PING Scottsdale ZB S Putter - cilck to magnify
Welcome to the 3rd installment of my 2011 PING Scottsdale putter review series. To date I’ve covered the PING Scottsdale Shea and the Scottsdale Senita putters, as well as the related iPING putter App. Today’s putter is the new PING Scottsdale ZB S Putter.
PING Scottsdale ZB S Putter Overview
The new ZB S is a conventional blade putter with a simple and clean design. The putter has a dark matte finish on the top and a black shiny chrome finish on the bottom, as do the other Scottsdale putter models. The look is very sharp and the matte finish prevents glare. (more…)
Welcome to my second in a three part review series of PING Scottsdale putters, each which is designed for a specific arc type. The first was my review of the PING Scottsdale Senita putter, which is most suited for a straight putting arc. Today’s subject is the Shea putter, best suited for a slight arc. Hey, that’s my arc type!
PING Scottsdale Shea Putter Overview
The Scottsdale Shea putter is a heel-toe balanced (mid-hang) mallet putter. It is a bit of a cross between a heel-toe blade and a small rounded mallet. Like the other Scottsdale putters, the top of the head is a darker matte finish. This helps prevent glare and is easy on the eye. The bottom of the club is a gloss finish. Gotta love glossy bottoms.
Shea Face – Thermoplastic Elastomer Insert – click to zoom
Technology
The Scottsdale line employs a few standard technologies.
The face of the Shea Scottsdale contains a “thermoplastic elastomer” insert. The plastic/rubber insert provides a great soft feel and helps with distance control.
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iPING on my Ping Scottsdale Senita putter – click to zoom
I’m a not only a golf guy, I’m a Mac guy. In fact I have a Mac site and blog called The Mac Space which has been running for years which I work on occasionally. I put way more time in here though. Way more. So being a Mac guy does mean that I have an iPhone. I have many golf apps which have been submitted for review and I really hope to get to them, probably in the winter when there’s less time to play golf. Perhaps the coolest app I’ve gotten though, which I moved to the top of the review queue, is the iPING app and iPING putter iPhone cradle. This is cool! Check it out.
iPING Overview
iPING is a two component system for analyzing and improving putting, which also happens to recommend a suitable PING putter when asked. Sure no problem. Love PING putters.
Component one is the iPING cradle, which mounts an iPhone 4 to any putter shaft. Sorry, but if you have any iPhone earlier than a 4 you are out of luck. Time to upgrade.
Component two is the iPhone application itself, which is truly amazing. This is no haphazardly put together rush job. The interface is beautiful and the features many.
The app is free, however the cradle is $30. But if you struggle with your putting, this could be the best $30 you’ve ever spent. (more…)
At a recent PGA Tour stop I had the pleasure of spending some time inside the PING tour truck. The tour trucks from golf manufacturers travel with the PGA Tour to support their players with gear, tweaks, repairs, maintenance, fresh hats and sometimes just a cool place to relax.
Inside the PING Tour Van. I want to live here. Click for more images.
Inside the PING truck were some very interesting machines and technology used in building and adjusting clubs. The tech, my new friend Daniel Udd (pictured below), could literally custom build any PING golf club in a matter of minutes. customized weighting, lofts, lie, grips take even less time.
Master technician Daniel Udd tweaks a PING wedge. Click for more images.
Perhaps the most fun was looking inside the drawers which contained player specific items like special grips for Bubba Watson or Hunter Mahan. The hat drawer had hats for all of their staffers and I wanted snag one of Miguel Angel Jimenez’s brown hats (below left). I resisted.
Brown hat is for Miguel Angel Jimenez. I want one... Click for more.
Two of my favorite companies are Apple and PING. If I could have a PING laptop I’m sure it would be easy to hit and the longest laptop on the market.
PING and Apple are working together on a new feature in Apple’s iTunes called “social music discovery.”
I’m not sure what PING and Apple have to do with discovering social music so stand by while I try to figure out just what they’re doing.
Clarification
Now that I’ve read deeper, it appears that Apple and PING are not working from a physical product standpoint. It appears that PING owns the rights to any social network using the name PING so Apple must have reached out to them. Apple’s new Ping is simply a new music social network where you can follow artists and the artists your friends follow.
Ping test drive = FAIL
Okay, after another hour I must say I’m not terribly impressed with Apple’s Ping. After setting up a profile, in which attempting to upload two different JPG’s for my profile image failed, I selected the following genres of music which I like: Rock, jazz and blues. There was no METAL or even just heavy rock selection, which is lame. That’s my main genre.
After setting up rock-jazz-blues, Ping’s first suggestion for me was Lady Gaga. Um, that is not rock, jazz or blues. Selection #2 for me, based on my rock-jazz-blues selection was Yo-Yo Ma, a classical cellist. Last time I checked, classical cello music isn’t in the rock-jazz-blues genre. Selection #3 (stop me any time) was Katy Perry, bubble gum pop. If I listened to that for more than 9 seconds I think my head would explode.
I’m sorry Apple (and/or PING), but Ping in it’s current state is a definite FAIL. NONE of the artists the engine selected for me were anywhere near the style I’m looking for, and once again METAL was not listed as a category I could select. FAIL.
Ping’s press release below
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