protee putting

[Cklguy2013]

I've had my Protee for a couple years and I'll have to admit I've never understood how to control putting distance on it. Tonight on a flat green I had the following results

3.27 mph ball speed, 4 feet, 1.22 feet per mph
5.01 mph ball speed, 9 feet, 1.79 feet per mph
7.16 mph ball speed, 19 feet, 2.65 feet per mph
9.01 mph ball speed, 30 feet, 3.32 feet per mph
11.86 mph ball speed, 52 feet, 4.38 feet per mph
14.74 mph ball speed, 80 feet, 5.42 feet per mph

Shouldn't this relationship be more linear? Am i missing something in the settings?

[ProTee United]

ProTee Golf or TGC?

[Cklguy2013]

Using Protee to play on the TGC.

[Cklguy2013]

I'd be curious to see someone's number using a CG2 or Skytrak, I was putting on the Flat putting green (Protee) in the TGC

[mmlincon]

I'd be interested in see if it is more linear if you used ProTee 2 and not TGC. I'm on a GC2 and the putting on TGC has been driving me crazy. I can never get the speed right and seeing those numbers I can see why. If I can find some time I'll try to run a similar test. Putting on the protee system is better though.

[ProTee United]

Don't bother comparing results with other hardware. TGC behavior is the same for all products. ProTee, GSA, ES16, SkyTrak, etc. Thats why I was asking if you tested in TGC or in ProTee Golf 2.0 software. Putting distance vs Speed is not linear. Green friction (known as stimp), Kinetic Energy, Ball Weight, Force and forward roll (to name a few variables) will determine distance.

Ball speed vs feet per mph looks linear (x3 roughly).

[Cklguy2013]

Yes I'd now agree not linear, however there should be an increasing per foot yield for each additional mph up to a maximum yield. See my post below.

[Cklguy2013]

It's interesting when you plot the incremental distance gains above, the last incremental gain would be 9.72 feet on the extra mphs (i.e 80 feet on 14.74 vs 52 feet on 11.86 mph), when you plug driver numbers into flight scope incremental increases peak out at around 7.8 feet per mph. My guess is that the putting numbers should be more in line with 3 mph generating 6 feet, up to 25 mph generating 100 feet, but not in a total linear fashion. That last mph from say 24 mph ot 25 mph would result in an extra 7 feet, whereas from 3 mph to 4 mph you'd only see an additional 2.26 feet. It would be great to have this dialed in though as it would really help with real world distance control.

[Bnorman58]

Great numbers to back it up Ckl. Putting on ProTee software is so consistent. TGC is just not right, sorry ProTee. This is not only my opinion, everybody that plays on my system finds it impossible to putt consistently. Literally, a 30 foot flat putt plays 6-8 feet. Do the settings for putting smash factor even affect TGC putting? They didnt seem to make a difference. I have mine set at 1.2 for ProTee software and it is great. I set it at 1.0 when I play TGC and it is like putting on ice. Please fix it.

[Bnorman58]

PS, my screen is 10 feet away, I had a 30 foot flat putt I hit halfway to the screen and it went 10 feet past. No green is stimped like that, even US open. This is a course from a credable designer too so I doubt it was that.

[ProTee United]

We will compare it with ProTee Golf and see what we can find.
Let me know (roughly) what you expect in terms of speed vs distance.

[Bnorman58]

Thanks. I wont speak for Ckl since he started the thread but if it would perfectly match the ProTee algo I would be delighted.

[SFR]

I've had my Protee for a couple years and I'll have to admit I've never understood how to control putting distance on it. Tonight on a flat green I had the following results

3.27 mph ball speed, 4 feet, 1.22 feet per mph
5.01 mph ball speed, 9 feet, 1.79 feet per mph
7.16 mph ball speed, 19 feet, 2.65 feet per mph
9.01 mph ball speed, 30 feet, 3.32 feet per mph
11.86 mph ball speed, 52 feet, 4.38 feet per mph
14.74 mph ball speed, 80 feet, 5.42 feet per mph

Shouldn't this relationship be more linear? Am i missing something in the settings?

Here are some numbers that were entered into some calculations for a Stimp speed of 8. See how they relate:

Feet.......ball speed mph for a stimp of 8
4..............2.94
9..............4.42
19............6.42
30............8.06
52............10.61
80............13.17

Last I played TGC I thought the greens were a bit slower than an 8 and by looks, if this was TGC you got the numbers from then they are a bit less than 8. 4.1 mph or 4.2 mph is what a ball rolls off a stimp meter.
Can't do lower than 8 to calculate.

As stimp speeds get faster it takes a lot less of an increase in ball speed to travel the extra few feet and thus harder to judge longer putts.

[Cklguy2013]

Hey SFR those incremental speeds are too low on short putts and too high on long putts, which is why it is so difficult to control longer putt. See my comments below.

[Cklguy2013]

SFR, where did you get your numbers?

[Cklguy2013]

Do you want the short answer or the long answer? First my putts were all taken 15" in front of the sensor, second test were all done on the "Flat Putting Green Protee" in the TGC, Third I measured the current speed, using a stimpmeter (and yes I'm a loser), and they are stimping at 10 right now, including the extra 15" or 9 if you don't, readings were basically 9 feet off of a 4.9 mph ball speed, or 10' including the extra 15" (joke omitted).

So the short answer would be if you want greens stimping at 10, the ball should roll, on a flat surface at 2.04 feet per mph of ball speed, if you want greens stimping at 12 it should be 2.45 feet per mph of ball speed.

The longer answer, however is a bit more complicated, as the ball speed goes up, the putts roll further on an average distance per mph of ball speed, this however does top out (stimping at 9) at an incremental speed of around 6 feet per mph of ball speed, so for example, generally speaking:

10 foot putt, 5 mph of ball speed, average 2.0
20 foot putt, 8.7 mph of ball speed, average 2.3
40 foot putt 15.2 mph of ball speed, average 2.6
80 foot put, 24.3 mph of ball speed, average 3.3
120 foot putt, 32.5 mph of ball speed, average, 3.7

With the incremental mph speed increasing from 2.0 all the way up to about 6 feet per mph, so given my numbers above, if you hit a putt with 33.5 mph of ball speed, it should go about 126 feet.

[SFR]

A stimp speed is more like the 4.1 something so rounded off I think most use 4.1 mph. That alone testing with a 4.9 mph putt will skew your results.

The numbers I posted are using calculations with a once in motion kind of calculations and what the roll out would be on a flat green at a set stimp. What I posted are for an 8 stimp which is as close to your posted numbers as I can get as I can't go below 8.

Now is this calculator calculation right.... It will be hard to test a flat green with an exact stimp speed and big enough to do it on.

[Cklguy2013]

SFR I think we are talking very similar numbers, you're saying at a stimp of 8 speed is 4.1 mph, or 1.95 feet per mph, I.m saying at 10 it's at a speed of 4.9, or 2.04 feet per mph, or at 12, 2.44 feet per mph. Of course you have to remember that these speeds only apply to 8, 10 and 12 foot putts in these cases, these speeds don't apply evenly to say a 30 foot putt, other than the last 8,10 or 12 feet, prior to that the balls are moving much faster on a feet per mph basis.

[SFR]

No... all that a stimp meter does is roll a ball at 4.1 mph off of it. From there if it rolls 6 feet only that green is a stimp of 6, if it rolls 10 feet it is a 10 stimp.

So ball speed off a stimp is always the same. It only matters how far that ball rolls to measure and they do this on as flat as they can and both directions and average out.

And you can't use a foot per mph in the calculation unless you want a ball park because the initial amount of force to start a ball rolling is more for the first part of the roll and then once a ball is in motion the difference in added ball speed after that, starts to lessen, to achieve every extra foot of roll.

This is why a 8 or 10 foot putt is much easier to read weight and stop it within a foot or two after the hole if it does not go in. Where as a 30 foot putt is a lot harder to get it to stop in the same two feet past the hole because it may only be a 1/4 mph that makes that difference depending on the stimp.

What happens when you compare an 8 stimp and 12 stimp greens, you will see you have more of a buffer in ball speed to stop that 10 foot putt at the hole compared to the 12 stimp you will find it a lot harder to have similar results due to it only needing a fraction more weight to go too far.

I would think the average person plays on greens that are less than 10 stimp and would be close to 8 when on the slow side. This again is on flat greens so throw in a bit of down hill and see how much the 8 to 10 stimp makes.

[Cklguy2013]

I agree and disagree, you can determine the average, based on distance divided by start speed, this of course doesn't tell you how fast it was rolling the first foot or the last, but it does give you the average. The purpose here is to try and replicate how far a putt on a flat green given a certain amount of average ball speed would go,which is why I originally said longer putts have higher overall average ball speeds.