The ball Rickie Fowler designed is now available to buy

But in the case of the new TaylorMade Pix ball, Rickie Fowler was responsible for the entire design. In fact, we think that the opportunity to get more involved in product development was one of the factors that instigated his high-profile move from Titleist to TaylorMade balls at the beginning of last year.

The lines, colours, shape and positions of the graphics on the TaylorMade TP5 Pix ball have all been devised by Fowler. Twelve strategically-placed orange, black and grey graphics frame the TaylorMade logo and TP5/ TP5x stamp to create a ClearPath Alignment aid, which illustrates when you’ve started the ball on your intended line and if you’ve hit a quality putt.

On a well-struck putt, whre the ball rolls end-over-end, you can see a clearing in the middle of the ball which lets you know you’ve hit it purely and started it on your intended line. 

“When we started developing the new design, one of my first comments was that if we didn’t have the full TaylorMade logo in two places, we would have space to create a path that works for alignment and feedback,” says Fowler. “The drawback of a plain white golf ball is that there’s nothing to focus on. The pix graphics give you a precise focal point to work with.”

With the help of researchers at Indiana University – the same team that helped design the alignment features on Spider X putters – TaylorMade and Fowler came up with multiple designs, which Fowler then tested in secret before settling on the final finish.

Pix is available on both the TP5 and TP5x, both £49.99 per dozen RRP.