Music plays.
Onscreen text:
Charles Schwab Presents
Sam: Beauty is what makes the ball go in the hole.
Sam sets a golf ball on a green and lines up a putter for a shot. Throughout, Sam will be out on a course, trying out different putters and watching others play; or moving about in his office or the workshop, talking to employees; or aerial shots will show various golf courses.
Onscreen text:
The Challengers
A series about people who
Question. Engage. Succeed.
Sam Hahn
Sam: My name is Sam Hahn, and I'm the CEO at L.A.B. Golf.
I left home about 18, and at the time, I was a musician and a songwriter and performer, so I had nothing to do all day. I was always working at night. So I was, yeah, full golf psychopath, and I was always a super equipment nerd. I loved screwing around with equipment. And I became pretty obsessed with putters. All toe hang putters are trying to shut in the takeaway. Why do you want to work so hard to control these putter heads?
I tried everything under the sun. I would bend them, and cut them, and re-grip them, and screw with them, trying to get them to sort of do what I thought the putter ought to be doing.
On-screen text:
Liam Bedford
Director of Player Development
Liam Bedford: Sam is obsessed with golf. And obsessed might even be an understatement for Sam. I think that dude could think about golf 24/7/365.
Sam: There was no moment where I was like, "You know, I think I'd like to get into the putter business." It was just that I had the experience I had with the first Directed Force putter I had, blown away by it. It was changing my golfing life.
On-screen text:
Bill Presse
Directed Force Founder
A photo shows Sam and Bill posing together outdoors, each holding L.A.B. Golf Company equipment.
Sam: Then I met Bill, and then the issues with the original Directed Force company surfaced, and there was an opportunity.
On-screen text:
Why wouldn't you want to use a putter that stays square by itself?
Sam: Why wouldn't you want to use a putter that stays square by itself?
I knew that I could explain to people why this was a better alternative than what they were
using. I would just kind of go down their putting journey. “What do you use? What are your good putting days like? What do they feel like? What do you notice? What are your bad putting days like? What do you feel? What do you notice? Which direction's it going?” Just kind of slowly trying to expose to them through these questions, and hearing themselves say out loud, "Well, yeah, I guess I do notice that when I use a toe hang putter, I miss to the right a lot." And I'm like, "Yeah, check out this review. This is why."
We got here a Mezz Max putter. Put it in motion. It's staying completely square all by itself.
On-screen text:
I've played with every single putter that we’ve put out on the market
Sam: I've played with every single putter that we’ve put out on the market, as well as every single putter that we haven't put out on the market.
From a manufacturing standpoint, at this point, I have nothing to do with it. We've got people way more qualified than I to figure out the best, most efficient way to make these putters. But as far as the development process, I have a lot to do with it.
Placards display technical diagrams of different putters made by Sam’s company.
Sam: I'll do a really mediocre job of explaining what it is that I'm hoping to see. They do some seriously technical work to get it on a 3D modeling program. Then we sit down together. We look at it. I say, "Can we do this?" They say, "Yeah," or they say, "No, we can't because of a weight issue," or this or that, and then we work together to get around it.
But we've got a bunch of people in the building that have got a good eye, so they'll all take it out for a spin. We'll go play a few holes with it. We'll see how it actually performs. Come back, give them the feedback, and then the next morning is another round of prototypes.
At certain points in the prototyping process, I'll switch putters three or four times a round. I'll go out with a handful of ’em and sort through ’em. And so I'm always screwing around with different stuff, and consequently, don't putt as consistently as I used to. But yeah, I've tried ’em all.
Kelly Slater is surfing and then golfing.
Sam: We had some really good breaks really early. One of them was Kelly Slater, the surfer. He started using it really early, and we didn't know that. We saw an Instagram post about it. We connected with him. Only a few weeks later, he was playing in the Pebble Beach Pro-Am with Adam Scott and Patrick Cantlay. And Kelly outputted everybody in that group. He made everything.
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Adam Scott
Sam: The following week, I get a call from Adam saying he'd like to try it. He's an amazing guy to work with. And I realize probably all manufacturers say that about the people that they work with. This is totally legit. And we've worked with a lot of players. He is a major golf nerd.
In a tournament, Adam sinks a putt using a L.A.B. Golf putter, and the crowd cheers.
Crowd: Yeah!
Adam Scott: I'm Adam Scott, and I play professional golf.
Adam is, by turns, speaking to the camera and on a golf course, playing. Also, L.A.B. Golf employees assemble, polish, and package putters.
Adam: Sam and the team can tell you all the great things it does. But essentially, delivering a square putter face is what you want to do, and this technology helps you do that a lot more often. Being a small company in the big pond of golf manufacturers, they've done an incredible job. But that's really because they've made an incredible product. And if they stick to their guns, I think the product can speak for itself, and more and more people will get to try it, and once you try it, it's hard to deny how good it is.
Sam and others watch as someone sinks a putt using one of his putters. They all clap and cheer.
Sam: There's so many “Sliding Doors” moments in a given life, and this one's special.
The way that this opportunity came about, and the lucky breaks that we've caught along the way. I get excited about the idea of people talking about L.A.B. the same way they talked about Callaway when they came out with the Big Bertha and how they changed everything. That's really awesome. It’s absolutely surreal. But I don’t think about it too much. I am at my core just a golf nerd. But I really hope that the folks in that building all say this was the best job they ever had.
In the company workshop, Sam and an employee high-five and then hug.
On-screen text:
Ask questions. Be engaged.
[Charles Schwab logo] Own your tomorrow®
Sam: If you were telling me I'm going to play a U.S. Open tomorrow, I'm probably still bringing a DF. The DF's the best. From a technological standpoint, it's the best putter in the world.
On-screen text:
[Charles Schwab logo] [PGA Tour logo] The Official Investment Firm
©2025 Charles Schwab & Co., Inc. All rights reserved. Member SIPC. (0225-GDT9)
Music fades.
On-screen text:
Thanks to
Jessica Bowser
Adam Scott
Kelly Slater
Emerald Valley Golf Club
PGA TOUR Entertainment
