Putting

A friend of mine was giving me some putting tips and he suggested I line up the putter by setting the head down on the green behind the ball, and adjust the face angle until it is exactly at the angle needed to send the ball in the correct direction. You do this as you are standing behind the putter while holding the grip in your left hand while facing toward the hole.

Once you're happy, you step around the club while holding it in the correct position. Without moving the putter now take your stance and grip then put being careful to keep the putter facing the right direction.

My question is this. Isn't this cheating? It sure seems like cheating to me. For one thing I thought you had to stay to one side of the ball. For another I thought you weren't allowed to touch the green with your putter -- something about not touching the line between the ball and the hole.

Nope, completely legal, a little goofy looking, but what ever works. It is only violating the rules if you make a stroke at the ball standing on the line. Long time ago, Sam Snead use to putt mallet style, standing behind the ball, and was really good, then they changed the rules. He still putted the same way, just stood to the side off the line, but still facing the hole.

The rule about touching the green does not apply to setting up to make a stroke. It means you can not use the putter or any other object, including your hands, foot, etc...to test the green, to find out speed or grain. You just have to do that by sight alone.

Oh by the way, no one else may stand on the line of a putt, front or back while making a stroke either. Now once the ball is rolling and the stroke as been made, you can run over behind the ball on the line, that is ok, just not during the stroke. Otherwise their caddie would stand there all the time helping them, they do it anyways, but you will notice just before they make the stroke, the caddie moves.

Just for fun, next time your playing a round and your buddy is tending the flag for you, dollars to donuts he will have one of his feet on the line behind the hole, people do it all the time. It will cost him a one stroke penalty...lol...some one will want to break out the rule book, any ways Rule 16 covers most of these
http://golf.about.com/cs/rulesofgolf/a/rule16.htm

Many thanks for the clarification and the link.

Still, can't help thinking it's not kosher. According to rule 16 they say it's ok to place the putter on the line of the putt in front of the ball, I take that to mean between the ball and the hole. In my situation the putter is behind the ball, basically a few mm away from impact position.

As I understand rule 16, you can pretty much ground the club, but, you can't "press down" on the putting surface.

One thing to watch out for is that you don't accidentally move the ball ... so be very careful when you are doing this.

All winter I practiced in a facility at the same time as a high school team ... I watched one player continuosly oscillate the ball and on occasion move the ball ... I mentioned it to their coach because I would have hated to see the kid take penalties or dq'd just for not paying attention.

There's actually a putter designed to stand on its own so that you can do exactly this - get behind and set your line perfectly.

Granted, you still have to keep the face square to that line at impact...