Why Did Putters Get Heavier?

Josh Babbitt July 14, 2020 14 Comments

The question has been asked a lot recently with Odyssey Stroke Lab coming out, why did putter heads get heavier over the years? Was it just design elements? To increase MOI? Something else?

We sat down with putter and industrial design expert Sean Toulon, who has been involved with the creation some of the most popular putters in golf over the last 3-4 decades to ask him this very question.

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Josh Babbitt

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Josh is the Publisher of The Hackers Paradise and co-founder of THP Media with his wife Morgan Babbitt. Together they share a passion for golf, and they travel the country in the THP Tour Van bringing their love and knowledge of the game to golfers everywhere.

14 Comments

mikeg_74 says:

July 14, 2020 at 9:50 am

Sean explains this one perfectly. I remember sitting with him and Austie during the Odyssey experience and having this explained to us and how it was hurting more than helping golfers putt consistently.
Nate says:

July 14, 2020 at 9:59 am

I agree to a point. I also think a big piece of the puzzle is most amateurs don’t have the perfect putting stroke. Too much hands, not enough shoulder rock, putter path not consistent, etc. With the big push in fittings, I think they started finding out that w/ the right amount of weight placed in the right spots of a putter, people started making more putts. Players didn’t have to take such a big stroke. It took the small muscles out that use to cause issues. The balls started getting to the holes. Cause and effect.
Chef23 says:

July 14, 2020 at 10:00 am

I am looking forward to watching this. I went heavy to help eliminate the yips. The backweighting helps stabilize things. You can’t measure swingweight of my putter because the handle is so heavy.
OldandStiff says:

July 14, 2020 at 10:06 am

Good stuff. Always love hearing Toulon’s thoughts on things.
mikeg_74 says:

July 14, 2020 at 10:10 am

[QUOTE=”Nate, post: 9424248, member: 4562″]
I agree to a point. I also think a big piece of the puzzle is most amateurs don’t have the perfect putting stroke. Too much hands, not enough shoulder rock, putter path not consistent, etc. With the big push in fittings, I think they started finding out that w/ the right amount of weight placed in the right spots of a putter, people started making more putts. Players didn’t have to take such a big stroke. It took the small muscles out that use to cause issues. The balls started getting to the holes. Cause and effect.
[/QUOTE]

I remember Austie talking about this. Golfers have inconsistent putting strokes and rather than work on it, they went heavier to feel “balanced” to cover up some flaws. I was a prime culprit of this. I went heavy because I thought it helped me “control” my stroke better, when in reality I was covering up for a bad putting motion.
Nate says:

July 14, 2020 at 10:12 am

[QUOTE=”mikeg_74, post: 9424264, member: 15992″]
I remember Austie talking about this. Golfers have inconsistent putting strokes and rather than work on it, they went heavier to feel “balanced” to cover up some flaws. I was a prime culprit of this. I went heavy because I thought it helped me “control” my stroke better, when in reality I was covering up for a bad putting motion.
[/QUOTE]
Why is that such a bad thing? I wouldn’t necessarily call it “covering up”. It’s an option that perhaps will help in your stroke. It did for me.
tahoebum says:

July 14, 2020 at 10:13 am

Is he implying that Stroke Lab putter shafts with the lighter shaft area between the grip and putter head and back weighting are superior to traditional steel putter shafts and the way of the future? Has the Stroke Lab tech been heavily adopted on any of the professional tours as I almost never see one of their shafts on TV? I also wonder how many golfers actually see greens speeds over 10-11 on the stimpmeter on a regular basis. My guess is most golf in this country is played on greens with a stimp under 10.
mikeg_74 says:

July 14, 2020 at 10:18 am

[QUOTE=”Nate, post: 9424268, member: 4562″]
Why is that such a bad thing? I wouldn’t necessarily call it “covering up”. It’s an option that perhaps will help in your stroke. It did for me.
[/QUOTE]

It’s a splippery slope is best I can explain. It can get out of hand really quick throwing the putter all out of whack swing weight wise. I think the consensus was it has it merits, but it can hurt more than help.

For you being a better player/putter and information at your disposal, you can make it work effectively. Too many just see something on TV or don’t do their homework on the set up and it can end up hurting them.
WLG1952 says:

July 14, 2020 at 10:42 am

I play a “B-1 Heavy Putter” and it really is heavy. With all the extra club head weights installed, and the counter weighted shaft, it weighs almost 2lbs.

This is a very old putter as far as when it was actually built. I’d had it for 15, or so years before putting it in my bag. When trying it out as a replacement, I also tested an 2 Ball putter, a Rail Gun putter and a couple of other putters I had laying around collecting dust.

Their claim was/is the extra weight created more stability in putting stroke. I have no reason to disagree with their claim. The weight of the club head resisted any twisting on heel/toe mishits. Except for the Rail Gun, the other putters I tried would twist on those mishits.

I putt pretty well with this putter. The extra weight also made it possible to use a shorter back stroke than I normally used. The shorter back stroke helped to keep the putter face on my putting stroke line.

This B-1 putter replaced a much lighter putter I had used for decades that had become unplayable. Took about 2 weeks of practice to get use to the extra weight. My putts per green average eventually returned to normal, and I never looked back.
Just_Hacking says:

July 14, 2020 at 11:11 am

[COLOR=rgb(41, 105, 176)]Honestly I had never given it much thought, but this makes a lot of sense.[/COLOR]
TCB2010 says:

July 14, 2020 at 11:16 am

there are guys that do good interviews, he is one. neubarth is another.
very enjoyable!
baylrballa says:

July 14, 2020 at 11:27 am

my distance control is so much better with “lighter” putters.
Junkyard says:

July 14, 2020 at 5:37 pm

I’ll be honest, it seems counter-intuitive to me. Sean said that when greens were slow heads were light. Once greens sped up golfers didn’t want to take big swings so they made the head heavier. Help me out here – if the green is faster, why would you need a longer stroke?

I’ll compare it to something I do understand, which is curling ice. When we talk about ice being faster, the curler will actually take longer to deliver the stone when measured between two points in the delivery. In other words, it takes less effort to make the rock travel as far when the ice is fast. To me, a putting green would be the same – faster means less resistance, or further ball travel under the same energy input. So why did the putter need to get heavier?
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