It’s easy to see that the big boys dominate the golf club industry. Big companies like TaylorMade, Titleist, Callaway, and PING sell a lion’s share of the clubs purchased by the millions of duffers every year looking to improve their games. So when a small company like Brex Golf pops up and gets some attention, it is often worth it to take a better look.
Brex golf was nice enough to allow me to get a first hand look at their unique putter and fitting system, and put it into play for several weeks. It was an eye opening experience; lets see how it went.
Brex Golf is the brainchild of Brett Burdick. Brett had been an avid golfer since his childhood, but had always been partial to the equipment side of things. After 20 years of tinkering around with putter designs he decided to get serious about his passion and Brex Golf was born. He had the inspiration for a Half-Pipe alignment system, received a U.S. Design Patent, and the rest is history.
Technology and Design
Brex Golf only has one model of putter, the BG-1. The BG-1 Putter is precisely CNC milled from high quality 303 stainless steel and aluminum and has an innovative modular construction and patented Half-Pipe alignment system that I will cover in just a bit.
The Brex putters and three different hosels.
What really sets the Brex Golf BG-1 apart from the rest is the unique modular design that allows you to select the hosel that is best for your game. With the use of a hex key you can easily change the hosel on the putter to one of the three different types available from the company: straight, face balanced, and full offset.
The BG-1 can be ordered with the hosel of your choice or you can choose to order the complete package that comes with all three different hosels to try.
As discussed above the BG-1 is a milled putter. The putter face and head are milled from 303 stainless steel and the half pipe alignment aid is milled from 6061 aluminum. The half pipe alignment aid is available in either black or white.
The unique, patented half pipe alignment system claims to subconsciously encourage golfers to get their eyes correctly positioned over the golf ball. Using a centerline milled into the inside of the half-pipe, the design gives visual feedback when the player’s eyes are positioned directly over the ball. When the eyes are directly over the ball, the center mark of the putter chassis appears as a perfectly straight line. If the eyes are either inside or outside the ball it results in the appearance of a curved line.
Here you can see the Half Pipe alignment aid.
Aesthetics
The BG-1 I received came as a complete package with all three hosel choices and a black half pipe alignment aid. My first reaction to the putter was to think it looked kind of odd. Here was a fairly traditional looking blade putter with a big alignment aid sticking out the back end of it. While it is a rather strange looking design it is in no way stranger than many of the offerings available today from the major club companies.
Alignment aid aside, the putter has nice clean lines, and a nice finish one would expect from a quality milled putter. The manufacturer does a nice job of fitting the removable hosel to the club head without any gaps or spaces. In fact without close inspection, you would not know the putter was modular. The putter comes standard with a white Iomic grips.
The BG-1 from the front.
Performance
I use a belly putter for my gamer, so with the impending doom of my putting style I thought the BG-1 would be a great way to get me back into the world of traditional putters.
As stated above I received all three hosel types in the complete BG-1 package so I thought a little fitting test to see which hosel worked best was in order. I have always liked the look of putters with full offset so I started with that hosel in my test. After 10-15 putts it became evident to me that I had chosen poorly. I repeatedly started putts off line with the offset, so I changed to the straight hosel. Voilà, the putts started dropping and I was able to start more putts on the intended line. I really liked the way the straight hosel felt, but for the sake of writing a complete review I went ahead and changed to the face-balanced hosel. While the face-balanced hosel performed better than the full offset, it was very evident to me that the hosel that fit my putting stroke was the straight in style. This was an unanticipated revelation to me, as I have always shied away from putters with straight hosels.
With the putter fitting completed, I took the BG-1 on the course. The putter performed very well. The half-pipe aid made the chore of aligning putts much easier, and it was also nice having feedback as to where my eyes were in relation to the ball. The putter had a very solid feel and was weighted very well for me. I was able to make putts from short distances and lag the longs ones close.
The putter sets up nice and square and along with the alignment aid gives the player a great sense of confidence that you are going to start the putt on line. The white Iomic grip was a bit small and slick for my taste, but the first thing I do with all my putters is install an oversize grip.
The white Iomic grip was too thin and not tacky enough for me, but that is an easy fix.
The one knock I have against the putter is the sound it makes when striking the ball. While the putter is solid and has a nice feel, I was not a huge fan of the metallic sound it emits. The sound is similar to the sound of the original Ping putter, though not quite as loud. I prefer more of a muted sound when I strike a putt, although if a putter helps me make more putts, it can make any sound it wants. Possibly in the future Brex might add an insert or find another way to dampen the sound.
Specs and Extras
The BG-1 is available in lengths from 32 to 35 inches. It is a 350 gram club head and it comes standard with 4° of loft and a 71° lie angle. You can order the BG-1 with any of the three hosel types listed above, or get the complete package with all three hosel types and do a home fitting. You may be surprised to see which hosel type works best for you.
The BG-1 with one hosel retails for $299. The complete package has a price tag of $475. If you order the complete package, you can return the hosels you do not like and the company will refund $80 for each one as long as they are in new condition. Brex will even pay for the shipping.
The BG-1 is only available on the Brex Golf website at www.brexgolf.com. The Brex Golf website also has some interesting articles on the mental side of putting that are worth a look.
Brex BG-1
Final Thoughts
It’s nice to see a company like Brex Golf come along and give the big boys a little competition. They produce a quality product that is as good as anything out there made by the big manufacturers. The fitting process and modular design is something that sets this little company apart from any others I have seen. I wish Brett Burdick and Brex Golf well in their venture to help the rest of us sink more putts.
Nice review. I don’t think I could get used to their half pipe alignment aid though, it just doesn’t seem like I can putt with anything except a traditional stle putter (like my Seemore Si-4 black Nickel). I dont need a big alignment aid, a small line at the top is not to intrusive and gives me what I need. I sure do with the best of luck to this new company though, and hope there is nothing but success in their future.
Interesting Setup – good idea as to the 3 hosels and fitting. Excellent review.
Good review, and thats a really interesting idea he had for the alignment line. Just one thought though … it seems like it wouldn’t necessarily gaurantee that your eyes were over the ball unless the putter was also perfectly horizontal to the ground. If you left the toe up, you’d be fooled into thinking your eyes were over the ball when they were, in fact, inside, and if you putted like Steve Stricker, your eyes would have to be beyond the ball to line up the line. Anywhos, I still like the thinking. Thanks!
The half pipe line seems like a new and interesting concept. Overall the putter is pleasing. I play a Scotty blade but would not mind the mallet-like feel of the alignment tool on the back as long as it didn’t feel clunky in its swingweight.
It seems like it would be hard to push or pull a putt with that white line telling you if your depth perception is off.