Back when I was doing a lot of competition shooting with my 44mag., I was always trying to get better scores, so I had a custom set of wood grips made for me, to fit my hand, they were MUCH better than the factory grips, and yes, they were pretty. (I forget who I had make them)
Anyway, my scores did go up, but I was dealing with Pachmayer quite a bit back then and I was there talking with Frank, when I got the idea that I wanted to try his rubber grips. I was shocked to see that one model was the exactly like my custom wood grips, but of course made from rubber.
After getting those rubber grips on my 44, low and behold, my scores climbed again, plus they "felt" like the 44 had less recoil! I was amazed and shortly later, I went back to wood and my scores returned to where they were before the switch to rubber. There's no question the rubber grips made me a better shooter!
Lastly, I won 13 matches in a row after putting on those "rubber" grips, so I'll be staying with them!!
DM