Review - Stability Tour
FEEL - 9
Performance - 9.5
The feel of the Stability Tour has changed substantially from the original. First, the weight has been reduced from 125 grams to 110 grams. Additionally, the balance point was moved toward the grip to bring it more in line with traditional steel shafts. Both of these changes worked exactly as planned: the Stability Tour feels identical to a traditional steel shaft.
To soften the feel of impact, Breakthrough Golf put 30% more carbon into the Stability Tour shaft. As I said about the original Stability shaft, I don’t find that it softens the feel as much as it cleans it up. Pure strikes feel almost identical with steel vs. the Stability Tour, but mishits don’t have as much “noise” with the Stability Tour.
The claims that Breakthrough Golf makes about the Stability Tour putter shaft seem bold but are very mild by golf industry standards. They state that the Stability Tour has an 82% decrease in [club face] deviation from square compared to steel and that the Stability Tour delivers a more consistent smash factor across the face. This translates to putts that have more consistent distance and more accurate start lines.
While those claims are eyebrow-raising, in talking with Barney Adams (listen HERE) he is very clear that the Stability shaft isn’t going to magically transform anyone’s putting. The Stability Tour should help golfers improve their distance control and reduce three-putts, but it won’t make every 20 footer find the bottom of the cup.
Based on my initial results and my experience with the original Stability Shaft, I’m excited to have the Stability Tour in my bag next season. I prefer the more traditional weighting of the Stability Tour and the slimmer look. While it may be a bit of the honeymoon effect, I was seeing more mid-range putts end up in or next to the cup compared to my steel shafted putter with the same head.
FORGIVENESS - 9.5
All of my experience to this point with Breakthrough Golf Technology Stability shafts has been with blade heads. The experiences were generally positive, but I thought I should try something different for this Stability Tour 2 Polar review. Given the idea is to have more stability in the putting stroke, I thought it might be worth seeing what it’s like pairing the Tour 2 Polar with a high MOI mallet. The Cobra King 3D Printed Agera I recently reviewed immediately came to mind. Let me make this clear…this was exactly the right choice.
To catch you up real quick, MOI means “moment of inertia”. In short, this is easily described as how much the club wants to twist/rotate at impact. A higher MOI means the club wants to twist less, which then should mean you’re more accurate. In this case, the high-MOI Agera paired with the Stability Tour 2 Polar resulted in incredible control. I felt the shaft itself smoothed out the putting stroke nicely and the mallet head kept things quiet and clean. In terms of performance, there really isn’t much else to say. I definitely felt more in control of the putter with the BGT in it than I did with regular steel and my putting was legitimately better with it.