Quote:
Originally Posted by
Shorty 
Name them.
We all know about Tiger and Nike a decade ago.
Next you'll be referring to him as "Miura San"
But then again, in your case it would more likely be Miura 'San.
Here is an article from the New York Times. It's pretty obvious that Miura forged Tiger's Titleist irons, Miura said so himself.
A Japanese Club Maker Forges a Reputation for Craftsmanship
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By BLOOMBERG NEWS
Published: June 17, 2007
Katsuhiro Miura and his family-owned Miura Golf have been shaping hand-forged clubs for three decades in Himeji, Japan, where craftsmen once pounded steel into samurai swords.
Without a formal presence or a single endorsement contract at the Open, which concludes today at Oakmont Country Club near Pittsburgh, the work of the 67-year-old Miura is well known. Retief Goosen and José María Olazábal used his clubs while winning majors.
“From what I’ve seen all these years, what he did really stands out,” said Olazábal, a finicky critic of equipment who used Miura clubs to win his first Masters title in 1994. “He was very, very meticulous.”
Miura Golf sells its custom irons for about $2,000 a set and provides what it calls “professional discounts” for top-ranked players, whose clubs can cost far more. While Miura Golf does not sponsor any golfers, its clubs have been used in 25 Japanese Tour victories.
The company has also forged irons for manufacturers like TaylorMade and Titleist. Because of such branding, players are often not aware of who is behind their clubs, even when they win.
“I haven’t met him,” Goosen said when asked about the Miura clubs he used to win the 2001 United States Open. “I didn’t know he did my clubs. I hit it pretty solid that week.”
A solid feel is what Miura is known for, and a forging process developed more than 47 years ago by the company’s founder is what sets the clubs apart, Bill Holowaty, a Miura vice president, said in an interview in the company’s North American office in Vancouver, British Columbia.
Forged clubs are made from steel that is heated and pounded into shape, and smoothed and finished on grinding wheels like the ones in Miura’s shop, 6,600 miles from Oakmont.
Most forged clubs are struck twice with a forging hammer. Miura’s irons get one more striking, creating a tighter molecular structure in the steel, which under a microscope looks more like a jar filled with sand than a jar filled with marbles, Holowaty said.
“There are fewer voids in the steel, creating a more solid feel,” Holowaty said.
TaylorMade, based in Carlsbad, Calif., worked with Miura’s 25-employee company for four years for its Tour Preferred line of RAC CB 300 irons. The partnership ended in 2004 because Miura’s 14-step forging process does not lend itself to mass production, the TaylorMade spokesman John Steinbach said.
Miura Golf makes only about 50 sets of irons each week, or about 1 percent of the output of major manufacturers like TaylorMade or Titleist.
Miura typically can be found sitting in the last chair along the company’s line of grinding wheels, with his two sons, Yoshitaka and Shinei, working alongside. His wife, Akemi, often rejects clubheads for the slightest imperfection.
Described by Japanese golf media as having the “hands of God,” Miura is a master craftsman, not just a club maker, Olazábal said. In his 1994 Masters victory, Olazábal used clubs forged by Miura under the name of Maruman & Company, a Japanese club company.
“He was quite serious about it and took his time with every step,” Olazábal said. “There was no rushing anything.”
As many club companies create oversized, mass-produced clubheads by pouring metal into casts, Miura’s forging process remains an anomaly. With a thin edge on the top of the clubhead and a straight connection where the shaft meets the face, the classic look of Miura clubs tends to appeal more to purists and highly skilled players than average golfers leaning toward ease of use.
“Most players look at them and say, ‘I can’t hit those blades,’ ” Holowaty said. “Mr. Miura would argue the other way. A well-made forged blade is actually easier and more forgiving, and produces a more precise strike than oversized clubs.”
Tiger Woods, the world’s top-ranked golfer, who is paid about $20 million a year to endorse Nike equipment, said at a news conference last month that he had never used Miura clubs. Beth Gast, a spokeswoman for Nike Inc.’s golf division, said in an e-mail message that Miura had never made clubs for Nike.
Miura said in an e-mail message that he has made wedges for Nike, and his company’s Web site says that in the late 1990s he forged irons for Woods under the Titleist name, then a Woods sponsor.
Miura, who would not comment directly about Woods, made 500 sets of limited-edition Tiger Woods Titleist models exclusively for the Japanese market in the late 1990s, Holowaty said.
For golfers like Olazábal who have won with the clubs, there is no denying the secret to Miura’s success.
“The Japanese people regard their work as if it was a piece of art,” Olazábal said. “That’s what really stood out. He paid attention to the smallest of details.”
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There was also a video on youtube that where Don White said that he has built rebadged clubs for over 200 tour pros so obviously pros are playing the clubs built to the highest standard. Why is this so surprising when this is common in say motorcycle racing where the frame is the only thing that a race bike and a stock offering have in common. It's all about the logo. If you believe that pro's play clubs right off the rack you are very nieve in my opinion. They are extremely picky and there is no way that off the rack clubs will satisfy all of there demands.
