PGA Master Professional Phil Kenyon shares insights on working with PGA Tour pro Russell Henley and how a switch to the Scotty Cameron Phantom 5 impacted his putting performance.
Learn more about Titleist and Scotty Cameron ambassador Phil Kenyon: https://www.scottycameron.com/articles/phil-kenyon-pga-master-professional-and-putting-coach/
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[Music] So, Phil, you’ve been working for some time with Russell Henley on the PJ tour. Uh, can you tell us a little bit about how that relationship started? Yeah, I first met Russell at the back end of uh 2023 where he reached out um basically looking to improve his putting. great approach play, great player, but he was looking to try and kick on to the next level and had had identified holding more puts like most of us would do. He’s been great to work with, you know, really good student of the game and um you know, there’s been a couple of areas that we’ve worked on, some refinements in and around his technique, helped him with his green reading, um intuitively a great green reader, but kind of some processes to help him tap into his instinct a lot more. He he would definitely struggle in terms of the his start line and that that was down to some aspects of his technique. We also changed his putter which I think has been a really um that’s been a really that’s big help actually. Um the putter he was using at the time was a a lower MOI model and we switched to the Phantom 5 which is face balanced high MOI and I feel that’s actually really helped him with his face control and face awareness. typically um or historically well when I first worked with him he had a lot of face rotation which he wasn’t able to control and and his bad put was a pull if anything and um alongside some technical changes that putter has helped him in terms of not just the stability of that rotation but the accuracy like I say his face awareness face rotation has improved a lot uh that’s helped him start more more putts online and he’s definitely putting better I gather you do a lot of your work is based on statistics. So, can you tell us a little bit about that journey where where he was when you started working together and and how he’s trending this year? Yeah, well, whenever I look at or start with a player, I I’ll always look at their stats historically. Um, you know, strokes gained is a really informative stat and I’ll look at the different areas in which they’re performing. So, inside 10 feet, 10 to 20 feet, outside of 20 feet. Um and for you know for Russell um his like I said I don’t think he’d been in the top 100 and in particular inside of 10 foot was an area that he could improve on. So that’s really really been the main focus and it’s really important to hit your start lines in that in that area. So start line um was something that he was very aware about aware of also. Um so last year he I think was his best year statistically was in the top 40. Um strokes gained putting and then this year you know he’s been putting well. Um he’s improved upon that so far midway through the season and um he’s had the win so far at Bay Hill. So um he’s making good progress. You never own it. You only ever borrow it. So you got to keep your you know foot on the accelerator. Keep working hard. Keep improving. But he’s doing a great job. Great. Great. And it’s it’s interesting to note that the putter that he had been using prior to his Phantom 5 was a a Newport style but with a custom long neck to try and reduce on that rotation. Yeah. Um so really cool for me to see that some of the success has come obviously under your watchful eye but also moving into a Phantom 5 with a single bench shaft face balanced which is part of our inline lineup. Yeah. Good to see. I think that’s definitely been had a big impact. Uh, like I said, I think the higher moment of inertia has given him more stability, improved his face awareness. Anytime you can do that, you’re going to hit better puts.
