This post we take a look at some news about PUREing, exactly what it is and does it improve club performance. Is golf’s best technology a secret? That’s a good question and Nick Sherburne, co-founder of Club Champion, the nation’s premier club fitter and builder, along with Matt Saternus, noted golf writer and founder of Plugged-In Golf, went looking for the answer. Though hard to believe, there is a custom fitting process that hundreds of PGA Tour players have had done that few golfers even are aware of – PUREing their shafts. SST PURE has been a fixture on the PGA Tour for more than 15 years, and players using this technology have won over $1.5 billion.
Club Champion tested whether PUREing delivers measurable benefits or if it’s just another placebo. What is SST PURE? To varying degrees, golf shafts are not perfectly straight or perfectly round. Irregularities might cause problems when the shaft twists and bends during a swing. SST PURE Shaft Alignment identifies the most stable bending plane or “Neutral-Axis”. SST claims that when the club head is installed in the proper orientation with the “Neutral Axis,” golfers will see improved consistency.
For the test, two seemingly identical six irons were used. The clubs had the same head, shaft, grip, loft, lie, length, swing weight, and total weight. The only difference was that one shaft had been SST PUREd and the other did not. All of the testing was done at Club Champion in a controlled environment.
The test consisted of seven golfers, whose handicaps ranged from the mid-teens to scratch. Each player hit ten shots with the PUREd six-iron and ten shots with a non-PUREd club. Players alternated hitting, using the PUREd iron first. No one knew which club was hit until after the testing had concluded. All shots were recorded on Trackman and no shots were deleted.
The test concluded that “PUREing” a shaft led to significant distance increases. On average, our testers gained over 7 yards of total distance with the PUREd six-iron compared to the non-PUREd club. That is nearly a full club of extra distance despite the fact that both clubs had the same loft! The greater distance came largely as a result of greater club head speed, ball speed, and smash factor. Players swung the PUREd club nearly 1 MPH faster and generated an extra 2.8 MPH of ball speed.
The study also concluded that PUREing does, in fact, boost accuracy. Overall, our test group was 2.2 yards closer to the centerline with the PUREd six iron versus the non-PUREd six iron. That’s the difference between a makeable birdie putt and a challenging two-putt. On the PGA Tour, that would be the difference between being #1 in proximity to the hole and being 91st.
PUREing helped players land their shots nearer the centerline and also helped to narrow their dispersion pattern. The average distance between players’ furthest right and furthest left shots was 2.1 yards smaller with the PUREd iron versus the non-PUREd iron. Finally the study concluded that, “The SST PUREing process is no placebo. It is one of the most impactful technologies that we’ve ever tested.”
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