Joe Ferguson gets his hands on arguably one of the most innovative golf clubs ever made - the Sausage Golf Boudin Noir modular putter to test out the technology and see if it could represent the future of putter design.
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Come and take a look at this. I'm a gear tester and I've never seen anything like this before in
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putting and I think it might just change the putting game. Let me introduce you to the Sausage
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Golf Boudon Noir putter. Right so what am I talking about? What is the Sausage Golf Boudon Noir? Well essentially
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what we've got here is a putter that's it's kind of broken social media lately. I've never had so
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many people contact me with dms and renders and pictures of this putter saying make sure you review
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this we want to know what it's all about and essentially what we've got is the first that
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i've seen modular putter so we've got a putter here that's got little gaps in the head that you
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can unscrew and re-screw to make this putter low torque face balanced and toe hanger not only that
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you can flip it around and do the same left-handed this thing's absolutely incredible now sausage
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Golf's a bit of a strange name, I hear you say. So where's that come from? Well, the founder and
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the designer of Sausage Golf is a man called Dave Rolls, and he came from Manchester. And people in
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Manchester have a very good sense of humour. So he was called Sausage Rolls at school, hence the name
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Sausage Golf. Now, he originally designed this putter as a bit of an experiment because him and
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his dad wanted to share a putter, and he wanted to do something nice for his dad who'd helped him
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out over the years. And this is how all this started. And he hit upon something, and he's just
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sausage rolled with it and it's gone on and on and on to see what we've got in front of us today
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and I'm really impressed and I'm really excited to give this a whirl
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Right, come a bit closer for this but I need to show you what I mean. So what we've got on the top here, you'll notice when you look a little bit closely, there's a few little rectangular pieces
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and underneath we've got a little screw set up here. So you unscrew these pieces, little bits
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slot out and then it kind of works like a little jigsaw puzzle. You move the thing, you move the
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pieces to where you need them to be to create the gap for where you want this shaft to enter the head
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and then you've got your three different torque profiles it really is incredibly impressive
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i'm intrigued to see how that mechanism works as we go through the video i've got my sort of
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not skepticism but i want to know how quickly and how easily it works and how tight the fit is more
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to the point because we don't want any gaps in these putters so let me hit a few putts away
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let's start to get some initial impressions before we start moving things about so first impressions are really genuinely quite good i thought i'd left that short then
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it's an incredibly premium looking putter i love what they've done here with the kind of premium
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all blacked out murdered out look which i think is really cool so you've got a little black pistol
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grip with sausage sort of emblazoned there and really subtly but you can still see it a nice
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matte black shaft into the all black head bar the alignment aids and the alignment aids are really
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nice bright white which pops really well against the black so we've got one across the top edge
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which is really helpful for those who use the sort of leading edge of the putter to line things up
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we've also got one on the back here to help those people who are used to kind of a flange line
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and do their aiming with that and there's a little dot as well which helps you center the ball in the
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face and also has a little benefit when we start moving into different settings which we'll talk
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about in a little bit but even just on that first putt I've hit there the feel is it's a very familiar
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one to me because I use a lab putter and this is made out of the same 6061 I think that's right
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aluminium or aluminium for our US viewers there and it really feels very similar to all the labs
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like my Mez Max that I've been using for the last few weeks what I would say is there is slightly
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more maybe ring or ting to it at strike there's a little bit more vibration which isn't a bad thing
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at all it actually feels really nice and I'm guessing that's probably something to do with
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the slots as tight as these are and as beautifully engineered and the fit is great
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just creating any sort of air gaps might create that little bit more vibration and feedback up the shaft
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But it's something that I really like the feel of. Super easy to line up, like I said, those alignment aids really pop
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And the lines and the curves are really soft A lot of the time when you get on even some of the better mallet putters on the market you see very sharp angles between the top edge and the sides
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They've rolled and softened these edges really nicely, and it gives you a beautifully rounded and soft feel
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even from the top edge here into the face. Quite often that's just a sharp straight right angle
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They've softened that nicely, and it really looks good. So let me get a couple more. I've got it in what they call the low torque setting
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It's not zero torque, but it's low torque. It does feel incredibly stable
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Like I said, off the face, it does feel familiar, but it's got that little bit of pop at strike
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and the roll seems to be really good. We've got some grooves on the face here to really help with that roll
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Initial impressions, feels premium, looks great, easy to line up. Let's get into moving it about and see what this modular stuff's all about
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Just as a quick reference point for those who may not know, so I mentioned this is in the low torque or zero torque setting and if you've seen lab putters you'll be familiar with that technology where you're controlling with weights in the head and the shaft entry point of the torque profile or toe hang or lack of toe hang of this putter
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So if I just hold this putter unaided in that low torque setting, you see how the toe kind of points up to the sky
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Now that gives us, makes the putter in essence want to orientate very square to your path
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So there's not going to be much opening and closing on that. It doesn't require any manipulation to square the face
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You're better off leaving the face alone in that setting. So what I'm going to do now is I'm going to take it out of that lie angle balanced or low torque setting, if you like
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And I'm going to move it into what we call a more face balance. it's going to be more traditional centre shafted putter. So let's see how easy this is. I'm going
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to kneel down because I know these screws come out. So I'm going to take, initially going to
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take the shaft out. So we've got two screws to do that. Get the bulk of it done with the wrench
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One comes out. I've got a few screws to work with. I'm going to have to lay them on the ground
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Second screw out. I can already feel the shaft loosening, which is kind of weird and cool
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that should be nearly there now so there we go that's the shaft that comes out of the hair we've
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got little screw holes in the bottom and then we just got our little sausage head where the
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screw's just fallen out where i just unscrewed it and we've got some gaps to fill here so what i
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need to do now is take this centerpiece out pop it in where that shaft was and swap the shaft over
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so i mean it's not the quickest job in the world but it's not you know it's not exactly let's be
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patient we're all things in the modern world we want them straight away but let's just be a little patient and see what we get two screws again i just think it's really cool i just think it's so
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cool to be able to just create three separate putters well actually six when we talk about
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left-handed in a minute from one putter so there goes the centerpiece out so then we've got a head
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now that's got two gaps we need to refill them so we're going to move the shaft one
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into the front. I'm just going to clean a little bit of sand off that because I don't want that getting in there. I'm going to move the shaft into the front. Just a perfect tight fit. There's no
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wobble at all. That's beautifully engineered. That's incredibly well done. That would be my
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concern that there'd be significant gaps and wobbling etc. That's brilliantly well done
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Let's get those screws back in there. So what do you reckon? We've got about a minute for that so far I reckon. Not too bad
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that's the second screw done up slot a little modular piece back in so we just got a little
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gap to fill there slot that modular piece back in a couple of screws again and we're away
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so i would say if you're um it's a bit moist and dewy out here today and these greens have
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a little bit of top dressing i think so i've got a few grains of sand so i think if you're doing
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if you do get one of these putters I just be a little bit cautious about popping the modular piece in with any grains of sand in You don want any scratching or anything going on there so just give it a little wipe before you do so And that is that I now got a face centre putter to have a
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little whirl with. Probably, I don't know, a minute and a half. So when I hold this unaided on my hand
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there, finger, face points perfectly up to the sky, so it's a perfectly face-balanced putter
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So if you're a tinkerer who wants to try these things, fantastic. You can do that in two minutes
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but you eliminate all the variables. We've got the same swing weight, we've got the same head
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weight, we've got the same alignment aids, the same grip, the same length, all variables are
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eliminated. We've just got two completely different torque profiles. Let's hit a couple of putts and
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see how we get on. One thing I should have mentioned that cameraman Dan pointed out very
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well there is when it's in that previous low torque or nearly zero torque profile
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you do require a two degree forward press and that's why they put this little white mark on
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on the grip and the leading edge line there on the face. You've got to get those lined up for it
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to play its true loft. If you played that with a straight up shaft, you'd have an awful lot of loft
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So you've got to factor that in if you're in that zero torque or low torque setting, as Sausage Golf call it. Something that is worth noting, this is something I've absolutely loved about this
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putter from a field point of view. It's quite heavy in the head. So all these extra screws
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and bits that are required to make it modular brings this head weight up to 365 grams. And most
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modern day putters coming around the 350 mark so that kind of 365 number if you prefer a heavy feel
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and a bit of stability in your putter you're going to really like this like I do. We're in the face
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balance one now so let's hit a couple of these longer putts just down the slope here. I have to
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say it sits brilliantly there's no quite often with putters you get some doming or some raised
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spots this is just like a perfectly flat head and it just sit looks like it's sort of glued to the
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ground it sits beautifully in the sole quite often you get a little bit of wobble and a bit
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of twisting when it hits the ground. I'm seeing nothing of that. Where I put this down and aim it
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and then I can build my stance, there's no twisting or wobbling which is really really nice to see
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Again just that little bit of a pop, that little bit of a ting off the face, that's nicely red
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that's a good start, that looks really good in that setting. I wouldn't say maybe I'm not
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precise enough with my feels, I wouldn't say I'm mass feeling even over this length I put a massive
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difference in torque profiles here. There's not too much between a low torque and a face
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balance putter. The principles are to try and keep that face relatively square and they're for strokes
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that don't have an awful lot of arc or opening and closing to them. So there's not masses in
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between them, but it has dramatically changed the look. And I would have to say, I think I much
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prefer it in this pure face balance setting with the shaft looking straight up and down
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and those are three pretty solid putts be nice to hold one there you go so that's a good finish so
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that's it in the face balance setting let's see what we can do in the toe hang setting and then
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I want to give you some thoughts about where I think we're heading with this and the type of
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people it could help right sorry to interrupt the sausage party on Saunton's putting green
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if you are enjoying this video please subscribe to the channel hit the like button it really helps
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us and comment down below what do you think about this whole sausage golf revolution so we're going
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to try it in that third setting now which is going to be heel shafted you've seen it took me a couple
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of minutes to do from the low torque to the center shaft this won't put you through watching me
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screw and unscrew these things again but how that's going to work is I'm going to use the two screws
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in the center here that are holding the shaft in place at the moment take the shaft out we've got
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this little tiny little block there which I think you can probably see because the cameraman's
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brilliant and then we're going to nudge that across that's going to sit over here which creates more
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space for the shaft to go in on the heel here. And then I've got a heel shafted putter with
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I'm going to say, I reckon about 45 degrees of toe hang. So let's have a look at that
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Right, so that is it in the toe hang position or the heel shafted position, whatever you want to call that
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So when we again do that same test, we going to hold it unaided there You can probably see down the lens I say it around that 45 degree toe hang So this should in theory suit people who have a little bit more arc and rotation to their stroke It would just want to move with you a little bit more
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So let's hit a few putts and see how it feels in that orientation. It is really strange having what is essentially the same putter
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I know it's the same putter because it's not left in my hands. And just seeing it in a completely different orientation there looking down
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And whilst the head looks the same, obviously that shaft's going in in a very different place
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And even on that first part, and that one in particular, I can feel, I can actually genuinely feel some torque profile there of some opening and closing of the face
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That's something probably wouldn't suit me. I'm somebody who likes to feel that square to square-ish style stroke
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I know it's never square to square, but I like to feel sort of minimal rotation stability
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and that is just really really cool left it in the jaws there I can hear a couple of people at
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home and I know some of my putting coach friends who will be screaming at the tv going what's the
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point that's frivolous all these golfers have got a torque profile if you go to a custom fitting
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they will suit either toe hang either zero torque or face balance but I'm of a different set of
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beliefs they'll be thinking what is the point having a putter you can move into three different orientations when you should in theory just have one torque profile that suits your stroke
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I'm of a completely different set of beliefs. I don't believe someone's torque profile or their
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putting stroke necessarily is like their DNA or their fingerprints. These things are malleable
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they move a little bit over time, we're humans and strokes change and people change. So I think
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having the ability to create, like I said, eliminate those variables and create essentially
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three different putters but with the same basic specifications of length, of lie angle, of swing
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weight all that stuff is an incredibly valuable tool just look at people like Tommy Fleetwood
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Justin Rose Fleetwood's been through a number of different putter head styles and torque profiles
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over the last couple of years but specifically this year before landing in the spider that he's
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just used at the Ryder Cup to hold putts all over the place and I doubt that'll be the end of his
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putting journey Rose is trying a different torque profile almost every week these people want to
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change these things and this is a brilliantly potentially cost effective way of doing that so
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you're not having to buy different torque profiles you can create what you want out of this putter
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and let's be honest who of us out there haven't had one of those putting days where you just think
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oh I need to change something I need to freshen it up but you don't have another putter some
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people even change grips overnight do all sorts of things what you've got here is the opportunity
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to stay in the putter you've been using maintain that sort of feel all the swing weights all those
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variables that I've spoken about but just freshen up the feel and the look slightly what a brilliant
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way of being able to do that without doing anything too radical so I've gone into this
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toe hang here if I'm struggling on that which I have been over the last couple of days I've been
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playing a tournament here on the greens you know just get the wrench out the night before this
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round that I've got coming up today go into a slightly different torque profile and who knows
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there might be a bit of success around the corner and let's be honest who of you out there now don't
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lie to me here haven't thought after a round of golf i could do better left-handed well with the
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sausage golf you've even got that option i hope you've enjoyed that look at the sausage golf
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boudoir i've had loads of fun testing this as a gear tester as i said we see a lot of samey products
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from time to time so to get something this different and this innovative is really exciting
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I was just starting to think, looking around the putting green at this event I'm playing here, I'm still looking at ping answer style shapes that have been around for 50, 60 years. We've
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been through a big driver revolution with adjustable weights, loft sleeves, face angles
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Have we exhausted that? And is it time, is it the putter's time to get in that space of serious
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innovation and tech and adjustability? I certainly think so. I think this could be the start of
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something big. Let me know what you think in the comments down below
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