Would You Sacrifice Appearance to Hole More Putts?

The BioMech AccuLock ACE putter sure looks strange. But it could help you become a wizard on the greens.

According to Dr. Frank Fornari, Ph.D. and CEO of Rhode Island-based BioMech Sports, most golfers don’t make a stroke when putting, but rather a ‘massive isometric contraction’. Ooh, sounds painful.

“It’s really just a giant spasm,” Fornari adds. “And it causes fatigue because the muscles are tense, and it attempts to coordinate the firing of billions of neurons and muscle fibers at the right time. It’s really no wonder most people find putting so frustrating and that so many end up with the yips.”

For six years, Fornari, an expert in physiology, physics, biomechanics, and the study of motion, has researched the putting stroke and developed what he thinks is a putter that radically improves a person’s posture, alignment, and stroke, and results in much-improved impact and putting performance.

If it’s classic looks and admiring glances from your playing partners you’re after, then the BioMech AccuLock ACE putter is patently not for you. This is no Titleist Bullseye, Wilson 8802, Ping Anser, or Scotty Cameron Newport. Make no bones, the AccuLock ACE looks weird.

For starters it is a good deal longer than most putters, coming in 39”, 41”, 43” and 47” versions (a grip is included with the 47” putter but not attached. The putter can be cut to the desired length and the grip added.) Next, the shaft is attached to the back of the putterhead, to enable the golfer to see the whole face. The shaft leans 12.5 degrees forward which allows the shaft to rest against the inside of the lead forearm. This eliminates a wristy twitch, and sets the shoulders at the appropriate angle permitting “optimal rotation throughout the putting motion” says Fornari.

Stand to the right of the golfer, not in front, and you notice the shaft is also much more upright – 13 degrees as opposed to 18-25 degrees in most putters. By standing much closer to the ball with your eyes directly over it, Fornari says your putting stroke creates less of an arc. “With the ACE, the path of your stroke becomes uniformly straight back and through,” says Fornari. “That leads to much more consistent impact and aids in stroking the ball on the correct line.”

Lastly, the head itself, milled from 6000 series aluminum and which weighs 372 grams, possesses a golf ball-sized hole in the middle, and a concave section with two laser-etched markings. “When the two etched lines form a capital “T,” the golfer’s dominant eye is located directly above the center of the hole of the putter and the golfer’s head, body, and the golf ball are in the same position on every putt,” says Fornari. “And at that moment, the putterface has two degrees of loft which promotes the optimal amount of overspin while eliminating and skidding or side-to-side ball rotation.”

The BioMech AccuLock ACE, which will conform to Rule 14-1B banning “contact-point putters” by the way, has been designed to make putting easier by enabling the golfer to adopt a far more natural, more comfortable position over the ball. It stimulates a much squarer back-and-through stroke that promotes solid impact, and purges your stroke of unnecessary and oftentimes harmful hand movement. It engages the large muscles in the shoulders and core rather than allowing the small muscles in the wrists and hands to dominate.

If you don’t mind its rather unconventional appearance, and the potentially unflattering commentary from your buddies, the AccuLock ACE will likely improve your success rate on the greens. And when you start rolling in putts and feel less stiffness and pain doing it, you might just convince them to try it too.

$279.99. BioMechGolf.com

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