I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it yet once more – the pros in the game of golf are using equipment meant to help hackers and amateurs play golf better, and they shouldn’t be permitted to do so.
It’s the equipment makers who actually rule golf today, not the associations – every time there is talk of bifurcation to equipment (different clubs and balls than what is offered to lower-skilled players of golf), they scream and threaten to sue.
It’s easy to see why – every deluded amateur out there who thinks they will become Rory McIlroy if they use the same driver he has, are putting money in the club makers’ pockets – and the same for the ball manufacturers.
Just look at the difference between my 1990’s Callaway Big Bertha and the TaylorMade RBZ from this era:
I can hit that Big Bertha and would happily put it in the bag if told I had to play with it, if everyone else did as well.
If pros are going to compete for millions of dollars and call themselves the best in the world – so should they be able and required to!
But now, we get to hear that the pros themselves aren’t satisfied with what they get out of their souped-up gear meant for plonkers to be able to get the ball off the tee and to the greens – according to former U.S. Open Champion Lucas Glover, they’re cheating on the equipment testing meant to keep them honest.
Let me say right now that I do not suspect Rory McIlroy of cheating – he gave the testers the same driver he was going to be using at the PGA Championship and it was found to be non-conforming.
Which means, he in all likelihood had no idea it had become so, if he handed it over to be tested.
The usual way a driver becomes nonconforming is that the face thins from constant impacts with the ball and, before it breaks, it becomes to “bouncy” and exceeds the limit of trampoline effect given to the ball, increasing ball speed and distance.
Rory hits a lot of balls. He gave his driver to the testers. It failed. It happens.
Scottie Scheffler himself is also no cheater, because he readily admitted that his own driver had failed testing and he had to use another, going on to win the event anyway.
But this… this below is disgusting.
In this Golf.com article by Josh Sens, Lucas says (bolding and underlines are mine):
“I’ve been trying to think all morning and all day how to say this without sounding like it’s gonna sound, but most guys don’t give them their real driver anyway,” Glover offered when his co-host, Taylor Zarzour, asked why testing isn’t conducted across the board.
“They give them their backup just in case. No, it’s true. And the testing is the way it is, why, and again, I know a lot of guys, they keep two drivers in their bag just in case. ‘Hey, oh, yeah, it’s this one. It’s this one right here. Yeah, do this, test this one.’”
Cheating. No other way to put it, if you read that.
“Just in case” of what? In case they get chosen for club testing and know their actual driver is no longer conforming or never did?
That’s cheating.
It’s not enough that they’re using ridiculous equipment as pros, they can’t even be trusted to honor the spirit of self-policing that the game initially became famous for – pros turning themselves in after committing a rules violation and missing cuts, being disqualified and even losing out on winning an event out of honesty and love of the game.
No – many of them are actually trying to cheat the club testing.
It’s time to go back to the days of stainless steel driver heads, wound balls (or balls that behave in the same manner) and blade irons and wedges.
Let the amateurs play whatever equipment gives them joy, but the pros, if they’re so good, can play with the equipment that separates the good from the bad, and that can’t be cheated with.
Just my opinion.
WAX Golf 
Was talking to a club fitter today who works on the tours,and he says that the crazy modern lofts they make the clubs today (a 4 iron having the same loft as a 1 iron being a huge example) is messing up the games of even players who’ve won majors.Course management,feel, and strategy is going out the window.
I’m actually shocked reading that statement about the backup drivers.Talk about a lack of integrity!!
“It’s time to go back to the days of stainless steel driver heads, wound balls (or balls that behave in the same manner) and blade irons and wedges.” Hear,hear. I switched to blades two years ago and have never been happier.Would love to use the old metalheads or even persimmon,but alas,the modern ball does not suit.
The longest drives I ever hit on the golf course (350-375y) were with a used KZG PFT-300, circa 2002 with a regular flex shaft and 9 degrees of loft, that I had been given back in ’08, and I used it until I broke the face in early 2010.
Here I am with it in September 2009, aged 39, driving one about 345 yards:
—–
Give me just about any club, I’ll hit it. I know where the sweet spot, regardless of the head size.
Wow! Some speed! You went through that swing alright
With all humility, silly, I was always able to hit the ball long – first year taking any lessons in ’97, I borrowed my instructor’s driver (it was titanium, very exotic at the time) and reached a 550y par 5 with driver (330) and 5 iron out of the light rough just off the fairway.
My thing was always accuracy and consistency, I never had any issues with power generation. Played baseball in my youth so, a swing is a swing.
My instructor, by the way, when I got back to the range clubhouse from my round and told him about it, scowled and said, “Give me back my driver.” 😂😂
I would be good with 1991 as the cut off period which is the same year the Big Bertha came out. And you know what? The Big Bertha as DJ just demonstrated, really wasn’t that big. I would not to go back to much earlier else all the persimmon forests would be cut down.
Totally in agreement, Sir Chief – we don’t want to go back to wooden heads, so 1990’s new stainless headed clubs would be the right place to go back to. The Big Bertha was barely larger than the persimmon heads, and the Titleist driver that TW used in 2000 is virtually the same size.
Big Bertha was 190cc’s in size, just round up to 200 cc’s max. With either wound balls or such that mimic the same properties in spin and distance.
Let’s see them swing the way they’re swinging today, with that equipment. The Classic Golf Swing would quickly outclass all other mechanical models and injuries would magically begin to go away with the swing changes.