What's New: Tour News

Tiger Woods switched back to his old standby Mitsubishi Rayon Diamana Whiteboard 73 X shaft before the Player’s Championship last week.  As told to The Tour Van, “I went back to my old shaft,” he said. “It helps not being hurt. I’m able to generate the speed like I used to, and I’m able to handle that shaft again.”  That being said, Tiger kept the driver in the bag for most of the tournament, relying instead on his 3 and 5 wood with the Mitsubishi Rayon Diamana Blueboard 103 X shafts.  If you are struggling with consistency, maybe you should try heavier shafts.  Standard, off-the-rack clubs usually come with light shafts in both drivers and fairway woods.  If you look at the options for better players with faster swing speeds and an aggressive transition, the TP shaft versions for TaylorMade for example, offer several 75 gr driver shafts and 85 gr fairway wood shafts as options.  Better yet, go to a custom fitter and find out what shafts fit YOUR game.

What an honor to fit Michelle French, one of the winners of the Mizuno Play Famously campaign.  Selected in the second group of four, Michelle is one of only 12 amateur players from around the USA to be selected for this award.  By trying the JPX 825 irons and writing a summary of her experience, Michelle was selected to get a complete set of Mizuno JPX 825 woods, hybrids, irons and wedges, and  play in the JPX Invitational in Atlanta this fall.  “I am so excited to have been selected”, said Michelle.  “I am hoping to meet and even play with Stacy Lewis!  That would be awesome.”  Michelle is from the Denver area, works for the West Denver Metro Fire Department and plays regularly at Foothills Golf Club.  Michelle as pretty good stick so look out Stacy!  To find out more about this sweet Mizuno campaign, go here.

April is Fitting Month and by the looks of things, the PGA Tour players are all about getting their equipment dialed in using the Trackman ball flight monitor.  We have two Trackman units and use them both indoors and outdoors.  They are extremely accurate and measure the critical fitting attributes like ball speed, club speed, launch angle, spin rate, angle of attack, landing angle and dynamic loft.  For more on how the PGA Tour uses TrackMan, see this article in GolfWeek.

With Miyazaki shafts in his woods, MATRIX shafts in his hybrids, and Project X shafts in his irons, the winner of the RBC Heritage won in a playoff under windy conditions.  The Miyazaki Kusala Indigo 56 X shaft in his driver has a low, penetrating ball flight with a firm mid section but feels smooth due to its higher torque rating.  The MATRIX Altus shafts in his hybrids provided a mid-high ball flight with the ability to land softly on the green.  The Project X Flighted 6.5 shafts in his irons allowed the ability to make shots with longer irons that held the wind-swept greens throughout the tournament.   Lesson here is that you play the shafts that match your swing and give you the confidence to make the shots you need to make.

After 9 years on the PGA Tour, Martin Laird gets his first win at the Valero Texas Open by tying the course record 63 to edge Rory McIlroy by two strokes.  What a way to get the Master’s, huh?  Martin is playing a full bag of TaylorMade clubs starting with the RocketBallz Stage 2 Tour 9 degree driver with a MATRIX OZIK 8M3 shaft (85 gram, low launch, low spin).  He is also playing RBZ Stage 2 Tour fairway woods with Diamana B Series shafts.  In his TaylorMade MC irons he has Rifle 7.0 shafts.  Congratulations to Martin, a Glasgow, Scotland native who played at CSU and turned pro in 2004.

Congratulations to Kevin Streelman for picking up his first PGA Tour win after over 150 tries.  Persistency AND consistency.  Last November, Kevin and his coach Brian May were at the TrackMan User Conference in Orlando and gave a seminar about how they use TrackMan in their training sessions.  Kevin, a long-time Wilson staff player, was asked if he was going to change equipment for 2013, especially his driver.  Kevins response was, “I will look at a few but the OBAN Kiyoshi shaft built to my specs will be in whatever I choose to play.”  Note that Kevin switched to the Ping G25 but is playing the same OBAN Kiyoshi shaft!  See my post from last fall:  http://www.dlancegolf.com/wp-admin/post.php?post=1546&action=edit

Mizuno, known worldwide for their leadership in making the highest quality forged irons, is launching a new campaign that will pick 12 amateur players to join Team JPX and get a first-hand PGA Tour experience.  The first team member joined Luke Donald, Charles Howell III, Jonathan Byrd and Stacy Lewis in Florida last week to get treated like a tour professional.  Come in to D’Lance Golf, try the JPX-825 irons next to your set and then apply to become a member of Team JPX.  For more information, follow this link:   Team JPX.  Or go to www.playfamously.com.

Just goes to show that sometimes old school works.  John Merrick played a complement of Aldila NV shafts in his driver, fairway and hybrid clubs which are certainly “old school”.  He played a 75 X in his driver, 85 X in his fairway and 100x in his hybrid.   We affectionately call the NV the “green genie”, and this shaft almost single-handedly brought Aldila back from the brink of disaster in the late 1990′s.  It was literally the first “low launch, low spin” shaft on the market and was very successful given the balls and club heads that were available then.  Today, the NV is known to have a little bit too much spin, compared to other shafts on the market.  So how does Mr. Merrick make the NV work?  Well, I did not see the exact stats from Shot Tracker or TrackMan, but since John is playing an 8.5 degree Titleist 913 D2 driver, my guess is he has a neutral to positive angle of attack.  This puts less spin on the ball than most players on tour.  The average angle of attack on tour is NEGATIVE 1.3 which means players get low launch but higher spin.  Hence the mantra... Read More

What a turnaround for Phil!  After struggling at Torrey Pines, he got a liitle coaching from Butch and a revamped driver from Callaway with a Mitsubishi Rayon Fubuki k 70X shaft and voila!  Just goes to show how matching swing techniques and equipment can make all the difference in the world.  It should make Phil more competitive this year.  Just hope he can stay out of his own way, if you know what I mean.  We have tested the RAZR Extreme and it is definitely lower spin than the original RAZR Fit.  Still more testing for us to do to see how it performs in different settings (spin rates, launch angles, etc.).  Phil has also stuck with the Mitsubishi Rayon Fubuki k series.  Getting the two components, head and shaft, dialed in is what we do for all of our golfers so set up a time for either a driver fitting or a complete club fitting and experience the difference in YOUR game.

OBAN is making statements all over the PGA Tour and with the major OEM’s like TaylorMade.  The OBAN Kiyoshi White is featured in the TaylorMade R1 TP for a mere $900.  But, for the right player it is worth every penny in distance, accuracy and control.  Come see us and get fit for the R1 with the RIGHT shaft for your swing!