Putting The Deep Freeze On Golf
WORCESTER - When you strike a golf ball perfectly, do you wish you could freeze your swing for safekeeping?
Robin A. Rhodes can't freeze your swing, but he can freeze your golf clubs.
Using a process called Nitrofreeze Cryogenic Tempering, Rhodes deep-freezes golf clubs at 300 degrees below zero inside a 24-cubic foot chamber in his Cryogenic Institute of New England office at 60 Prescott St.
Deep-freezing of metals, a process first used by NASA in the 1960s, changes their microstructure, relieving stresses and producing a more consistent and uniform material, Rhodes said. As a result, the company claims that golfers get a better feel, less shaft twist for improved accuracy, a larger sweet spot and more distance.
Deep-freezing -- now there's a concept sure to send shivers up golfers' spines. “It's a more solid feel. You have fewer mis-hits,” Rhodes said. “You know when you mis-hit a ball and you get that vibration? Well, you don't get that.” Golfers with tendinitis or arthritis would especially appreciate that.
Rhodes, a Worcester native and 1977 graduate of St. John's High, founded Cryogenic Institute of New England nearly a year ago, purchasing a Connecticut company and moving it into a former used furniture warehouse. The bulk of his firm's work involves deep-freezing machine parts, cutting tools and even brake rotors to prolong their usefulness. But last summer Rhodes branched off into deep-freezing golf clubs as a means to promote his business. He also enjoys golf -- he's a 14-handicapper at Worcester Country Club.
“Now I can go on a golf trip and legitimately say it was a business expense,” the Westboro resident said. He froze his own clubs last August, then helped his four-man team win a turkey shoot at WCC in October.
Rhodes, 43, hasn't frozen many clubs yet -- about 100 for 20 customers who have chosen to put their golf games on ice. He realizes he faces an uphill battle in getting golfers to take deep-freezing seriously. When the National Golf Foundation was called for its stance on deep-freezing for this story, the receptionist burst into laughter. Barry Frank, NGF vice president of growth and development, said he was vaguely familiar with deep-freezing, but that the foundation had no formal position on the effectiveness of the treatments.
Rhodes has heard all the jokes about cryogenics -- someone asked his director of operations Mark Bettke if his grandmother could be frozen during the holidays -- but he doesn't let them bother him. He's even hung a picture of Ted Williams in his office.
“Maybe it's the answer, maybe it isn't,” Matt Moison, head pro at Green Hill Municipal Golf Course, said when told a Worcester firm was deep-freezing clubs. “I'd be willing to give it a try as a onetime gimmick, but it sounds a little fishy to me.”
“Any time you freeze anything, in my mind, it becomes more fragile,” Green Hill teaching pro Jim Fenner said, “so it doesn't make sense to me.”
“This is a new one on me,” said Tim Bishop, former Holden Hills CC head pro. “I'd give it a shot, but I probably wouldn't publicize it that I tried it.”
Bishop wonders if deep-freezing clubs belongs in the same category as the Power Pod, a circular club head which was supposed to cure a slice, the ceramic all-white club which never caught on, or the contraption you were supposed to wear on your cap to help you line up putts. “I think it caused double-vision for half the people who used it,” Bishop joked.
Rhodes tells his skeptics to check out the Web site for Jack Nicklaus golf equipment -- www.nicklaus-golf.com/f/cryogenic--ss.html. For the past four years, Nicklaus Golf has cryogenically treated all of its club heads. “Club heads just keep getting bigger and bigger, yet they all have to weigh the same, about 200 grams,” Bob Kelly, CEO of Nicklaus Golf, said. “So you have to make the walls thinner and thinner. Using the cryogenics enables you to harden up the metal, especially with stainless steel, to prevent them from breaking.”
The Nicklaus Web site claims cryogenically treated club heads are 25 percent stronger and 18 percent harder than titanium, and 28 percent stronger than steel. “It's a lot of marketing hype, to be honest with you,” Kelly said, “but it does molecularly change the structure of the metal and it does make it harder. You can definitely hit it further because it hardens up the metal, in our opinion, with the tests we've done. How much? It's hard to say.”
Unlike Nicklaus Golf, Rhodes deep-freezes the entire club. Deep-freezing can crack the plastic ring between the club head and shaft, but Rhodes said the ring is a cosmetic piece that doesn't affect the club.
Rhodes knows of only two other cryogenic treatment companies in New England, one in Waltham and another in Longmeadow, but his is the only one with a focus on treating golf clubs. Such treatments are much more common in Florida, he said.
Rhodes hands out deep-frozen disposable razor blades, which he said can stay sharp for a month or more, to promote his business. He's also arranged to man a booth at the Golf Expo at the Bayside Expo Center in Boston in March when he'll offer golfers to hit with treated and untreated clubs to compare the two.
Rhodes treated this reporter's 3-iron and there was no noticeable difference between that club and an untreated 4-iron on Friday when hitting balls at the Golf Dome in Shrewsbury. But to be fair, this reporter hadn't swung a club in three months and balls can't travel their full distance inside the Golf Dome before hitting the back wall. Bob Johnson, winner of numerous club championships and senior club championships at Pleasant Valley, also hit this reporter's 3-iron and 4-iron and noticed no difference. Unlike this reporter, Johnson hit both clubs well.
WCC member Dick Kennedy, on the other hand, said his treated clubs perform better. Kennedy enjoys his 10-year-old clubs and froze his Big Bertha 3-wood so he wouldn't have to buy a new one with a bigger head. “I went from a 13 (handicap) to a 19 so I needed something,” Kennedy said, “but I'm not going to beat it with technology. I think I need to beat it with something I'm comfortable with, which is my own set of clubs. The early results are pretty good, but maybe it's just between my ears.”
Rhodes charges $25 to deep-freeze one club. Other prices range from $60 for three metal woods up to $230 for a full set of 14 clubs. The benefits of one treatment are supposed to last forever. “Clearly, I am catering to the enthusiastic, serious golfer,” Rhodes said, those “who have a USGA handicap, who play on a regular basis, who play competitively.” Unfortunately, there's no evidence that deep-freezing a putter would help find the cup. “I don't know what it would do to a putter,” Rhodes admitted. USGA and PGA rules allow the treatment of golf clubs, but not golf balls. Deep-frozen golf balls travel farther, roll truer and don't mark up as easily, according to Rhodes. Nevertheless, some golfers have their golf balls frozen for recreational use. Rhodes deep-freezes them for someone who sells them on the Internet.
Rhodes said deep-freezing can also make bats last longer and hit balls harder. For safety reasons, he treats softball bats, but not baseball bats. Deep-freezing has been used on hockey skates, gun barrels, tennis racquets and racing engines. Rhodes has even heard that deep-freezing helps nylons keep their shape for up to a year.
Word of Rhodes' deep-freezing business has spread at WCC. Whenever he hits a good shot, his playing partners jokingly accuse him of using a treated golf ball. “So now I have to go out of my way to buy golf balls at the pro shop -- which my pro loves -- in front of my competitors,” Rhodes said.
Wearing his white lab coat, Rhodes explained how treatments work. The temperature in the chamber is slowly lowered to 300 degrees below zero with liquid nitrogen gas. After a minimum of 24 hours, the temperature is slowly raised above freezing. Immersing clubs in liquid nitrogen would make them brittle, but Rhodes uses a computer-controlled processor with liquid nitrogen gas to prevent that. Once the process is complete, the clubs don't feel or look any different than they did before. Rhodes says they just hit the ball better.
By: Bill Doyle, Telegram and Gazette Staff
January 12, 2003
