Browsing: driver

Three Team India stars got into a cab in Adelaide, leaving the driver stunned (Screengrabs) An Uber driver in Australia was left visibly stunned after discovering that his latest passengers were none other than Indian cricketers Dhruv Jurel, Prasidh Krishna and Yashasvi Jaiswal. The Indian team is currently in Australia for the ongoing ODI series. A video circulating on social media shows the driver waiting for his pick-up, unaware of who he was about to meet. Moments later, the three cricketers were seen getting into the vehicle and taking their seats one by one.The driver, clearly taken aback, looked at them in disbelief before quietly starting the ride. The clip also captured the moment when the group reached their destination. The driver appeared to share a brief exchange with the players before they stepped out. The video drew amused reactions from fans.Users commented that the driver was living the dream of every Uber driver.Watch the viral video here Some users empathised with the driverâ€s quiet reaction, noting how meeting famous personalities can leave anyone speechless. The short clip also drew attention to the players†casual demeanour during the ride. The video has since gained traction across social media, with viewers amused at the driverâ€s understated reaction to an unexpected star encounter. A day after the video of the players entering the cab went viral, Team India went on to lose the series 2-0 in Adelaide.

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How would you react if you unexpectedly met a celebrity during a ride?

Australia clinched victory with a hard-fought two-wicket win over India at the Adelaide Oval on Thursday. Chasing 265, young batters Matt Short (74), Cooper Connolly (61*), and Mitch Owen (36) led the hosts to victory in 46.2 overs after a composed recovery from early setbacks.For India, Rohit Sharma top-scored with 73, while Adam Zampa (4/60) and Xavier Bartlett (3/39) starred with the ball for Australia. The defeat handed Shubman Gill his first series loss as ODI captain, with India struggling to convert starts and failing to defend a competitive total.

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At first when I heard Rory McIlroy was considering leaving driver in his locker for this week’s DP World India Championship I thought he was speaking figuratively. Leaving it in his locker as in not using it much. But then when he showed up for his first-round tee time it turned out that he had very literally taken driver out of his bag. Second round? Same thing. And it makes sense, when you hear him explain it. But we’ve also never seen this from Rory before. So let’s talk through why this is interesting.

(Let’s talk through some other stuff, too.)

1. Rory has never done this before.

He first teased it in his pre-tournament press conference.

“I’d say the next time I hit my driver will be in Abu Dhabi,” he joked, referring to his next tournament start. But in fact it wasn’t a joke. “I don’t think I’ll hit a driver this week. I just don’t feel like the risk is worth the reward. I’d rather leave myself two or three clubs back and hit a 7-iron into a par-4 instead of hitting a wedge, where if you just get it off-line here, the ball is gone. You’re hitting it into jungle and you’re not going to be able to get it out. You can rack up a very big number very quickly.”

Then came his comments after the first round — his first professional round without his most famous club (and its trademark dog headcover).

“Dog was out of the bag, probably asleep in the locker,” he said. “Yeah, I was sort of thinking about it last night before I went to bed. Sometimes if you’re really conservative off a par-5, you might have like a 5-wood into the green, but I’m never going to hit driver, so I just thought I’ve got to go 2-iron, 3-iron, 4-iron all the way through, and then I’ve got a 5-wood just in case I need to hit it for an approach shot on a par-5. But I just don’t see any hole out there that I hit to hit it more than say 260, 270 off the tee.”

2. My buddy has, though.

I have a close pal who has taken driver out of the bag just because he knows that if it’s in there, at some point he will be tempted to hit it, he will then drive the ball out of play and he will start having a bad time. McIlroy is basically doing the same thing. He just happens to hit his long irons about 80-100 yards past my buddy, who’s a 20 handicap.

3. Then again, he’s never done any of this before.

This is McIlroy’s first time in India and it’s one of the higher-profile tournaments in the nation’s golfing history. It seems like a win-win from each side; McIlroy has for multiple years expressed his interest in playing here and he continues to find joy in new golf tournaments around the world. And because the DP World Tour has a more lenient policy around appearance fees, it’s safe to assume that McIlroy and his high-profile peers are being well-compensated for their time this week.

4. The numbers tell a fascinating story

Through two rounds the average driving distance for the India Championship is just over 265 yards on its measured holes. That is wild when you consider the PGA Tour’s average driving distance is 303.3 yards. McIlroy’s no-driver strategy still has him in the top half, averaging 270.25 yards. But that’s more than 50 yards behind his 323-yard average. There’s a wide range in strategies, though: Thriston Lawrence of South Africa went bombs away en route to a 308-yard average through two rounds, with the average-length Brian Harman just behind him at 299.5 yards a pop.

As for McIlroy’s accuracy? He has hit 75 percent of his fairways, good for T17 in the field and miles ahead of his 51.2 percent PGA Tour average. The tradeoff is pretty clear.

5. The visuals do, too.

If you spend any time watching the India Championship on TV (and I recommend it, particularly if you live in the U.S. and you’re an insomniac) you’ll quickly see why these guys are laying so far back — the course is in the middle of New Delhi, the second-most-populous city in the world, but it’s also essentially cut into a jungle. The corridors are narrow and missing spells doom.

6. For that matter, the sounds tell a fascinating story.

You can hear sounds of the city come through on every minute of the broadcast — and even on the fun social clips the DP World Tour has been posting. We often hear about how courses are in major cities when in fact they’re on the quiet outskirts of quiet suburbs, but not here! It’s worth embracing the extent to which this course is in the mix.

7. He’s still losing to his straighter-hitting pals

It’s no shock that this course would set up well for McIlroy’s two closest friends on Tour, given their statistical profiles; Tommy Fleetwood (who leads at 12 under through 36 holes) has slightly below-average length but is one of the straightest drivers in the world and an incredible irons player. You could say something similar about Shane Lowry (11 under, T2) who is notably straight off the tee and notably elite with an iron in hand from the fairway.

“There’s a lot of holes where you’re not hitting much off the tee and you’re trying to get it in play and that’s why I think it suits me,” Lowry said. “There’s a lot of mid-irons out there which a strength of my game.”

8. This is the golf experiment we’ve been waiting for.

People in and around pro golf think and talk obsessively about distance. Whether pros hit it too far, whether golf courses are too short, what anybody can do about any of it. This week is certainly one example of how to de-emphasize distance as a skill; accuracy off the tee is essential to success, while driver has been effectively outlawed. And the players seem tickled by the test.

“It’s great. We spoke about it quite a bit out there — it’s just such a unique challenge for all of us,” Fleetwood said. “I haven’t hit more than a 5-wood. The one hole where I could hit more is 18, but you get to that and you’re like, ‘Well, I haven’t hit one, and I don’t really feel that comfortable with it.’ It’s such a unique challenge, and the greens are firming out a little bit and the pins have been tricky.

“It’s been very, very enjoyable. It’s a test of patience when you’re not quite on it because like it’s one of those courses, you get a few of them where you feel — if you hit it good off the tee you’re going to have some short irons and wedges and feel like you’ve always got a chance to get it wrong. It’s such a waiting game. You’ve got to be very patient. It’s been a great test.”

9. It’s also a reminder for us.

I live in Seattle, where many courses present as bowling alleys. But I’m so conditioned to seeing the pros hit driver or 3-wood everywhere that I assume if they showed up here they’d do the same. This is evidence to the contrary. Even through analytics have steered pros towards a bomb-and-gauge style of play in recent years, there are limits to that strategy when courses become tight enough and misses become penal enough. So yeah — it’s okay to lay back off the tee if it means you’re going to keep it in play. Not much fun getting stuck in the jungle all day, anyway.

10. Sports rule.

I spent my Thursday night watching Joe Flacco trade punches with Aaron Rodgers in one of the more memorable regular-season matchups in recent NFL history — and then eventually flipped over to catch the sights, sounds and strategies of the India Championship. Sports remain the best thing going because they deliver the unexpected. Let’s go back to McIlroy’s pre-tournament press conference for the final word:

“I would say that deep down at its core, the essence of watching sport, it’s the realest reality show that we have. We don’t know the outcome. We don’t know what’s going to happen, and that’s amazing. There’s very little content on TV nowadays that can actually do that.”

Two more intriguing rounds in this latest episode.

Dylan Dethier welcomes your comments at dylan_dethier@golf.com.

When Jeffrey Kang was in college at the University of Southern California, he’d sometimes earn some extra cash by helping head coach Chris Zambri with his junior golf clinics. For Zambri, it was simple: He’d point at Kang, one of the most decorated recruits in program history, and say to the kids, “This is what it takes.â€

If only Kang knew then just how much it would take.

Kang’s long and winding road to the PGA Tour culminated last Sunday in French Lick, Indiana, where the 34-year-old prodigy turned journeyman ended the Korn Ferry Tour Championship ranked 14th in points and grabbed one of 20 available cards for 2026.

“It took a lot of patience, a lot of self-talk, just believing in myself and trusting that it was all going to work out in the end. It’s been tough, but this is why we do it,†said Kang, who in the aftermath of the card ceremony was, like most everybody else, not only soaking up the moment but also in champagne and Michelob Ultra.

“I’m just really happy I stuck it out.â€

What has proven an arduous journey began in Fullerton, California, just outside of Los Angeles, where it all once came easy and where Kang developed into a standout not only at Sunny Hills High but nationally. Student-athletes of Kang’s ilk – talented, smart and from the West Coast – usually matriculated to Stanford. But when Kang verbally committed to the Trojans, Zambri was so content with his Class of 2010 haul, which also included another AJGA All-American in Ramsey Sahyoun, that he didn’t care that it meant a kid by the name of Patrick Cantlay heading to crosstown-rival UCLA. Cantlay would win the Haskins Award, given to the best player in the nation, as a freshman. But Kang had done alright, too, an all-Pac-10 selection his first year and All-American honorable mention the following season, which included a playoff victory over Jordan Spieth in Hawaii. Midway through college, however, Kang’s prospects veered quickly.

“It was the lowest I’ve still ever been,†Kang said of the driver yips that debilitated him for large swaths of his final two years in school and beyond.

There were two misses: a ball that started 7 degrees right and ended up off the planet, and then the massive overcorrection. It didn’t really matter the club, either.

“And over time, it made his swing hub very unstable,†said instructor Dana Dahlquist, who worked about seven years with Kang after graduation. “I described it as a motorcycle not able to go through the turns.â€

Kang never missed a round for the Trojans as a junior or senior, though that was more indicative of the state of those USC rosters. The situation got so dire for Kang that Zambri, known for meticulously testing his players during his career (he’s now the head coach of the U.S. National Development Program), exempted Kang from such practice mandates, hoping that Kang, still one of the hardest workers to come through USC, could solve things on his own. Kang nearly won in Hawaii his senior spring before Oklahoma State’s Jordan Niebrugge sped past him late, but that was a rare bright spot in an otherwise frustrating semester. The Trojans placed dead last by eight shots at the 2014 NCAA Championship at Prairie Dunes, and Kang, in his last college event, tied for 150th, beating just five players.

“A lot of guys have stepped away from the game because of this,†Kang said. “But I always knew I was going to get over the hump, and I never doubted my ability.â€

With Dahlquist’s help, Kang changed his wrist conditions and how he releases the club, and eventually he went from a guy too afraid to commit to a line because he didn’t know what would “come out of the gun†to someone who had begun to not only manage his driving anxiety but reprogram his path to PGA Tour-level golf.

It took Kang a couple years to earn any status, and then he missed seven cuts and posted just one top-50 showing on PGA Tour Canada in 2016. He headed to Asia that next year, finding a home on PGA Tour China, where he won in his debut. But the pandemic shuttered that tour and left Kang again with nowhere to play. He didn’t log a world-ranked start for nearly 20 months.

“COVID derailed everything,†Kang said. “I was on the up and then I’m sidelined. I couldn’t get anywhere. Just surviving was an achievement. So, I had to restart a little bit, but looking back that’s probably the best thing that ever happened to me. It was a forced break mentally to refresh me and allow me to start from the bottom, stick to a game plan and get to where I need to be. It was a blessing in disguise.â€

During that sabbatical, Kang reconnected with a high-school friend, Josh Park, an up-and-coming coach, during some mini-tour events in Arizona. They’d spend hours on end talking about golf, and eventually Park joined Kang’s stable. Along with Dahlquist and Dr. Scott Lynn, Park got Kang using the ground more effectively, specifically pushing off earlier to get the club to release earlier. His tee ball continued to improve.

“He, along with all of us, knew that if kept that driver on the hole he was supposed to play, then he would one day end up on the PGA Tour,†said Park, who started working full-time with Kang about two years ago.

Kang played mostly on PGA Tour Canada, and the temporary Forme Tour, from 2021 to 2023, notching 10 top-10s, including three runners-up. While sprinkling in a few PGA Tour starts via Monday qualifying, he medaled at the second stage of PGA Tour Q-School in 2023 and earned his KFT card for the first time last year. But 14 missed cuts in 24 starts left him No. 81 in points, and he’d begin this season with conditional status before rattling off three missed cuts in his first four events.

Then, finally, the breakthrough: A T-3 finish at the Visit Knoxville Open jumpstarted Kang’s season, and he added a pair of solo seconds late, at the NV5 Invitational and Albertsons Boise Open, to enter the KFT Finals inside the top 20. When he tied for fourth in Columbus, Ohio, he’d essentially locked up his card with two events left. Sure, he finished this season ranked No. 133 in total driving, but as the tour’s third-best putter and one of the best wedge players Park has ever seen, that was enough to get him to the PGA Tour.

Park says that Kang, armed with his USC degree, could’ve been successful in anything outside of golf, but “he never quit when most of us would have.†The sun setting on a dream day in southern Indiana, and Post Malone’s “Congratulations†blaring in the background, Kang credited people like Park and his girlfriend, Ji, for keeping him going.

Worked so hard, forgot how to vacation.
They ain’t never had the dedication.
People hatin’, say we changed and look, we made it.
Yeah, we made it.

“He persevered through some really hard times, and I just have so much respect for that,†said Zambri, who traveled to watch Kang compete in Raleigh, North Carolina, this year. “Not everyone gets to keep pursuing until they’re in their 30s. He was fortunate, but he made the most of it. And I hope it continues to work out for him. It’s not easy to go from where he was to get back in the middle of it all.

“I’m hoping he has like a Tom Lehman type of career.â€

Lehman played a few seasons on the PGA Tour right out of college but with little success. It then took him nearly a decade to regain his card. What followed was an almost two-decade second stint on the PGA Tour, where he won five times, including the Open Championship and Tour Championship in 1996, and made three Ryder Cup teams.

Kang will take that.

NEW DELHI — Shane Lowry ran off five straight birdies on the back nine and then got up-and-down for birdie on the 18th hole Thursday for an 8-under 64, giving him a one-shot lead over Keita Nakajima in the DP World India Championship.

Rory McIlroy decided to leave driver out of his golf bag at tight, tree-lined Delhi Golf Club. He had a collection of bogeys and birdies and settled on a 69 in the inaugural tournament.

“Dog was out of the bag, probably asleep in the locker,†McIlroy said. His bag featured a 3-wood and 5-wood, the latter in case he needed more height for longer shots into par 5s.

That didn’t help him on his 17th hole, the par-5 eighth, when he pulled his tee shot into the trees, advanced it only about 15 yards into the rough made a bogey.

Lowry returned from his Ryder Cup heroics at the Spanish Open last week by missing the cut. Another week into the closing stretch of the season seemed to suit him much better, particularly his iron play and putter.

Starting on the 11th, his five birdie putts were all in about the 10-foot range.

“I putted nicely today. I played nice,†Lowry said. “You know, 64 is a really nice score. It’s not that hard when you are out there but when you start missing fairways it becomes quite tricky.â€

Lowry, who holed the putt that assured Europe would keep the Ryder Cup, played alongside Tommy Fleetwood and Ryder Cup captain Luke Donald, who each shot 68.

There was plenty of reminiscing about their stellar performance before an unruly New York crowd at Bethpage Black. Lowry said one part of Delhi Golf Club went along the streets and they could hear the horns of the nearby cars.

“It was not as off-putting as the Bethpage crowd,†Lowry said.

Nakajima also had five straight birdies in the middle of his round, starting on No. 18 and then four straight to begin the front nine. This is an important time of the year for the former world No. 1 amateur as he tries to get into the top 10 of European tour players who would be granted PGA Tour cards for 2026.

Ben Griffin, who made his Ryder Cup debut for the U.S. team, opened with a 68 alongside another American, Michael Kim, who was late arriving in India because of visa issues. Kim already has won on the European tour this year at the French Open.

This start a big stretch run for McIlroy at the end of the year, as he also plans to play the Abu Dhabi Championship and DP World Tour Championship, along with the Australian Open.

Oct 16, 2025, 07:12 AM ET

Rory McIlroy’s decision to leave the driver in his locker did not affect his ability to score as he carded six birdies around the narrow Delhi Golf Club but was let down by three bogeys in the opening round of the DP World India Championship.

The world No. 2 got off to an ideal start by chipping in from the fringe at his first hole, the 10th, but his difficulties began at No. 11, where he three-putted, before he failed to get up and down for back-to-back bogeys.

Despite the absence of the longest club in his bag, McIlroy had no problems birdieing the two par-5s to make the turn at 1 under, and he picked up three more shots over the next seven holes.

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However, he bogeyed the 522-yard eighth to finish with a 3-under 69, four behind clubhouse leader Keita Nakajima.

“Dog [driver] was out of the bag, probably asleep in the locker. I was sort of thinking about it last night before I went to bed,” McIlroy said of his club selection in his postround interview. “Sometimes if you’re really conservative off a par-5 today, you might have like a 5-wood into the green, but I’m never going to hit driver. So I just thought I’ve got to 2-iron, 3-iron, 4-iron all the way through, and then I’ve got a 5-wood just in case I need to hit it for an approach shot on a par-5.”

McIlroy said the course was still “pretty tricky” despite the limited length needed off the tee.

“You’re just really trying to be as conservative as possible off the tee and then trying to pick off birdies on the par-5s and maybe pick up a couple more,” he said.

Think all PGA Tour pros are using the latest $650 driver that just hit the market? Think again.

This weekend, Steven Fisk earned his first PGA Tour win with a Mizuno ST-Z 230 driver. The ST-Z was a huge leap forward for Mizuno, which has been trying to shed the characterization of an iron and wedge-only company for better players, thanks to new technology like its Cortech Chamber.

In fact, the company has continued making the driver for three years since it came out in 2023, and currently, it can be had at retail for just $300. Yes! A brand new driver for just $300.

Fisk isn’t the only player using the ST-Z either. Fellow Mizuno staffer Keith Mitchell, one of the PGA Tour’s premier drivers of the golf ball, also plays the ST-Z, as does Marco Penge, who has won twice on the DP World Tour this season.

Steven Fisk’s clubs: What’s in his Sanderson Farms-winning bag

By:

Jack Hirsh

All of Fisk’s clubs are actually throwbacks to the earlier part of the 2020s, from his Mizuno MP-20 irons and T-22 wedges to his Odyssey White Hot OG Rossie putter. The only club in his bag that is a current model year club besides his driver is his Vokey SM10 lob wedge.

While most of those clubs (except limited grinds of the wedges, which I’ll link here and below) aren’t being sold right now, his Ping G430 fairway woods are also an excellent deal.

Fisk plays both a Ping G430 Max 3- and 7-wood, and while that popular line has been replaced by Ping’s G440 line, the 430 fairways are still getting plenty of use out on the PGA Tour.

Those fairway woods can currently be found for just $290 at retail.

With both the driver and the fairway woods this week at the Sanderson Farms, Fisk was fifth in the field in strokes gained: off-the-tee, picking up just under four shots. It makes him a perfect example of going with the club that works the best, not necessarily the most expensive or the newest.

Want to find the best driver and fairway woods for your game?Find a club-fitting location near you at True Spec Golf.

Mizuno ST-Z 230 Driver

A straight bias driver with excellent stability from off centre hits. Similar in look and character to the previous ST-Z. Boosted by the CORTECH Chamber to be faster from the face, spin less and deliver an incredible, solid sensation at impact.

Ping G430 Max Fairway Wood

Sizing up your approach into a long par 4, going for the par-5 in two, you want 100% confidence that your fairway wood will give you the solid contact, speed and higher ball flight to get you home. In the G430 fairways, we’ve developed Carbonfly Wrap to deliver more distance by positioning the CG closer to the force line to maximize ball speed, resulting in higher, longer carries. The PING G430 MAX Fairway Wood fits the widest range of golfers with four options (3W/15°, 5W/18°, 7W/21°, 9W/24°).

Mizuno T22 Custom Wedge

 With more than 50 years of refining, the Grain Flow forging process in Hiroshima, Japan, Mizuno’s wedges are unrivaled for touch and feel around the green. Properties best demonstrated in Mizuno’s T-Series wedges, developed hand in hand with former world #1 Luke Donald. The latest evolution – the T22 refines Mizuno’s player’s shape once again and introduces four different sole grinds for varying techniques and conditions.
One-piece Grain Flow Forged using HD Boron, at Mizuno’s iconic facility in Hiroshima, where Mizuno irons have been produced since 1968, the new T22 wedges feature a microlayer of copper beneath the nickel-chrome delivering an extra split-second of control at impact.The new T22 wedges feature a slightly more compact, ‘modified teardrop,’ profile with an extensively beveled top edge to make it appear thinner. The spin-weighted blade design, created by tapering the upper portion of the blade, helps create a more consistent spin and a more penetrating trajectory.Mizuno’s HydroFlow Micro Grooves deliver great wet weather performance as they are laser etched to release moisture and reduce spin drop off, while the Quad Cut milled, and loft specific, grooves are cut into Boron infused steel to offer a longer effective lifespan.The T22 wedges are available in three finishes; Denim Copper, Satin Chrome, and Raw. The Raw finish comes without the copper underlay, but it will rust over time for a look requested by many of the Mizuno tour players.The expanded grind options include:S Grind – with the minimal sole grind for fuller shots and lower loftsD Grind – with moderate heel and toe relief, allowing gentle manipulation of the clubfaceC Grind – with heavy heel and toe relief for more skilled players and firmer conditionsX Grind – with extreme heel and toe relief for the real short game maestros.Mizuno has strived to “create the best products for consumers” for 115 years, and the new T22 wedges adhere firmly to that original spirit and desire while offering the best performance benefits that modern technology can bring. #ReachBeyond
 
T-22 S GRIND WEDGE SPECIFICATION

Club #
Loft °
Lie Angle
Length (inch)
Bounce

45/05
45
63
35.5
5

46/06
46
63
35.5
6

47/07
47
63
35.5
7

48/08
48
63
35.5
8

49/06
49
63
35.5
6

50/07
50
63
35.25
7

51/08
51
63
35.25
8

52/09
52
63
35.25
9

53/10
53
63
35.25
10

54/12
54
63
35.25
12

55/13
55
63
35.25
13

56/14
56
63
35.25
14

57/15
57
63
35.25
15

58/16
58
63
35.25
16

T-22 D GRIND WEDGE SPECIFICATION

Club #
Loft °
Lie Angle
Length (inch)
Bounce

54/08
54
63
35.25
8

55/09
55
63
35.25
9

56/10
56
63
35.25
10

57/11
57
63
35.25
11

58/12
58
63
35.25
12

T-22 C GRIND WEDGE SPECIFICATION

Club #
Loft °
Lie Angle
Length (inch)
Bounce

56/06
56
63
35.25
6

57/07
57
63
35.25
7

58/08
58
63
35.25
8

59/09
59
63
35.25
9

60/10
60
63
35.25
10

T-22 X GRIND WEDGE SPECIFICATION

Club #
Loft °
Lie Angle
Length (inch)
Bounce

58/04
58
63
35.25
4

59/05
59
63
35.25
5

60/06
60
63
35.25
6

61/07
61
63
35.25
7

62/08
62
63
35.25
8

Dexterity: RH Satin Chrome, Demin Copper & Raw. LH Satin Chrome only.

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Welcome to GOLF’s Fully Equipped’s weekly Tour equipment report. Each Friday of PGA Tour weeks (plus other times, if news warrants), GOLF equipment editor Jack Hirsh will run you through some of the biggest news surrounding golf clubs on Tour, including changes, tweaks and launches.

There’s no doubt, the fade has become the preferred shot shape at the upper echelons of golf.

The years of players meticulously crafting their swings to move from the inside out and hit push-draws have been replaced with power players pulling the club inside as hard as they can and hitting left-to-right peelers to retain spin and control.

Min Woo Lee, with his 124+ mph ball speed (fourth on the PGA Tour this season), is no exception. So why did Lee just switch into Callaway’s Eltye Triple Diamond Tour Draw driver head?

To understand why Lee, a modern power hitter who typically plays a fade, would switch into a driver head optimized to hit the ball the other way, we need to understand exactly what the Callaway Triple Diamond Tour Draw (herein referred to as the Triple Diamond TD) platform does.

The Triple Diamond head is Callaway’s Tour-inspired driver profile. It’s a slightly smaller head (450 cc), has more of a pear shape preferred by better players and, most importantly for our purposes, it has a right bias.

Lee won earlier this year at the Texas Children’s Houston Open with the Elyte Triple Diamond head, but notably, he had a wild right miss on the 70th hole, leaving the crucial tee ball in the water. He ended up making a bogey and got the win, but the right miss was the ball Lee feared, and it made him gunshy, according to Callaway Tour Content Manager Johnny Thompson. Lee fell from 5th to 102nd this season in Strokes Gained: Off-the-tee this season and hit just 55 percent of his fairways.

“With Triple Diamond, in the direction that his golf swing went. He was, he was looking up sometimes and seeing like, ‘Man, that kind of really slid and I just don’t feel like the golf swing produced that much slide,’” Thompson said. “That little doubt, which, under high-pressure situations, on those difficult golf courses they play, can be very discomforting, especially coming down the stretch.”

That’s where the Triple Diamond TD solves the problem. The Tour Draw head isn’t your typical draw-bias game improvement driver — although Callaway has a staffer, Alex Noren, who uses one of those for similar reasons.

Callaway Elyte Mini, TD Max and TD Tour Draw drivers | 4 things to know

By:

Jack Hirsh

The TD TD was introduced because Callaway found that players, specifically on lower speed tours like the PGA Tour Champions and LPGA, were setting up Triple Diamond heads to negate some of the head’s right bias. It has less face progression (the face of the driver sits behind the center of the shaft — i.e. more offset) and a different center of gravity to help encourage a straighter start line.

That turned out to be just what Lee needed.

“When they tested the Triple Diamond TD with the guys over in Europe, it was almost plug and play,” Thompson said. “Because he didn’t change his shaft. He didn’t change the length, didn’t change swing weight. The weights were even set up very similarly so that the feel of where the CG is in relation to the shaft axis — all that stuff was fairly similar.

Min Woo Lee’s new Callaway Elyte Triple Diamond Tour Draw.

Callaway

“You could almost call it like a single variable change where they just gave a reduction of right bias.”

The new build paid immediate dividends for Lee two weeks ago at the FedEx Open de France where Lee was No. 2 in SG: Off-the-tee and T1 in driving accuracy on his way to a T5 finish.

This week in Mississippi, despite a lackluster 70-73 showing, Lee ranked inside the top-30 in SG: Off-the-tee, picking up more than a shot-and-a-half on the field.

Callaway Elyte Triple Diamond Tour Draw Custom Driver

Draw It Like a Pro

The all-new Elyte Triple Diamond Tour Draw is designed for better golfers who desire to turn the ball over from right to left and prefer a more compact, tour-proven head shape.
Features the same shape and specifications of the popular Triple Diamond model.
The Elyte TD positions slightly more weight heel-ward to enhance a golfer’s ability to turn the ball over compared to Triple Diamond model.

Game-Changing Technologies of Elyte

Shaped for Speed: The all-new Elyte Triple Diamond shape provides enhanced aerodynamics for elite speed throughout the entire golf swing.
Thermoforged Carbon Crown: This aerospace grade carbon fiber enables a low CG for optimal launch and spin.
Ai 10x Face: Our most advanced Ai face to date, the new Ai10x Face enhances speed, spin, and dispersion across the entire face.

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ALSO AVAILABLE AT: PGA TOUR Superstore, Callaway Golf

Disappearing 4-irons

3 gear trends at PGA Championship that caught my eye

By:

Johnny Wunder

First, they came for the 1-irons, then the 2s and 3s. Now, even PGA Tour pros are opting to take 4-irons out of their bags in favor of more forgiving 9-woods and hybrids.

At the Sanderson Farms Championship this week, a 12 players are going without a 4-iron, employing a high-lofted fairway wood or hybrid in its place to attack pins at the Country Club of Jackson.

Even as players opted to remove long irons, for a while it seemed like the trend would stop with 4-irons. But now Tour reps are able to adjust internal weighting of hybrids and high-lofted fairway woods to the point where they can produce any ballflight a player needs.

Many of them are replacing them with Ping 9-woods and hybrids.

“10 years ago, I would imagine there had probably been no players without a 4-iron,” Ping Tour Rep Kenton Oates told GOLF. “Now you have 12 guys not using one.”

PING G440 Max Custom Fairway Wood

The G440 fairway family (MAX, LST, SFT) advances PING’s reputation as a Tour-preferred model of choice through a re-designed face structure and low CG system. The face is taller for more confidence off the tee while maintaining a CG location that delivers high- launching performance off the ground. The MAX model (which fits most golfers) is available in five lofts (including a new 4-wood) to provide more gapping solutions. 
HIGH MOI
Easy to launch, stable design increases forgiveness. 
FLEXING FACE
Maraging steel face flexes for more ball speed, optimizes spin. 
TALLER FACE PROFILE
Improves performance off the tee, maintains low CG. 
FREE-HOSEL DESIGN
Saves weight to lower CG, optimize launch/spin and increase forgiveness.

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ALSO AVAILABLE AT: PGA Tour Superstore

Oates said, with the dramatic uptake in use of launch monitors, players are much more aware of their impact numbers and have become less steep in their angle of attack. Couple that with advances in equipment, especially the golf ball, and even pros with speed lose distance with 4-irons because they don’t spin enough. Then they have a gapping issue.

“Let’s say your 7-iron goes 190, your 6-iron is 203, your 5-iron is at 216, well, then the 4-iron is only going 220 or 223 because it’s just not staying in the air,” he said. “That player probably hits their 7-wood 255.”

That’s when a 9-wood becomes a great option because it can consistently carry 230 yards and modern advancements in weighting allow players to control trajectory better. As a bonus, it’s way more forgiving.

“It feels like you have a pitching wedge that you hit 230 yards, which you can imagine that’s a pretty good feeling to have,” Oates said.

He did give the example of a player with a high ballflight who might find a 9-wood always flies that same peak height. But that’s when you can use a 4- or 5-hybrid to fill the gap like Thriston Lawerence and Paul Petersen are doing this week.

Odyssey S2S Tri-Hot Launch

It’s that time of the year when companies are releasing new 2026 gear seemingly every week.

This week, Odyssey’s Square 2 Square Tri-Hot putters launched on all global tours and GOLF’s Jake Morrow got a look at the new designs at this week’s Epson Tour Championship.

Odyssey’s new Tri-Hot S2S putters.

Jake Morrow/GOLF

The Odyssey S2S Tri-Hot Jailbird.

Jake Morrow/GOLF

The Odyssey S2S Tri-Hot Jailbird.

Jake Morrow/GOLF

The Odyssey S2S Tri-Hot Jailbird.

Jake Morrow/GOLF

The Odyssey S2S Tri-Hot line appears to have a new face technology.

Jake Morrow/GOLF

The Odyssey S2S Tri-Hot Rossie.

Jake Morrow/GOLF

The Odyssey S2S Tri-Hot Rossie.

Jake Morrow/GOLF

The Odyssey S2S Tri-Hot No. 7.

Jake Morrow/GOLF

The Odyssey S2S Tri-Hot No. 7.

Jake Morrow/GOLF

The Odyssey S2S Tri-Hot line has a new pistol grip.

Jake Morrow/GOLF

So far, the folks at Odyssey are tight-lipped about the new technology in these putters, but from what we can see, there’s an obvious story of the weighting of these putters compared to the original Odyssey Square 2 Square.

The shaft is placed more forward with the S2S Tri-Hot and because the shaft axis of a zero torque putter must be through the CG of the putter, that mean mass must be pushed forward in these putters. That implies less onset than the original S2S, which should offer a more standard look to those coming from a traditional putter.

There appears to be a new dual-material face insert that maintains the AI Smart Face tech from the Ai-ONE line.

Lastly, a new red and black color scheme bears a striking resemblance to Xander Schauffele’s gamer.

Check this out

This section is dedicated to one cool photo we’ve snapped recently on Tour, but haven’t had a reason to share yet. For this week, check out this special TaylorMade MG4 wedge gifted to Rory McIlroy at the Travelers Championship in June to commemorate his Career Grand Slam at the Masters.

Rory McIlroy’s gift from the TaylorMade wedge team.

Jack Hirsh/GOLF

Odds and Ends

Some other gear changes and notes we’re tracking this week.

Christiaan Bezuidenhout is in PXG’s new Lightning driver (9˚) and fairway wood (15˚) that launched at the Procore. He has the UST LIN-Q White 7F5 in the driver and a Graphite Design Tour AD XC 7-X in the 3-wood … Both Hayden Buckley and Taylor Montgomery added new Titleist GT2 drivers to the bag and Titleist again had more than double the number of drivers in play (62/46%) of any other brand…. Project X launched the new Denali Frost Black and Blue wood shafts this week … Michael Thorbjornsen and Jacob Bridgeman have inserted TaylorMade’s new TP5 golf ball this week … Nicolai Hojgaard switched into a combo set of Callaway X Forged and the unreleased ’26 Apex MBs … With a 71-67 start, journeyman pro Vince Covello is off to the best 36-hole start of his PGA Tour career in his first week using Titleist’s new Pro V1x Left Dash.

3 things you should read/watch

A selection of GOLF content from the past week that may interest you.

Amari Avery: What’s in the Bag? – At this week’s Epson Tour Championship, Jake Morrow takes you through the bag of former USC star and TaylorMade athlete Amari Avery, including how she ended up in a split set of P770 and P7CB irons.

TaylorMade P770 Custom Irons

FORGED HOLLOW BODY CONSTRUCTION
The forged hollow body construction gives golfers the best of both worlds; beautyand performance. A soft 8620 carbon steel body is paired with an incredibly thinforged 4140 steel face and Thru-Slot Speed Pocket™ for a design that is fast,flexible and forgiving even in a compact head shape.
FLTD CG
FLTD CG strategically positions the center of gravity (CG) the lowest in the long ironsand progressively shifts higher throughout the set. Using up to 46g of tungsten, FLTDCG is designed to provide players with improved launch and playability in long irons and increase spin in the scoring irons.
SPEEDFOAM AIR
All new SpeedFoam Air is 69% less dense than its predecessor, creating mass savingsthat is redistributed to improve performance. SpeedFoam Air dampens vibrations forexquisite sound and feel while delivering a fast, flexible face.

TOUR-INSPIRED SHAPING
Featuring elegant refinements, including less offset in the long irons, the new P•770is designed to fit the eye of a more discerning player with visual cues including a thintopline, less offset, and shorter blade length when compared to the P•790.

THRU-SLOT SPEED POCKET

The Thru-Slot Speed Pocket™ provides increased face flexibility while preserving ballspeed and distance on low face strikes.

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How to fill the top end of your golf bag | Bag Builders — We look at Callaway’s three new long game options in the Apex Utility Series and see how you can use them to build out the top end of your golf bag.

Callaway 2025 Apex Custom Utility Wood

The Apex UW is designed for serious, avid golfers seeking the perfect blend of a fairway wood’s power and a hybrid’s versatility. Engineered with Tour feedback and loaded with performance technologies, it delivers a higher, more neutral ball flight with the control all players demand. 
TUNGSTEN SPEED WAVE
A dynamic, 41g+ tungsten wave structure positions mass low and forward, enhancing ball speed and launch—particularly on low-face strikes where players tend to lose distance.
STEP SOLE DESIGN
A redesigned sole with a stepped geometry reduces turf interaction, helping to maintain swing speed through impact and promoting more consistent contact across different lies.
TRIAXIAL CARBON CROWN
The lightweight carbon construction allows for strategic weight redistribution, creating a more forgiving clubhead while refining launch and spin for greater shot-making control.
TOUR-INSPIRED SHAPING
Designed with input from the world’s best, the compact, refined shape and neutral face angle inspire confidence at address and deliver workability from tee to turf.

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Ryder Cup 2025: Inside the golf bags of Team Europe — Take an inside look at some of the key clubs used by Team Europe on their way to winning their second Ryder Cup in a row last weekend at Bethpage Black.

Want to overhaul your bag in 2025?Find a club-fitting location near you at True Spec Golf.