The main goal for me was to find a lower spinning driver and 3-wood head. I will certainly take their suggestions for shafts, but I am set to be fitted at Fujikura HQ on their ENSO machine in April.
My current gamer was a Callaway Epic (non-Sub Zero), 9* loft with a Fujikura Atmos 7x Blue shaft. When I’m swinging poorly, my attack angle gets too far upward (+6 degrees) and the the launch angle starts getting over 16 degrees while I start hitting shots thin and generate a spin rate of 3,200+.
When I’m swinging well, I can lower those launch metrics…get the launch angle closer to 13 degrees with 2,800-ish spin rate. So the goal was to find a head and shaft combination that I could get closer to 2,000 to 2,500 rpm’s while sustaining a launch of no more than 14 degrees.
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The True Spec studio is located at the back of the range of Lake Nona. The staff at Lake Nona are eager to help as I had to be shown where the studio was. The range was pristine as always. The grass was very tight, yet plush. And they not only mow the grass at the range, but they have an air-blower that makes sure the grass clippings are blown to the side.
We started off with the driver. I got some warm up in as the fitter went to get a bunch of heads and shafts. One thing I warn to golfers going to a high end fitting place is to conserve their energy. You’re going to make a LOT of swings in a small period of time and it’s easy to tire yourself out. I was hitting the ball well in the warmup and after 7 swings I stopped to conserve myself.
Of course, as I told the fitter that I have a problem with generating too much spin and launch AND after I struck the driver well in my warmup…my swing goes to hell on Trackman and the Trackman numbers look like this:
But again, I was swinging the club poorly. A bad habit I have is that my right femur/right hip goes into internal rotation too soon in the downswing and at this time when I do that it is Smother-Hook City. I didn’t do that ONCE in the warm-up. Fortunately, I regained my swing and started to hit more typical shots with radar metrics that looked like this:
In the end, I don’t think my current game was a bad fit for me. The Epic head (not the Sub-Zero) is more of a higher spinning head so the head could have used an adjustment.
The selection of heads we went to were the:
Callaway Rogue
Ping G400 LST (Low Spin Technology)
TaylorMade M3
We tried a variety of different shafts. The Ping G400 LST I just didn’t hit it well. It launches too high and I would lose shots to the right with it. I was skeptical about the M3 at first because I know it’s a higher spinning head than the M1. I hit it well, just it launches high. I could keep the spin rate under 2,500 rpm and I really like how forgiving the club was. I think TaylorMade is really onto something with the Twist Face technology.
But, in the end, the Callaway Rogue with an Aldila Rogue Elite Blue 65 (X-Stiff) shaft was the best fit. Here were the numbers I had with this fit:
In the end, the comparison of when I started to swing well with my gamer versus the fitted Rogue looked like this:
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The 3-wood we saw problems with right away. I was using a Cobra King F7+ with a Fujikura Atmos 7x Blue shaft. I had suspicions that I could hit my 2-hybrid (Titleist H1) as far as my 3-wood at times and that is only 41” long compared to my 43-1/4” 3-wood. And my suspicions appeared to be correct as here were my numbers with my gamer:
We tried the following heads:
TaylorMade M4
Cobra F8 3+
Callaway Rogue 3+
Ping G400 3+
We tried a variety of shafts, but the two shafts that worked best for me were an Accra shaft and a Veylix shaft. The Veylix shaft ended up winning out. We found similar results in the Ping G400 and the TM M4 that we did with the drivers. The Ping missed high and right. The TaylorMade performed pretty well, but launched too high. It then came down to the Cobra and the Callaway Rogue and they have very similar launch numbers, but for whatever reason the Cobra carried about 5 yards shorter on average.
Here were my numbers with the Callaway Rogue:
And here’s a comparison between my gamer and the fitted Rogue:
The final fit was for the following:
Driver: Callaway Sub Zero Rogue, 9* loft w/45” Aldila Rogue Elite Blue 65 (X-Stiff)
3-Wood: Callaway Sub Zero Rogue 3+, 13.5* loft w/43.75” Veylix Rome 788LR Wildeye shaft
I think in the end I was not too far off with my driver, just the head fit was more problematic as the Epic is a higher spinning head. However, the 3-wood fit was dramatic as I added 18.7 yards of carry and 22 total yards. What was crazy was that I was not used to seeing a 3-wood fly like it did.
If there’s a downside to these high-end fitting studios is that they use ‘ala carte’ pricing and everything is at Retail.
I was quoted for a driver at $810. The head was fairly priced ($499.99). But the shaft was priced at $299.99 when I could find it at GolfWorks for $175 (GolfWorks Aldila Rogue Shaft)
It also charged $10 for the grip (Golf Pride Tour Wrap 2G midsize) which go for $6.99 retail.
The 3-wood head was fairly priced ($299.99), but the Veylix shaft was priced at $350 compared to $250 the shaft can be had at thepeoplesclubs.com (People's Clubs Veylix Rome Shaft)
The value of places like True Spec Golf is their selection of equipment and the technology to help find the best possible fit. Having been to numerous places like this, the sticker shock can turn people off to he product, but if you’re seeking to find the best possible fit and find the components on the internet or on eBay, it can be very beneficial.
3JACK
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