[Dr Winston O Boogie jr]

I played golf today with someone who blamed my missed putts on the lumpy donut.

On the first hole I missed a six foot putt simply because I didn't hit it hard enough. She walked over to the hole and said, "We have decided that when they make new holes, they pull up the ground around the hole and make a mound." She then, to my horror, proceeded to stomp around and on the hole to flatten out this mound. She caved in the nice sharp edges of the hole making it more likely that a good putt will lip out.

I worked at golf courses for 35 years and I have seen tens of thousands of holes cut in the greens. I've heard other people say the same thing and I can tell you that this is pretty much never the case. When a worker cuts a new hole, it is possible that the turf is pulled up into a little mound around the hole. But then the worker must set the cup. To do this, he uses a device that is a metal disc about a foot in diameter. It has a hole in the middle and a 4-1/4" tube that extends about an inch from the bottom and then is reduced to 4-1/8" for another inch or so. The cup is placed over this tube and slid into the hole. The worker then steps on the disc to pus the cup all the way down and flatten the area around the hole.

Now, Dave Pelz has come up the the term "Lumpy Donut" for a hole that has a slight mound around it. According to Pelz, this mound comes not from pulling out the hole cutter during the hole cutting process, but from golfers stepping around the hole to retrieve their balls.

Golfers tend not to step on the hole when taking their ball out, but rather 6"-10" around the hole. What happens is that the area from 6"to 10" away from the hole becomes depressed but the area inside that 6"-10" circle remains at the same height.

The solution to this is not to step on the hole caving it in as my companion did this morning. Nor is it to blame this lumpy donut for you missed putts. Research has shown that a putt that is going at a speed that would carry is 15" beyond the hole, if it misses, has the best chance of going in. This is because a putt going that speed will not be affected by any imperfections in the green including the lumpy donut. A putt going faster than that can lip out more easily so 15" past the hole is the perfect speed.

I play with a lot of people who either hit their putts to hard or too soft and when it doesn't go in say that they got robbed.

I had two short putts that went right across the face of the hole today and both times, I was told that I got robbed. Both times I replied that I didn't get robbed, I just didn't hit the ball hard enough. A bad golf shot is the fault of the player 99.99999% of the time. I get amused at people that blame the course and everything else for their bad shots.