CaptZ

The golf shirts I wear mostly are 100% cotton from the Augusta National Golf Club. They are a mix of private label — Augusta, Masters, etc. — and Bobby Jones, Peter Millar, Slazenger, and Polo by Ralph Lauren. Since any shirt with a polyester-cotton blend pills, I refuse to purchase them, and 100% polyester shirts are just way too hot and sticky. 100% Sea Island cotton golf shirts by Brioni, Turnbull and Asser, Gucci, Proper Cloth, Apposta, and Sunspel are silky smooth and soft. The very BEST golf shirts in the world are 100% Sea Island Cotton by Loro Piana, but they start at $2250 each.

Why wear clothing that shows dirt, sweat, and stains so easily? Just sitting in a golf cart with white pants shows up on the pants immediately. A little bit of mud or dust shows up immediately. Every person with white pant I’ve ever seen on a golf course has spots, stains, or dirt on his pants after a few holes.

Added a Makser 7 wood and a 9 wood to my Makser 3 and 5 woods years ago, but these Makser 3, 5, 7, and 9 woods were replaced with Taylormade 3, 4, 5, and 6 hybrids because these hybrids were consistently straighter.

My Taylormade clubs had 5° gaps when purchased: 45° W, 50° A, 55° S, and 60° L and they work fine.

Have used a 7 and 9 wood for over 20 years because they don’t run as much as an iron with the same distance in the air. Tried this because Vijay used a specially altered 7 wood back then. Their trajectories are higher than my hybrids with the same face degree.

Costco has had great wide-brim sun hats for YEARS — $15-$20. Tripletts’ Ping hat was available several years ago, but appears now to have been replaced by other Ping models. Tilley hats are almost indestructible and completely washable, worth their high price.

There are more than 10 FREE golf apps with GPS available for anyone with an Android or iPhone AND the free USGA GHIN app has FREE GPS now. I’ve compared them to my own and friends’ Skycaddie, Garmen, Bushnell and other handheld GPS devices, EACH $100-$300, and there is NO discernible difference except for displays. I bought a Skycaddie GPS when they first came out years ago, then a Garmen, and then a fancy Bushnell because of better displays and information. Gave them all away. If you want to spend unnecessary money, go right ahead.

2 different color accurate Transitions w/bifocal prescriptions - 10-50% and 40-80% reduction depending on sun brightness level

Bobby Jones shirts are extremely well made with finely woven cotton but are $150+. Masters golf shirts are available ONLY for non-members at the Masters Tournament from $150-$250; there are no phone, mail, or internet purchases. Sea Island cotton for warm weather and Merino wool and cashmere for cooler weather are my favorites; these are usually available only at high end menswear stores. Joseph Bank has some great stuff and it’s frequently half price on sale. Life and golf are too short to wear cheap and poorly made clothes.

This is normal for Ping. My Eye2 irons took 12 weeks for delivery in 1987.

The inventions of perimeter weighted irons and perimeter weighted putters by Karsten Solheim are still the only recent club design breakthroughs (since metal shafts and the sand-wedge) that have actually made golf somewhat easier for the average player. USGA handicap records supposedly show that 18 hole scores of average players has declined less than 1 stoke since they began keeping score data in 1948. Ping discovered that varying groove depths on grooved putter faces can produce more consistent distances from off-center putter face ball contact. MGS test results indicated that Ping "might have" another technological advancement; varying groove depths in a mallet putter could benefit anyone considering a heavy mallet putter. My trusty long putter would be illegal in 2 years, requiring going back to a short putter. Each one of my 5 previous short putters demonstrated why it had been replaced, so I was looking, but not in a hurry. Previous MGS comparisons of clubs were extremely helpful to deciding on new clubs, so new MGS putter test results convinced me to consider a Ping Ketsch. Oh, oh! Ping Ketsch putters were sold out everywhere I checked. Then MGS reported that Ping had stopped taking new Ketsch putter orders, in addition to canceling over 6000 backorders, but previously accepted orders would be fulfilled. During this time I was a once-a-week Golf Galaxy non-buying regular after accepting that, for some undisclosed reason, Ping had actually stopped delivery of their new Ketsch putter, despite enormous interest and thousands of orders. MGS members speculated widely, offering two very believable and possible scenarios why Ping had made such a disruptive decision. The supposed inside story: The failure rate of carving exactingly precise grooves with variable depths for just the center grooves of a previously machined block of aluminum was too high to continue. Manufacturing this putter head in the quantities that Ping needed for consumer orders could not be done with Ping's existing equipment in Scottsdale. The Ping Ketsch putter was designed by the Ping research lab in Ketsch, Germany, without consideration of manufacturing cost limitations. How difficult could it be to cut equally spaced grooves on one side of a precisely shaped aluminum block and then precisely vary the additional depth of just the center grooves? Much more costly than Ping ever imagined. Ping thought that duplicating the precise position necessary to accurately deepen the center grooves could be done with their existing machinery. Ping refused to validate speculations that every Ketsch putter head made in Scottsdale shipped before Ping stopped production had to be hand checked because groove flaws were too common. Unverified tales of 40% rejections, 65% rejections, and even 80% failure numbers are most likely exaggerations, but Ping's cancellation of already ordered Ketsch putters had to result from some type of manufacturing problems. I tell this story about Ping and MGS because MGS tests indicated that this new Ping Ketsch putter was overwhelmingly superior to any other tested putter, in addition to being priced right in the middle. MGS tests also showed that higher priced putters were demonstrably inferior to the new Ketsch. How would you label what serendipitously happened to me when I was again in Golf Galaxy? I was repeatedly told by every Ping seller that Ping wasn't accepting any more Ketsch orders. Golf Galaxy repeatedly insisted that their monthly orders for Ping putters were not changed by Ping's Ketsch cancellation, and I could still order any other Ping putter. While I was once again testing putters in another attempt to determine which configuration would be the least harmful, I was interrupted by a Golf Galaxy salesman who understood the difficulty of changing from a long putter to a short putter. He whispered to me that his store had just received 3 Ping Ketsch putters specifically stated in the included Ping invoice that were sent to fulfill earlier guaranteed special orders accepted by Ping. The 34" and a 35" Ketsch putters were grabbed as soon as I removed my hands, but shortly afterward I was given a 35" counterbalanced model, which I immediately bought. All 3 had the same putting arc, which I knew nothing about, but I didn't care because I hadn't a clue about my putting arc and because I believed that MGS reports and member comments were more accurate and more valid than any other source. Conclusion: searching for, and obtaining my Ping Ketsch putter was 100% due to MGS, and this putter really has reduced my total putt numbers.

1. My previous clubs were 14 years old in 2011. MGS tests of new game improvement clubs convinced me to demo every brand that I could, resulting months later with new TaylorMade 1st generation Rocketballz clubs: driver, 3 wood, 4-9 irons, PW, AW, SW, and LW. 2. I purchased TaylorMade Rocketballz 3,4,5, and 6 hybrids a year later in 2012. 3. I still continue to demo different brands of new club models, but I have yet to perceive an advantage over my "obsolete" Rocketballz clubs. Compare old TaylorMade RAC irons with their "new technology" Rocketballz irons, and then compare Callaway X-16, X-20, X-24, and X-etc. irons. These models are all superficial variations. Advertisements by golf equipment manufacturers are no different than chewing gum advertisements. 4. In 2014, I replaced my long shaft Oddessy 2-Ball putter with a Ping counterweighted Ketsch putter in order to comply with the forthcoming USGA rule change in 2016. 5. In 2015, a fixed shaft TaylorMade Aeroburner driver replaced my Rocketballz adjustable driver. 6. I attribute my 2016 handicap being 5 points less than 5 years ago, despite being older and weaker, to demoing and then buying new clubs tested by MGS. 7. 40 years ago I could tell the difference between high compression and low compression wound golf balls, but today my 83 mph swing cannot discern any difference between different brands of golf balls. 8. Thanks for keeping to your original intentions of revealing verifiable facts!