Bob Labbe on Lag Putting by the Numbers | Alaska Golf Podcast

Bob Labbe’s answer to long-distance putting is not a new grip tip or a vague reminder to “trust your feel.” In this episode, he explains Putting by the Numbers, a quantitative lag-putting system built to make longer putts more accurate, more repeatable and easier to approach with confidence.

For the Alaska audience, the conversation lands on a problem nearly every recreational golfer recognizes: the round is going fine until a long first putt turns into a three-putt or four-putt. Labbe says that exact frustration started the whole project after he sold his second air pollution control company in 1996. He was improving across the rest of the bag, but judging distance on long putts kept costing him strokes.

What makes the method different is Labbe’s insistence that lag putting can be measured. He describes an “individual power factor,” which defines how far a golfer’s ball travels for each inch the putter is drawn back. That number is personal. Labbe gives the example that his own summer number is 20 feet of travel per inch of retraction, while his wife’s is 11 feet per inch. Same idea, different golfer, different result.

The system did not become a book quickly. Labbe says he spent roughly 25 years developing and proving the method before writing Putting by the Numbers. He wanted to be sure the approach was true, reliable and useful beyond his own game before putting it in print. His goal is to give golfers a practical way to calculate a long putt instead of simply guessing at speed.

He also connects the method to practice habits. After taking up the game seriously, Labbe’s early routine included playing 18 holes three days a week and practicing three days a week. That commitment helped him improve, but the putting system came from the one part of the game that still needed a more dependable process.

The episode closes with how listeners can find the book. Labbe says the e-book is available through Amazon and describes an August 99-cent offer that includes a review-and-signed-copy promotion for readers who follow the instructions in the book. For golfers trying to turn long putts into simple two-putts, the episode is a focused look at turning distance control into a repeatable number.

Heard on Alaska Golf Podcast, part of the Golf Podcasts USA network.
​More Alaska golf coverage at golfpodcasts.org.

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