MGS Sourced Ball Fitting - you decide

[Tsecor]

when someone can quantify and relate all this data to actual scoring, ill pay more attention. Until that day comes its just fun to experiment and talk about it but it really means nothing to me in the big picture

[Thin2win]

3 hours ago, Tsecor said:

when someone can quantify and relate all this data to actual scoring, ill pay more attention. Until that day comes its just fun to experiment and talk about it but it really means nothing to me in the big picture

So I can totally do that for you! The ball makes a lot of difference, or maybe none at all! From an actual strokes gained number, if you find a ball that adds 5% more distance (say 225y to 238y) due to spin/launch characteristics, then you are talking about almost  .4 strokes gained on each drive(pulling these numbers from a strokes gained site). 

So, if there is a ball that can do that, then yes there is real scoring to be had.

If you are already playing a ball that gives you the best performance, then what Tony C has been preaching for a couple years is really visible in this data, play the same ball. They all do fly, land, and roll out a bit different, some are drastically different. Can you score with any of them? Yes, but you need to hit a different approach with a 2 piece surlyn vs a 3 or 4 piece urethane. So just knowing how the ball will behave is big.  

I think I had become a real ball snob over the last 3 years on this forum, but after this testing so far I have a different opinion of 2 piece balls. They spin less around the green, but if you play a bump and run that isn't an issue and might be preferable. I thought I would see a big drop off in driver distance, and I haven't seen that. So yeah.

I know the pro's all talk about finding the ball that works for your short game and work back to the driver. I think for them that is the right path, and I'm not sure that it isn't right for us either. But... I think maybe just going full Bryson and finding the ball that goes the furthest off the tee will give you the best scoring option. 

 

[fixyurdivot]

4 minutes ago, Thin2win said:

So I can totally do that for you! The ball makes a lot of difference, or maybe none at all! From an actual strokes gained number, if you find a ball that adds 5% more distance (say 225y to 238y) due to spin/launch characteristics, then you are talking about almost  .4 strokes gained on each drive(pulling these numbers from a strokes gained site). 

So, if there is a ball that can do that, then yes there is real scoring to be had.

If you are already playing a ball that gives you the best performance, then what Tony C has been preaching for a couple years is really visible in this data, play the same ball. They all do fly, land, and roll out a bit different, some are drastically different. Can you score with any of them? Yes, but you need to hit a different approach with a 2 piece surlyn vs a 3 or 4 piece urethane. So just knowing how the ball will behave is big.  

I think I had become a real ball snob over the last 3 years on this forum, but after this testing so far I have a different opinion of 2 piece balls. They spin less around the green, but if you play a bump and run that isn't an issue and might be preferable. I thought I would see a big drop off in driver distance, and I haven't seen that. So yeah.

I know the pro's all talk about finding the ball that works for your short game and work back to the driver. I think for them that is the right path, and I'm not sure that it isn't right for us either. But... I think maybe just going full Bryson and finding the ball that goes the furthest off the tee will give you the best scoring option. 

 

Good points and I think your tests have been interesting a revealing. With regards to spin on the greens, I rarely see or play with folks who have issues with over spinning balls.  Most amateurs simply do not hit down on balls such that it is problematic. Occasionally I'll get a little back-up on my 50 or 56 but nothing zipping across half the green.  

Like you, I'm more of a sweeper/small divot hitter. I have pretty average spin numbers and slightly higher ball height through the bag as compared to most amateur data I've seen.  Except for just off the greens (say inside 20'), I do not play a bump and run and see very little difference in stopping power between a 2 piece and tour balls.  In fact, I'll suggest that since many amateur's tend to land short, having a less spinney ball might yield better results.

It will interesting when you get a chance to repeat your shortlist of options, off natural turf, about 40-60 yards away, and onto a green, what if any stand out.

[GregGarner]

16 hours ago, Thin2win said:

I know the pro's all talk about finding the ball that works for your short game and work back to the driver. I think for them that is the right path, and I'm not sure that it isn't right for us either. But... I think maybe just going full Bryson and finding the ball that goes the furthest off the tee will give you the best scoring option. 

This is something that would be a really interesting test. I think for many Ams, playing a Tour-level ball only really makes a difference when you've missed a green. And even then, if you've missed a green such that you have a bump-and-run to the pin, getting the ball on the ground and rolling is a higher-percentage play than flying it to the hole with spin. So really, the main scoring element is missed greens, short-sided. It would be really interesting to see, in the course of 10 or 20 rounds, what percentage of total shots played required something with a significantly higher spin rate on partial shots. (and even that would be slightly complicated since, as we saw, ionomer balls may have a higher peak trajectory and steeper descent angle, which could compensate for their lack of spin)

For me, playing a Tour-level ball gives me more options. For a lot of folks, they don't need more options, they need more commitment to the shots they trust.

[Berg Ryman]

I'll jump in here I guess since I've been following this closely, and I'll inject something I saw on in a TXG video from about 2 weeks ago where they tested a low spinning, mid spinning, and high spinning ball (AVX v. Z Star v. Staff Model). For all the talk we do about optimizing shafts, lofts, heads, etc... optimizing a ball to work in concert with all that and your abilities might be more important and I think that's what you're doing for yourself @Thin2win. There is no one answer for us all, or one size fits most ball, but you're building a bank of information to help you make that choice and I'm sure that once you suss it all out, you'll find the ball that does it for you on the most consistent basis.

[Thin2win]

Well, that was exhausting. I went right into drivers after doing a superspeed workout. not sure that is how you are supposed to do it, but you do what you can in the time you have right?

Driver data, I took 1 bad shot off the entire group, it was all bad and didn't need to reflect poorly on the ball(it was the noodle). I hit shots with all of them that I felt were playable, still its golf and I'm not named Matt, or a robot. I'm not going to flood the screen with all the ball data charts, I'll just throw up the averages because... in Driver at least, there is a pretty clear winner. Both in distance and dispersion.

 

Do you all agree?

After two tests of staying in the game, the Kirkland showed its spin in full power on driver, wow.

Stay tuned for next week, I have some balls that arrived in the mail from @Londo to test against 1 or 2 more I have, and I think that will complete the first round of the bracket.

[fixyurdivot]

Yea, the Maxfli Tour X looks good... just a whisker better than this mystery ball.  Based on the MGS Lab tests, the Maxfli TX looked like a good match for your swing speed.  I'd say that's a pretty cool correlation... that and Tony's robot has nuttin on you .

[Thin2win]

3 hours ago, fixyurdivot said:

Yea, the Maxfli Tour X looks good... just a whisker better than this mystery ball.  Based on the MGS Lab tests, the Maxfli TX looked like a good match for your swing speed.  I'd say that's a pretty cool correlation... that and Tony's robot has nuttin on you .

That mystery ball? The Titleist Velocity. 

[fixyurdivot]

9 hours ago, Thin2win said:

That mystery ball? The Titleist Velocity. 

You'll need to confirm, but I believe so.

[Berg Ryman]

I'll be honest in this set, if you really preferred a softer feel, Vice PS is a ball that checks a ton of boxes for what I think I'd be looking for. It's not crazy behind the Maxfli in any of the tests.

[Londo]

1 hour ago, Berg Ryman said:

I'll be honest in this set, if you really preferred a softer feel, Vice PS is a ball that checks a ton of boxes for what I think I'd be looking for. It's not crazy behind the Maxfli in any of the tests.

Agreed on this, Vice Pro Soft and Callaway Chromesoft are probably the softest golf balls that I would legitimately game as all the other lower compression balls don't check a box that I need from a ball.

[Thin2win]

3 hours ago, Berg Ryman said:

I'll be honest in this set, if you really preferred a softer feel, Vice PS is a ball that checks a ton of boxes for what I think I'd be looking for. It's not crazy behind the Maxfli in any of the tests.

You aren't wrong, it preformed great and felt good. It also got a good score in Ball Lab. 

[Thin2win]

Hello all. Just starting the final round here. Got some late additions to the test courtesy of @Londo.

Some wedge numbers to start your pondering. I don't know why Green ball and I weren't getting along, but user error decided that I just was going to spray it for some reason as you can see in the area chart and the larger std. dev numbers from the other 2. But the straight averages where right in line.

And since @Londo knows 2 of the 3, I'll give you all the help Snell MTB and MTBX. The 3rd ball, is your only mystery, and I'll tell you that it is one that I already tested.

 

[GregGarner]

1 hour ago, Thin2win said:

 

I'll give you all the help Snell MTB and MTBX. The 3rd ball, is your only mystery, and I'll tell you that it is one that I already tested.

I'd start my guessing with Green being MTB Black and Blue being MTBX based solely on the fact that other than a couple hundred revs of spin, these are the same ball. Not sure what Red is... would need to give a more thorough check of the other balls, but my hot-take is that it's something like the Z-Star XV and that it's getting decent spin, but it's riding up the face a little bit. (Though, my track record suggests that Red is the MTB Black and Blue is the X with Red being the mystery third ball... or something like that)

[Thin2win]

Here is some 7i data, swung a little slower on average with blue today for whatever reason, that shows in the carry distance averages.

[Berg Ryman]

Alright, I think Greg has the Snells flipped green is MTBX, blue is MTB Black and I think Red is Chrome Soft X

[Thin2win]

I've taken a few days off with the holiday, will try to wrap this up tomorrow. But I need to know @greggarner, how does it feel to know that people are literally just betting the opposite of what you do? cough cough @Berg Ryman

[GregGarner]

18 minutes ago, Thin2win said:

I've taken a few days off with the holiday, will try to wrap this up tomorrow. But I need to know @greggarner, how does it feel to know that people are literally just betting the opposite of what you do? cough cough @Berg Ryman

Based on my track record, I think it's a solid strategy...

[Berg Ryman]

14 hours ago, greggarner said:

Based on my track record, I think it's a solid strategy...

I was about to say, I play the percentages! The snell profiles seem close, driver may tell the tale between them. The third ball though is a baffler

[Londo]

Probably out there but going to go out on a limb

Red- MTB Black

Green- MTB X

Blue- TP5x

[Thin2win]

Okay, Rd 5 driver data... This was the oddest round of the test. I figured I was just broken after the first cycle through each ball. I couldn't generate any backspin. So I went all the way through the test as I normally would, then I tossed down the ball I have been using as my "gamer" during this test to see if my swing was just so far off today that I didn't have any spin. And, well, it did what I expected it to. So that said, I'm going to take a hard pass on all three balls in this round due to their driver spin numbers just not giving me any backspin.

With that said, here are some numbers to look at, and if any of you want a ball with lower backspin off the drives, might I suggest the ProV1. I couldn't get it to spin at all. Also, @greggarner you actually got the MTB/MTBx pairing correct.

First, the 3 I tested:

Then I was thinking I might have to redo this another day because the spins were so low, so I hit the Chromesoft X LS:

That was still on the slightly low side of the range where I want to live 2200-2500, but it was what I would call normal. So I decided that the spin on these others was just that low. The ProV1 only got to 1800 because I blew one 48 yards to the right and even then it only got to 2450 rpm, if I take that one out I averaged 1500rpm with the ProV1 this round. I did test it a few rounds ago, and it was low, but it wasn't this low. So, I guess being human means we swing differently day to day, who knew?

So I think going into the next round I have the CSXLS, Vice Pro, Maxfli X and the Srixon ZV

[GregGarner]

Dang! I can't believe the MTBX is that low-spin for you! Having not put that or the CSXLS h2h on a monitor before, I'm amazed at how much more spin you're getting from Cally. Those two balls both perform so well for me on-course that now I need to try them out on a monitor for comparison. I did a ProV1 vs ProV1x h2h on a Quad and to make the regular V1 playable, I had to switch the weights in my driver to put more weight in the rear. Which, incidentally, was apparently my holiday diet strategy.

[Thin2win]

1 minute ago, greggarner said:

Dang! I can't believe the MTBX is that low-spin for you! Having not put that or the CSXLS h2h on a monitor before, I'm amazed at how much more spin you're getting from Cally. Those two balls both perform so well for me on-course that now I need to try them out on a monitor for comparison. I did a ProV1 vs ProV1x h2h on a Quad and to make the regular V1 playable, I had to switch the weights in my driver to put more weight in the rear. Which, incidentally, was apparently my holiday diet strategy.

If I was going to pass a ball through this round, it would have been the MTBX, it is only 150 ish rpm less the the Callaway. Which isn't bad. so if you were hitting one 2300 and the other 2450, that is good and I don't think there is much between them. But over 60% of the set it had spin less then 1800.. so for me to put that into play, just brings some OB tee shots into my round that I'd rather avoid   But I don't there there is much between them honestly. 

[cnosil]

2 minutes ago, Thin2win said:

If I was going to pass a ball through this round, it would have been the MTBX, it is only 150 ish rpm less the the Callaway. Which isn't bad. so if you were hitting one 2300 and the other 2450, that is good and I don't think there is much between them. But over 60% of the set it had spin less then 1800.. so for me to put that into play, just brings some OB tee shots into my round that I'd rather avoid   But I don't there there is much between them honestly. 

Don't know if you addressed,   are you hitting everything it roughly the same location on the driver?  Can be some wild differences if not.  

[Thin2win]

Just now, cnosil said:

Don't know if you addressed,   are you hitting everything it roughly the same location on the driver?  Can be some wild differences if not.  

Yeah, I'm not robot for sure. but I'm pretty consistent with my swing on any given day. The GC3 doesn't show face impact, but I can tell you from contact/feel that overall they all hit in the same area over the batch. 

[cnosil]

7 minutes ago, Thin2win said:

Yeah, I'm not robot for sure. but I'm pretty consistent with my swing on any given day. The GC3 doesn't show face impact, but I can tell you from contact/feel that overall they all hit in the same area over the batch. 

That was my thought.   I have a tendency to hit down and as a result ball impact is high on the face so I tend to get low spin.   The results can be anywhere from sub 1000 to low 2000s.  

[Thin2win]

4 minutes ago, cnosil said:

That was my thought.   I have a tendency to hit down and as a result ball impact is high on the face so I tend to get low spin.   The results can be anywhere from sub 1000 to low 2000s.  

I actually tee it lower then most probably, just to try and generate some spin. I also use a Sim2 Max and 12.5°, something about my delivery is just doesnt generate backspin.

[cnosil]

3 minutes ago, Thin2win said:

I actually tee it lower then most probably, just to try and generate some spin. I also use a Sim2 Max and 12.5°, something about my delivery is just doesnt generate backspin.

You sound a lot like me.   I bring/make my own tees to most wanted testing since the tees they use are too high for me and just really throw me off.   

[GregGarner]

4 hours ago, cnosil said:

That was my thought.   I have a tendency to hit down and as a result ball impact is high on the face so I tend to get low spin.   The results can be anywhere from sub 1000 to low 2000s.  

I used to be a very high-spin player but I've worked to bring it down. Was surprised the other day when testing one of the new Mizuno drivers and a standard ProV1 was giving me sub-2000 spin. Then mid-1000s. Then I caught one high-toe and it was 975 spin. Turns out, the ball was about to pop. Swapped balls and it immediately jumped up to 1900 spin. Still too low, but if we had just blindly followed the monitor, it coulda been bad...

[Thin2win]

Yikes, 3 weeks has really gone by fast. Work /life has been over busy. But, I've still had a number of good sessions. Since I'm getting to the end I'm taking my time with the last round. I'm collecting 100 shots with each, so still have a bit to go. 

Then with the new Callaway balls, the Z-star diamond and the Wilson triad... I guess I'll just start over again.