Brooke Henderson makes a change with an eye towards an LPGA major victory

SAMMAMISH, Wash. — It’s just the second major of the LPGA season, so why not switch out half the clubs in your golf bag?

Brooke Henderson, the 18-year-old from Smiths Falls, Ont., who’s the fourth-ranked player in the world, will put a new putter and new irons in play when she tees off Thursday in the first round of the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship at Sahalee Country Club.

She didn’t plan on it turning out this way, revamping her starting lineup at the beginning of a big week. It’s not like she’s struggling though she is coming off her poorest result of the season, a tie for 45th at the ShopRite LPGA Classic last week (she had a tie for third in the tournament before that, the LPGA Volvik Championship).

It just happened.

The first couple of days of a tournament week on the professional tours are an interesting time. There’s a little more relaxed vibe before things get serious. Representatives from the equipment companies prowl the ranges and practice green trying to get their equipment in the hands of the pros.

Many of the players have contracts to play a specific brand of equipment (though some have the option of using whatever brand of putter they happen to prefer at the moment). 

It’s not unusual for a couple of dozen players on the PGA Tour to try a different putter in any given week. According to Golf Digest, 21 of the top 50 players in the world made at least one putter change in 2014.

Henderson has a lucrative contract to play PING equipment and works with fitter Scott Wolpa to tweak her gear.

PING came out with a new line of putters Monday called the Vault Series and Henderson, who had a sneak peek at the new gear a couple of months ago during a visit to the company headquarters in Phoenix, liked what she saw when she rolled a couple of putts with the Oslo (a mallet, the style Henderson prefers).

Her putting has been just okay this season. She’s ranked 23rd in putts per green in regulation at 1.78 and 37th with 29.56 putts per round (world No. 1 Lydia Ko, by comparison, ranks first in putts per GIR at 1.73 and is second in putts per round, 28.80).

Sometimes it is just time for a change.

If you’re a golfer, you know that feel a new club has, especially a putter. Your relationship with it hasn’t been corrupted by its refusal to do what you tell it to do. Everything is fresh and your creaking scar tissue has been replaced by the sweet feel of optimism and potential.

If you’re lucky, it lasts for more than a round or two.

Henderson liked what she saw and felt on the practice green with the new flat stick.

So the PING CRAZ-E putter she had been using for the last 18 months or so is on the bench.

“I really like the look of (the Oslo). It reminds me of a putter I was using a few years ago. I wasn’t really planning on switching, but Scott brought it out yesterday and I got a few putts in and I really liked it. We’ll see what happens,” she said.

Henderson has also switched out her conventional putter grip for one of those Super Stroke fat grips.

“That’s another thing. I wasn’t planning on changing the grip either. We put it on just before my pro-am (Tuesday) and I putted pretty well, gave some putts some good chances.

After experimenting with some irons that were about three inches longer than what she was using, Henderson has gone back to the specs she was using earlier this season. She has a new set of the same make and model (PING i) in her bag.

“We tried (the longer irons) out and I’ll try it again, for sure, but through this stretch I’ll stick to these,” she said.

Confidence is such a big part of the equation, especially when it comes to putting. It’s way too fleeting, that feeling that all you have to do is put the putter down behind the ball and more than half the work is done.

“It gives me a lot of confidence,” Henderson said of her new putter. “I think switching it up is good. I used that previous putter for over a year and a half. Looking down at this one, I like it. It looks good and it feels good, too.”

When it comes to putter relationships, that’s all that matters.