A Cup Outside
U.S. Solheim Cup team unanimously puts viral putting debate to rest
You’re looking at a putt. It’s going to break left to right. One of your playing partners says, “It’s a cup left.” How far outside the cup are you aiming? This question has dominated golf Twitter and Reddit for the past 24 hours with a fervor that is as intense as it is confusing. Luckily, Morgan Pressel asked the U.S. Solheim Cup team to weigh in, and they were unanimous with their answer.
The diagram that’s circulating shows three options of what your target could be if someone says to aim ‘one cup left.’
It shows three cups, the one on the right being the actual hole. In the middle of the cup directly to the left of the hole is option three, on the perimeter of the second cup is option two, and in the middle of the third cup is option one.
Got in a debate about this with some friends. Where do you aim for putting if you're told to aim "one cup left?"
byu/Captain-Obvious ingolf
Team USA and its captains, from Nelly Korda to Paula Creamer, say there is only one correct answer here: Option two. Allisen Corpuz jokingly says that if you’re choosing option one, you might be a psychopath. Who is out there choosing anything but option two?
Going through some of the comments on this debate, the argument for option three is that you’re lining up a cup outside of the center of the hole. But that rationale doesn’t make sense. If someone told you to aim two inches left, you wouldn’t aim at the left edge of the cup. You’d aim two inches left of the left edge of the hole.
Watching this diagram be debated online has been confounding, because there is only one correct answer. And luckily the U.S. Solheim Cup team is here to confidently end this debate once and for all: It’s option two.