Jason Day Took a Page Out of Bryson’s Equipment Playbook

Jason Day got in the mix a few times last season, tying for third at the American Express, for eighth at the Arnold Palmer Invitational and the Masters, and for fourth at the Travelers Championship. But in four starts since the start of July, he missed two cuts and failed to finish inside the top 20.

The Aussie is back in action this week at the Bank of Utah Championship at Black Desert Resort and posted an opening-round 3-under 68. After signing his card, Day explained how he hasn’t been happy with his iron game of late and went into detail about some massive changes he’s made to his bag since we last saw him.

“I decided to have a chat to my coach, Colin (Swatton), and say, ‘Do you reckon we can go out and just maybe have a look?’ I don't have an OEM sponsor, so I'm a free agent there, so I can go out and see what the best of the best is,” Day said. “Stumbled across Avoda in a way that, like, obviously Bryson had some success with it. He won with the Avoda irons at the U.S. Open at Pinehurst."

After asking Swatton to have a chat with Avoda, he came back and said, “Man, in all the years I've been doing this, I've never come across the guys the way they explained everything.”

So, Day met with Avoda in person and went through the process of 3D printing an iron head to his liking. After the Bank of Utah Championship, Day will get back together with the manufacturer to go over some potential improvements.

“I think, currently right now, I would like to see a little bit—a tiny bit more offset. Try and get a little bit more turn,” Day said. “If that has a little bit more offset it will actually elevate the ball a little bit more in the air, which would be nice.”

Instead of his normal Dynamic Gold True Temper X7 shafts, Day’s gone to 110-gram graphite shafts. And here’s the kicker—he’s got JumboMax grips on the sticks.

“So there is just number of things from the curved irons to the graphite shafts and the JumboMax grips,” Day said. “The theory I think I have the same profile shaft from 60-degree all the way up to driver. The goal is to be able to swing, just pretty much have one swing like whatever ball flight you want, whether that's a draw or a fade. For me it's a draw. To go up there and hit a draw and pretty much put the same swing on it and hopefully it produces the same shot over and over again.”

Sounds like Day took more than a few pages out of Bryson’s equipment playbook—to be fair, it’s worked pretty well for The Big Golfer.

"So right now I think we're in the testing phase," Day said. "You know, we still got to get the gappings right, have to get the spins right, so obviously that is going to be more testing coming up for me.

"But that's something that we have to kind of mess with the grooves a little bit, try and make sure that like we get a little bit more spin, but also make sure that they're up to regulation. Hopefully that makes things hitting shots into the greens a lot easier."

Over his first 18 holes in Utah, Day missed five greens and lost over half a shot with his approach play.

Obviously, there's going to be some growing pains until he gets the setup dialed in.