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Golf Equipment Chronicles 2005 (Part 4)

Tournament Triumphs, Clubmaker Breakthroughs

I get to “toot my horn” -- as my grandmother used to say. It all started with making a wish, setting goals and then doing the work to make the wish reality. As with most wishes that come true, there was a lot of mileage between the two events.

Clubmaker corner. It surprises me that some months I learn new tricks that make club fitting much more accurate and efficient. No worry about the “old dog.” I share some of my recent enlightenment this month. I receive a lot of emails from clubmakers who appreciate my tips. It’s fun to share insights. If you have some discoveries that deserve to be revealed to other clubmakers, let me know and I’ll pass them on with proper attribution.

Finally, there were a few truly innovative products in 2005. I’m planning a “Best and Worst” article for January 2006. If you’d like to contribute your opinion about a club that had an important positive impact on your game, let me know. I’ll tell you about mine, starting now.

Developing a Personal Practice Method

Way back in the spring, in a soliloquy about the virtues of competitive golf, I expressed a desire to win one more tournament. Winning means that you post the lowest score -- at scratch. To some extent, amateur golf has been taken over by the “net” constituencies. Most tournaments are handicapped which means that you might be up against players who manage their index to best advantage. Most of the clubs in the Bay Area try to control unfair competition, but it’s a difficult challenge. When there’s money at stake, even a little money, some players will try to make sure they get more than their fair share.

I’ve been a member of both the Palo Alto Muni http://www.paloaltogolfclub.org and Shoreline “Mens’ Clubs” www.shorlinegc.com for many years. Mens’ Club is an anachronism because all of the clubs now have many women as active members and competitors in the tournaments. If you’re looking to take your game to the next level, you’ve got to test yourself in competition. If you want to work into competition slowly, the best way is to join a muni club -- that’s if you don’t have a spare $400K wasting in a savings account that you can use for a private club membership in the San Francisco Bay Area. There’s another choice: If you don’t like the muni golf courses, you can join Amateurgolf.com. They sponsor a great tournament series at upscale golf courses throughout California. http:\\www.amateurgolf.com.

Getting better is a concept that most of us dream about but are unwilling to accomplish -- if accomplishment means you have to do the work. In the last few years, with the advent of technology applied to golf equipment, the unfortunate notion that you can “buy your game” arose. Players started looking for “magic clubs” hoping that if they just found the right golf clubs, they would get better without doing the work. Mitch Voges, the founder of Max Out Golf Labs reminds his clients it’s not that easy. “Talent, Technique and Technology -- in that order” is Mitch’s mantra. Will the “right” clubs help? Absolutely. Are there players who gain immediate improvement dropping their handicaps three or four strokes almost immediately? Yes, but few. Will the search for magic clubs ever end? Never.

When I set out on my own quest to improve in the spring, I made a plan I could stick with. I don’t like hitting balls off of mats. Range balls feel like stones. You hit to targets you can’t see and the ball bounces like its hitting concrete. You don’t learn much. When I go to the range to hit balls, I pretend I’m lifting weights.

I chose to practice on the course. Each month since March, I bought my senior card at the Palo Alto Muni that lets me play unlimited golf four days a week, Monday through Thursday. I invited Golf Lab customers and friends to join me for nine holes at 7:00 most mornings. We played all kinds of games, some serious, some frivolous. I always kept a few balls in my pocket, just in case the first shot didn’t look right. The main benefit was the discipline and commitment to drag myself out of bed every morning just after dawn. One morning, playing with the Dane I made my second hole in one this year, after fifty years wondering if I’d ever make the first one. There is simply no better way to practice than hitting the actual shots you’re going to play on your golf course. If you can find a time when your course isn’t too full, even if it’s a little inconvenient, the experience is worth it. The unanticipated benefit of on-course practice is that I became very comfortable on the back nine at Paly. That helped a lot when it came down to winning the “Tournament of Champions.”

Palo Alto Golf Club “Tournament of Champions”

Most golf clubs reward their loyal players with some kind of points championship. The annual contest is based on accumulating prize money throughout the year. At the Palo Alto Golf Club, the reward is a free round of golf in the Tournament of Champions for the top 36 point getters. I made the field by a couple of points, based on two low gross wins earlier in the year. That presented a problem and an opportunity. The Tournament of Champions is a limited field event with a preponderance of mid and high index players. As the lowest handicap to make the field, I was cursed with the position of “favorite.” There is nothing worse than thinking that you should win a golf tournament. I was worried.

I planned and prepared for the TOC as if I were going to the Masters. I never missed a morning. I used the tournament as my own Tour Championship, setting up four sets or irons and half a dozen drivers for testing to see which setup would make it into my bag for the tournament.

The Audition

I wanted Miuras in my bag. I finally received my set of Miura combos, 4 grams light. I’d been saving an interesting set of shafts, the Aerotech (Chinese) constant weight, 95 gram Steel Fibers. I spent a full day building out the set as perfectly as possible, took them to the course, hoping for nirvana and it just didn’t happen. In the last year, I’ve built out a dozen sets of irons with high hopes. At least half the time, the test lasted one day. Alas, it happened again with the Miuras. Later on, I figured out what went wrong.

My original theory: some heads like graphite shafts, some don’t. I think that Miuras just want to be shafted up with Japanese shafts -- Nippon steel is the obvious choice but Fujikuras might work as well. Maybe it’s a Japanese thing. What makes “magic clubs” magic? When we say that a set “feels right” it’s a combination of balance, flex, head feel and grip. Somehow, certain shafts just go with certain heads. Some players insist they can measure balance by swingweight. That’s a mistake. Swingweight is a crude tool to try to predict the “head feel” of a club. Swing weight measurement cannot take into consideration the weight distribution of the shaft, the flex of the shaft or the sensation of metal on golf ball. Therein lies the magic. You can’t measure it, but you definitely can feel it. The only way you will even know what works for you is to try the setup for yourself. Sometimes it doesn’t work out.

Miura heads are very expensive -- up do double the price of other quality lines. How do they get away with it? Part of the justification is precision. Clubmakers can buy Miura heads heavier and lighter than “standard.” The margin of error in clubhead weight is plus or minus one gram. You can order a set of heads four grams light, eight grams light, four grams heavy or six grams heavy. Other companies offer a single standard with a tolerance of plus or minus three grams. If a clubmaker is trying to build out a set that is longer or shorter than standard, or with shafts lighter or heavier than standard, he can do it without shoving weight up the shaft or plastering lead tape on a new head. Much nicer. On the radar screen for 2006 are new Miura models that will make the top-of-the-line Japanese forgings accessible to a wider range of players. Today, you’d better be a single digit handicapper to get the most from a set of Miura irons.

In the Bag (Saturday)

Chronicles readers know that I have a few favorite models. For irons, I’ve worked my way through almost all Ping styles. Lately, I’ve focused on the I3+ blades, mainly because I could get a couple of sets of maroon dots (5¡ up) and swap out shafts easily. Pings are easy if you’re swapping shafts, there is no ferrule to finish. For most of the summer, I’ve been coming back to an unusual set, the Ping blades shafted up with 80 gram Aerotech Steel Fiber shafts. I doubt if you can find another player on the planet with an index under 3 who’s playing 80 gram graphite shafts. Alas, Saturday October 22 was probably the end of that experiment.

I also made a mistake with my driver. I’d had success through most of the summer with the Nike Ignite and the Taylor Made R7. The Nike was a rare Tour head from Fort Worth shafted with the Fujikura Vista Tour, courtesy of our Nike rep Ray Leach so I decided to leave it alone. The R7 was shafted with the Mitsubishi Diamana. It was my best performer all summer. Just to be unpredictable, I chose a Titleist 905T shafted up with a Fujikura Z-Com. My reason? In my pre-tournament morning rounds I hit a couple of unexplainable “bombs” with the Titleist/Z-Com combo. We started chanting “Z-Com, Da Bomb” around the Golf Lab and it went to my head. All I could think of was “Z-Com, Da Bomb” so it went in the bag.

I chose the Heavy Putter because I shot a 68 with it earlier in the year. I forgot that three out of four birdie putts coming down the stretch that day were misses. They went in thanks to the very heavy head that helps your misses crawl up to the hole and fall in. Wedges were my Ping I3 O-Size shafted with Royal Precision Project X nine iron shafts. There’s a Mizuno 21 degree Fli Hi shafted with a Fujikura Banzai that’s got a permanent spot.

Saturday Results

I shot a 76 and was in the lead by 1. That’s the good news. The bad news is that I missed a lot of easy shots around the green and wasted what should have been a 71. The first casualty was the driver. I can’t remember if it was long because I was never close enough to the yardage markers to know. I was wild. Here’s my first takeaway: I’ve been playing a 44.5” driver all year (except for occasional moments when I revert to 48”). I left the Titleist 45” -- big mistake. I might come back to this combo, but it will only be after a haircut. If you are playing a 45” driver and miss more than three fairways a round, try a shorter length. If you need more motivation, the average driver length on the PGA Tour is 44.5”. Ask yourself why amateurs are playing 45” when the pros play 44.5”? Launch monitor testing at the Golf Lab confirms, again and again, that the extra half inch on of-the-rack drivers does nothing for distance and creates control problems for most players.

My irons showed flashes of brilliance. After sniping a drive on the second hole, I hit a beautiful four iron from the rough to the front edge to save par. Fabulous six iron to ten feet on four. The problem was my misses. I pulled shots to the left on several holes, hitting the green but wide left. My distress culminated by yanking a six iron into the left trap on eleven. I got the feeling that the overall weight of the clubs was just a little too light. They seemed to get away a little bit and cause that “tug to the left.” In the back of my mind, I was always worried about 80 gram graphite shafts being too light. It might be that the light weight is OK for normal rounds but a not so good when I’m amped up in a tournament. The TOC round transformed worry to blame.

In the Bag (Sunday)

It would sound pretty crazy to most players leading a tournament to completely change a bag for the second day. But this wasn’t exactly the Masters. I wanted to win, but I also write my story every month and I thought I might create some interesting material with a full bag swap, win or lose. Plus, I want my readers to think I’m a little bit crazy.

On Saturday afternoon, I went back to the Golf Lab and picked up my backup set of Ping 13+ blades. I had them ready to go, shafted up with the new Nippon 1150 Tour shafts, stiff flex, SST PUREd and decked out. (Tested to PCS 6.0.) The Nippon 1150 Tour shafts are a little heavy from what I’ve been used to, weighing in at 115 grams. However, the shaft weight does not translate into a club that feels heavy. The trick is that the Nippon 1150 shafts are back weighted. As a result, they don’t deliver an inordinately high swing weight. After Saturday, I thought I wanted a little more overall weight in my irons to fight against the tendency to pull the shots left. Swingweights were a couple of points higher, testing to D-7 at 1” over length.

The Titleist 905T went back in the closet. Out came the Taylor Made R7. I’ve mentioned the R7 before, sometimes deriding the reluctance of players to change the weights. Mine worked well from day one so I was proud of never looking at the weight distribution. That’s over, I took a peek. The weights are just about standard, 10-10, 2-4. That’s just an extra two grams of weight on the heel, theoretically to promote a draw. Weird. My R7 does have a draw bias.

For good measure, I went back to my old trusty Odyssey putter, leather grip, Balance-Certified back weights. It’s been there, and I wanted at least one trusted friend in the bag.

Sunday Results

I hit 15 greens and shot 72. Two misses I was putting from the fringe. The one green that I missed by a mile, I got it up and down. That was good enough to win by seven shots. Mission accomplished. (You’ll probably deduce that my putting was miserable.)

After touting the merits of graphite shafts, particularly for seniors, I’m conflicted. The Nippons did great. I’ve got a set of Nippon 1150’s waiting for the Miura heads. I’m going to swap out the 80 gram Aerotech shafts in my second set of Pings for the constant weight Aerotech’s in the Miuras -- my version of musical chairs. I’ll see if it’s really a Japanese thing with the Miuras. I still like lightweight graphite, but I’m going to take the weight up just one notch and see how that works out.

Satisfaction

Way back in the spring, I wished for one more low gross, willing to trade all of my second and third place low nets for a place in the winner’s circle. Since that wish, I won three tournaments at the PAGC. I already admitted it isn’t the Masters, but it is competition at my level. Pressure in golf is a relative concept. I can choke over a $2 Nassau. Looking ahead, I invite any Chronicles readers to join me for “mornings at the Muni” throughout 2006. I’m going to renew my card starting in January and try to keep my nine hole cost under $5 per round. I’m hoping to do it again in 2006.

R7 Understanding

The Taylor Made R7 has been around for a couple of years. I was a little slow to recommend the R7, mainly because of the very high $800 retail price on the “Tour Preferred” model. I had been thinking that it could be a “flash in the pan” -- an interesting idea that doesn’t stick. But then I traded for one, shafted it up with a Diamana 63 gram, stiff flex shaft and it earned a place in my bag. For the first few months, I didn’t even look at the weights because I was hitting it well and because I’m superstitious, didn’t want to spoil my results. Then I took a look. Sure enough, it was set up with a little draw bias.

I’ve been saying that my R7 just doesn’t want to go left. It might be that the very subtle weight distribution was causing that tendency. Whatever the reason, that’s the outcome. So here’s the problem with changing the weight pattern. Most players want to swap the weights and see the results in their next round. It doesn’t work that way. Each player has a lot of inconsistencies in their swing. It takes a while to figure out how any driver wants to be hit. Then you have to finish a few rounds with a driver to make sure you know the tendencies. If you have an R7 and change the weights, it’s going to take a few rounds before you know the effects. I think that changing ball flight by changing weight distribution is a very subtle adjustment. I could see tweaking an R7 for the better part of a summer.

I’m hearing that Taylor Made is going to stick with the R7 model for 2006, but in slightly larger head configurations to keep up with the style of the day. I withdraw my reservations. I think that adjustable weight technology is here to stay -- at least for one more year. Prices for this year’s model are sure to collapse after Taylor Made announces its new models so if you’re looking for a Christmas toy, an R7 TP could go on your list. Be sure you get the complete weight kit.

Air Power for Grip Installation

Three years ago, while meandering the back aisles of the PGA Show in Orlando, I ran across a guy who was “blowing on” grips. He had a little electric air compressor and the grips were sliding up and down the shaft like they were greased with K-Y jelly. It seemed like an interesting idea. I ordered his system but it never came.

Back in the spring, the drumbeat about using air power to install grips started picking up steam. The Professional Clubmakers’ Society (PCS) is sometimes in the forefront of clubmaking methods and this was one of those times. The PCS runs regional gatherings to recruit clubmakers and the new technique for installing grips was showcased at those meetings.

Most golfers are familiar with traditional grip installation. You lay down a base of double-sided masking tape, juice it up with mineral spirits, douse the inside of the grip the same way, shake it up and slide the grip on the shaft. It’s easy. There’s one problem. You’ve got to wait for the glue to dry or the grip will slip. That means you can’t use the clubs for a couple of hours.

The glue on double-sided tape does nothing to help the grip hold. All it does is make it easy to slip the grip on. There is a better way. For the last several months, we’ve been using air pressure at the Golf Lab to blow our grips on. Here’s the procedure: first, you’ve got to get an air compressor. We bought a monster but yours doesn’t have to be a big one. The small, portable electric compressors have enough power. We use duct tape to lay down the base on the grip. You need at least one layer of tape because the grip manufacturers assume there’s going to be a layer of tape to get the right finished size. You need a special attachment to get air into the grip cap. We use one sold by the Star Grip Company. It has a collar and a small aperture that fits into the hole in the grip cap. We slobber a little mineral spirits on the end of the grip to help it work onto the shaft. Then, we squirt a little air into the grip and coax it down the shaft. It takes a little practice, but most clubmakers can master the skill in an hour.

There are many benefits: the biggest benefit is that you can play the club immediately. As clubmakers, we frequently recommend shorter or longer clubs. With launch monitor testing, it’s very convenient to recommend to a player that we cut his club down, do the work in five minutes and return to the launch monitor to prove that the club works better. We can only do that by blowing grips on.

The second major benefit is that it makes testing different grips possible. A player doesn’t have to use his imagination to waggle a test grip on a cut off piece of shaft to see if he likes the feel. We can install a grip on his clubs and he can hit shots to understand how a specific grip feels with his clubs -- hitting shots. Blow one off, blow another one on. It’s a great customization option.

Finally, blowing grips on allows for much more precise sizing. Using duct tape, you can build up a grip to a certain size and profile and allow the player to test the club immediately. A second club can be built up with a slightly different profile. A player can test the two clubs side by side. In the end, the only thing that matters with grip selection is how it feels to a player. Standard measuring techniques just don’t work as well as hands-on testing. Once a player knows exactly what feels the best, the set can be finished.

Many players believe that the grip is the most important part of a club. I wouldn’t go that far, but I do believe that the grip is very important. Using air power to blow grips on has greatly improved our ability to satisfy our customers’ whims when it comes to custom grips. This is a highly recommended procedure. Any clubmakers who are not blowing their grips on should pay a quick visit to Home Depot and send an order to Star Grips for the nozzle. Golfers who are looking for true customization for their grips should demand that their clubmakers give them an option for testing their grips.

Caveat: air power doesn’t work for all grip types. Winn grips, Gripmaster leather grips and some Golf Prides are unpredictable with air installation.

Grip Sizing

I figured out what went wrong with the Miuras with the Aerotech shafts. There were two contributing errors. The first problem was that the butt end of the Aerotech shafts came out a little larger than the .60” standard. Then, I switched to Golf Pride Tour Velvet grips to save some weight. The Tour Velvet grips have a slightly different profile than my former favorite, the Lamkin Crosslines. They get bigger at the top of the butt. Put these two variables together and the butt end of the grip on my Miuras was just too big for comfort. The conventional wisdom regarding grips is that larger sizes slow your hands down. I grew up playing skinny grips, mainly because forty years ago no one worried about grip size.

Unfortunately, this enlightenment happened after the TOC. The Chinese shafts are still mounted in the Japanese heads. I blew the midsize grips off and replaced them with standard size, two layers of tape under the left hand and four under the right hand. They feel great. Meantime, another set of heads is in transit and the Nippon shafts are on the bench. Stay tuned.

My Favorite Clubs for 2005

This is to set an example. I’m picking two clubs made the most difference in my game for 2005. I’m asking readers to do the same and let me know what their own breakthrough club was. It will make an interesting feature for a future article.

Despite all of the attention paid to fancy drivers, expensive irons and exotic putters, my Clubs of the Year is my Mizuno 21¡ Fli-Hi shafted with a Fujikura Banzai and a Nike T-60 four wood shafted with a Taylor Made Fujikura Speeder 757 pullout.

As a golf snob, it’s a tough choice to take my 3 iron out of the bag. My personal collection of classic irons has a lot of sets that go down to the 1 iron. I always prided myself on being able to hit the long irons. Alas, that dream is over. The Fli-Hi has a permanent spot in my bag and my three iron is in the trunk. The Fli-Hi is twice as reliable, at least, as any three iron from any set. For me, it’s good for around 200 yards carry. There’s nothing better for your attitude than sticking your ball to 20 feet from 200 yards out. The Fli-Hi has done that for me repeatedly. It is a good choice out of fairway bunkers. It is a great lay-up club off of the tee. It made the difference in the Tournament of Champions, on the long par threes. It will be a subject for future articles, but there is a sea change in progress in bag make up. Mark my words, for most amateurs, the iron set will start at the five or six iron within a couple of years. Look for a 24¡ utility.

The shaft choice is important. I’ve tried all of the hybrid shafts, and none has performed like the Banzai. In hybrids, the shaft is at least as important as the head. If your hybrid is not doing the job, a Banzai reshaft is an inexpensive option to save the club.

The Nike 4 wood makes it possible for me to just grab one club and walk to the middle of the fairway on par fives. I no longer think about laying up or playing safe. The head shape on the T-60 is deep, but also deeply contoured. Deep is good off the tee. It’s usually a disaster from the fairway. But, because of the head shape, the T-60 gets the ball up off of tight hard fairways. I hit more par 5’s in two this year than in many years. That’s great for your score.

The shaft choice is to point out that a great way to make use of expensive driver shafts that are too stiff is to install them in fairway woods. Recycle, recycle.

Send in your discoveries if you found a club that changed your game this year. I’ll be back in January with the 2005 “Best of the Best” picks from 2005, and a 2006 Preview.

Leith Anderson is a partner in the Golf Lab in Palo Alto. He will answer all questions related to clubmaking and clubfitting personally. Contact Leith Anderson by email: Leith@calgolftech.com. Cell phone 650-743-2816.