I took part in the discussion to which Bill refers. I have built rod each way. In the end, I think I like the idea of a straight rod when looked at by someone else as an example of my work than any minute advantage the "spine" of the rod might give you. I like the rod I built that way to show to people more so than the rod I built to the spine on.

I guess what sealed it for me was the Sage factory tour on dvd that clearly showed one of the builders aligning the sections to acheive the straightest finished rod in spite of the location of the spine that told me it was ok to build that way.

On the rod I'm currently building the spine location seems to be fairly close to the straightest finished rod locations for each section. I'm going with straightest. If I didn't the tip section would veer off to the right significantly following the spine.