After a third appearance as a father-son duo at the PNC Championship in south Florida, 14-year-old Charlie Woods accidentally let slip a key insight into his father’s putting.
Tiger Woods and Charlie managed to finish tied for fifth at the tournament – shooting 19-under thanks in part to some short-game struggles on the first day.
When asked by Golf.com about how good of a caddie his dad is, Charlie mentioned that Tiger’s reads are not traditional.
‘For Dad as a caddie, his reads are hook-bias, and I don’t hook as much as he does,’ he said.
‘So all of my putts, I miss right. So I have to account for that.’
Charlie Woods says that his dad, Tiger, tends to hook his putts and that messes up some reads
An analysis finds Tiger tends to start his putts aiming right before closing the face at impact
The Woods duo finished tied for fifth at this weekend’s PNC Championship
Analysis of putt lab data (via Golf Digest) found that Tiger actually addresses the ball to the right of his intended line. But thanks to a strong right hand in his putting stroke, he hooks the club face back to being slightly closed.
While not technically ‘perfect’, it is consistent – and Tiger has practiced it enough that it’s become natural and it works well for him.
On Saturday, the pairing only finished eight-under and blamed their work on the greens for a performance that wasn’t up to their standards.
‘I mean, I drove the ball really good today – I didn’t miss a fairway – and we still managed to shoot eight-under,’ Charlie remarked, adding, ‘We just suck at putting.’
Tiger agreed, following up his son’s comments by saying that he ‘summed it up right there’.
Sunday, they got their act together – shooting eleven-under on the day to finish 19-under for the whole tournament.
Bernhard Langer and his son Jason won the tournament by two shots.