:24for you, give it a whirl, see how it goes and hopefully you'll start to save shots on

02:29that green with that lovely loose free flowing stroke.