Puma Golf's TitanTour golf shoe has been my spiked gamer of choice in 2015. It looks good and it's comfortable, even for people with big, wide feet like me. The traction is excellent, offering the kind of requisite stability and fluidity of motion that every good shoe can boast.
The company is trying to one-up itself and build on the success of the original TitanTour with its latest offering, the TitanTour Ignite.
With this shoe, lead designer Grant Knudson and his team made the transition to a new, proprietary foam that it calls Ignite, which, from its location in the midsole, provides energy back to the player with each and every step by bouncing back as the foot moves, again and again. If that sounds familiar, it should. Ignite foam, which has been found in Puma's other athletic shoes and is now being brought into the golf category, is similar to adidas' Boost foam, which the company put into its AdiPower Boost shoes earlier this year.
(For the record, the spikeless version of the Adipower Boost has been a go-to this year as well. Just depends on the conditions.)
Not only does this kind of injectable foam improve comfort, but it also affords engineers more options when designing shoes, allowing for more specificity in the position and thickness of the foam. That's good for your feet.
And, on the sock liner of the shoe, Outlast material, developed in part at the International Space Station, returns from the TitanTour line to regulate foot temperature in all conditions.
As for the performance side of the shoes, the TitanTour played a heavy influence in this latest iteration. The Powerframe from the TitanTour has been renamed the Pwrframe in the Ignite, but the thin TPU frame is the casing for the Ignite foam and aids with traction and the shoe's flexibility on the outside. On the toe-end of the outsole, a feature dubbed Duoflex creates five intersecting channels that separate spikes and offer added flexibility to get through the ball.
Thanks to some recent rain, we haven't been able to take these shoes for a test round. However, if they're anything like the TitanTour, they should be a welcome addition to any golfer's locker.
The Puma Golf TitanTour Ignite shoes will be available in November in three colorways for $180. Two more colorways arrive Feb. 15, 2016. A premium leather version will be available for $10 more in February 2016. A spikeless version will be available in December 2015 for $120.
