I lose more strokes on the greens than anywhere else. At 58, playing to a 14 handicap with a swing that's not getting any faster, I know the fastest way to lower my score is to stop three-putting. Last November I cleared a corner of the garage and set up the PUTT-A-BOUT Par Three Golf Putting Green (3' x 9'), mostly because it was the one piece of practice equipment I could leave out and actually use. Five months later, it's the piece of practice gear I reach for most. Here are ten reasons it earns a spot in my bag.
A note before the list: no mat is going to fix your stroke by itself, and this one won't make you a better lag putter. What it does is make practice convenient enough that you'll actually do it. Convenient practice, it turns out, is the only kind I've ever stuck with. I'm not here to sell you on a gimmick. This is a simple mat, and that's the point. It's the reason the PUTT-A-BOUT stayed in my garage while other training aids went to a yard sale.
Practice the putts you keep missing, without leaving the garage.
The PUTT-A-BOUT Par Three (3' x 9') gives you a real putting surface you can leave set up in a corner of the garage or a spare room. No trip to the course required.
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It's already set up, so you actually use it
The biggest lie in my golf life is that I'll practice more if I have the right gear. I've owned alignment sticks, a swing plane trainer, and a net that spent three years in the basement. The PUTT-A-BOUT works because it lives on the garage floor. When I walk past it on the way to the car, I drop a ball and hit five putts. Five minutes a day, most days, without ever making a plan to practice.
The ball comes back to you, so you never stop to chase putts
The cup at the far end of the mat returns the ball to your feet, so a made putt rolls right back to you. That sounds minor until you've practiced on a mat where every make means walking to the far end. I get three or four times as many repetitions in ten minutes because the ball is always there. The garage stays tidy too, which matters more than I'd like to admit.
It's slower than most club greens, which is exactly what I needed
Greens at my course roll fast in summer and medium the rest of the year. The PUTT-A-BOUT runs a little slower than both. At first I hated that. Then I realized it was forcing me to hit putts with real pace instead of babying them. On the course, my putts now get to the hole instead of dying six inches short. Practicing on a slower surface made the real greens feel quick, not intimidating.
Nine feet is the right length for the putts that cost me strokes
Most of my three-putts are from six feet and in. I don't miss many 30-footers twice; I miss the four-footer that follows. The 3' x 9' mat lets me set up from three, four, and six feet, the exact distances where I was giving away strokes. I put a tee at the edge of the mat and move it back a few inches each week. It also forced me to get honest about which distance was killing me: the short one, not the long one. This is the closest thing I've found to practicing the putts that actually show up in a round.
It showed me my real problem: pace, not line
One Tuesday night in February I hit 20 putts from four feet and watched 14 of them die short of the cup. I'd blamed my misses on reading the line wrong. The mat doesn't have any break to misread, so it stripped away my excuses. My problem was pace, not line. I spent the next month working on a firmer stroke, and the next time I played, my four-footers started dropping.
The surface has held up to daily use
I've had this mat out since November. It sits on a concrete garage floor that gets hot in summer and cold in winter, and the surface still rolls true. The edges haven't curled, the backing hasn't peeled, and the cup hasn't worn through. I expected to replace a cheap mat by spring. The PUTT-A-BOUT is still flat and solid, and I've stopped looking for a replacement.
It takes up less room than you think
Three feet by nine feet sounds big until you see it against a garage wall. It's about the size of two bicycles side by side. I keep it rolled out between the push cart and the workbench, and I can still park the car. If I need the space back, it rolls up in about thirty seconds. My wife Carol doesn't golf, and she hasn't complained once. Even Murphy, our yellow Lab, steps over it on his way to the backyard.
It pairs with the practice routine I already had
I already walked nine holes twice a week and hit balls at the range ten minutes from the house. What I never did was work on putting, because the practice green at the course is usually crowded and I was always rushing to tee off. Now my routine is five minutes of putts in the garage before I load the push cart. The mat didn't replace my routine. It filled the gap in it.
It gave me a warm-up that carries into Saturday rounds
Our Saturday foursome tees off at 7:40, and the practice green is packed. On the weeks I skip a warm-up, I three-putt the first three holes. On the weeks I spend ten minutes on the PUTT-A-BOUT before loading the car, my first putt of the day is a confident stroke, not a guess. I can hit thirty putts in ten minutes and show up loose instead of cold.
It's the one training aid I've actually kept using
I own a garage full of good intentions. A swing trainer I used twice. A putting mirror that lives in a drawer. The PUTT-A-BOUT is the exception because it asks nothing from me: no setup, no batteries, no app. It's a flat surface with a cup at the end, and that's exactly what I needed. Five months in, I still use it most days. My handicap has dropped from 15 to 14 in the process. The mat didn't do that alone, but it did the part I was ignoring.
What I'd Skip
This mat is not for everyone, and I'd skip it if you're looking for a true green simulation. It's flat, so there's no break to read. It's nine feet long, so you can't practice lag putts from thirty feet. And it runs slower than most club greens, which will bother you if you're used to fast greens. If you want to practice reading slopes or long-distance speed control, you'd be better served by a bigger, contoured practice green. I'd also skip it if you expect a mat to fix your stroke. It won't. It just makes practice easy enough that you'll do it.
Fourteen of my twenty putts from four feet died short of the cup before I started using this mat. Two months of daily practice later, that number was reversed.
Ready to stop three-putting from inside six feet?
The PUTT-A-BOUT Par Three (3' x 9') is the most convenient putting practice I own. It sets up in seconds, takes up one corner of the garage, and it's still the first thing I reach for before a round.
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