Q-Roll are both designed to improve contact and reduce skid. But curved faces had always focused on the vertical, top-to-bottom axis. It took a septuagenarian from Newport to spot the benefits of a putter curved across the face, from heel-to-toe ... and to have the guts to develop it.
The first Spherical Blade putters appeared in spring 2007. Their concept came from a retired business engineer, Welshman Ivor Thom, who had been inspired by watching snooker. The sphere-on-sphere accuracy of the plant shot set him thinking about the efficiency of striking a ball with a curved face; meanwhile the players' ability to produce over-spin by striking the top of the cue-ball saw him focus on a design in which the putter's face would impact the ball above its equator.
Thom set about designing a putter-face with both a top-to-bottom, north-south curve and a toe-to-heel east-west curve. The north-south curve would not be a bulge but would have a vertical, flat top edge that would simply curve back under itself, like the shape of a broom dragged across the floor. This would ensure impact at 22.5 or 23mm above the ground, and so above the ball's centre line.
Thom's idea behind the east-west curve was to compensate for a putter that is slightly closed or open at impact; if the face is a degree or two shut the arc on the face should, in theory, minimise the effect of the mis-aim.
Thom's belief in the concept, and his desire to patent it, saw him approach potential investors, Dragons' Den style. In this case the dragon was Cardiff-based businessman and 18-handicapper Ian Smith. And he liked what he heard.
"The very fact that Ivor had already established via a patent agent that the spherical face had not been done before was a great start," Smith recalls. "There has been plenty of technology going into putters in recent years, but it's focused on inserts, weight distribution, grooves, but very little on the actual shape of the face." Smith put up £100,000 to secure funding for the patenting process and kick-start the process of building prototypes. "Above all," he adds, "I believed in what Ivor was saying. The technology made sense and I felt golfers would understand the benefits of the technology."
But would they? Is the concept that a curved putter face can help you roll the ball straight and true that easy to get your head around? Surely a toed strike will head right and a heel strike left?
"We are talking a very gentle curve," counters Smith. "Its radius is 1.5m. You can't even see the horizontal curve unless you put a business card or some other straight edge against it.
"Secondly, yes, if you are a good player deliberately trying to hit it off the heel and toe - say to deaden the strike - you would have to make a little compensation, and we don't deny that. But then our putter is aimed at the vast majority of golfers who are tying to hit the ball on the sweetspot of the putter; if there is a very slight twitch around that sweetspot then that's what the curve will forgive."
A curved face begs two further questions: is the putter easy to square up? And if a curved face compensates for an open or shut putter, does squaring up actually matter? After all, tap a ball forward with the rim of a saucer and it goes in the same direction, however the saucer is ‘aimed'.
"You're right, but you're still trying to line up as best you can," says Smith. "Our putter compensates to a degree but can't correct a poor putter path or for the face being too open or closed. In this respect it's designed like a modern driver; you're still trying to hit it straight but the club aims to forgive any misalignment coming from the operator."
But Spherical Blade sees the east-west curve as secondary to the putter's main benefit, that of imparting ground-hugging over-spin on the ball. That's why they recently commissioned independent tests from Paul Hurrion's Quintic Consultancy in an attempt to substantiate their claims.
The tests set their Emperor, Silver Swallowtail and Arrowhead models up against six putters from other leading manufacturers. A putting robot arm was used to strike 20ft putts, recorded by video analysis at 250 frames per second. On average, eight frames were digitised prior to impact and a further 15 frames after.
In the test, only the S-Blade Emperor got the ball rolling with topspin immediately on impact (frame zero); The Arrowhead, along with two other putters, got the ball rolling from frame one while the S-Blade Swallowtail had the ball rolling from frame two. Other models initially suffered from backspin at impact; two brands were still back-spinning by frames six and seven.
"The results showed that our putters have come out better than most of their rivals, with the Emperor better than anything on the market in terms of getting the ball to true roll faster," says Smith.
The snooker analogy is clear, but then putting greens aren't billiard tables. Accepted wisdom is that a putter needs a little loft to help the ball out of the depression formed by its own weight. How does Spherical Blade allow for that?
"It doesn't allow, and it doesn't need to," argues Smith. "For one thing, on today's greens I don't think this is such an issue. Based on the evidence of my own eyes and other people using the putter, the roll is fine. But moreover, the momentum the putter-head gives the ball is enough to get it rolling. There is hardly any downward impact; hitting just above midpoint is enough to get it rolling.
"In fact, I think the problem with many putters is that three degrees or whatever is too much loft, too much lifting it out, and that's when you get the bobble or the spin."
The new Spherical Blade range is being distributed through Sigma, who have also provided the components for some of the products. And whether you buy into the curve story or not, there is no doubt the technology is intriguing. Certainly independent testing will help put any charges of gimmickry to bed; Smith is in the process of devising, with Quintic, an accuracy test to sit alongside the roll test and prove the effectiveness of that east-west, flinch-curing curve.
"The pros at Newport Golf Club helped us develop these putters," Smith sums up, "and they said that if they could be sure of the roll of the ball they could put more pace on short putts and take some of the break out. But I believe the real mass market attraction is people like me, worried about three-putting; our putters give you the extra roll to get the ball close from long range... and that's going to take three of four shots off your score."
To see the full Spherical Blade range click on http://www.sphericalblade.com/
Case study
PGA Pro and former Jamaican National Team coach Ian Melville (pictured) has become a stockist of S-Blade putters at Rutland County Golf Club, Lincs - as well as using one himself.
"The ball-roll off the S-Blade Greenstreak is exceptional and I hadn't experienced anything like it before," he says. "The spherical face technology sounds complicated but it is in fact quite simple; and you can clearly see the increased topspin that the S-Blade puts on the ball. I am a supporter of any technology that helps club golfers get the ball rolling - and I have to say the S-Blade does exactly that."
