There is a lot of cool gear in the golf equipment world that doesn’t always fit neatly into Most Wanted Tests or Buyer’s Guides. You still want to know how it performs. In our We Tried It series, we put gear to the test and let you know if it works as advertised.
What We Tried:
BLAST Golf Swing & Stroke Analyzer. This little sensor attaches to the end of your clubs to analyze your swing and stroke for full swing, chipping and putting.
Who Tried It:
Connor. Director of Soft Goods Testing and resident sneakerhead. I believe golf is better with a pair of cool shoes and comfortable joggers. I need all of the help I can get.
The Need to Know
- Retails for $179.95
- Package includes sensor, club attachments (2) and a charger
- Two sizes of club attachments to fit both regular and oversize grips, including putter grips.
- Sensor pairs to smartphone app via Bluetooth
Three … Two … One
Pairing the Blast sensor with my smartphone was a breeze. Once you’ve paired the sensor in the Blast app, all you need to do is select which club you want to train with and get to work.
I spent some time using Blast Golf in each of the different training modes.
Full Swing Practice
More than likely, you’re interested in the Blast Golf Swing & Stroke Analyzer because you want to get better at golf. So let’s dive into my experience practicing in full-swing mode.
Let’s start with metrics. What does Blast Golf actually capture? Both the full swing and short game modes produce the following metrics:
- Swing Speed
- Peak Hand Speed
- Swing Tempo
- Backswing Time
- Downswing Time
- Attack Angle
- Total Swing Time
Right away, I noticed that my tempo was super quick. Way too quick. The fun speedometer-style gauge on the application makes it very clear where your tempo stands on full swings.
From here, I was able to consciously slow my tempo and work on smoothing my swing. I really enjoyed this portion of the full-swing practice.
Chipping and Short Game
The chipping and short-game practice is very similar to the full-swing practice. It provides the same metrics. I was able to use the short-game practice to dial in my angle of attack which tends to get a little wonky when I’m chipping. I really focused on hitting down toward the ball and found the Blast Golf sensor to be very useful here.
Putting (My Favorite Part)
My favorite part about the Blast Golf Swing & Stroke Analyzer is the putting mode. The metrics that Blast captures and provides are different from the swing modes. The putting mode really focuses on face angles and delivered loft—two things I struggle with.
An extremely underrated feature of Blast Golf is the video capture function. It allows you to capture a video of your swing (or in this case, my putting stroke) in the app via your smartphone camera. The software automatically places an overlay of your swing or stroke metrics on top of the video. This is great for reviewing footage so you can see what a good versus a bad swing, putt or chip looks like.
All in all, the putting mode captures the following metrics:
Speed Control Metrics
- Tempo
- Backstroke Time
- Forward Stroke Time
- Impact Stroke Speed
- Backstroke Length
- Loft Change
- Total Stroke Time
Directional Metrics
- Face Angle at Impact
- Backstroke Rotation
- Forward Stroke Rotation
- Lie Change
Other Practice Modes to Try
- Air swing mode. I did get to play with this a little and it’s a great alternative to hitting balls if you aren’t able to do so. You’re still able to gather speed and tempo metrics without hitting a ball, which is nice.
- Bunker mode. I did not have a chance to play with this but the bunker mode provides the same metrics as the full-swing and short-game modes.
Blast Motion Golf: Is it Worth It?
If you want a relatively inexpensive way to work on your swing and putting stroke, I found the Blast Motion Golf sensor to be useful. It won’t ever provide the same level of data that a true launch monitor but it still gave me plenty of useful information to help me get a little bit better.
