Few things in golf are more frustrating than crushing a drive off the tee, wedging it to 8 feet, and then completely missing the putt. To make it worse, your playing partner skanks a drive into the trees, skulls his second into a bunker, chunks his sand shot to 15 feet — and then drains it for par.
You both walk off with 4's, but it feels like you should have beaten him by at least two strokes. That's golf. But becoming a better putter to complement your improved ball striking is entirely achievable — and I've found what may be the perfect training aid to get you started in under 20 minutes.
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The scenario above is practically autobiographical for every golfer, including myself. My putting had deteriorated from neglect while I was focused on driver work for the "Bomb Your Driver" series.
When I finally committed to fixing my putting, I tried everything. My go-to drills — the Putting Shaft Drill, checking Forearm Alignment, working on Distance Control — didn't seem to make a difference.
I was particularly struggling because our greens had deteriorated, leaving them extremely bumpy and grainy. Couple that with a stroke that was wobbly at best and too long, and I was missing more putts than I made.
On slow, bumpy greens especially, it is absolutely critical to strike your putts solidly with an accelerating stroke. If you decelerate, the putt will never hold its line.
I tried a heavier putter, a long putter, putting with my wedge — and finally realized I was overcomplicating everything. There had to be a simple fix.
Enter the Eyeline Golf Putting Plane. As members know, I'm extremely cautious when it comes to endorsing training aids. The market is flooded with gimmicky products that promise miracles and deliver nothing. In this case, I'm glad I gave it a second look.
We teach that the putter should work back and through on a slight arc. This arc occurs naturally when the shoulders rock gently, but it's far less severe than extreme arc methods. Think of it as the ideal middle ground — not dead straight, not exaggerated, just a natural shoulder-driven arc.
Visualizing and teaching exactly how much arc feels right has always been challenging — but the Putting Plane solves that problem instantly.
The Putting Plane is tilted at 72° — allowing a natural, gentle arc that requires zero hand or arm manipulation. Just a simple shoulder motion with minimal independent movement in the hands and arms.
The instant I made my first few strokes on the Putting Plane, I was sold. The feedback was immediate, my stroke felt smooth and solid, and I started draining putts consistently. After testing it with students and seeing identical results, I knew this was the real thing.
Immediately, students could feel and see what the stroke should look and feel like. The Acceleration Drill I'm going to show you in this video has made me the most confident putter I've ever been — and I'm confident it will do the same for you.
You can identify a truly great training aid by two criteria: it's simple, and it works. Simple concepts always hold the deepest truths in golf, and the Putting Plane is as simple as it gets while revealing an enormous amount about your stroke.
The built-in mirror shows you where your eyes sit relative to the ball, whether your head moves during the stroke, whether your shoulders are square, and whether your shaft angle is correct — all while letting you see and feel a mechanically correct stroke.
Getting that much diagnostic information would normally require an instructor, two camera angles, and a laptop. Instead, you get it for barely more than the cost of a sleeve of Pro V1's.
Video Transcription: Putting Acceleration Drill
Let's face facts. Putting isn't exactly the most glamorous or exciting part of the game. We all know that the majority of strokes are taken on or around the green, but it's rarely fun to practice — largely because the results are difficult to measure and the progress feels invisible.
It's easy to see the payoff when you crush a 300-yard drive. But putting involves such minute, detail-oriented adjustments that progress is hard to quantify. Small improvements in face angle or stroke path don't produce the dramatic visual feedback of a booming tee shot.
Even with a video camera, you can't readily measure one or two degrees of the putter face being open or closed, or the club head drifting off its proper arc. It's an incredibly challenging aspect to teach because the critical variables — arc amount, face angle through impact, grip pressure — are all too subtle for most golfers to see or feel without guidance.
Putting Plane
When students ask about my putting philosophy, I always explain that the putter works on a slight arc. I don't advocate any hand or arm manipulation — consistent with everything we teach in the full swing. Take your proper grip, rock your shoulders back and through, and the putter will naturally travel on a gentle arc.
People often ask, "So that's different from the Pelz pure in-line stroke?"
Yes — I don't believe the putter works straight back and straight through. But the arc is very subtle.
"OK, so you're teaching an arc like Stan Utley?"
Not exactly. The putter head does work on an arc, but not to the severity Utley teaches, which requires a much more hands-and-arms-dominated stroke to achieve that tight, pronounced arc.
My approach falls right in the middle. The putter works back on an arc, but it's very slight. Not straight back and straight through — that's not a natural movement either.
Explaining such a precise, subtle concept has always been the challenge. How much arc? How do you set up for it? How does the whole system work together?
Mirrored plate provides visual feedback
After years of searching, I finally found something that explains it perfectly. It's the simplest training aid I've ever encountered — and as members know, I'm notoriously slow to endorse anything.
In four years, I've only mentioned two training aids worth purchasing: an impact bag and a swing speed radar. Both are dead simple and effective. Most training aids aren't worth the money, in my experience.
The Putting Plane from Eyeline Golf finally solves the explanation problem. It has two adjustable rails for your putter head, built on an 18° tilt. This allows the putter head to slide naturally — working up as it moves inside on the backswing, returning to center through impact, then tracking up again as it follows the natural arc through the follow-through.
The arc is very slight as the putter head travels up and down the tilt. It's exactly what I teach — and it lets you feel and see the proper motion immediately.
Mirrored plate provides visual feedback
Best of all, this training aid has simple holes drilled into the surface that enable specific drills. Today I'm focusing on one drill in particular — the Acceleration Drill — that has transformed not only my teaching but my own putting.
I've always received compliments on my putting stroke. So why change it? I didn't want to change the stroke — I wanted to understand why I wasn't converting more putts. The Putting Plane showed me exactly why.
The first time I used it, I discovered that my shoulders were slightly open at address. We're talking maybe a few degrees — not enough to catch on video, but the built-in mirror made it immediately obvious.
I also discovered that my eyes were positioned too far behind the ball. This contributed to the open shoulders and created a tendency to pull putts. Getting my eye position corrected using this tool made an immediate difference.
The second breakthrough was learning to limit my backswing to one of the tee-marker holes and then accelerate through the ball.
My stroke had always been praised for its smooth tempo, but I consistently pulled putts. The problem? When you take the putter back long and slow, you tend to shut the face as you begin the release coming through.
The club slides along the angled plate, creating a natural arc
If your timing and tempo aren't precisely calibrated on every stroke, you're going to run into trouble. Taking a shorter stroke and accelerating through eliminates many of those common misses — pulled putts, hooded takeaways, inconsistent face angles — and keeps the putter working on its proper arc.
Let's look at the setup for the Acceleration Drill.
In this drill, I've placed a tee in the ground behind the ball, with the ball positioned in the center slot of the Putting Plane.
On an actual green, you'd stick a standard tee into one of the holes on the Putting Plane. Indoors, a rubber tee achieves the same purpose — limiting how far back you take the putter.
Without a ball first: as I set up and take the club back, I want the putter to just barely contact that tee — then I accelerate through aggressively.
Setup for Acceleration Drill
The through-stroke should be roughly a third faster — or even twice as fast — as the backstroke. You don't want to drag the putter back slowly and then creep through, because that slow tempo encourages the face to shut during the takeaway and close even more coming through.
Take it back at a good tempo and let the heel of the putter glide up and down the arc of the Putting Plane. You'll find that your stroke becomes much quieter and you'll naturally accelerate through the ball.
Now I'll place the ball in position. The first putt you hit with this drill will feel remarkably solid.
This first putt rolled dead on line. The putter worked up and down the plane perfectly. For right now, all you're focusing on is taking the putter back to just barely contact that tee — then accelerating through.
Take the putter back to the tee
With the second tee position, on a typical green you should be able to roll the ball 8–10 feet. If your putts are only traveling 3 feet, you're not accelerating enough through impact.
Work on this tee drill and it will teach you how to accelerate properly through every putt — producing solid, consistent contact and a reliable roll. For the same kind of immediate, precision feedback on your full swing, try a free AI swing analysis that diagnoses your mechanics in detail. To practice with real-time coaching, check out a free AI golf lesson.
Watch part 2 now to see how you're moving your body in the opposite direction of the pros!
Putting Plane
