Ultra Unofficial Review of Wilson Triad Ball

[HikingMike]

I have three rounds in with the Wilson Triad now. I'm happy to say I like the ball so far. I can definitely keep using it, and perhaps I'll get more after this 12-pack.

@Wheelieb did a "Super Not Official Review" of the Triad back in February as well, so let me reference that right away here! I posted a few times there as well. It turns out I got some Wilson Triads in the offseason and was planning to play those also, so it was great to see his post. I was going to just post another reply there, but it turned out I had more to say than I thought. I hope this is not too many Wilson Triad reviews, haha. 

I also found this other thread on the Wilson Triad from early 2022-

Reading those comments makes me wonder... who among those people are still playing the Triad. 

@Wheelieb, @GolfSpy Barbajo, @benb1989, @Richard Wise, @funkyjudge, @McGolf, @russtopherb, @sg419

Are you still playing the Triad? If not, what have you moved on to? 
I hope you don't mind the callout! I think it would be great to check in.

Perspective

This is early season, and I can be inconsistent, so I can't judge the ball by solely by my play. Of course the ball model is one of the smaller factors out there in the whole scheme of things, although you do hit it on every shot. But I've been playing pretty well. And from what I've seen of the ball, I like it. 

Let me say that I won't put number ratings out of 10 or whatever in here. It just feels like that wouldn't make sense. We know what golf balls do. I can tell you what I like, what I've noticed. But it seems like differences between golf balls are so thin, preferences and swings can be very different, and the ball is kind of down the list as far as factors in your play. What I will do is go into depth on what I think of the ball in the different portions of my game. Feel free to fill in ratings for yourself based on that.

Intro

I'll save the long intro talking about myself for if I get selected for an official forum test  But I will throw in some details that are most relevant for evaluating a golf ball. 

I have played Titleist AVXs the most the past couple years. I gravitated toward the lower flight, soft urethane cover, and lower spin Pro V1 alternative. Soft is also kinda nice, though not required. I also frequently play Pro V1, and occasionally play Srixon Z-Star, Callaway Chrome Soft, TaylorMade TP5... depending on what I find in the woods, LOL.

Going by those other threads, it sounds like there are others like me that played the AVX and now are trying the Triad, so that's actually really neat to hear a kind of convergence of preferences there.

My swing speed with driver is around 108-110. I generally don't have any problem stopping the ball on the green with my iron shots. I don't know about spin, but they get plenty high. Sometimes they hop back. I don't play a high spin game with my short game. And I've learned I have a bit higher spin with driver. Also, my primary miss off the tee is a hook, so I am fine with less spin in case that helps my driving game slightly.

Golfshot showed last season I ended at a 16.0 index, and now after these three rounds I am 11.0   I'm not going to play this up because it's crazy and I can't attribute that to the ball, but hey that's great. I was fairly sure that number was inflated by some bad play in the short time I've been saving my scores in Golfshot. You'd better believe I changed that in my MGS profile as soon as I saw that, haha. I'm at a 4 in one of my 9-hole leagues.

Goal

My goal in exploring different ball options is simply to find something different than an AVX or Pro V1 (or insert other high end ball here), still high performing, but that costs slightly less. The cost differences we're talking about here aren't that huge. But I don't have any loyalty to Titleist, and I'll take a few bucks if I have a good option besides Pro V1 and AVX. Now I'm reading more on this stuff, it seems like there is enough competition and there should be options out there. I know a lot of people like the Maxfli Tour and Vice balls for example, and I probably wouldn't have considered them prior to joining the MGS forum.

I have to mention one interesting factor here is that Titleist's AVX is different for 2024. MGS article on new AVX here. And now it actually costs $5 less than the Pro V1, when before it was the same exact price. This puts a wrinkle in things. I know the AVX may not be the most optimal ball for my swing speed. Though the new version maaaaayy be improved(?)... or it may be somewhat of a cross between the old AVX and the Tour Speed, which is now discontinued. And the Triad also may not be the best for my swing speed, so it's something I'll keep in mind and we'll see how this plays out.

BTW, I was lucky enough to be one of the 80 or so MGS testers who evaluated the Titleist prototype ball at the end of 2023, which later turned out to be the new 2024 AVX. 

Cost

I'll put this section next since cost was a part of my goal just above. Watching the price changes can be confusing when there are golf ball changes mixed in every couple years, and sometimes models are discounted before a new version comes out. But below I have prices for the current model of each year for 2023 and 2024. I think they're right. 

(prices in USD)

2024
Titleist Pro V1: $55/dozen
Titleist AVX: $50/dozen
Callaway Chrome Tour: $55/dozen
TaylorMade TP5: $55/dozen
Wilson Triad: $35/dozen (sale?)
Wilson Staff Model: $50/dozen

2023
Titleist Pro V1: $55/dozen
Titleist AVX: $55/dozen
TaylorMade TP5: $48/dozen
Wilson Triad: $40/dozen
Wilson Staff Model: $50/dozen

Alright, let's get cracking with the ball on the course!

Off the Tee

I have lost two balls so far, both in the first round, and one was a hook off the tee into some water. That is my struggle and I'm hoping to do better this year with that miss. But of course it's nothing against the ball. But on my good shots, I am very happy with the ball flight. I like playing my medium draw. I've only had one or two high slices. Is the tech of the Triad ball helping to keep it straight? I can't say for sure. I didn't lose a ball in my second and third rounds, so that's definitely a good sign with my tee game. And it is possible it took something off of my strong draw tee shots. It's hard for me to tell as left/right consistency with driver is the worst part of my game.

Driver distance seems good for me so far. I did have a couple 300 yarders for my longest ones. I'll occasionally hit 300 yards in past years, so that's normal. Golfshot says my driver is a 280 yard club currently. I have lots of other driver shots with the Triad in the 275-285 range as well.

 

(Of course there were no birdies in these two. Birdies are more likely to be found when least expected.)

Approach Shots

Approach shots with my irons have been solid. The trajectory has been mid, and looks good to me. The second ball I lost was a second shot over water where I was behind a tree and I was trying a punch shot that I didn't hit well enough, it caught part of the tree, and went for a swim. 

@Wheelieb said he noticed shorter distance on his irons, though he was playing in cold temps in winter and that seemed to be the reason.

Hop and stop is normal for me when landing on the green. Now that I think of it, I did have some balls hop back a bit despite the sandy greens, including a 150 yard 7 iron into the wind on a par 3, a 174 yard 8 iron with the wind on a par 4, and a 154 yard 8 iron on a par 4. So with the sandy greens, it is possible I'm getting more spin than I did with the Titleist AVX on approach shots. Time and more play will tell. 

For minor mishits, it seems the ball and my irons are doing a good job keeping the ball going to fairly close to the right place. This ended up giving me a fair amount of shots on the fringe that I could putt, and thankfully often on the same side of the green as the pin. How much of this is the ball? I'm not sure. But I did see @McGolf made a Youtube video that showed the Triad had a tight grouping for him with a 7 iron (relative to the previous version Staff Model, though partly due to one pulled shot with the Staff Model). And this is part of the marketing for the ball with its MOI setup. So maybe there is something to that, and if so, wow I really like that. 

I have been hitting my 100 yard shots better than usual with my GW. This is another weakness of my game normally. A lot of that could be down to my swing as I think I have that shot figured out better now (I play it like a long pitch, not a 3/4ths swing). They have been fairly on line and distance has been very good.

I like that the Wilson Triad feels firmer than the AVX. It felt closer to a Pro V1, the MGS ball testing data bears this out (below). 

Short Game

This one is really to-be-continued. My chipping around the green was mediocre. Usually it's a strength for me. A lot depends on the lie and shot and things haven't been the best, as I can remember not having good contact on some chips. That said, I can probably blame the sandy greens a bit here too because some have run long. Often I get a little bite and then some run out, so this could throw me off. Some of these have been biting a bit, but mostly not with the conditions of the greens. My third round had some ugly chipping, but then I also had a fantastic curving chip-in from 30 yards for birdie! When I hit a good one, it does what I want.

Putting

The greens at my home course are still a bit sandy, so that sucks. And it feels like I'm shaking the rust off my putter more than my other clubs. I putted well the first round, and mediocre the second and third rounds. I have five 3-putts so far in these three rounds. I got two in a row annoyingly after being on in regulation in my first two holes, booooo. Short putts were giving me some problems, and it doesn't help that I'm leaving myself with downhill/sidehill slider putts a lot. But then after that, I stopped missing the short putts and I made some nice midrange putts too. I also made my first birdie of the year with a 30 footer

I like the feel of the ball off my putter face. My putter is just milled stainless steel, no inserts. I think I prefer a ball to feel somewhat soft, or probably midrange compression, when putting. It shouldn't really matter and I should be able to adjust, but that is just my "feel" thing. I have not actually played with many high compression balls like Pro V1x. Anyway, it feels good, and I saw no issues when putting. 

Design

The style of the ball has grown on me. I like the simple black against white background. At first I thought the logo (wordmark?) was just ok, but now I quite like it. When I walk up to identify it in the grass, it just plain looks good to me.

I like the Wilson logo better than the STAFF logo that was on the previous version of the Wilson Staff Model balls.

Previous Staff Model design ---------- new 2024 design 

 

MGS article for previous Staff Model ball ---- MGS article for new 2024 Staff Model ball

That STAFF logo is cool on their irons, but for some reason I don't like it on the golf ball. I'm glad they switched those to the same Wilson logo as the Triad as well, and put the "Staff Model" on the side as the alignment line, like how most ball brands do it (brand name on the main logo, model on the side).

As for the W/S in the shield or not - I'm good with either way. Taking the W/S out actually looks pretty darn good on a ball when most balls have just the one-word brand name and no logo. This takes some busy-ness out of it. So maybe I favor no W/S. 

I do have some flashbacks to Wilson's stuff from the late 90s/early 00s when I had a bad impression of them. But I love how they are staying true to their roots, playing up their brand heritage, and rehabilitating their image in golf lately. If you haven't seen their 3 new lines of irons yet, or their new wedges, go take a look   Dynapower Forged Irons, Staff Model cavity backs and blades, Model ZM Wedges

By the way, I may have to try those new Staff Model balls as well since they are geared toward higher swing speed. I'm leery of more spin since I have a strong draw or hook for my common miss and reducing that slightly is helpful. And the ball stops for me ok on the green with iron shots. Once MGS has a new ball review, I'll have to check how they compare.

Durability

I noticed a tiny bit of wear, but really no problem for me. It would be nice if we had another ball washer or 3 out here so I could see better. I haven't had any sand shots yet. And I may be a bit of a sweeper. The sad honest truth is that it's rare that I play a ball long enough to retire it due to wear. I did hit some trees as well. 

Here's my current Triad after 10 holes. I wiped it down and it's still in great shape.

 

And here it is after 19 holes, after cleaning. There are a few spots and a bit of a line, but nothing serious all. I'll play it again.

  

Intangibles

On 2/12/2024 at 2:23 PM, HikingMike said:

The downside here is that Triad High School was my school's biggest rival.

On 2/12/2024 at 4:38 PM, JohnSmalls said:

That means you should want to hit these harder!

On 2/13/2024 at 1:03 AM, HikingMike said:

I like your thinking

I am not sure why I have an odd affinity for Wilson. I think it feels kind of counter-culture because Wilson became so strongly associated with low-end sports equipment found at Wal-Mart (though they do make tennis rackets, basketballs, footballs, etc. that the pros use). I'm comfortable going against the bias from that. Maybe I like underdogs? Sometimes? I don't know. Oh wow, I just remembered, my very first golf bag was Wilson brand. Yeah it was definitely a bit cheapo, thin dark blue fabric for the bulk of it and a tan low-quality plastic-leather for the trim. I'm pretty sure it fell apart... but lucky for me I got a high school Ping Hoofer stand bag at the time. 

I don't think I've seen any Wilson balls besides mine at my home course, so that's kind of cool. I've had no trouble identifying my ball among my group (sometimes a Titleist among Titleists). 

By the way I have heard they had an odd marketing campaign around this ball. I truly have not seen any of that. It sounds like they're going after a young crowd, so that's cool. But anyway it hasn't colored my perceptions at all.

Exchange I had with the great fitter at Golf Galaxy when I tried out the Callaway Paradym Ai Smoke line--

"Somebody's been watching Rick Shiels"

"No, I saw them on MyGolfSpy."

"Oh. They do a pretty good job there of staying true to the data" ... or something like that.

I've heard the name but had never seen a single Rick Shiels video. I did later look up the video on Youtube. It was pretty short, but he hits a bunch of good irons shots into a par 3 and likes the ball

MGS Rating

MyGolfSpy Ball Lab rates the Wilson Triad fairly highly for their consistency of compression, weight, diameter. They are made by Foremost in Taiwan, who seems to do a good job.

If you're interested in the tech behind the Triad, Wilson put out a good video on that. It does have something interesting going on inside.

Bottom Line

I like it, and I'm going to keep playing this ball. It's my new gamer. And their current price is fantastic at $35 USD/dozen.

I may have something to gain going to a higher compression ball, so I may explore that at some point. The Pro V1x has slightly higher ball speed per MyGolfSpy's 2023 ball test, about 1mph (Tableau scatter plot here). I had previously stayed away from it due to spin. However it looks like the Wilson Triad has significantly more spin with driver than the Pro V1x. That said, I'm on the road to fixing high driver spin and volatility with better methods than the ball, haha. 

The (old) Wilson Staff Model similarly shows up with higher ball speed in the 2023 test too, and less driver spin than the Triad, but still significantly more driver spin than the Pro V1x. It will be interesting to see what the new 2024 Staff Model does. The new Callaway Chrome Tour is intriguing as well.

2023 MGS Ball Test Scatter Plot - handy!

Man I would love to have this data outside of Tableau so I could better compare the core things I want to look at (ball speed for driver, spin for driver, spin for iron, compression... for fast club speed). Maybe I'll take on that project someday, to manually type out the data.

Buuuuuuttttt, here is a comparison of some figures from Wilson, Titleist, Callaway, and Maxfli balls that I thought would be useful.

• Wilson Triad has similar compression and iron spin to the Pro V1, but the Pro V1 has slightly more driver ball speed and less driver spin.
• Wilson Staff Model has similar compression and driver ball speed to Pro V1x and Pro V1x Left Dash. However, the Staff Model has higher driver spin and higher iron spin.
• Maxfli Tour X is quite close to the Pro V1x in driver ball speed, iron spin, and compression. However where they differ is the Maxfli Tour X has more driver spin than the Pro V1x. 
• Wilson Triad and Maxfli Tour have similar driver ball speed and compression. But the Triad has more driver spin and iron spin.
• Kirkland has the highest driver and iron spin. Also, I didn't include this number, but it's an outlier with lower iron ball speed.

Let me also add thank goodness the MGS forum software auto-saves your posts before they're submitted. This one was a doozy and definitely was almost lost a couple times. I did write it up in a notepad first, but it would have been a lot to recreate still.

Edited April 24 by HikingMike
prices in USD, typo fix

[Wheelieb]

Great write up and way more in depth. I am still using it, but you can go and see my update. I’ve got testing I have to do. 

[funkyjudge]

7 minutes ago, HikingMike said:

I have three rounds in with the Wilson Triad now. I'm happy to say I like the ball so far. I can definitely keep using it, and perhaps I'll get more after this 12-pack.

@Wheelieb did a "Super Not Official Review" of the Triad back in February as well, so let me reference that right away here! I posted a few times there as well. It turns out I got some Wilson Triads in the offseason and was planning to play those also, so it was great to see his post. I was going to just post another reply there, but it turned out I had more to say than I thought. I hope this is not too many Wilson Triad reviews, haha. 

I also found this other thread on the Wilson Triad from early 2022-

Reading those comments makes me wonder... who among those people are still playing the Triad. 

@Wheelieb, @GolfSpy Barbajo, @benb1989, @Richard Wise, @funkyjudge, @McGolf, @russtopherb, @sg419

Are you still playing the Triad? If not, what have you moved on to? 
I hope you don't mind the callout! I think it would be great to check in.

Perspective

This is early season, and I can be inconsistent, so I can't judge the ball by solely by my play. Of course the ball model is one of the smaller factors out there in the whole scheme of things, although you do hit it on every shot. But I've been playing pretty well. And from what I've seen of the ball, I like it. 

Let me say that I won't put number ratings out of 10 or whatever in here. It just feels like that wouldn't make sense. We know what golf balls do. I can tell you what I like, what I've noticed. But it seems like differences between golf balls are so thin, preferences and swings can be very different, and the ball is kind of down the list as far as factors in your play. What I will do is go into depth on what I think of the ball in the different portions of my game. Feel free to fill in ratings for yourself based on that.

Intro

I'll save the long intro talking about myself for if I get selected for an official forum test  But I will throw in some details that are most relevant for evaluating a golf ball. 

I have played Titleist AVXs the most the past couple years. I gravitated toward the lower flight, soft urethane cover, and lower spin Pro V1 alternative. Soft is also kinda nice, though not required. I also frequently play Pro V1, and occasionally play Srixon Z-Star, Callaway Chrome Soft, TaylorMade TP5... depending on what I find in the woods, LOL.

Going by those other threads, it sounds like there are others like me that played the AVX and now are trying the Triad, so that's actually really neat to hear a kind of convergence of preferences there.

My swing speed with driver is around 108-110. I generally don't have any problem stopping the ball on the green with my iron shots. I don't know about spin, but they get plenty high. Sometimes they hop back. I don't play a high spin game with my short game. And I've learned I have a bit higher spin with driver. Also, my primary miss off the tee is a hook, so I am fine with less spin in case that helps my driving game slightly.

Golfshot showed last season I ended at a 16.0 index, and now after these three rounds I am 11.0   I'm not going to play this up because it's crazy and I can't attribute that to the ball, but hey that's great. I was fairly sure that number was inflated by some bad play in the short time I've been saving my scores in Golfshot. You'd better believe I changed that in my MGS profile as soon as I saw that, haha. I'm at a 4 in one of my 9-hole leagues.

Goal

My goal in exploring different ball options is simply to find something different than an AVX or Pro V1 (or insert other high end ball here), still high performing, but that costs slightly less. The cost differences we're talking about here aren't that huge. But I don't have any loyalty to Titleist, and I'll take a few bucks if I have a good option besides Pro V1 and AVX. Now I'm reading more on this stuff, it seems like there is enough competition and there should be options out there. I know a lot of people like the Maxfli Tour and Vice balls for example, and I probably wouldn't have considered them prior to joining the MGS forum.

I have to mention one interesting factor here is that Titleist's AVX is different for 2024. MGS article on new AVX here. And now it actually costs $5 less than the Pro V1, when before it was the same exact price. This puts a wrinkle in things. I know the AVX may not be the most optimal ball for my swing speed. Though the new version maaaaayy be improved(?)... or it may be somewhat of a cross between the old AVX and the Tour Speed, which is now discontinued. And the Triad also may not be the best for my swing speed, so it's something I'll keep in mind and we'll see how this plays out.

BTW, I was lucky enough to be one of the 80 or so MGS testers who evaluated the Titleist prototype ball at the end of 2023, which later turned out to be the new 2024 AVX. 

Cost

I'll put this section next since cost was a part of my goal just above. Watching the price changes can be confusing when there are golf ball changes mixed in every couple years, and sometimes models are discounted before a new version comes out. But below I have prices for the current model of each year for 2023 and 2024. I think they're right. 

2024
Titleist Pro V1: $55/dozen
Titleist AVX: $50/dozen
Callaway Chrome Tour: $55/dozen
TaylorMade TP5: $55/dozen
Wilson Triad: $35/dozen (sale?)
Wilson Staff Model: $50/dozen

2023
Titleist Pro V1: $55/dozen
Titleist AVX: $55/dozen
TaylorMade TP5: $48/dozen
Wilson Triad: $40/dozen
Wilson Staff Model: $50/dozen

Alright, let's get cracking with the ball on the course!

Off the Tee

I have lost two balls so far, both in the first round, and one was a hook off the tee into some water. That is my struggle and I'm hoping to do better this year with that miss. But of course it's nothing against the ball. But on my good shots, I am very happy with the ball flight. I like playing my medium draw. I've only had one or two high slices. Is the tech of the Triad ball helping to keep it straight? I can't say for sure. I didn't lose a ball in my second and third rounds, so that's definitely a good sign with my tee game. And it is possible it took something off of my strong draw tee shots. It's hard for me to tell as left/right consistency with driver is the worst part of my game.

Driver distance seems good for me so far. I did have a couple 300 yarders for my longest ones. I'll occasionally hit 300 yards in past years, so that's normal. Golfshot says my driver is a 280 yard club currently. I have lots of other driver shots with the Triad in the 275-285 range as well.

 

(Of course there were no birdies in these two. Birdies are more likely to be found when least expected.)

Approach Shots

Approach shots with my irons have been solid. The trajectory has been mid, and looks good to me. The second ball I lost was a second shot over water where I was behind a tree and I was trying a punch shot that I didn't hit well enough, it caught part of the tree, and went for a swim. 

@Wheelieb said he noticed shorter distance on his irons, though he was playing in cold temps in winter and that seemed to be the reason.

Hop and stop is normal for me when landing on the green. Now that I think of it, I did have some balls hop back a bit despite the sandy greens, including a 150 yard 7 iron into the wind on a par 3, a 174 yard 8 iron with the wind on a par 4, and a 154 yard 8 iron on a par 4. So with the sandy greens, it is possible I'm getting more spin than I did with the Titleist AVX on approach shots. Time and more play will tell. 

For minor mishits, it seems the ball and my irons are doing a good job keeping the ball going to fairly close to the right place. This ended up giving me a fair amount of shots on the fringe that I could putt, and thankfully often on the same side of the green as the pin. How much of this is the ball? I'm not sure. But I did see @McGolf made a Youtube video that showed the Triad had a tight grouping for him with a 7 iron (relative to the previous version Staff Model, though partly due to one pulled shot with the Staff Model). And this is part of the marketing for the ball with its MOI setup. So maybe there is something to that, and if so, wow I really like that. 

I have been hitting my 100 yard shots better than usual with my GW. This is another weakness of my game normally. A lot of that could be down to my swing as I think I have that shot figured out better now (I play it like a long pitch, not a 3/4ths swing). They have been fairly on line and distance has been very good.

I like that the Wilson Triad feels firmer than the AVX. It felt closer to a Pro V1, the MGS ball testing data bears this out (below). 

Short Game

This one is really to-be-continued. My chipping around the green was mediocre. Usually it's a strength for me. A lot depends on the lie and shot and things haven't been the best, as I can remember not having good contact on some chips. That said, I can probably blame the sandy greens a bit here too because some have run long. Often I get a little bite and then some run out, so this could throw me off. Some of these have been biting a bit, but mostly not with the conditions of the greens. My third round had some ugly chipping, but then I also had a fantastic curving chip-in from 30 yards for birdie! When I hit a good one, it does what I want.

Putting

The greens at my home course are still a bit sandy, so that sucks. And it feels like I'm shaking the rust off my putter more than my other clubs. I putted well the first round, and mediocre the second and third rounds. I have five 3-putts so far in these three rounds. I got two in a row annoyingly after being on in regulation in my first two holes, booooo. Short putts were giving me some problems, and it doesn't help that I'm leaving myself with downhill/sidehill slider putts a lot. But then after that, I stopped missing the short putts and I made some nice midrange putts too. I also made my first birdie of the year with a 30 footer

I like the feel of the ball off my putter face. My putter is just milled stainless steel, no inserts. I think I prefer a ball to feel somewhat soft, or probably midrange compression, when putting. It shouldn't really matter and I should be able to adjust, but that is just my "feel" thing. I have not actually played with many high compression balls like Pro V1x. Anyway, it feels good, and I saw no issues when putting. 

Design

The style of the ball has grown on me. I like the simple black against white background. At first I thought the logo (wordmark?) was just ok, but now I quite like it. When I walk up to identify it in the grass, it just plain looks good to me.

I like the Wilson logo better than the STAFF logo that was on the previous version of the Wilson Staff Model balls.

Previous Staff Model design ---------- new 2024 design 

 

MGS article for previous Staff Model ball ---- MGS article for new 2024 Staff Model ball

That STAFF logo is cool on their irons, but for some reason I don't like it on the golf ball. I'm glad they switched those to the same Wilson logo as the Triad as well, and put the "Staff Model" on the side as the alignment line, like how most ball brands do it (brand name on the main logo, model on the side).

As for the W/S in the shield or not - I'm good with either way. Taking the W/S out actually looks pretty darn good on a ball when most balls have just the one-word brand name and no logo. This takes some busy-ness out of it. So maybe I favor no W/S. 

I do have some flashbacks to Wilson's stuff from the late 90s/early 00s when I had a bad impression of them. But I love how they are staying true to their roots, playing up their brand heritage, and rehabilitating their image in golf lately. If you haven't seen their 3 new lines of irons yet, or their new wedges, go take a look   Dynapower Forged Irons, Staff Model cavity backs and blades, Model ZM Wedges

By the way, I may have to try those new Staff Model balls as well since they are geared toward higher swing speed. I'm leery of more spin since I have a strong draw or hook for my common miss and reducing that slightly is helpful. And the ball stops for me ok on the green with iron shots. Once MGS has a new ball review, I'll have to check how they compare.

Durability

I noticed a tiny bit of wear, but really no problem for me. It would be nice if we had another ball washer or 3 out here so I could see better. I haven't had any sand shots yet. And I may be a bit of a sweeper. The sad honest truth is that it's rare that I play a ball long enough to retire it due to wear. I did hit some trees as well. 

Here's my current Triad after 10 holes. I wiped it down and it's still in great shape.

 

And here it is after 19 holes, after cleaning. There are a few spots and a bit of a line, but nothing serious all. I'll play it again.

  

Intangibles

I am not sure why I have an odd affinity for Wilson. I think it feels kind of counter-culture because Wilson became so strongly associated with low-end sports equipment found at Wal-Mart (though they do make tennis rackets, basketballs, footballs, etc. that the pros use). I'm comfortable going against the bias from that. Maybe I like underdogs? Sometimes? I don't know. Oh wow, I just remembered, my very first golf bag was Wilson brand. Yeah it was definitely a bit cheapo, thin dark blue fabric for the bulk of it and a tan low-quality plastic-leather for the trim. I'm pretty sure it fell apart... but lucky for me I got a high school Ping Hoofer stand bag at the time. 

I don't think I've seen any Wilson balls besides mine at my home course, so that's kind of cool. I've had no trouble identifying my ball among my group (sometimes a Titleist among Titleists). 

By the way I have heard they had an odd marketing campaign around this ball. I truly have not seen any of that. It sounds like they're going after a young crowd, so that's cool. But anyway it hasn't colored my perceptions at all.

Exchange I had with the great fitter at Golf Galaxy when I tried out the Callaway Paradym Ai Smoke line--

"Somebody's been watching Rick Shiels"

"No, I saw them on MyGolfSpy."

"Oh. They do a pretty good job there of staying true to the data" ... or something like that.

I've heard the name but had never seen a single Rick Shiels video. I did later look up the video on Youtube. It was pretty short, but he hits a bunch of good irons shots into a par 3 and likes the ball

MGS Rating

MyGolfSpy Ball Lab rates the Wilson Triad fairly highly for their consistency of compression, weight, diameter. They are made by Foremost in Taiwan, who seems to do a good job.

If you're interested in the tech behind the Triad, Wilson put out a good video on that. It does have something interesting going on inside.

Bottom Line

I like it, and I'm going to keep playing this ball. It's my new gamer. And their current price is fantastic at $35/dozen.

I may have something to gain going to a higher compression ball, so I may explore that at some point. The Pro V1x has slightly higher ball speed per MyGolfSpy's 2023 ball test, about 1mph (Tableau scatter plot here). I had previously stayed away from it due to spin. However it looks like the Wilson Triad has significantly more spin with driver than the Pro V1x. That said, I'm on the road to fixing high driver spin and volatility with better methods than the ball, haha. 

The (old) Wilson Staff Model similarly shows up with higher ball speed in the 2023 test too, and less driver spin than the Triad, but still significantly more driver spin than the Pro V1x. It will be interesting to see what the new 2024 Staff Model does. The new Callaway Chrome Tour is intriguing as well.

2023 MGS Ball Test Scatter Plot - handy!

Man I would love to have this data outside of Tableau so I could better compare the core things I want to look at (ball speed for driver, spin for driver, spin for iron, compression... for fast club speed). Maybe I'll take on that project someday, to manually type out the data.

Buuuuuuttttt, here is a comparison of some figures from Wilson, Titleist, Callaway, and Maxfli balls that I thought would be useful.

• Wilson Triad has similar compression and iron spin to the Pro V1, but the Pro V1 has slightly more driver ball speed and less driver spin.
• Wilson Staff Model has similar compression and driver ball speed to Pro V1x and Pro V1x Left Dash. However, the Staff Model has higher driver spin and higher iron spin.
• Maxfli Tour X is quite close to the Pro V1x in driver ball speed, iron spin, and compression. However where they differ is the Maxfli Tour X has more driver spin than the Pro V1x. 
• Wilson Triad and Maxfli Tour have similar driver ball speed and compression. But the Triad has more driver spin and irons pin.
• Kirkland has the highest driver and iron spin. Also, I didn't include this number, but it's an outlier with lower iron ball speed.

Let me also add thank goodness the MGS forum software auto-saves your posts before they're submitted. This one was a doozy and definitely was almost lost a couple times. I did write it up in a notepad first, but it would have been a lot to recreate still.

In answer to your question, I am not still playing the Wilson Staff Triad ball, although I still have a couple of sleeves. The reason? I went back to playing the Maxfli Tour X ball (2023 version). There is nothing inherently wrong with the Triad ball; I just prefer the Maxfli Tour X a bit more.

[cksurfdude]

Have been intrigued by this ball since it came out; of the MOI claims are even partly true it could possibly benefit my game.

And yeah their marketing with Manolo and his Maniacs is, well, different and actually kind of entertaining imho....

[BreakfastBall15]

Great write up! I got a free dozen at a Wilson demo event for their AI fitting system and have played a few holes with them and was surprised. Currently putting the Bridgestone BX through its paces but planning on doing more testing with these. For the price they’re hard to beat. 

[JohnSmalls]

Great write up! With work like this you'll be a part of an official test in no time.  Wilson makes great equipment, glad Triad is working for you. I have been meaning to try these for ages!

Here's the commercial with Manolo.  I liked it!  Wilson needed to change things, and this made a splash.  

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=UGMk0Wq2L3k&pp=ygUTV2lsc29uIHRyaWFkIG1hbm9sbw%3D%3D

[HikingMike]

6 hours ago, funkyjudge said:

In answer to your question, I am not still playing the Wilson Staff Triad ball, although I still have a couple of sleeves. The reason? I went back to playing the Maxfli Tour X ball (2023 version). There is nothing inherently wrong with the Triad ball; I just prefer the Maxfli Tour X a bit more.

Alright, good to know. Thanks!

[HikingMike]

4 hours ago, BreakfastBall15 said:

Great write up! I got a free dozen at a Wilson demo event for their AI fitting system and have played a few holes with them and was surprised. Currently putting the Bridgestone BX through its paces but planning on doing more testing with these. For the price they’re hard to beat. 

Thanks!

Wow that’s pretty amazing, a free dozen! That’s great you went to one of their Wilson Fit AI demos. I’d love to hear about that. I told my dad about one coming up nearby since he said he may consider new irons. From what I’ve read, it sounds like the most advanced automatic fit tool out there right now, and I hope more of that kind of tool is used (not just for Wilson irons). 

[HikingMike]

3 hours ago, JohnSmalls said:

Great write up! With work like this you'll be a part of an official test in no time.  Wilson makes great equipment, glad Triad is working for you. I have been meaning to try these for ages!

Here's the commercial with Manolo.  I liked it!  Wilson needed to change things, and this made a splash.  

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=UGMk0Wq2L3k&pp=ygUTV2lsc29uIHRyaWFkIG1hbm9sbw%3D%3D

Thanks. Hey yeah I like that commercial. I’m going to start saying “golfing ball” with the accent now, haha. 

[Rob Person]

Fantastic and in depth review!  I have a couple Wilson balls kicking around and will have to try them out at some point!

[HikingMike]

Here is an updated table with a bunch more stuff.

• Added the 8 balls from Vice and Bridgestone, though haven't compared them yet. I think this rounds out a good group. 
• Added the yellow Pro V1, just because it is oddly quite a bit different from the white Pro V1. They didn't have the compression on that one, FYI, but surely it's the same as the Pro V1. 
• Added Iron Ball Speed column.
• I also discovered that MGS's Tableau scatter plot shows numbers to 2 decimal places on the Y axis, but not the X axis. So I also regathered all the numbers and juggled axes  to get the more precise data. 

(Data from MyGolfSpy 2023 Ball Test)

I will be able to do different scatter plots with this data than what MGS had displayed. Club (Driver/Mid Iron) and Club Speed (Fast/Mid/Slow/Wedge 35 Yards) are separate dropdowns on MGS's scatter plot, so it was not possible to compare driver spin to iron spin for instance, driver ball speed to iron spin, or driver ball speed to iron ball speed.

But first, here is something neat you can see with that MGS Tableau scatter plot. The Titleist Pro V1x Left Dash has the highest driver ball speed (fast club) among these. And the spin is on the low side, whereas the Maxfli Tour X which is nearly tied in driver ball speed has 185 rpm higher spin. The Pro V1x is not far behind in driver ball speed, and also lower spin. The Wilson Staff Model (yellow-green) is there in 4th spot for highest driver ball speed, and its spin is 221 rpm higher than the Pro V1x Left Dash. And the Wilson Triad is the other yellow-green spot near the top of driver spin, and I guess I'd say for driver ball speed it's within the main grouping though near the lower end of that (close to Maxfli Tour).

Looking at iron ball speed (below), you can see they are all quite close in a horizontal grouping on the right side . Basically the bulk of the group is between 117.69 and 118.23 ball speed, a difference of only 0.54 mph (throwing out a few outliers). It makes sense there would be less range on that. Driver ball speed range in this group more spread out, you can see the dots are less clumped horizontally in the above diagram. Driver ball speed is between 166.45 and 170.94, for a range of 4.5 mph. So iron ball speed is not very interesting, and I might disregard it, except just for checking the outliers. The Pro V1x Left Dash has lower iron spin, close to the AVX and Chrome Soft X LS, so that matches what it did with driver, but interestingly it isn't at the top of the pack for iron ball speed. The Kirkland is bottom of the chart low iron ball speed here at 116.67. The Vice Pro Zero is also there at 116.93. And the Bridgestone Tour B RX is on the low side with 117.40. Again the Wilsons are yellow-green spots with the Staff Model having higher iron spin and iron ball speed. Both are on the higher end of iron spin, as they were with driver spin. And they're both in the core grouping for iron ball speed, with the Triad on the low end of that. But again, caveat all this - for iron ball speed, the differences are tiny numbers. Iron spin is interesting. Iron ball speed is mostly not interesting.

Oh I do see here that the Vice Pro and Vice Pro Plus are solidly in the core groupings in both plots. For Bridgestone, the Tour B X is the only one that is solidly in the core grouping for both.

[BreakfastBall15]

15 hours ago, HikingMike said:

Thanks!

Wow that’s pretty amazing, a free dozen! That’s great you went to one of their Wilson Fit AI demos. I’d love to hear about that. I told my dad about one coming up nearby since he said he may consider new irons. From what I’ve read, it sounds like the most advanced automatic fit tool out there right now, and I hope more of that kind of tool is used (not just for Wilson irons). 

So it was pretty cool. Got warmed up with the fitting club, answered some questions the fitter put into the app, and then took 5 swings to get the numbers. They use a blast sensor which is very similar to a shot scope sensor. Very similar to the mizuno shaft optimizer but also recommends head shape based off your answers and swing data. Overall a cool experience but if I were going to buy Wilson irons I would want to test the shafts it recommends

[HikingMike]

13 minutes ago, BreakfastBall15 said:

So it was pretty cool. Got warmed up with the fitting club, answered some questions the fitter put into the app, and then took 5 swings to get the numbers. They use a blast sensor which is very similar to a shot scope sensor. Very similar to the mizuno shaft optimizer but also recommends head shape based off your answers and swing data. Overall a cool experience but if I were going to buy Wilson irons I would want to test the shafts it recommends

Nice, cool to know, thanks. It sounds a lot more advanced than the Mizuno tool to me from what I've read, particularly that it records a lot more swing parameters and the use of AI to convert that to recommendations. What do you mean shot scope sensor? I'm thinking the Shot Scope club tags, and I think those are just RFID tags, not sensors. The Arccos ones have sensors but I believe they are only sensing the impact (by sound with a mic). 

[HikingMike]

Now let's do some new never-before-done scatter plots! 

 

Driver spin vs iron spin... you can see the average trend here is a diagonal line from bottom left to top right, as something with high spin kind of has high spin on both driver and iron. But, there is variation of course, and that's where the interesting stuff is. Driver spin is on the X axis, iron spin on the Y axis. 

Similar deal here. You would expect a ball with high driver ball speed to also correlate with higher iron ball speed, and vice versa. But there is some variation. That Bridgestone Tour B RXS on the left for instance has a lower driver ball speed than the rest but an iron speed that basically matches the group - odd. The Vice Pro Zero has a similar driver ball speed to the group, but a lower iron ball speed. 

This one below might be interesting if you want both high driver ball speed and high iron spin. That would mean you want to go for what's in an arc on the top right - best ones would be Chrome Soft X, Wilson Staff Model, Pro V1x, Maxfli Tour X

[BreakfastBall15]

43 minutes ago, HikingMike said:

Nice, cool to know, thanks. It sounds a lot more advanced than the Mizuno tool to me from what I've read, particularly that it records a lot more swing parameters and the use of AI to convert that to recommendations. What do you mean shot scope sensor? I'm thinking the Shot Scope club tags, and I think those are just RFID tags, not sensors. The Arccos ones have sensors but I believe they are only sensing the impact (by sound with a mic). 

The sensor is similar in size and that it goes on the butt end of the grip. Not sure if it plugs into anything in the shaft and how it works but I’m pretty sure it’s all Bluetooth. The fitter started explaining everything about it but I had the deer in headlights look 

[Wheelieb]

I’m not gonna lie, you’ve done an amazing job here with the review and testing. Very insightful on a few items about driver and iron spin metrics you posted. Eye opening is probably the best way to describe it. 

[HikingMike]

13 hours ago, Wheelieb said:

I’m not gonna lie, you’ve done an amazing job here with the review and testing. Very insightful on a few items about driver and iron spin metrics you posted. Eye opening is probably the best way to describe it. 

Yeah maybe this fits somewhere better. But I've been wanting to get more information out of the ball test data for a while now. I thought about typing out everything in there into Excel, going robot mode for a while, but never got around to it, since that would be a big pain. Way back, I did try getting Tableau and checking if there was a better way to access the data. As is, it only allows for export to image, PDF, PowerPoint, which is not exporting the data at all, just an image. But with a Tableau account it still did not allow me to download the data. You do have to pay for a lot of things with Tableau it looks like, but my guess is downloading the data is just disabled, which would be completely understandable.

This review, and talk of some of the other ball options, prompted me to give it a go for at least some of the data. I appreciate it.

[HikingMike]

Here is Driver Spin vs. Iron Spin now with a trendline added. I didn't say much before for this one, so here we go.

Balls above/left of the trendline have more iron spin relative to driver spin compared to the others. Balls below/right of the trendline have more driver spin relative to iron spin compared to the others.

So you can see that the Titleist Pro V1x, Pro V1, Callaway Chrome Soft X, and Wilson Staff Model all do a good job having relatively high iron spin while keeping down driver spin. The Wilson Staff Model is on the higher end for spin with both driver and iron there, but the iron spin is pretty high given its driver spin. Eyeballing, it looks like the Pro V1 and Pro V1x have below average driver spin and above average iron spin. Gold star to those two . Ooh actually let me put an average point in there too. Yep, confirmed. The average point is the dark purple one on the line by the Vice Pro Plus.

The Bridgestone Tour B RX, Tour B RXS, and Vice Pro Soft have high driver spin relative to iron spin. The Tour B RX is pretty off-the-chart there . It does have a near average driver spin, but the iron spin is waaaaaay low. The Callaway Chrome Soft and Chrome Soft X LS are also below the line there, though not as far. This is interesting because it makes these two very different from the Chrome Soft X, which had the second highest iron spin.

Basically the others are right on the trendline, including the Wilson Triad on the higher spin part of the line and the Titleist AVX on the low spin side. We'll just pretend the Kirkland isn't there 

Edited April 25 by HikingMike

[Wheelieb]

It was well done. I have enjoyed reading the data you’ve gotten. 

[sg419]

 

1st of all

Great review

 

Still playing the Triad, but not exclusively 

Also play the Bridgestone XS, the 2022 model

I started to play the Bridgestone because they were on sale, but I still come back to the Triad as the ball for me.

Just works for my swing

I just got some Snell Prime 3.0 in and will try them against the Triad

I was a Snell Black player and never would have tried another ball if they still made the Snell Black.

If the Snell doesn't work out,(like the Prime before) then I will play the Triad or the BridgeStone XS, whichever one I can get in yellow and get a good price. 

But I will look for the Triad 1st.

I am a bit nervous about Wilson upgrading the Triad.  It has been out for 2 years and that is typically when OEM's update products.

Until they do, or if they ruin it, I will keep playing it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[HikingMike]

1 hour ago, sg419 said:

1st of all

Great review

 

Still playing the Triad, but not exclusively 

Also play the Bridgestone XS, the 2022 model

I started to play the Bridgestone because they were on sale, but I still come back to the Triad as the ball for me.

Just works for my swing

I just got some Snell Prime 3.0 in and will try them against the Triad

I was a Snell Black player and never would have tried another ball if they still made the Snell Black.

If the Snell doesn't work out,(like the Prime before) then I will play the Triad or the BridgeStone XS, whichever one I can get in yellow and get a good price. 

But I will look for the Triad 1st.

I am a bit nervous about Wilson upgrading the Triad.  It has been out for 2 years and that is typically when OEM's update products.

Until they do, or if they ruin it, I will keep playing it.

Thanks! That's good to bring that up. Wilson did just update the Wilson Staff Model, and now there is a new Staff Model X in addition to Staff Model. Those two could set up very well and I'm interested to see them in this year's ball test. I have no idea about updating the Triad, though it is slightly discounted for a while now.

I have not tried any Snell balls yet myself. 

Thanks for your input.

[McGolf]

I moved from the Triad to the staff ball. Wilson made a massive upgrade there IMO. It is a top notch performer.

[HikingMike]

2 minutes ago, McGolf said:

I moved from the Triad to the staff ball. Wilson made a massive upgrade there IMO. It is a top notch performer.

Hey, good to know. I will definitely check that one out, maybe next buy. 

By the way, after the first post I've since watched a bunch of your videos. Great stuff man!

[Mark Beatty]

I’ve had the Ping G400 set for just over 4 years now. I absolutely love the woods, as they seem to be the most consistent thing for me. The irons get the job done and aren’t bad, but can just also feel clunky sometimes. Also the look to me is kind of weird. The wedges are solid, but I prefer vokey’s over them. Overall, a good set of clubs to have and I have enjoyed my experiences with them!

[HikingMike]

2 hours ago, Mark Beatty said:

I’ve had the Ping G400 set for just over 4 years now. I absolutely love the woods, as they seem to be the most consistent thing for me. The irons get the job done and aren’t bad, but can just also feel clunky sometimes. Also the look to me is kind of weird. The wedges are solid, but I prefer vokey’s over them. Overall, a good set of clubs to have and I have enjoyed my experiences with them!

Hi Mark, welcome to the MyGolfSpy forum! I see that's your first post  You'll have to make an intro post to the "Introduce Yourself" area when you get a chance.

Hey, is there any chance that reply was supposed to go somewhere else? It seems like a different topic.

Edited Monday at 07:19 PM by HikingMike

[hands39]

Been gaming the Wilson Triad balls for the first couple of rounds this year and I have been content with them. Haven't really noticed a difference in switching to them from Maxfli Tour balls (due to availability in EU).

However, they do feel a tiny bit smaller. Not sure if this impacts anything, especially at my level.

Will look to the new Staff balls for the next reload or maybe some Vice offerings. The graph analysis of the ball data is incredible! Helpful to try and pick a ball based on my needs with out the ability to go due a ball fitting. Thank you!

[HikingMike]

3 hours ago, hands39 said:

Been gaming the Wilson Triad balls for the first couple of rounds this year and I have been content with them. Haven't really noticed a difference in switching to them from Maxfli Tour balls (due to availability in EU).

However, they do feel a tiny bit smaller. Not sure if this impacts anything, especially at my level.

Will look to the new Staff balls for the next reload or maybe some Vice offerings. The graph analysis of the ball data is incredible! Helpful to try and pick a ball based on my needs with out the ability to go due a ball fitting. Thank you!

You're welcome! I'm glad that's helpful. I have retrieved the rest of the data now also. If you have an idea for another comparison you would like, I can now do that no problem and provide another scatter plot. Just let me know what - give me club speed, driver/iron, and which two values you'd like compared [ball speed, spin, carry distance, total distance, descent angle, launch angle, max height].

That's great you have also tried the Maxfli Tour. Thanks for mentioning that. I was really curious about that since they seem really popular great balls, but I have never hit them myself. In the data, the Maxfli Tour and the Wilson Triad look very close on ball speed, but the Wilson Triad has more spin. It looks like your level is my level too so your input is useful to know.

I do really want to try the new Staff Model balls also after what I've been hearing, though they do cost significantly more. I guess they are still slightly cheaper than Titleist Pro V1. I have not yet hit a Vice ball either, though they look like a good option in the numbers.

[russtopherb]

Great writeup and review. 

I, like a lot of others, have landed on the Maxfli Tour (S in my case) as my ball for the season, so unfortunately I have no feedback on the Triad. 

[HikingMike]

1 hour ago, russtopherb said:

Great writeup and review. 

I, like a lot of others, have landed on the Maxfli Tour (S in my case) as my ball for the season, so unfortunately I have no feedback on the Triad. 

Thanks! Ah I thought on another thread it sounded like you played Triad before. My bad. Good luck with the Maxfli Tour S. The Maxfli is definitely on my list to try.

[HikingMike]

9 more holes with the Wilson Triad in the books, and I'm still using my third ball! So it's been through 28 holes. And 2 birdies back-to-back! It's been a while since I did that. And I had a good look at eagle, but missed the putt.

Just not losing a ball for that long is a solid victory for me. My driving has definitely been improving over last season, and that was one of my main focuses to start this season. I'm also playing a new driver. I played my usual course from the white tees this time. My 2 leagues play different tees, and it's a big difference, so there is a chance of more danger off the tee a lot of places as things get a little narrower closer to the green. But if I can keep it straight, there is definitely more chance to shoot lower from the white tees. On a couple holes, I had drives that were the closest to the green I've ever had. I've been comfortable and consistent with my medium draw on most tee shots.

My iron play and chipping has been at times really good and other times losing me the most shots. That's on me though. I did have some hop back on a few shots that hit the green - even one pitch that was about 85 yards stopped really well. The greens are less sandy now too so that is probably helping. Putting has also been hot and cold so far this season. I've made some medium and long ones, but also had some trouble on short ones. 

But overall the ball is performing well for me. Let me dig it out and take a closer look at it to see if it has more wear. 

Man that just looks great, and I wish I didn't screw up the last hole or two! Soggy wedge shot was fat and short, and then I blasted my first putt way long too.

Edited Wednesday at 04:23 PM by HikingMike