I was amazed to read your comments on ball balancing.
Have you ever viewed the videos on the Wilson True
website? Some of the balls, for example the Strata,
were absolutely embarrassing. To say that you
wouldn't worry about this by using a new ball is
absurd. This is in fact a very important
consideration for putting. The good news is that
Wilson made such a big deal about this that it should
shame the other manufacturers into improving. Anyway,
I use the Check-Go to balance all my balls and orient
their axis of rotation along my putting line. I'm
confident that, if I miss, it's not the ball's fault!

Butch Dye

Dear Butch,

Thanks for the comments. You're probably right.

I was a little concerned about the lawsuits against Wilson alleging that their tests were a little rigged. As I understand the allegation, Wilson tested the competitors' balls to identify the worst possible way to orient the ball for filming. Since the actual orientation of a ball is happenstance in play (usually), the tested orientation was something like a 1 in 100 chance of actually being that bad. I am concerned that there is also a chance Wilson cherry-picked the worst balls they could find to represent the competitor. I don't know any of this to be true, but it is an issue that I haven't really resolved.

If you can shed any light on this, please let me know. Also, I am interested in your Check-n-Go experiences. Can you tell whether a ball is imbalanced, and if so, in what way and how badly? Anything you can tell me about this is much appreciated. Always listening and learning ...

Cheers!

Geoff Mangum
Putting Theorist and Instructor
The PuttingZone
http://puttingzone.com
Golf's most advanced and comprehensive putting instruction.

Over 45,000 visits mothly and growing strong ...

I too, have purchased and used the Check-Go product and I hope the members of this forum can confirm or refute my findings.

I have marked dozens and dozens of golf balls in the last few years and have consistently been puzzled by one thing. If the point of marking a ball is to determine its imbalance and neutralize it, then why is it that every time I put the ball back in the spinner the line that I have drawn around the circumferance does not immediately re-center itself.

If the CG offset has not moved, replacing the ball in the unit should be forced to return to the equator, and yet it does not. Please try this yourselves. Take aball which you have marked and see if returning it to the unit creates the same balance point.

I have spun an individual ball more than a dozen times and tried it on more than a half dozen brands. All I get is a ball that ends up looking very similar to a basketball.

I hope to see if anyone else has had dissimilar results.

Dear Geoff,

Thanks for the response. I am impressed with your
website and your dedication to putting. As an
actuary, I tend to be very analytical about my golf
game, particulary my putting.

Regarding the Check-Go, I believe that it is the best
piece of golf equipment that I have ever purchased. I
always orient the ball so that its "rotation line"
points toward the target (on the tee and when
putting). This way I am confident that it's not the
ball's "fault" when I hit a poor shot.

Before the Check-Go, I used the Epson salt approach to
finding the "light side" of the ball. Using this
approach, I found that poorly balanced balls (e.g.,
Strata Tour Ultimate II) would immediately spin to a
light side up position. On the other hand, better
balanced balls (Pro V1) either would take longer to
spin to a light side up position or not repeat the
original position.

When using the Check-Go, the poorly balanced balls
repeat their rotational axis sooner than the better
balanced balls. However, all repeat their rotational
axis. The poorest balls have trouble staying in place
in the plastic cup on which they spin because they
vibrate as their "heavy side" approaches their
equator.

An unscientific but interesting "test" of this device
is available at the following website:
http://www.golfclubreview.com/spin_balanced_balls.htm

Butch Dye

"I have spun an individual ball more than a dozen times and tried it on more than a half dozen brands. All I get is a ball that ends up looking very similar to a basketball."

Either:
1. You have defective device
2. Your batteries are down
3. You have not waited for a 20 second "spin" as per the directions.

Rarely have I found a ball which will not realign. I have tried a couple of used Wilson Trues. Their lines overlapped near the equator--still somewhat unbalanced. The Strata balanced ball consistently realigned on the manufactures line. Every Pro V I have tried readily realigned e.g. they are unbalanced.

See the URL in the other post for the "science".

tom

Both Singh and Woods were aligning small lines on their balls in last weeks tournament. Were they balanced?