Gigagolf Golf Clubs

[bobby14HC]

Have you ever seen a tour pro, man or woman play Giga Golf clubs? I have not, and I frequent pro tournaments every chance I get. If Giga clubs

were great, why are they shunned by best players? Don't give me that excuse "Giga does not subsidize pro golfers" blah blah...

There are many pro's on tour who play clubs for which they get no subsidy because they like those clubs.

Only people I see using "clones" almost always can not break 80. Yet these same people "love" their clones & off brands.

If they love them, why their scores are so mediocre? If price is very important, go with Nickent or Tour Edge brand. Both

make excellent clubs at reasonable prices.

[Kieran123]

Originally Posted by bobby14HC

Only people I see using "clones" almost always can not break 80. Yet these same people "love" their clones & off brands.

If they love them, why their scores are so mediocre?

You talk about players who hardly break 80 with their clones...so, going by your handicap, they'd be similar in skill as you, yet you use better non-clone clubs.....so going by your opinion on this, if they changed to better clubs ( likes yours? ) they would start breaking 80 and even beat you!

[darkhunter139]

Originally Posted by bobby14HC

Have you ever seen a tour pro, man or woman play Giga Golf clubs? I have not, and I frequent pro tournaments every chance I get. If Giga clubs

were great, why are they shunned by best players? Don't give me that excuse "Giga does not subsidize pro golfers" blah blah...

There are many pro's on tour who play clubs for which they get no subsidy because they like those clubs.

Only people I see using "clones" almost always can not break 80. Yet these same people "love" their clones & off brands.

If they love them, why their scores are so mediocre? If price is very important, go with Nickent or Tour Edge brand. Both

make excellent clubs at reasonable prices.

I switched from Pinemeadow clubs to Ping (mainly cause I wanted different flex and got a good price) and for some reason my scores did not magically go down.  Weird I must be doing it wrong.

[LuciusWooding]

Definitely troll.

As for Nickent and Tour Edge, they are nowhere close to the price of GG. You can get an iron set for 100-200$, other clubs for 25-40, and drivers for 75-150. Also GG is customized and built to order, and sells clubs individually. Want to buy a 7 iron? Too bad, you either have to buy used or pay for the other 7 clubs; with GG you pay the cost of one club, with no bundling or packaging of sets.

A tour pro could use Giga clubs, but why give up hundreds of thousands of dollars in sponsorships, free custom clubs, and general ass-kissing by a major brand? A European tour event was on TV one day, and there was one player not wearing a hat. The announcers speculated that he was giving up hundreds of thousands for not giving up that ad space on his forehead, and he wasn't a big name even on the Euro tour.

If I ever make it on tour, and Giga is still around, I probably wouldn't stick with them just because tournament winnings are next to nothing. Tour pros make money through endorsements, not winning events. Tiger Woods, as of 2009, had won about 90 million in winnings through his entire career. How do you explain his being a multi billionaire?

The pro game is barely anything like amateur golf, and most of us are happier not paying attention. It's all about money at that level, and the million dollar purses are pocket change compared to what the OEMs pay players and spend on advertising. Guess where they get all that money? Sure, they spend on R&D; as well, but mostly they mark up the price by about 4 times what it would take to make a profit. GG doesn't do that; it's not the best known since they don't advertise, and it's not endorsed by tour players since they don't pay billions of dollars in bribes, and the clubs are a year or two behind design trends, though performance isn't meaningfully different. Who cares? All I care about is that I don't have to take a second job to afford to golf. They don't market towards tour pros either, their market is Joe Schmoe, so I fail to see how what the tour players choose is meaningful.

[sean_miller]

Originally Posted by darkhunter139

Quote:

Originally Posted by bobby14HC

Have you ever seen a tour pro, man or woman play Giga Golf clubs? I have not, and I frequent pro tournaments every chance I get. If Giga clubs

were great, why are they shunned by best players? Don't give me that excuse "Giga does not subsidize pro golfers" blah blah...

There are many pro's on tour who play clubs for which they get no subsidy because they like those clubs.

Only people I see using "clones" almost always can not break 80. Yet these same people "love" their clones & off brands.

If they love them, why their scores are so mediocre? If price is very important, go with Nickent or Tour Edge brand. Both

make excellent clubs at reasonable prices.

I switched from Pinemeadow clubs to Ping (mainly cause I wanted different flex and got a good price) and for some reason my scores did not magically go down.  Weird I must be doing it wrong.

Yes, you're most definitely doing it wrong. You still have to hit the ball whether you're hitting clones or OEMs.

[glock35ipsc]

Originally Posted by LuciusWooding Tiger Woods, as of 2009, had won about 90 million in winnings through his entire career. How do you explain his being a multi billionaire?

Yep, endorsements!

Golf Digest 50: Tiger Woods' Total Earnings

• 2003: $83,700,288
• 2004: $89,370,407
• 2005: $86,992,739
• 2006: $98,941,827
• 2007: $122,702,706
• 2008: $117,337,626
• 2009: $121,915,196
• 2010: $74,294,116
• 2011: $64,067,059

[LuciusWooding]

About a tenth of that money was from tournament winnings. The deal with Nike alone was huge, and I know he makes a cut of their profits, possibly has shares of Nike as well. Not to mention that's just the reported earnings.

He makes 90% of his cash from using the equipment he does. Why the hell would he even think about switching when he's invested in Nike so heavily? Even if a set of clubs gave him a huge advantage, he wouldn't switch. And this is Tiger, a man who has made a metric ton of money off winnings. Given he has a premium price for endorsements, but how many pros could live off winnings alone? Most pros make a few million off winnings, not 90. To live comfortably, the average pro needs to make a few endorsement deals.

[bobby14HC]

I regularly shoot in lower 80's, not bad for a man over 70. In the thousands of rounds of golf I have played since age of 20, I have not ever, not even once been beaten by anyone using clones. In my younger years I have broken 80 more often than I can count. From my observation people who use clones either do not get to play often or just can't afford better clubs or  just are too cheap. I average 100+ rounds every year, and have played at public and private courses and have observed literally thousands of golfers. And I have owned myself with many clone brands including Giga brand. I have owned every major brand of golf clubs, since I am a sucker for trying "new and improved". The 460cc titanium drivers truly revolutionized my scores. My Callaway FT driver and Cobra L4V drivers are simply amazing.

I do not think the majority of golfers spending their hard earned money on name brand are all fools. That said, there is a place for clones. As I said above, people who play few rounds or have limited finances or do not play tournaments should by all means buy the cheaper clones.

[MbolicGolf]

Originally Posted by dcouz

I think it's because i'm a 6'2 and I hit hard on the head and it just cannot take it.

So if you are a big hitter, DONT BUY and if you swing around 200, well it's your choice! You can have a use real club for the same price!

I'm 6'3 and I'm a big boy my first driver was a giga golf driver that DESTROYED learning the game it held up to alot of fat hits into the ground while I swung out of my shoes. And it was long.

By the way. Do you have any Idea of the ludicriousness of what you just said?

[beisenhauer]

I've been using GigaGolf clubs for years with few problems. When I had a problem, they fixed it. No complaints whatsoever.

[bobby14HC]

If you are happy with any brand of clubs, and that includes Giga, by all means stick to it.

Golf is 75% mental and 25% physical IMHO. Play whatever gives you the best results.

But please do not claim clones are superior to major name brand clubs. No tour player I know of

plays clones. The name brand companies spend huge outlays on research. They are not fools

and their customers are not fools either.

For example one of my iron sets is Cobra UFI. Talk about technology, the iron face is a alloy of

7 different metals encased in a steel skeleton, bottom flange has tungsten inserts, top flange is

partially graphite, and has vibration dampening insert back of the face. Does Giga have anything

even close to such hi-faluting technology?

In my own case, I seem to play best with Ping irons such as the i series irons, and

Callaway metal woods. So I will stick to that.

[LuciusWooding]

Originally Posted by bobby14HC

But please do not claim clones are superior to major name brand clubs. No tour player I know of

plays clones. The name brand companies spend huge outlays on research. They are not fools

and their customers are not fools either.

For example one of my iron sets is Cobra UFI. Talk about technology, the iron face is a alloy of

7 different metals encased in a steel skeleton, bottom flange has tungsten inserts, top flange is

partially graphite, and has vibration dampening insert back of the face. Does Giga have anything

even close to such hi-faluting technology?

I'm pretty sure you're trolling, but I'll say again: 80% of a tour player's earnings comes from getting paid to play name brand equipment. If I were able to play clubs for free, I'd use them, let alone getting paid millions per year. The amount most tour players can possibly win from tournaments is nothing compared to what they get paid by their clubmakers.

Also, the major brand's customers are certainly fools in most cases. Go to any golf course, it will be filled with fools. As for the brands, they spend lots of money on research, but a lot more on advertising and endorsements. If tour players didn't play their products, they wouldn't be major brands. Therefore they pay Tiger Woods hundreds of millions to promote them. To profit, they charge over 100$ per club and cheap out on manufacturing by outsourcing to China. Giga just copies their designs to an extent, makes their clubs in America as much as possible, and use quality components, keeping the cost below 30$ in most cases. The cost is that they don't advertise or bribe elite players, so they're a small company.

Alloys have been around for over 3000 years, steel has been around for several hundred, tungsten inserts have been around since at least the 70s in golf clubs, I have a set of Titleist irons that have tungsten weights in them from 1971. The top flange being made of graphite is meaningless, and vibration dampening inserts are standard in GI irons in a lot of cases. The Wilson Staff Ci and Di lines both have all those features for under 400$, among others. I don't know of any tour players that use Cobra UFI irons, and have never been beaten by someone using them, so they must be crap I guess?

Giga has all that technology listed, since it copies the best selling designs. If I could get name brand clubs for the same price, I might play them. But Giga has way better value than they do, and you don't need to go used or non-fitted. So in terms of value, they beat the crap out of every other brand. In terms of build quality, they are about the same, tbh. Maybe not as shiny.

[iacas]

Originally Posted by LuciusWooding

I'm pretty sure you're trolling, but I'll say again: 80% of a tour player's earnings comes from getting paid to play name brand equipment. If I were able to play clubs for free, I'd use them, let alone getting paid millions per year. The amount most tour players can possibly win from tournaments is nothing compared to what they get paid by their clubmakers.

What? 80% isn't right. Heck it's not even true for the top guys who actually might earn a million bucks a year for the club contracts. And you accuse someone else of trolling while you make up stats? 90% of Tiger's income is from Nike? No, sorry, not even close.

Giga Golf clubs, if they're clones (and IIRC they are), are by definition "behind" the tech curve because another company has to come out with something first. That's not to say they're crap, but then again I've never been particularly fond of one company using another company's R&D.;

[Meddle]

Originally Posted by bobby14HC

I regularly shoot in lower 80's, not bad for a man over 70. In the thousands of rounds of golf I have played since age of 20, I have not ever, not even once been beaten by anyone using clones. In my younger years I have broken 80 more often than I can count. From my observation people who use clones either do not get to play often or just can't afford better clubs or  just are too cheap. I average 100+ rounds every year, and have played at public and private courses and have observed literally thousands of golfers. And I have owned myself with many clone brands including Giga brand. I have owned every major brand of golf clubs, since I am a sucker for trying "new and improved". The 460cc titanium drivers truly revolutionized my scores. My Callaway FT driver and Cobra L4V drivers are simply amazing.

I do not think the majority of golfers spending their hard earned money on name brand are all fools. That said, there is a place for clones. As I said above, people who play few rounds or have limited finances or do not play tournaments should by all means buy the cheaper clones.

I've broken 80 and average in the mid-80's and play clones. The reason I'm not better isn't because my equipment is holding me back, it's my own faults as a golfer. Having played with a bunch of different major brands and a couple of clone brands (Diamond Tour and Pinemeadow), I've noticed no significant difference in quality.

And anyway, we all know it's the Indian, not the arrow. The importance of equipment is overstressed in the golf community, probably because of all the advertising we get bombarded with from the big golf companies.

[badfish74]

I'm sorry but I have a hard time believing that if a GigaGolf driver or other club was the difference for a pro to say win The Masters, they wouldn't have it in their bag in a heartbeat.  I know they, like everybody else, like money, but those guys are also super competitive and love to win.

[LuciusWooding]

Yeah, but clubs aren't the difference. Every pro in the event is using top end equipment. There isn't really an edge to be gained through equipment at the pro level. The winner is the one on the top of his game. You don't hear a pro saying that his clubs were the reason he won, do you? And likewise, you don't hear one say that he could have won if he played Callaway irons, for example.

The way I look at it, the pro who gets an equipment contract is being paid to stop shopping. He agrees to stick with the brand, allowing them to focus on keeping his equipment up to date. You don't get an equipment contract unless you're at the peak of the game, and at that point the gear becomes meaningless, aside from mental issues. Pretty much all of the tour level, brand name equipment is among the best. You can customize, but it's not detrimental to your game regardless of what you pick. Any preference at that level is mainly down to mental comfort.

Drivers are also a bad example, since they are a different animal from the rest of the set. They require the R&D; money and advertising to stay competitive. I have a Giga driver, however, and I firmly believe that I could win the Masters with it if I had the game. It's not going to snap in half, and using an R11 instead won't make the rest of the field forfeit or add more than a few yards. The irons could do anything GI irons can do, and the woods and hybrids aren't made of a special high MOI nanocrystal that triples ball speed, but neither are the major brands.

Every clubhead except the driver is a chunk of steel. You can temper it, grind it to shape, change the formulation, and add weighting and polymer inserts, granted. But Giga and the other clone manufacturers are using the same types of steel, the same weighting strategies, copying the shape, and machining and tempering it the same way. Just for a quarter of the price. I promise you I could get a set of X22s, put in the same shafts, and my clones would still score the same. All things being equal, I'd love the latest set with a nice brand name. But I can't afford to buy clubs that way, the options of customization are poor, and the clones are a set I can grow into and replace without problems. I doubt I'll win the Masters, but the clubs aren't hurting my chances. More like the fact that I can't break 90...

[badfish74]

I get what your saying about the pro's Lucius.  I guess when really looking at them it is hard to compare them when talking about equipment.

I also understand the prices for the latest name brand stuff.  I can't afford that stuff either, but for the same price of a GigaGolf driver I got an 09 Taylormade.  My whole set is name brand and I paid less than what some people pay for irons alone.  I will admit though that I tend to find comfort in dealing with name brand companies for stuff like this.  I have had enough off brand clubheads going farther down the fairway than my ball to last a lifetime. LOL

[sean_miller]

For every guy who's been brainwashed into thinking a white driver adds 10 yards there's a guy who thinks his clones are the same as high end OEM equipment because it doesn't snap in half on contact with a golf ball. I've never hit clone blades that had a decent grind or feel. but compared to a Callaway SGI iron? Sure, there could probably be an equivalent.