Altering/Re-Gripping Counter-Balanced Putter

[RandyBobbitt]

I'm looking at a Ping putter that is 38 inches long and has a counter-balanced grip. I like the look and feel, but in its present form it's too long and a bit too upright (toe up in the air).

Shortening the club by 2 to 3 inches would fix the lie angle problem, but what would it do to the weight? Would it feel too light with another counter-balance grip? Would it feel too heavy with a conventional putter grip?

Thanks. 

[boogielicious]

  On 1/28/2019 at 5:29 AM, RandyBobbitt said:

I'm looking at a Ping putter that is 38 inches long and has a counter-balanced grip. I like the look and feel, but in its present form it's too long and a bit too upright (toe up in the air).

Shortening the club by 2 to 3 inches would fix the lie angle problem, but what would it do to the weight? Would it feel too light with another counter-balance grip? Would it feel too heavy with a conventional putter grip?

Thanks. 

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Longer putters tend to have lighter heads than their shorter counterparts in standard style putters. But that may not be the case with this one as it is designed to be heavier. Cutting it down could change the swing weight a lot and the putter head would feel lighter. 

The lie angle can be changed if the change it not too extreme (a couple of degrees). You would have to have a shop tell you if it would be too much.

[Adam C]

  On 1/28/2019 at 11:49 AM, boogielicious said:

Longer putters tend to have lighter heads than their shorter counterparts in standard style putters. But that may not be the case with this one as it is designed to be heavier. Cutting it down could change the swing weight a lot and the putter head would feel lighter. 

The lie angle can be changed if the change it not too extreme (a couple of degrees). You would have to have a shop tell you if it would be too much.

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It's actually the opposite. Long putter heads are much heavier than the standard version. They have to be when you ad all that extra shaft weight on the back end. Usually 100 grams heavier give or take.

 

As far as the length goes you know many of those counter balanced putters are made longer on purpose with the idea being that you grip down in the middle of the grip not on the end like a traditional putter. If it's that kind of design (which it sounds like), then gripping down will also flatten it out and bring your ball position back to neutral below your eyes.

[RandyBobbitt]

I tried simply choking down about 3 inches, making it the equivalent of a 35-inch putter, and that immediately solved the lie-angle problem. What am I concerned about now is what would happen if I shortened the club by 3 inches AND re-gripped it with a non-weighted grip. Would it feel lighter or heavier? 

[boogielicious]

  On 1/29/2019 at 5:35 AM, RandyBobbitt said:

I tried simply choking down about 3 inches, making it the equivalent of a 35-inch putter, and that immediately solved the lie-angle problem. What am I concerned about now is what would happen if I shortened the club by 3 inches AND re-gripped it with a non-weighted grip. Would it feel lighter or heavier? 

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The head would feel much heavier in relation to the club. The club overall would be lighter.

[Righty to Lefty]

  On 1/29/2019 at 11:17 AM, boogielicious said:

The head would feel much heavier in relation to the club. The club overall would be lighter.

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Yes...the swing weight would increase...but the total weight would decrease and this may or may not work for you. I found the best way to fit a putter is: 

1) Find a flat putt of 30 to 50 feet. 

2) Line up the first putt and then stroke the putt. Do not look up and stroke 4 more without looking up at the hole.  

3) Note the results:

Perfect fit - All putts finish in a tight grouping AND close to the hole (within 2 feet). No adjustments needed. You are done with your fitting!  This means that you initial read is good and that your putter is talking to your hands and giving you a consistent distances.  

Moderate fit - All putts finish in a tight grouping BUT are noticeably short or long of the hole (If your putts are all left or right of the hole then you don't aim your putter well  and that will need to be recalibrated or a different putter chosen that fits your aim.) If your putts are well past the hole then you will need to reduce the weight of the putter (difficult to do) and if they are short of the hole then you will need to add weight to the putter (easy to do with tour lock opti vibe weights.) I don't want to change my stroke and the distance that I expect the putt to go...I want the putter to do that for me so that is why I adjusted the weight of my putter until it rolled the prescribed distance that I FELT it should roll with the STROKE LENGTH that I think that I need (This is so so important and should be the goal of the fitting.)  Make adjustments and retest until desired results are found. 

Bad Fit - Putts miss short and long and do not have any pattern to them at all.  This would be a nightmare scenario and will probably either require a lot of work to get the putter to fit you or might require a totally different putter all together.  

When I fit putters I fit them to lag putt inside a 3 foot circle because if you can do that and make anything over 90% of your 3 foot putts (Mickelson 3 foot drill on the nastiest slope you can find) then putting will not need to be your focus until you are a very low single digit handicap. I also used a laserputt training aid for a long time to show me exactly where I was aiming my putter face without question.  That will help if you like the look of your putter but don't aim it well because you can work with the laserputt and adjust even though the best case would be to naturally aim your putter well. Hope this helps and let me know if I wasn't clear on something.  

 

[iacas]

  On 1/29/2019 at 12:12 PM, Righty to Lefty said:

1) Find a flat putt of 30 to 50 feet.

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That's a horrible way to do a putter fitting IMO. You'd still see golfers aiming well left or right and then pushing or pulling the ball onto the line not to mention you'd see people misreading the heck out of the putt to begin with.

Fit for aim first on a short (~6-10 feet), straight putt, then fit for distance control on a reasonably sized putt 15-25 feet or so. PGA Tour level distribution on even a 30-foot putt is ~3 feet, so you could have a spread of almost six feet at even 30', and at 50', well, it'd be pretty bad. Useless, really.

[Righty to Lefty]

  On 1/29/2019 at 12:48 PM, iacas said:

That's a horrible way to do a putter fitting IMO. You'd still see golfers aiming well left or right and then pushing or pulling the ball onto the line not to mention you'd see people misreading the heck out of the putt to begin with.

Fit for aim first on a short (~6-10 feet), straight putt, then fit for distance control on a reasonably sized putt 15-25 feet or so. PGA Tour level distribution on even a 30-foot putt is ~3 feet, so you could have a spread of almost six feet at even 30', and at 50', well, it'd be pretty bad. Useless, really.

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I didn't say find a breaking putt, I said find a flat putt. Maybe I should have added a flat and straight putt that are all being hit from the same spot...that is 30 to 50 feet away. The entire fitting is done from one distance that the golfer chose depending on how much space they have available.   I am not concerned with how many they make anyway...I am concerned with how tight their grouping is.  If you miss to the same spot then that is a good thing...that is why I said don't look up also because I don't want the golfer to manipulate stroke length...I want the golfer to make the same stroke. A tight grouping is what I am looking for..then the correction is all about where it is in relation to the hole. 

If the putter fits you correctly then you can make a predictable stroke and then you can expect a certain distance will be produced reliably.  Then it is a matter of how well you aim it after that.  Aim is partly how the putter suits your eye but if you just love the look of it then the laserputt option will teach you how to aim it reliably.  If you can lag putt into the 3 foot circle reliably from variable distances, and you make a high percentage of your 3 foot putts ( at least 90% or better when doing the Mickelson 3 foot drill on a nasty slope) I assure you that you will putt better.  There is no reason to put anymore stress on your putting when it isn't the most important factor to scoring until your handicap is in the low single digits approaching scratch.  

[iacas]

  On 1/29/2019 at 2:02 PM, Righty to Lefty said:

I didn't say find a breaking putt, I said find a flat putt.

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1. Flat putts are just putts that don't go up or down. A putt 90° to a slope is a flat putt.
2. And… there are not a lot of flat, straight 30- to 50-footers out there.
3. Not to mention that when you're making a big enough stroke for that range, you're not testing aim so much as you're testing the stroke. Someone can easily aim well left and have developed a push stroke.

But hey, what do I know? What does David Edel know, or my good buddy John Graham know? Or my friend Preston Combs, or any of the putting guys I've gotten to know over the years? And no, this isn't an appeal to authority… which is why I am presenting facts that back up my opinion that fitting a putter at ~40 feet is silly.

  On 1/29/2019 at 2:02 PM, Righty to Lefty said:

I am not concerned with how many they make anyway...I am concerned with how tight their grouping is.

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Did you read what I wrote? Because:

• I never talked about making any putts.
• I pointed out specifically why the grouping size at 40 feet is pretty useless unless you make several hundred putts with different combinations.

  On 1/29/2019 at 2:02 PM, Righty to Lefty said:

If the putter fits you correctly then you can make a predictable stroke and then you can expect a certain distance will be produced reliably.

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Again, from 30-50 feet, your grouping is going to be about 28 to 78 square feet in size (+/- 3' to +/- 5'). That's not useful, and it would take many, many, many putts with just one configuration of putter to determine how "good" that setup was relative to another configuration. And, though PGA Tour players aren't much better putters than average golfers, they are better putters, so that area expands even more.

  On 1/29/2019 at 2:02 PM, Righty to Lefty said:

Then it is a matter of how well you aim it after that.

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It's not, because people make strokes that deliver the face differently at impact than it is at setup. Aim is how you set up to the ball, and a person who aims poorly develops a poor stroke to compensate for it.

  On 1/29/2019 at 2:02 PM, Righty to Lefty said:

If you can lag putt into the 3 foot circle reliably from variable distances…

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Again, on the PGA Tour, lag putts are close to 10% of the distance of the original putt, so from 40 feet lagging a ball to 4' is a "PGA Tour level" putt, and yet, it's not inside the three foot distance.

Fitting a putter from 50 feet away is a horrible way to go about it.

  On 1/29/2019 at 2:02 PM, Righty to Lefty said:

There is no reason to put anymore stress on your putting when it isn't the most important factor to scoring until your handicap is in the low single digits approaching scratch.  

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It's not the most important factor to scoring then, either.

[Righty to Lefty]

  On 1/29/2019 at 2:24 PM, iacas said:

1. Flat putts are just putts that don't go up or down. A putt 90° to a slope is a flat putt.
2. And… there are not a lot of flat, straight 30- to 50-footers out there.
3. Not to mention that when you're making a big enough stroke for that range, you're not testing aim so much as you're testing the stroke. Someone can easily aim well left and have developed a push stroke.

But hey, what do I know? I've only been fitting putters to hundreds of golfers for about a decade?

Did you read what I wrote? Because:

• I never talked about making any putts.
• I pointed out specifically why the grouping size at 40 feet is pretty useless unless you make several hundred putts with different combinations.

Again, from 30-50 feet, your grouping is going to be about 28 to 78 square feet in size (+/- 3' to +/- 5'). That's not useful, and it would take many, many, many putts with just one configuration of putter to determine how "good" that setup was relative to another configuration. And, though PGA Tour players aren't much better putters than average golfers, they are better putters, so that area expands even more.

It's not, because people make strokes that deliver the face differently at impact than it is at setup. Aim is how you set up to the ball, and a person who aims poorly develops a poor stroke to compensate for it.

Again, on the PGA Tour, lag putts are close to 10% of the distance of the original putt, so from 40 feet lagging a ball to 4' is a "PGA Tour level" putt, and yet, it's not inside the three foot distance.

Fitting a putter from 50 feet away is a horrible way to go about it.

It's not the most important factor to scoring then, either.

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Are you kidding me...find the flattest putt that you can...how bout that?  Every hole has a straight putt around it so there you go..but if not then find the fall line on any given putt from 30 to 50 feet away so long as you are hitting putts at target a specific distance away.  You don't even need to be putting to a hole...stick a tee in the ground...whatever it takes. Like I said I am not even concerned with how many putts are made because I am looking for the club to be consistent. You can then take that fitting and track your stats over time (hundreds if not thousands of putts) and verify if your putting stats are improving. That's why I track every round that I play so that I can refer back to see if my putting actually improved and if it was sustained (which it has been.) You fit how you fit and I fit how I fit. I was a tour lock fitter and have done my fair share of putter fits with great success also so what's your point? The information is there for the readers to do with it what they may.Try your method and try my method and go with what works best for them and go play good golf.  I said that aim can be off and gave a remedy for that...the laserputt as it will fix that issue pretty quickly I assure you.  Have you ever tried fitting someone in my way? I started out fitting the way you suggest and found that I got better results doing it differently. I never said your way is wrong...I said that I got better results doing it differently. No shame in that...

Edited January 29, 2019 by Righty to Lefty

[iacas]

  On 1/29/2019 at 2:52 PM, Righty to Lefty said:

Are you kidding me...find the flattest putt that you can...how bout that?

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Still a horrible way to do putter fittings for the reasons I've stated.

  On 1/29/2019 at 2:52 PM, Righty to Lefty said:

Every hole has a straight putt around it so there you go.

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Every hole has two to four straight putts, really, but those lines are almost never straight for 30 feet let alone 50.

And again, at 30-50 feet, you're testing the stroke and not the aim, and you're doing a horrible job of testing distance control given the typical or expected distribution of those putts.

  On 1/29/2019 at 2:52 PM, Righty to Lefty said:

You don't even need to be putting to a hole…

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I never said you did.

  On 1/29/2019 at 2:52 PM, Righty to Lefty said:

Like I said I am not even concerned with how many putts are made because I am looking for the club to be consistent.

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You really don't seem to read what's written in response to your posts, do you? Because…

  On 1/29/2019 at 2:24 PM, iacas said:

Did you read what I wrote? Because:

• I never talked about making any putts.

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C'mon.

  On 1/29/2019 at 2:52 PM, Righty to Lefty said:

You can then take that fitting and track your stats over time (hundreds if not thousands of putts) and verify if your putting stats are improving.

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That's not what I said when I said that at those distances you'd need to hit hundreds of putts with different combinations in the fitting.

  On 1/29/2019 at 2:52 PM, Righty to Lefty said:

I said that aim can be off and gave a remedy for that...the laserputt as it will fix that issue pretty quickly I assure you.

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In my experience it won't, and your assurances don't mean much to me. I've talked at length about how a putter fitting should fit a putter to what the golfer sees as straight - you're not really "putter fitting" if you have to tell someone "oh, you aim that putter right every time, but just use this laser so that you can learn to aim your putter square, even though it's always going to look closed to you."

And if you were a Tour Lock fitter, that's not a complete putter fitting. TourLock just makes counter-weights. That's not "a putter fitting." That has nothing to do with aim.

  On 1/29/2019 at 2:52 PM, Righty to Lefty said:

You have never even tried fitting someone in my way so how do you even know that it doesn't work?

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You don't know that.

And I've given reasons, which you've once again ignored, why I came to the conclusion I came to.

[phillyk]

  On 1/29/2019 at 2:02 PM, Righty to Lefty said:

Aim is partly how the putter suits your eye but if you just love the look of it then the laserputt option will teach you how to aim it reliably. 

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You rather them learn to aim the putter versus adjust the putter to their aim?  There is something to be said for feel/swing weight of the head, but loving the look dictating the fit? I think people would get over the look pretty fast if they are making more putts with a uglier looking putter.  Or they would try to adjust the better looking putter/customize order the putter to their specs.

[iacas]

  On 1/29/2019 at 3:27 PM, phillyk said:

You rather them learn to aim the putter versus adjust the putter to their aim?  There is something to be said for feel/swing weight of the head, but loving the look dictating the fit? I think people would get over the look pretty fast if they are making more putts with a uglier looking putter.  Or they would try to adjust the better looking putter/customize order the putter to their specs.

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Ultimately, when you realize that he's coming at this from the perspective of once having fit TourLocks, you can see that he's not really done "putter fittings" the way they're typically thought of. He's fit some counterweights.

I've talked with a number of people about "fitting to aim" versus "training to aim" and the thing I keep coming back to is that if you "train to aim" you are just introducing another variable and another thing that you have to maintain: your ability to aim the putter properly. With Edel putters, or others that are "fit to aim," what you see as square is unique to you, but it also holds up over time.

[Adam C]

  On 1/29/2019 at 5:35 AM, RandyBobbitt said:

I tried simply choking down about 3 inches, making it the equivalent of a 35-inch putter, and that immediately solved the lie-angle problem. What am I concerned about now is what would happen if I shortened the club by 3 inches AND re-gripped it with a non-weighted grip. Would it feel lighter or heavier? 

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I am just not sure why you want to do this. The counterbalanced putters like this are designed this way on purpose. You are going to all this trouble to basically make the putter back into a traditional putter. Unless you already own it, why not just look for a traditional 35 inch putter. Sounds like you prefer a bit more head weight, so find a heavier one or put a little lead tape on the head of one you like.

[Righty to Lefty]

  On 1/29/2019 at 3:27 PM, phillyk said:

You rather them learn to aim the putter versus adjust the putter to their aim?  There is something to be said for feel/swing weight of the head, but loving the look dictating the fit? I think people would get over the look pretty fast if they are making more putts with a uglier looking putter.  Or they would try to adjust the better looking putter/customize order the putter to their specs.

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No..I'd rather the golfer pick the putter that they naturally aim the best regardless of the looks of the putter but most golfers don't take this advice.  Scotty Cameron putters don't have anywhere close to the tech in them that MLA or EVNROLL putters have in them but people love the look of them and thus they sell a bunch of putters. If you are dead set on having a certain putter then get it weighted up correctly and get the laser putt on it and learn how to aim it reliably.  It may not be 100% optimal but it will be much closer to optimal.