bellairemi

Been very happy with my E722 - very consistent and forgiving.. Bought it new for $200 only a few months after initial release.

Was able to hit the Paradym at a demo day with data being provided by a Trackman 4. I really liked them at address and the feel was nice - solid but springy. Ended up getting some very good numbers with the Hzrdus graphite (silver maybe - first shaft in that family I liked) and I put 18 out of 20 on a pretty small Trackman green. Honestly I would have placed an order on the spot until the fitter gave me the cost - $206 per club with my preferred grip. Probably just as well given the spelling issues would have driven me insane. Growing up with an English professor and a newspaper editor makes it hard to live with "Paradym" and "Hzrdus" in my bag.

What Ping has done has made MOI their primary goal. As with anything in design, there is give and take in making that decision. To go super high in MOI, you either need to elongate the clubhead and make it shallower (look at some of the older Maltby designs) or just accept a higher VCOG to maintain a more normal shape. As someone whose miss is thin, I do not like any of the newer Ping irons. That is why Titleist, unless they change their design parameters, will never produce irons with MOIs as high as Pings. They consistently have maintained lower COGs.

I did try the fingernail test on the edge of a demo Stealth face. You could say it left a mark but definitely not an identation. In fact I was able to buff out the mark pretty easily.

You will not see mine in the used market - have played 12 rounds with it and have been stunned at how long and forgiving it is. I did not like the sound inside but I do not notice it outside.

You might consider getting him fit locally and then ordering irons from Golfworks. They will be cheaper, better built and comparable to the major companies.

I play with TE Forged but built a set of the TS-1s for my son's graduation present. We have the same specs so I have played quite a bit with his irons. Neither he nor I have seen any gapping issues between the pitching and gap wedges and they generate plenty of spin ( we both play the OnCore Elixir balls). I paired his irons with the new TSW DRM wedges which are very nice. The sole grind works well for our varied conditions (we go from hardpan to very soft quickly) and the feel is very nice. I will be replacing my Tricepts with the DRM wedges this week.

Winter finally arrived here. About 8" inches here in the last 24 hours with the wind chills starting to dip under zero. With everything closed due to Covid, we have had to transform the overnight homeless shelter I manage into a 24 hour a day shelter - nowhere for our people to go during the day.

I wish they made the 16th into an interesting hole at least - really an insipid hole to surround with stands.

I have been demoing all the new drivers in the Trackman 4 simulator so I can a little better replicate how the driver might play on the course. While I can get better numbers just hitting balls, none of the new ones show a Strokes Gained advantage over my old one once I take them out on the "course". I'm pretty happy I decided to go this route as just from the standard hit balls down the range testing I would have purchased a new driver. This route saves both money and disappointment.

Yep, I am in the hate camp but have some playing partners who love them.

My experience was that Sterlings gapping was better and they were equally forgiving with the F7s. My brother has the set of Sterlings I built and will no doubt play them until they fall apart.

I've been testing the new drivers in the launch monitor/simulator against my 7-8 year old model. While I can see some small and consistent improvements in some measures (ball speed and launch/spin) on the launch monitor, I do not see any advantage when I actually take them to the simulator and play them on the course. My strokes gained driving have shown minimal gains at best (.3 strokes a round) and actually had a few end up in negative numbers against mine.

Maybe you could send some of that snow up north? You now have more on the ground than we do in TC.

I don't think that would be the case for Ping as their manufacturing standards for their shaft partners are tight (as is their overall QC), I did have instances where stock graphites were disappointing versus what I hit at the fitting. For me it was Steelfibers that allowed me to ultimately make the shift because they reacted in my hands just like a steel shaft.