Recently I saw a post from the folks at Golftec that was intended to explain “lie angle balancing”, which is the latest hot new thing in putter design from the folks at L.A.B. Golf (home of the $600 – before options – putter.)
https://x.com/i/status/1956742227587224055
First let’s talk about the text of the post:
They wrote “Rather than balancing a putter around the shaft […] @labgolf putters balances their putter based on lie angle.”
Well, I’ve got news for you, folks – the lie angle is the angular relationship of the long axis of the shaftof the putter to the club head, so balancing the club around the shaft and balancing the club around the lie angle are the same thing – so right off the bat you can see that they are playing a little smoke-and-mirrors game with you.
Now let’s break down the problems with the video:
1) The term is “lie”–“angle” – two words, not “line-gle”, as the kid[1] in the clip pronounces it.
2) When he picks up a “standard putter”[2] he mentions “a potentially differing weight from the end of the club to the head of the toe”. What the hell does that mean? What I think it is that they are trying to get across here, however poorly expressed, is (the obvious[3] fact) that more of the mass of the club head lies to one side (the toe side) of the axis of the shaft than to the other (the heel side.) This imbalance causes the club to rotate about the shaft such that the toe of the club is lower than the shaft. This is called “toe hang”, and most putters have some amount of it.
3) He starts out with the “standard putter” balanced on a finger and held with the toe up, and says “when I let go of this club you’ll see it has the tendency to swing wide open[4].” Here he is using misdirection to emphasize this supposed undesirable aspect of the design of this non-LAB Golf putter. Pretty much putter ever made will swing down, dropping the toe, when held in this starting position. What is important is the angle of the face relative to horizontal when the putter is at rest.
4) He then takes what appears to be a left-handed[5] LAB Golf putter with a center shaft, balances it on a finger and (allegedly, because his other hand is not visible in the video) releases it, resulting in the face remaining vertical, saying, “so when I let go of this you’ll see how the face stays square.”
What he is calling “square” here is what anyone else would call 100% toe hang. No explanation is offered as to why this configuration is desirable, what benefits it has, or what stroke shape it is suited for (based on the conventional thinking that a large amount of toe hang is suited for a stroke with a large arc in the horizontal plane, 100% toe hang suits a massively arced stroke.)
And let’s talk about toe hang for a minute.
While one putter manufacturer touts a “toe-up” design that “significantly reduces the negative effects of torque, promoting a smoother and more consistent motion and allowing the putter head a greater opportunity to return to square at impact”, it is a generally accepted fact[6] that the greater the arc in your putting stroke (arc in the horizontal plane, to be clear…) the more toe hang your putter should have, ostensibly in order to facilitate the opening and closing of the face as the putter is swung back and then forward.
Since toe hang is caused by the center of mass being well out toward the toe, away from the shaft, in the horizontal plane as the putter is used, and the putter is being swung in the horizontal plane, what force is acting on the putter to make it rotate?
Gravity acts at 90º to the orientation of the moment arm between the location of the center of mass, and inertia – which can be treated as a force in a dynamic situation like this – would cause the toe to hang back as the putter is swung back, thus closing the face, and again, in the opposite direction as the putter is swung forward, opening the face. This is the opposite of the description I have read of the reasoning behind “big arc, more toe hang”, which is “toe hang facilitates the opening and closing of the putter face in the backstroke and follow-through”.
I have never agreed with the arcing-stroke school of putting because my engineer’s predilection for finding the simplest solution eschews the complexity of a motion that requires timing to ensure that the face of the putter is square to my intended line at impact. Is this “big arc, more toe hang” thing another one of those old wives’ tales of golf like “hit down to compress the ball” (don’t get me started on that one) which no one actually understands, and which doesn’t follow physical reality but which everyone nods their heads and agrees with because they don’t know any better?
I think so, yes.5) Finally – to close out the video, the world’s worst spokesperson[7] says “LAB will fit you first to your “linegle” (sic) which will then determine how they get the shaft axis and the head balance within each other, hence the lack of twist.” This is gobbledygook that is worthy of a Republican legislator explaining why cutting your medical benefits and giving tax cuts to billionaires is really a good deal for YOU.
The bottom line is that this video does worse than promote misinformation; it gives no actual information at all, while purporting to present a wondrous new concept in the guise of an amazing revelation. It is a load of unrelated BUMF, nonsense statements strung together by someone who has no idea what he is talking about, and no concept of how to present information clearly.
Please – PLEASE – Golftec, do better. If you feel the need to promote putters that cost what we used to spend for a high-end driver, First – use a presenter who can at least sound like he knows what the hell is talking about; Second – illustrate and explain the physical differences between the putters that are being compared and present them each in the same way, visually; and finally – explain, or at least make an effort to explain, how the $600 putter achieves its radical physical characteristic, and why it will (supposedly) turn your basic 18-handicapper into Steve Stricker or Brad Faxon on the putting green.
And for goodness sake, send the kid in this video clip back to the stockroom to count sweaters.
[1] Don’t at me – at my age anyone under 40 is a kid…
[2] Do the folks at Edel Golf know that this kid used one of their putters like it was the “Before” photo in a weight-loss ad?
[3] Or it should be…
[4] The club face is not “wide open”, because “open” or “closed” is relative to swing path; it is, in this instance “toe down”.
[5] Important rule for experiments/demonstrations: Compare apples to apples.
[6] I use the phrase “generally accepted fact” in the sense of “widely spread concept that may or may not actually reflect physical reality” – about which more later.