How many times have you heard that keeping your head absolutely still is the key to good putting? No less than two of golfing's greatest luminaries have said the very same thing. Jack Nicklaus says that head movement is the biggest single problem that all golfers, professional and amateur alike, have with putting. Tiger Woods also says that even the smallest head movement can throw a putt off-line.

An article in the Journal of Motor Behavior reports the research done by a golfer-professor at McMaster University who says otherwise. So who are you going to believe? The good professor or golf's greatest players? We all know which side the conventional wisdom falls down on.

It's an important subject because putts, for both pros and weekend golfers alike, commonly account for about 40% of your stroke total for the round. Improving your putting is by far and away the best single way to improve your golf scores. Even if you could magically add 50 yards to your drives it would pale in comparison to the magical effect on your golf scores of never making another three putt. And that's without saying anything at all about the magical effect it would have on your wallet if you happen to play for a little of the green stuff now and then.

The researchers assembled two groups of golfers for their experiment. The two groups were aged roughly the same but one group had average to high handicappers and the other group consisted of professional and scratch golfers. Each golfer made 60 putts. The researchers used a sophisticated infrared tracking system to measure the tiniest movement in the golfers heads while they were making their putts.

The research showed that both the experts and the average golfers moved their heads about the same amount during their putts. The big difference was that the average golfers moved their heads in the same direction as the putter head, and the experts moved their heads in the opposite direction of the putter reversing their head movement at precisely the same time that they reversed their putter movement.

The exact reasons for the difference in the direction of head movement is not entirely clear and the researchers surmised that the expert golfers were more focused on maintaining a stable and balanced stance that severely restricted torso movements, while the average golfers were swaying their entire torso in the direction of the putter the same way that they were moving their heads.

The researchers say that the experts are coordinating their body movements exactly the same way that we coordinate all of our other limb movements during the day. The experts are unconsciously maintaining a stable body position by using their head as a counterweight to counteract the destabilization to their stance being introduced by the putter movement. The findings then are completely consistent with what a kinesiologist would classify as normal coordinating body movements even if they are not consistent with the common wisdom and most golf instructors.