Gear: TaylorMade Truss putters
Price: $299 each with KBS Stepless Stability shaft and Lamkin Sink Fit Skinny grip
Specs: Aluminum-bodied putters with tungsten weights and grooved face insert.
Available: Feb. 7
TaylorMade has enjoyed success in recent years with its Spider family of putters because the mallets provide golfers with enhanced stability in a compact shape. But even as the Spider putters have been refined through the release of the Spider Mini, the Spider X and now the Spider S, some golfers have resisted switching to one. They want the performance benefits but can’t get past the untraditional look.
Now, for players who demand a classic look at address but also want more mallet-style stability, TaylorMade has something completely new: the Truss putters.
If you think back to your high school physics class, you might recall that a truss is a load-bearing framework, usually constructed with triangular shapes, that creates a rigid structure. TaylorMade’s putter designers have borrowed that idea from bridge makers and added it to the neck section of its latest putter family.
TaylorMade said it creates more horizontal stability and stiffness by creating a larger area of supported mass in the heel area. That means when you hit a putt outside the sweetspot, either toward the heel or the toe, the club stays square and resists twisting open or closed. According to TaylorMade’s data, the Truss TB1 blade deflects 61.5 percent less than a standard heel-toe-weighted blade, and the center-shafted TB2 deflects 80.3 percent less.
But the real beauty of adding the Truss stability system, according to TaylorMade, is that when a golfer soles the putter behind the ball and looks down in the address position, the whole system disappears and all the player sees is a classically shaped club. The triangular support system disappears by visually blending into the topline. So, TaylorMade said, Truss putters can deliver Spider-like stability in a classic size and shape.
To enhance the quality of the roll of the TB1, TB2, TM1 and TM2, TaylorMade gave the four Truss putters the same Surlyn insert found in the Spider putters. The grooves in the insert face down at a 45-degree angle and are designed to grip the ball at impact and encourage it to start rolling instead of skidding for better distance control and consistency.