The Fitting: Take Two

Buying new golf clubs is a bit like buying a car. There are a zillion choices and no matter what you buy, it will almost surely lose value as soon as you drive it off the lot.

Last week, I booked an appointment with a master fitter at Golfsmith. I’m not sure what the prerequisites are to be a master fitter, but age is clearly not a requirement because the master fitter assigned to me looked like he just graduated high school. I will call him Master Fetcher because the one thing he excelled at was fetching the clubs I wanted to try.

He directed me to one of the hitting bays in the back of the store so I could warm up. The hitting bay is a dark room with black cloth draped on the walls. It reminded me of a bat cave. This would be fine if, like a bat, I had the ability to echolocate the ball, but since I don’t, the dungeon-like hitting bay seems ill-suited to its task. The giant screen with a cartoonish video-game image of a fairway casts just enough artificial light to make you aware that you are definitely not out playing on a sunny golf course.

I had brought my current set of Ping G2s and warmed up by hitting driver. The launch monitor tracked my first hit at 174 yards. Just about average for me. A couple of weeks ago, I had gone in there with the same club and hit 184. Then I tried a men’s Ping i20 and got 196 with it. I have always suspected that golf store launch monitors are not that accurate, which is why I made sure to bring my current clubs. At the very least, I would have a baseline to compare new clubs with.

To continue the car analogy, I prefer Ping the way some people prefer Toyota or Honda. They are well-made and reliable, and they don’t advertise with crazy gimmicks about rocketing balls or amping up speed. My current Ping G2 has 15.5 degrees of loft, and Ping doesn’t even make drivers with that much loft anymore. It has a ladies flex shaft, which my husband said is probably too much flex for my current swing speed, which has been tested at around 77 mph.

I asked Master Fetcher if I could try the Ping i20, but this time I didn’t get anywhere close to 196 yards with it. Master Fetcher said the i20 is kind of a “player’s driver” and instead suggested I try the Ping Serene, which is Ping’s new line of ladies clubs. I tried it but didn’t get great results with it either. I told him I wanted to try some more clubs with senior flex or men’s flex. I really shouldn't say "men's flex" since that term is gender-biased. Technically, it is just "regular flex." Although that term implies that women and seniors are irregular. Ah well, what can you do?

I actually had a lot of questions about shaft flex but Master Fetcher didn’t seem to be able to answer any of them. I had heard that the Ping Serene driver comes in a choice of two shafts, and I asked him to explain the difference. He said Ping Serene only comes in one shaft choice. I knew he was wrong, so at that point, I realized I was on my own in the bat cave.

For the rest of the fitting, I focused purely on distance. Theoretically, any of the newer drivers, with longer shafts and those 460cc heads that look like portabello mushrooms compared to the little cremini head on my 400cc Ping G2, should benefit me in terms of distance. But in reality this just isn’t true. I tried the clubs that promise more distance, like the TaylorMade Rocketballz and the TaylorMade Burner. I tried them in ladies flex, senior flex, and men’s flex. But they didn’t do me enough good to merit spending big bucks just to hit a few yards more.

Then I tried the men’s Ping G20 in 10.5 degree loft. I got more distance, and Master Fetcher said it went straighter for me too. So I bought it. I had been hitting balls for two hours already and I was mentally exhausted. I didn’t want to try any more clubs. I also bought the Ping G20 3-wood, since I need something on the fairway that can hit longer than my old 7-wood. It helped that the Ping G20 series happened to be on sale.

Since then, I’ve played with the new clubs twice. I am getting about 10-15 more yards on driver, and the new 3-wood has helped tremendously in making greens in regulation. Or at least it would if I could hit straighter. I still think I need some practice so I will have to hit the range.

I do think the men’s grips feel a bit big in my hands. But I didn’t think to ask Master Fetcher about it (not that he could have helped). Also, according to the Ping G20 driver flex chart, my swing speed is on the low end of the scale for the regular flex shaft. But this is something I can work on. I’d rather be inspired to rise to the level of my equipment than feel like I will outgrow my equipment again.

The bottom line is, new equipment with more recent technology is actually helping my game. I plan on going back for the G20 irons, but that will have to wait a few weeks. I'm hoping there will be another price drop soon. In the meantime, anyone want an old cremini head Ping G2?