GolfBear

I think it's more than a penalty. If the flag is mid right and you hit your ball mid left you're still on the green but you have a bunker between you and the hole. Normally that wouldn't be that big a deal because I'd just pull out a wedge and hit either a lob or a two hopper. Instead, now I'm on a green and I have to somehow putt my way around this nightmare.

I just had my clubs checked. I've been playing the same KZG forged irons for 12 years. They're made with a relatively soft 1030 carbon steel. 3 of the irons were off on the lie by 1 degree....that's it. I was actually quite surprised and pleased.

So I finally got a chance to hit both the R11s and the RBZ 3w. The driver really didn't impress me, my numbers were virtually the same and I found the sound to be amazingly irritating. The 3w however is an absolutely CANNON. I was hitting the thing 250 yards. That's a full 20 yards longer than my Ping 3w which I absolutely love. Unless I start using it as a driver I don't have a lot of need for a 3w that long.

Airscrotum? Airsac?

There's nothing better than putting new irons into the bag. Congratulations!

I've been driver browsing for the last week or so and I'm seriously considering using a 13 degree Adams XTD as a driver and taking the "driver" completely out of the bag. For the last 5 years I've been playing a 9 degree Ping Rapture as my boomer. It's a wonderful driver when I hit it straight and absolutely brutal when I don't. On the screws I can put it out around 275 but in assessing my stats, I'm just not hitting enough fairways. I hit the XTD again today and I'm carrying the thing 250 with an avg ball speed of around 160 mph. The ball just explodes off the face and just seems to hang forever. The best part is that the dispersion is far better than what I've seen with any driver I've tested. My goal this season is to take the left side out of play. My league course is really tight and if I can hit 3 more fairways per round I'd gladly give up 20 yards in distance. Anyone else contemplating something similar?

In Love new stuff!

Quote: The pro I go to has a couple of friends that are on the Taylormade tour staff. I can assure you the RBZ's that Villegas is using are very far removed from the "off the rack" variants.

I really didn't mean it in any way. The 712's CB's look to me to be a decendant of the cavity back design that the DCI had. It appears that the cavity may not be as deep but if you like the DCI's you'd probably like the 712's.

I actually looked at the 712 CB's for the first time today. I was shocked at how much they reminded me of the DCI's I played 20+ years ago.

Let's be clear, I'm not suggesting that they hit into people. I'd just prefer they not wait for them to get to two clubs away before they hit.

I find the entire discussion of clones vs OEM's to be laughable. Golf is a game whose results are almost completely dictated by physics. Golf balls don't differentiate between club manufacturers. Flight laws don't give a crap about OEMs. Your Pro V1x or your Pinnacle doesn't go straighter because it's hit with a Ping and not a Pinemeadows iron. Your wedges don't land three feet from the pin because you hit the ball with a Vokey wedge and not a Gigagolf wedge. If you can't admit that simple fact then you're not being honest. That said, there may be difference in feel, the quality of materials used and the R&D; that goes into making the heads. If the tech is being "borrowed" then it comes down to the quality of the materials. I honestly haven't heard much about Gigagolf but this thread did get me to check their website. Based on their listings, it appears that they do use some quality components. True Temper isn't making lower quality S300 shaft for GigaGolf than they do for everyone else! I don find it interesting that they offer a 30 day guarantee. There's not a lot of OEM's that do that. As for the "I've never been beaten by a guy playing clones" comment, that's just idiocy. When I played on my HS team (playing & practicing every day) I was playing as a 2 handicap and beat a LOT of guys playing OEM stuff with my beloved Chi Chi blades that I got at a garage sale when I was 16. I'm not a 2 anymore but I still take money from guys with bags stuffed with $2k worth of gear with my irons that most of them have never heard of. OEM's spend billions annually convincing you that their gear is better.

I've been a public course player my entire life so not much bothers me but there is one thing. The thing that does bother me though is "the group in front of me that refuses to hit". You know the group, they won't tee off until the group in front of them if 400 yards away an they NEVER hit a second shot on a par 5 until the green is clear. Worth noting, there isn't a person in this group that's capable of hitting a 250 yard shot on their best day but they insist on waiting anyway. They're not playing slow, they're playing stupid.

If driver and ball manufacturers weren't lying their asses off we'd all be hitting 600 yard drives. For the last 30 years every driver that has come out has been "10 yards longer" followed by a slew of the "longest balls". There is some truth to the slot technology though because it adds a ton of spring. Sadly, that won't be coming to drivers anytime soon. I'm amazed we even have to swing the club at all anymore! :)

You aren't helping

Something smells fishy..........

For reasons unknown to me, or perhaps its the billions of dollars being spent by advertisers, but I'm consumed with the thought of new irons this year. I almost jumped in last year with the AP 712's and held off but the new Ping i20's keep whispering "hit me, come on, you know you want to, hit me". The thing is, I love my current irons but they're getting really long in the tooth. I'm playing a KZG forged CB2's with Rifle shafts. They feel great and I hit them well but I'm concerned because the shafts are pushing 15 years old and the heads are around 12. The groves are starting to get a little compressed but otherwise they're still in solid shape. I think they fit me pretty well but I haven't checked the lofts/lies in a while. Partially because I haven't noticed any anomalies that I would attribute to the clubs. I'm getting older and probably could benefit from another full fitting with a shaft check etc. I just look at the prices for a new set of irons and think "OUCH". So I went online and checked some of my stats from last year and was blown away by a single stat. I missed 44% of my fairways last season to the left. Now I'm thinking that maybe I should just ignore the irons for another season and get a full driver fitting with a new driver. Anyone else in a similar position? The indecision is killing me.

If I'm not mistaken, Green was in a pretty bad accident and lost both his girlfriend and dog. Life has not been kind to Mr. Green. I've never heard of Gantz but I do remember reading a lot about Tommy Bolt. Apparently he was a legend when it came to tantrums and self abuse. On of my favorites was a story about him going over to some kind of thorned bush and backhanding it repeatedly until his hand was bleeding profusely. I believe he was heard to be saying "that will teach you to turn over". Now that's harsh! Sadly, no iPhones or video of that :P

Ken Green makes Tiger look like an altar boy! Fortunately, know one knows who Ken Green is/was! :) Tiger does get an exponential amount of exposure when compared to his peers and that means EVERYTHING he does is going to be on camera. I'm not making excuses for his and you'd think a guy with his "discipline" would be able to control himself. I do admit it gets a little tedious listening to him yell "damn it Tiger" every time he doesn't stick it next to the flag. The guy has been getting "stuck" for over a decade now so maybe he should be frustrated. He hit some dog ass ugly shots on Saturday.

I really doubt that the stuffed shirts that are the "members" of Augusta would enjoy shooting 160 every time they they played a round. I'm positive the course they play isn't set up anywhere near tournament conditions. When you set the course up to Master's tournament conditions it's an entirely different animal. Personally, I think the biggest challenge a lot of amateurs would have playing Augusta is adjusting to the slopes. It's one thing to be a low handicap golfer on a flat course that you play all the time. Hitting a 190 yard shot when the ball is two feet above your feet to a green that's protected by a creek is an exercise in terror. Not to mention that the uphill lies alone would have most amateurs falling on their backs.

I don't believe you asterisk wins based on who is in the field. If that's the case then you'd have to put an asterisk next to a lot of Nicklaus's records. For that matter, everyone that one when Tiger had his meltdown. Let's not forget, before his wife tried to kill him with a 2i, he won the U.S. Open on a broken freaking leg.

Tom Watson is the best wind player I've ever seen. It's not even close.

Bubba's got a bit of Mickelson in him. Sometime you just need to take your foot off the gas and hit safe shots to win the tournament. Both he and Phil love to engage in heroics and sometimes it costs them. Sadly, neither of them seem to be able to hit a fairway in the clutch. I will admit though, Bubba's short game was exceptional this weekend. He's really smooth with his wedges.

It's been a while but I got a change to play McKenna Resort when I was on my honeymoon in Maui. I remember it as a great layout with some fantastic & memorable holes.

I think Foley's going to destroy what was left of the Tiger we once new. Nothing Tiger is saying any more makes any sense. He says "I'm getting better compression on the ball now". Isn't this the same guy that hit a 4 iron a bajillion yards out of a bunker to about 10 feet. WTF does he need more compression for? The guy used to be one of the best iron players on the planet and his swing "coaches" are destroying the natural ability he had. I'll give the Foley experiment another 6 months then hopefully Tiger will come to his senses.