First Look: Odyssey White Hot RX Putters

The Putting Prescription

That’s the first thing that I thought of when I learned that the new Odyssey White Hot line would sport an “RX” in its name. Back in the day when Callaway was struggling, and couldn’t afford all of the letters to make complete words, that RX could have stood for something like RAZR Xtreme.

To be fair though, Odyssey has never really struggled in the putter market. They earn their #1 Putter in Golf tagline year after year. It’s not unreasonable to expect that the RX will help that tradition continue.

What’s New?

When a new version of an established line launches that “What’s new?” question is entirely valid. It’s likely more important for putters, as golfers are known to stick with old faithful longer than any other club in the bag. Yours truly excluded, of course.

Ideally, a new incarnation of an older, yet successful putter line will keep the aspects that players liked, revise the aspects needing improvement, and then sprinkle the whole package with innovation.

It’s a tall order. Change too much and you risk losing the loyalist. Don’t change enough, and you’ll catch a load of grief for trying to re-market the same thing year after year.

So what is new in the White Hot RX line?

The Models

The Odyssey White Hot RX line will include seven different head shapes. Six of those are Odyssey staples: #1, #2, #7, #9, 2-Ball, & Rossie. Don’t immediately assume that these are the same as previous versions though. You know that the heads vary in architecture from year to year. If you track the #7 over the past couple of cycles you will see a great variation in size and overall geometry. Additionally, there is a great new mallet in there as well.

The V-Line Fang is a new model in the White Hot RX line and I’ll come right out and say that it is going to be very popular. There are all kinds of hybridization going on here. You can see some #7, some V-Line, and even a touch of Sabertooth in the alignment lines.

By the way, did you know that Odyssey released a Works Versa Sabertooth in Japan? How did I miss that one? I love the Sabertooth…

Anyway, I think that the V-Line Fang will be the standout in the line-up. It sets up deliciously at address, with alignment achieved effortlessly via dots and lines. The fangs throw the weight wide, promoting a very stable swing. And that insert, whoa. More on that nugget in a bit.

Added bonus: It scoops the gimmie better than most. Better than most…

I’ll get my hands of the rest of the line and have a more complete Club Report article for you when the line releases next month on the 26^th, but the V-Line Fang has the lead out of the gate for me.

The New Insert

White Hot inserts have been dropping balls in cups for the last fifteen years. There have been multiple White Hot permutations throughout that tenure, with each generation hoping to add something new while maintaining the beloved White Hot essence.

I don’t want to tangent into a detailed discourse about my White Hot insert opinions. Let’s just say that I feel that some were better than others.

The new White Hot RX insert is one of the good ones.

So what did they do? First, Odyssey focused on the retaining the White Hot feel. Feel is subjective in many ways, but that’s what gets putters out of the corral (and cash out of pockets).

Don’t agree? OK, how many times do you think that someone goes into a shop and says “This putter feels like shit, I’m buying it immediately!”?

Odyssey knows the importance of feel and their new two-layer insert hits the “feels-great” mark. You’re entitled to you own opinion, of course, but I bet you’ll be as impressed as I am when you roll one.

Better Roll

Get the ball rolling sooner. That seems to be a common goal for many putter companies, though the approach is often different. Nike has their grooves and polymers, Rife, Yes!, and others have different grooves, and even that random Golf Channel infomercial putter has its negative loft to help get the ball rolling sooner, or your money back.

Odyssey’s Metal-X (X gonna give it to ya) metal insert cap is all about latching onto the ball surface and getting it rolling. I believe it does exactly that, but it requires Odyssey to mount a piece of metal over the top of the softer polymer, to the detriment of the polymer’s cushy feel.

The new White Hot RX insert has the ovals of the Metal-X cap molded directly into the polymer, thus eliminating the loss of feel.

During the design process Odyssey’s engineers realized that the edge of the polymer ovals didn’t quite grab the ball the same way that the Metal-X ovals did. To address reduced lesser friction issue, without distorting the shape of the oval, Odyssey developed an abrasive, clear coat paint that when applied to the face, increases friction, and promotes quicker roll.

Performance over paint is now performance via paint.

Other Design Notes

There are a couple of other things worth noting regarding the new White Hot RX line. The finish on the putters is bright, sparkly, and bold. Full sun dazzle, for sure.

Oh, and you may have noticed that the golf color of 2016 is blue…

The other WHRX must-mention is the SuperStroke option. There is nothing wrong with the standard grip, but I have the feeling that Odyssey is going to sell a whole lot more of these with the SuperStroke Slim 3.0 option. For me, the combination just feels, and performs better. YMMV, of course, but I’d say it’s well worth the extra twenty bucks.

More To Come

As I mentioned, we will have a more complete Club Report article on these next month. We will let you see all of the models from all of the angles, and provide you with an idea about which White Hot RX will cure what ails ya.

So far, I’m not seeing any negative side-effects of this RX.