NEWS FROM THE TOUR VANS
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If you’re trying to understand the mindset of a man who has held onto the No. 1 spot in the Official World Golf Ranking for more than 160 consecutive weeks going back to May 2023, being comfortable with what you do and the equipment you use to do it may be the key ingredient.
Scottie Scheffler was asked ahead of the Travelers Championship about switching back to a narrower T-grind on his 60-degree Titleist Vokey Design WedgeWorks SM9 lob wedge, and his answer revealed a lot about himself.
“The lob wedge is one of those clubs where you have to learn to play from so many different lies that I get, like, almost in a relationship with the club where you’re like, I don’t really want to let it go – I know it so well,” Scheffler said.
“I’m weird about my golf clubs, so that’s funny that you noticed that, because I don’t really have a strong rhyme or reason. Because I played 2024 mostly with a T-grind … with the kind of narrower sole and then I played most of 2025 with a wider sole. There’s no real rhyme or reason to it. I think just sometimes I put it in imagining, ‘Oh, when we get to the firmer courses I’ll use the narrower and on the soft ones the wider one.’ I use it in the first tournament and I like it and it’s like, actually, I don’t really want to change because I got to adjust to this new wedge and I’m like, ‘oh, that’s too much.’
“Sticking with the narrow one for now. We’ll see. If I get an inkling to change it I will. But once it gets in the bag it’s typically tough for me to take a club out.”
Scottie Scheffler is shocked when his wedge doesn’t get the job done at Travelers Championship.
Ben Jared, PGA TOUR via Getty Images
Viktor Hovland switched to the Ping G440 LST driver at the RBC Canadian Open and finished third. Despite missing the U.S. Open cut at Shinnecock Hills, he found a groove with it at the Travelers Championship, where he led the field in strokes gained off the tee (3.962) in eventually beating Scheffler in a playoff for his first PGA Tour victory since the 2025 Valspar Championship.
“I’ve obviously been working a lot on my swing to try to get back technically to where I can, you know, not think about the swing as much and just step over the ball and expect to see a certain shot shape. I feel like I've gotten a lot closer to that in even recent weeks,” Hovland said.
“I thought in Canada it was a lot of promise, and even U.S. Open I drove it a lot better. I just had one OB ball on the worst time possible. I hit one bad shot in the left-to-right wind, and it was gone to the right. It’s just been I’m seeing the good shots are really good. It’s just the bad ones have been punishing me a lot. I feel like what my feel was in my swing and what I’ve been working on is starting to kind of get the shot dispersion a little bit tighter.”
Matt Fitzpatrick has been searching for a new driver since his Titleist GT3 cracked before the Memorial. After a frustrating week off the tee while contending in the U.S. Open, he settled on a Ping G430 LST at the Travelers.
The choice paid off as he finished fourth, leading the field with 94.64 percent driving accuracy (53 of 56 fairways) and ranking fifth in strokes gained off the tee.
“I have a different driver this week. That’s obviously new. Just getting comfortable with that and I had, you know, felt like I practiced well these first three days as well and just managed to find something that I felt was working a bit better,” Fitzpatrick said. “It’s just a different brand. Obviously I was in one for a long time and, yeah, it was just kind of give it a go, I guess.
“When you fit a golf club, everyone has tendencies, and not to bore everyone, but my tendency is like I like clubs or a driver with the CG closer to the heel. That’s kind of where … I’ve lived for basically my whole career. And certain golf clubs are, like, made without that. Just the box one, the one you buy off the rack might have it on the toe side, which if you gave that to me I would hit it 500 yards right or whatever it is. So the detail is really important and it’s important to try and get that right as best as you can. Everyone is different, their habits, how they move the club, how they react to different clubs. I tried one in Canada where it was literally exactly that, like neutral, neutral, neutral, and I hit it 50 yards right, and that’s just the way I react. So I think people think that guys just get driver and it’s just going to go straight and away you go and there’s obviously a lot more to it than that.”
Scott Michaux
