For the past few years, the PGA Merchandise Show in Orlando has featured the world's greatest demo day. All of the manufacturers setup their latest products in mass at the Orange County National Golf Center in Winter Park, FL. Its a 600 yard diameter circular practice tee. Not even the world's longest hitters can sniff the other side of this thing. It takes about 5-6 hours or more to make it all the way around if you stop and hit a few balls at each manufacturer's station. Callaway, Ping, Nike, Titleist, you name it and they are there.
For someone like me who sits in the office of a golf store all day, its the one chance a year I have to see all of the new products at once. The best stations are those setup by the grip and shaft companies. They have all of the newest heads from the big boys, but they have their shaft or grip installed. Its an easy one stop shop to hit lots of different companies side by side. I found the Graphite Design shafts to fit me best, and I particularly liked the new "Q" shafts they have out. I was hitting an Adams A3 driver on a Q 65 Stiff that was just working perfectly.
SeeMore Putters had the best new putters in my opinion. That simple little red dot in the heel helped me make more puts that with any other putter I tried. I also found that the Odyssey chipper, The Marxman, made it so easy to chip from simple greenside lies, that I don't think I'd need to learn how to chip with any other club. I recommend one of those for anyone who has the chipping yips.
We tested the new Mizuno MP-600 driver with the movable weights. I hit balls with it set to complete draw mode, and with it set to complete fade mode, and I hit them the same. Maybe I'm just not the golfer they are looking for on that one. I hit it great both ways. It wasn't a bad thing, but my swing didn't prove their physics.
Adams still wins the Hybrid war with a new Fairway Hybrid called the Insight XTD. I tried a 14.5 degree model and it was VERY easy to get in the air. Coming in a close second was the Nike Sumo Square Hybrid. I tried the #4 hybrid and hit it as high as I normally hit my 7 iron. If you're looking for height on your long irons, look into one of these two in 2008.
The GPS Range Finder battle is about to get very sticky also. A new company will debut in April called U Play Tech. They have a proprietary technology that basically reinvents how you think about those GPS devices. Theirs is designed a lot like an iPod, and includes video flyovers of the holes, point to point custom distance measuring, and lays the distances over an actual image of the hole. They are using satellite photos to create realistic views of the course right on their hand held device.
The PGA Merchandise Show doesn't officially start until tomorrow, and I'll be back to bring you more goodies.
CS
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