3D Printed Putting Trainer Helps Golfers Observe New USGA Rule

If you’re a golfer, there’s now a 3D printed device that can help you curb a bad habit and prevent you from breaking a new United States Golf Association (USGA) regulation. Rule 14-1b, which goes into effect in 2016, officially makes it a big no-no to support your golf club with your abdomen when you’re putting.

The rule, explains the USGA, “preserves one of the important traditions and challenges of the game: That a player freely swing the entire club. Anchoring,” the announcement notes, “…the act of intentionally securing one end of the club to the body and creating a physical point of attachment is a substantial departure from the traditional free swing of the club.”

Infographic demonstrating rule 14-1b. Courtesy of USGA.

When you’re putting, your ball is in close range of the hole and you’re striving for incredible precision, so steadying your putter with your body seems to make sense. There are even specialized putters with longer handles called “belly putters” that make it easier to employ this technique. While you can still use that longer putter, you can’t brace the end against your body. But what if you’re accustomed to putting in that manner? How do you break a potentially years-long habit?

3D MedScan, creator of a medical brace called Amphibian Skin, which is produced using 3D scanning, modeling, and printing, has designed the In-Sync 3D Putting training device that will help golfers retrain themselves to conform to the new rule.

The In-Sync 3D Putting trainer, which is awaiting patent approval, uses muscle memory to coach your body, particularly your arms, into revising a movement (or series of movements) that is so ingrained you don’t even have to think about doing it — you just do it. Athletes know how strong muscle memory is and they rely on it to help them act without really having to think much about it.

3D MedScan will customize each In-Sync 3D Putting device. The first step is, probably not surprisingly, taking a 3D scan of the individual golfer’s arms and hands while placed in the ideal putting position. With the use of 3D modeling, the device is created and then 3D printed. Fashion-conscious customers can choose the color of their In-Sync 3D Putting trainers.

3D MedScan, which is based in Pueblo, Colorado, will be attending the 2015 Denver Golf Expo and will be scanning clients and begin taking orders for customized In-Sync 3D Putting devices. Not going to the expo or don’t want to wait? You can contact 3D MedScan through the In-Sync 3D Putting website now to request more information.

We’re brainstorming here about other possible retraining devices. What about a 3D printed trainer that improves your tennis serve? Or a customized device that helps basketball players make those free throw shots? The possibilities are probably limitless as long as we humans remain less-than-perfect and, for that matter, when corner-cutting becomes against the rules.

Let us know what you think about this device, and other similar tools that might help a golfer adhere to new guidelines, in the In-Sync 3D Putting forum thread over at 3DPB.com.