Six months later, my putting has improved leaps and bounds just from a putter fitting that opened my eyes to what types of putters I should actually be using.
And you can win the same VIP putter fitting experience I had at Bettinardi Golf for free right now.
For the entirety of this holiday season, Fairway Jockey is running a promotion where you can win a free, all-expenses-paid trip to Bettinardi’s Studio B fitting facility in Oak Brook, Ill., outside of Chicago, where you’ll get an elite custom putter fitting, your own handcrafted putter and a behind-the-scenes tour.
Between November 3 and December 29, you’ll receive one automatic entry into the giveaway, which will draw a total of four winners every two weeks. That means there are still a few chances to win this top-notch putter fitting experience. The four winners will be notified by phone or email and will receive the trip, which includes airfare and lodging. Trip coordination will begin in the first week of January, after the promotional period officially ends.
I got fit for a putter at Bettinardi’s Studio B. The result shocked me
By:
Jack Hirsh
You can read more about my experience below, but I thought this would be a good time to revisit my putter fitting and how it’s helped me.
Since that fitting that saw me end up in a Bettinardi BB-28SB, a face-balanced blade putter I thought would never be a good fit, putting has gone from potentially one of the weakest parts of my game to a strength. I feared a left miss and now I can feel like I release the putter head freely and know it will start on my intended line.
As you’ll read below, Tom Sopic, Studio B’s lead hive concierge, put me through my paces hitting putts and found that the high-toe-flow putter I was using was causing me to put more hook spin on the ball than forward roll, which was causing my left miss.
Since then, I’ve felt like I’m making one or two — or more — 10+ putts a round, and I made it to the finals of my club championship. This summer was by far my best on the greens and can only lead to bigger things over the next few years as soon as I get the rest of my game in order.
Keep reading below for my experience, and be sure to enter Fairway Jockey’s Bettinardi VIP Fitting giveaway today!
I got fit for a putter at Bettinardi’s Studio B. The result shocked me
Editor’s note: This story was originally published on June 3.
As I’ve chronicled my own golf journey through gear, I’ve started to realize that I’ve fallen into some of the bad habits that we here at GOLF preach against.
Take my putting.
Not until I was fit for a putter at Bettinardi’s Studio B did I become aware of the putting stroke and putter I should be using.
Today, I’m in a putter type I could never have imagined using, but I felt and saw instant results with how easy it was to get the ball rolling end-over-end on my intended line.
For those who have been hesitant to get fit for a putter, this article is for you.
Some background on my putters
All my life, I have used a Ping Anser-style blade putter, which was the putter type that came in my first U.S. Kids’ Golf set. The first Scotty Cameron my dad cut down for me was a 2005 Studio Style Newport 2.5 with a GSS insert.
That putter has a flow neck and a ton of toe hang, which I always thought matched my stroke because I always thought about the putting stroke as an arc and opening the face going back was the easiest way to return it to square.
In 2010, the first golf club I ever bought myself was a 1999 Scotty Cameron Teryllium II Newport 2 for a $150 on eBay, and I had it refinished. This putter has a plumber’s neck, but I was going for feel and I didn’t know anything about putter fittings at the time.
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By:
Jack Hirsh
I kept using that putter for 13 years before a newer Teryllium version came out, this time as a wide-body blade and a high-toe flow short slant neck. I still thought my stroke matched best with a lot of toe flow so I bagged one and never thought twice about it.
I did get fit for this putter but after I already had purchased it. I got fit to the putter, rather than finding a putter that was fit for me.
But, as these things tend to go, I was wrong!
My Bettinardi putter fitting
I was excited to go to Bettinardi’s Studio B in Oak Brook, Ill., just outside of Chicago; it would be my first putter fitting at which we’d start from scratch, and I was going in with a completely open mind.
From the moment we started rolling putts, I realized something was about to change.
“Does this green have a bit of a left break?” I asked, innocently, thinking I was hitting good putts.
“It actually has more of a right break, if anything,” said Tom Sopic, Studio B’s lead hive concierge and my fitter for the day.
Using a high-tech camera system in the fitting bay and Quintic putting analysis, Sopic uncovered a huge revelation about my putting stroke.
He didn’t even need to see the video to confirm it.
“Just watching you hit a couple of putts during your warm-up, I could see that it was more of a pendulum-style stroke,” he said. “The easiest way we saw it was that your takeaway when we came to the apex of your stroke, the pocket of your putter was dead straight behind the golf ball.”
On the video screen, Tom showed me that my putter face stays almost square for most of the stroke, as opposed to opening on the way back and closing on the way through as it would for an arc. Because the face naturally wants to close on the way through, it created a hitch in my putting stroke that would mostly cause me to strike the ball on the heel and pull it.
We could also see that my eyes were about 2 to 2.5 golf-ball widths inside the heel of the putter, which was because my putter was long (36″).
“A lot of times when people are fitting into toe hang putters, they recommend your eyes fall inside the heel, which we do as well,” Sopic said. “But that distance away from it, with you being a pendulum-style putter, is going to create a lot of exaggerated arc that isn’t there naturally.”
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By:
Ryan Barath
All of this was causing my golf ball to launch with almost as much side spin as forward roll. The Quintic analysis showed my forward spin at a 51 RPM average and the side spin at 45 RPM. Ideally, Sopic said, you want three times as much forward spin as side spin. It wasn’t consistent, either, because my highest side spin was up to 75 RPM of hook spin!
The result of my putter fitting
We stayed in a blade-style putter because, while I believe a mallet putter is more forgiving, I’ve never found one I like looking at. I’ve gone to wider-blades to give me more forgiveness and that seems to do the trick.
Our winning putter was three degrees flatter (67˚) than my gamer (as the toe of my putter was still coming in high), and a half inch shorter (35.5″), which brought my eyes right over the heel of the putter. To me, it really didn’t feel that much different, which was what Sopic was going for. My spine angle didn’t change when addressing the shorter putter.
Bettinardi BB28 Slotback Putter
After a successful debut in the last BB line, RJB took his BB28 back to the workshop for some artful and game-changing modifications resulting in the newly refined BB28 Slotback. The new and improved wide-body blade is slightly more compact, with shortened heel-to-toe and pocket lengths, while also featuring taller muscles and bumpers. The slotback milled from the flange serves as a natural alignment aid, allowing you to frame the ball perfectly at address. The near-face-balanced BB28 Slotback has a single bend shaft that flows seamlessly into the spud neck, providing a three-quarter shaft of offset for simple setup and a consistently effortless putting stroke.
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The real shock to me was the head and neck, which was a Bettinardi BB-28 Slot Back, a nearly face-balanced putter with a single-bend shaft. I had never used any putter without a hosel before.
Interestingly, the BB-28 has an identical offset (3/4ths of a shaft) to my previous gamer, which, despite the absence of a hosel, looked completely different; however, lining up to a putt felt almost the same. That’s no coincidence, Sopic said, because right-eye dominant players, like myself, who like to use sight lines on the flange to line up their putts, tend to also prefer less offset.
But the results on the Quintic were clear. With six putts, my forward rolls averaged 60 RPMs of forward spin and just 12 RPMs of sidespin, well above the 3-to-1 minimum ratio.
The cool part of the Studio B experience was that a new putter was built to my exact specs right there for me, and I was able to go out and play with it immediately that afternoon.
I won’t lie and say there wasn’t an adjustment period, especially considering I’ve been scared of pulling short putts for the better part of six months now, but by my third round with this putter (and even the back nine that day) it was clear that this putter fit me better than any other I’d had before.
The author ended up in a Bettinardi BB-28SB putter.
Jack Hirsh/GOLF
What this putter fitting really tells us
We could go on and on about how this has really changed how I think about my putting, or how it’s going to improve my game, but the reality is simple:
You need to be fit for your putter, not to your putter! There’s a difference.
It also comes down to more than just specs. Different putter shapes, faces, necks, etc., all do different things. I could bend and cut my old putter to meet the same specs as this new one, and it still wouldn’t work as well because of the toe flow.
So my suggestion: Go get fit and then buy a putter; your scores will thank you later. It will cost you only about $100 to $150 ($100 at Bettinardi’s Studio B), which really isn’t that much when you’re already spending $400-$500 on a new putter. Think of it as an investment for all the money it will end up winning you on the greens!
A few notes on the giveaway: It is available to U.S. residents only. Ground transportation not included in prize. Spend threshold will be calculated using the subtotal after any discounts have been applied and prior to tax and shipping being applied. Items or orders returned and refunded will not count towards entry. All TaylorMade, Ping, Odyssey and Scotty Cameron products are excluded from the promotion and do not count toward purchase thresholds. However, product add-ons like as shafts, grips, and ferrules will count toward all purchase thresholds.
Ready to start earning some entries? Explore Fairway Jockey’s wide array of gear here — and click here for more information on the Bettinardi giveaway.
Want to find the best putter for your game? Find a club-fitting location near you at True Spec Golf.
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