Unless you were in attendance at Riviera Country Club for the final round of the Genesis Invitational, you likely missed Jon Rahm’s under-the-radar equipment change.
It’s not uncommon for pros to shake up the equipment setup midway through a tournament, but Rahm chose to wait until Sunday to insert a new Odyssey White Hot OG #7S — the “S” denotes a slant neck — for competition.
Unlike some of his Tour colleagues, Rahm rarely makes impromptu equipment changes. Every piece of gear has to be thoroughly vetted before it earns a spot in the bag. And even then, there’s no guarantee it will make the cut. The White Hot OG #7S that replaced Rahm’s trusty White Hot OG Rossie S was actually a practice putter before it ever saw the greens in competition.
According to Joe Toulon, who spoke to GOLF.com via text, Rahm worked regularly with a #7 putter when he was practicing at Silverleaf Club, his home course, and liked the overall look and feel of the head. But it still wasn’t enough to convince him to switch until he started “burning a lot of edges” with the Rossie S.
When Rahm arrived at Riviera to prep for the Genesis, he spent time on the practice green testing the #7 with Toulon to see how it performed. It didn’t take him long to pick up on several noticeable improvements while conducting head-to-head testing.
“His path looked very good with it,” Toulon told GOLF.com. “[The putter] stayed lower to the ground during the backstroke which allowed it to arc nicely and put him in a great position to release the putter through impact.”
Rahm had initially planned to stick with the Rossie and conduct additional testing until he lost a combined 5.056 strokes to the field on the greens over the first three rounds at Riviera. Realizing he had nothing to lose by inserting the #7, Rahm switched putters during the final round and closed with 65.
Even better? He picked up 2.444 strokes with the putter in the process.
Aside from the head change, Rahm refrained from making any changes to the weight, loft or length (37 inches). The only noticeable alteration was the addition of black sightlines to the wings for alignment purposes. Prior to switching to the #7, Rahm’s previous putter was “naked” — meaning it didn’t have an alignment aid on the crown.
If there’s one thing recreational golfers can learn from Rahm’s latest putter change, it’s that you don’t always need to stick it out with a trusty gamer when things continually go sideways. Keep your options open and be willing to test a different head shape or neck to see if something gets your putting on track.
If Rahm can make the leap, so can you.
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