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NEWS FROM THE TOUR VANS
BROUGHT TO YOU BY GOLF PRIDE, THE #1 GRIP ON TOUR
We’ll have to wait a little while longer to see Bryson DeChambeau use a 48-inch driver in competition.
The U.S. Open champion had long been teasing the possibility of making a switch to the longest shaft allowed under the Rules of Golf – one that could reportedly enable him to carry tee shots close to 400 yards – but he ultimately stuck with his 45-inch Cobra King Speedzone. There was drama in the decision as DeChambeau continued to tinker with his 48-inch driver during practice rounds and hinted that it could be a game-time decision.
“We’ve gone through at least three or four iterations of the shaft, and this is the most promising one yet,” DeChambeau said on Tuesday before the tournament. “Yesterday I had about 4 to 5 mph in ball speed increase. I got my swing speed up to 143, 144 on the range yesterday, and the dispersion is the same and spin rate was even down.
“I mean, it looks really promising right now. I did not expect it to work yesterday. I was like, ‘This is going to take even more time,’ but it did work yesterday, and I’m not 100 percent sure if I’ll put it in play yet just because of the unknown; it’s so close to the Masters, but it is an improvement in every facet of launch conditions, then I don’t see why not.”
While DeChambeau stayed put with his driver, others did not. Adam Scott employed a 46-inch Titleist TSi4 driver at the Houston Open and led the field in driver distance (326.4 yards), which gave him confidence to try the same club during the Masters. Vijay Singh, an equal with DeChambeau in the tinkering category, went to a 46.5-inch Callaway driver.
While many tour reps suggested that the soft conditions around Augusta National early helped to convince some players to take a more aggressive, free-wielding approach off the tee, some believe this also can be a long-term trend in the game.
Phil Mickelson, who went to a 47.5-inch driver last week and said he’s “driving like a stallion,” sees a future where longer shafts are the norm.
“I think ultimately a good friend of mine who I have a lot of respect for has an opinion, and I agree with it: That ultimately, it might be five years, 10 years, 15 years, but every driver will be standard at 48 inches, and then you’ll have kind of a weak driver, kind of a 2-wood, if you will, which is kind of what I’ve gone to now,” Mickelson said.
“Transitioning to a longer driver is not that much more difficult for me because it’s just a timing issue. … It’s more consistent with my swing than, say, some of the others, the young guys that are so physically strong and able to create speed just through a quick turn and rotation; that I think for some of those guys, it might be a little bit more difficult to get the timing down, but eventually they are going to do it and they are going to hit the ball even farther.”
That would have been a bold prediction two years ago, but not in the DeChambeau era of searching for mammoth drives.
Once competition began, Titleist posted its first driver-count win at the Masters since 2000. Patrick Reed, the 2018 Masters champion and an equipment free agent, put a new 9-degree TSi3 in his bag in an effort to play a driver with less spin – he was one of 29 players to go with Titleist off the tee. Nine of the 29 players using Titleist drivers are non-agreement players, including four of the six amateurs in the field.