{{ubiquityData.prevArticle.description}}
{{ubiquityData.nextArticle.description}}
NEWS FROM THE TOUR VANS
BROUGHT TO YOU BY GOLF PRIDE, THE #1 GRIP ON TOUR
Lanto Griffin’s evolution from mini-tour journeyman to PGA Tour winner is an inspiring tale, and his equipment choices only add to the intrigue.
For one, Griffin has been a loyal Titleist disciple since age 12. He felt so strongly about playing the brand’s gear that he spent a good portion of his college years at Virginia Commonwealth University paying to use Titleist rather than accepting the equipment given to the team for free.
Titleist later brought Griffin onto the company staff and reciprocated his loyalty. Griffin reached humbling lows in 2013 when he missed the second stage of Q-School and lost status on the PGA Tour Latinoamérica, but the company stood by him.
“I remember calling (Titleist rep) Jim Ohlsen at the end of the season,” Griffin recalled to PGATour.com. “I said, ‘Hey man, is there any way I can just get a set of irons? I’m guessing you’re not going to be able to support me this coming year the way I played.’
“He immediately said, ‘Look buddy, we’re not dropping you. We’re behind you still.’ I’ll never forget that phone call, and Titleist having my back at probably the lowest point of my mini-tour career … Jim is a hero to me, for sure.”
Griffin slowly climbed until reaching the PGA Tour in 2018, falling back to the Korn Ferry Tour in 2019 before graduating to the big leagues once again. He had been playing Titleist AP2 irons throughout the bulk of that stretch, but decided he wanted to switch to the black T-100s that were released this summer.
When Titleist let him know the clubs were available only to PGA Tour players – Griffin was still on the Korn Ferry Tour at the time – he coordinated for the clubs to be delivered to his house so they would be waiting for him after clinching his PGA Tour card.
“It was like Christmas morning,” Griffin said. “Even to this day, just getting a box that has Titleist written on it, it’s so exciting to open it.
“The black irons, looking down on them, they just look so cool. They have the perfect head shape. It looks like a blade but performs like a cavity back. They’ve gotten a lot of attention. Everybody loves the black finish. I’m a huge fan.”
The one club in his bag that isn’t Titleist? That would be his Sik Flo putter, a flat stick he borrowed from a buddy during an annual friends trip to TPC Sawgrass last April. Griffin’s group had cancelled their morning tee time to watch Tiger Woods win the Masters and then came out to play nine holes in the afternoon. When Griffin picked up his friend’s putter and started making everything, he figured he would borrow it for tournament play.
Six months later, Griffin won the Houston Open and earned an invitation to Augusta National. The friends trip, which traditionally takes place each year during the Masters, will have to be rescheduled in 2020.
Sean Fairholm