A Golf Gear Nerd's Manifesto

Do new clubs with new technology actually make a difference?

This is a question I ask myself over and over every time a new product is released - especially when it comes to drivers, and as someone who has spent a great deal of time testing clubs, looking deep into the numbers, and doing everything I can to understand the ins and outs of equipment, the honest answer is yes.

But like anything in life it’s not as cut and dry and yes or no, and I must implore that my "yes" doesn't mean I feel every product is demonstrably better. What I do know is that each new product iteration has a group who benefit from its creation, so the result is a net positive for golfers across the board.

It’s this concept of a shifting net positive, and how golf equipment can be tweaked, fit and customized, that is exactly why I love to pour over every tiny detail, because in the end, it's the little details that add up to performance gains. Even if those gains start at the tee, they can and will bleed into the rest of your game.

You might initially shake your head at how much a degree of launch and a few 100 rpms can make a difference in a tee shot or a wedge approach, but these little numbers add up over time, so your score doesn't have to.

Looking At It From A Different Angle

Although I feel like I beat this analogy to death, golf clubs and related equipment like golf balls are like cars, and golfers are like drivers - let's use Formula 1 as the reference point.

Even though all of the drivers are highly skilled (or you have a dad that owns the team), some teams have a clear performance advantage thanks to clever engineering that works with their driver styles.

Now, on a lap-to-lap basis, it's entirely possible for a less technology advantaged team, with a slightly less skilled driver (again, a relative term), to be the fastest in a certain section or for the entire lap. But, over the course of a 60-lap race, it’s nearly impossible for that car and driver to come out on top when others are gaining tenths of a second on every lap.

It's these little incremental gains that add up, and in the case of golf, they help golfers at the highest level hit it longer and straighter than ever before, break course records at an unprecedented clip, and make sub-60 rounds a lot more commonplace.

Did you know 12 of the 15 sub-60 rounds on the PGA Tour have occurred in 2010 and after, and 3 of those have happened in the last 2 years?

These gains help average golfers too, which is exactly why as a gear head of the highest degree, I relish every opportunity to talk to the people behind the products and use tools to test and experiment in hopes of helping other golfers find advantages in the latest and greatest.

Now I’m not saying you shouldn’t play golf with old gear, because I for one still love to play golf with retro persimmon woods and pre-1970s blade irons from time-to-time, but what I am saying is if you’re truly looking to gain every advantage - modern clubs that have been properly fitted go a long way in helping you achieve lower scores.

My Shining Example

Let's say you haven't bought a driver in 5-6 years (industry buying trends show that the average golfer buys a new driver every 4-6 years, and irons every 7-9 years), and since your last purchase, you’ve lost a bit of speed and developed a more heel-side miss with your driver.

Even with practice and checking in with a coach, you’re still trying to gain back what you have lost and hoping to find more.

Now let's introduce a common scenario.

At your home course there is a pesky fairway bunker on a dogleg that sits right around your max carry yardage - a well struck driver should in theory cover it but anything missed is for sure in the sand. You hit it into this bunker more that you would like to admit.

So, you go to a fitting and find a newly fit driver covers the bunker’s carry distance with ease thanks to some gained back ball speed, higher launch, and lower spin on well struck shots. Even a 5% gain on a 240 yard average carry, is an 12 extra yards, which turns that 240 yards into 252.

Here’s the bonus, not only do you carry that bunker with ease on well struck shots, but that old miss that used to for sure end up in that bunker now covers the same hazard on an almost guaranteed basis. This is made possible thanks to greater ball speed and spin retention on your modern driver that has been engineered to work better on heel misses (thanks to equipment company’s product segmentation).

Extrapolate that over an 18-hole round of golf, and over the many number of rounds of golf you will play any given season and the seasons after with your newly fit club, and those incrementally better misses lead to more opportunistic approach shots. Those opportunistic approaches lead to smaller approach dispersion, and that tighter dispersion leads to one or two extra putts made per round.

Bingo, you see your scores start to move lower and lower, in the same way an F1 driver gains hundredths of a second on every lap until they get out to a 15 second lead.

And, if you can find those gains with new equipment through your bag if you replace clubs as needed when performance starts to drop. Those gains can be found even faster!

So when engineers explain that a new face technology reduces dispersion and helps to maintain balls speeds while weight distribution helps to boost forgiveness and stabilize spin - those percentage gains add up, which is exactly why I sweat every detail to help other golfers find their own gains too.