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Cleveland CG Black Driver Forum Testing Review Thread

SuperStroke
Chunkylover77 said:
Does the magic eraser get rid of the ball marks on the face? Would love to get rid of the nasty heel shot ball marks lol. Just don't want to take the black off with it
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Ok hitting driver in darkness is a pretty difficult task. Good note I made solid contact everytime, carried the lake and airport runway in front of the house and each ball landed in the woods. Bad news, I couldn't see the ball but they all were long to reach the woodline.

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Chunky the magic eraser works pretty well. Sorry for the crappy phone pics, camera is at the office.

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tapatalk
 
That was awesome, SW! That made me laugh!
 
Awesome SW!! Now I will erase all the bad shots and just keep the good ones.
 
haha that is my buddy SW! I love that dude :clapp:. The man goes the extra mile to please huh?
 
Glad I could help! Taking this bad boy to the course tomorrow night for the first time, and the flip camera has fresh batteries. Just don't laugh at my swing :devil:
 
I got out for a quick range session and after some struggle I found my happy tempo and started flushing them. I forgot my tripod, so I'll go back tomorrow and take a few videos.

Most of my misses were push fades with a few thinned pulls both as a result of swinging too hard or bad tempo. The good ones, boy were they good.
 
Great pictures cl and SW, that driver is really beautiful. Loved the picture of mini cl, and lol'ed at swamp balls. Great stuff guys and I think I will by a magic eraser for the face of the R-11.
 
I ran to the house real quick to let the dogs out, and the box from Cleveland has been sitting in my office since 6, since I have been at urgent care and the hospital with my wife. Well, since I was home for 15, I couldn't help myself and had to just see the driver in person. I picked up the box, andit felt like there was nothing in it. My first impression, after pulling it out of the box, is this driver is gorgeous! The all black combination is amazing. The driver weight does not feel too light to me, as my Taylormade tour burner has a 55 gram shaft, so I do not think that will be an issue. It is an inch longer than my current driver, and the head is probably 10 - 20% larger. I really like how the grip feels right out of the box. That is ali have for now. I can't wait to get this to the range and the course, but I have to take care of my wife tonight.
 
chewie69 said:
I can't wait to get this to the range and the course, but I have to take care of my wife tonight.
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Family and loved ones are priorities. This is just about a game.

Extending good energy toward your wife.
 
Great start guys, really feeling this driver and thinking it could be very good long-term for some of you.

Chewie, I hope to see some updates soon - cos that would mean your wife is on the mend! Take care.
 
the_paulo said:
Chewie, I hope to see some updates soon - cos that would mean your wife is on the mend!
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Quoted and bolded for how we all feel.
 
Test Date: 11/14/11
Testing Club: Cleveland Black Driver--10.5* with 39S C Kua shaft
My Club: This will be my gamer but my last 2 drivers have been Razr Hawk and Titleist 910 D2 both with stiff shafts
Ball Used: Range balls
Environment: Windy but pretty nice


So let me talk about the quick session I had the other night. I wanted to hold off on talking about it so that I could see the ball flight and run out during the day, but a sick 7 year old meant no range yesterday. I got the package as I was leaving for work on Monday. Took it to work and was going to wait until I got home so that I could do an unboxing video. Yeah that thought didn’t last long. I had to see it! Well I posted my first impressions earlier so I won’t rehash. Suffice to say I was very impressed with the looks of this driver. Let’s get to the meat!

Got to the range at 8 and it was closing at 9. So I was feeling a little rushed. Took some swings with the wedges to loosen up and got right to work. Picked up the Razr Hawk and took some swings. I hit some nice drives with it and felt like I was ready to start with the Black.

The Black does not feel light to me. I know it is a lighter weight driver. I am someone who also usually feels if something is light. I just don’t feel it with the Black. It feels normal to me in terms of weight. I also don’t feel like it’s overly long. My last few drivers have been 45” and the Black didn’t feel like it was longer than that. What I mean by that is that there was no adjustment time needed for it.

The place I went to had nothing but mats open. The tee on this mat was just a little too high for my liking but it was what I had. Put the ball on the tee and took my address position. First thing I thought was the Black felt perfect. It sits neutral to slightly closed which is how I like my driver. It frames the ball very well. Reminds me slightly of the FT-IZ for some reason. The feeling I get from looking down at the ball with this driver is that I can go ahead and crush the ball. Very confidence inspiring. Took some waggles and the shaft felt quite stout for such a lightweight.

My first few swings were nothing to write home about. Hit 2 toward the heel and pull hooked a couple. Took a deep breath and calmed down. Not sure what was happening. Grabbed the Hawk and hit some nice shots. Grabbed the Black and absolutely murdered a ball with it. That was when the love began lol. Looked at the ball mark and it was a little high on the face but that ball just took off. Got up fairly quickly but just kept going. I have never seen that before. I kept thinking it would drop from the sky like my normal shots and it just kept going. Quite impressive.

The next half hour was more of the same. Lots of shots high on the face that just kept going. Was swapping out the Hawk and the Black and the results were consistent. Both drivers started out on the same trajectory. The Black would just get up a little bit higher and would ride the wave quite a bit longer. The Hawk gave me my usual up in the sky and then drop down like a stone. The Black just kept going. As I said I couldn’t see the roll out because of darkness but I’m betting that I was getting a fair bit of it with the Black.

Right at the end of the session the light at the end of the range finally kicked in. Stupid halogen took forever to finally kick in. This gave me a little bit more sight to see the ending of the drives. So I got down to my last few balls. I wanted to get one more shot with each driver that was hit well. Took the Hawk and hit a very solid drive. There is a green at the end of the range that is about 10-20 yards away from the netting. This drive landed on this green and then had a little bit of rollout. It was about 250 and then some rollout. I picked up the Black and hit my best shot of the night. Looking at the ball mark afterward and it was the first shot that was not too high on the face. This ball just took off like a rocket and kept going. It hit the middle of the net. I don’t know the distance that ball went but it was impressive. This is not my normal range but I’ve been there a few times. I had never hit the net before.

I walk away very impressed after my first range session. The typical shot that I was seeing was a very small fade which I liked. I was able to hit draws/fades/straight shots. Had a couple of stinkers in there but I always do. Hit the ball much higher on the face than I normally do so I’m excited to get this to my usual range and tee it up to my normal height.

The last thing I wanted to touch upon is the shaft. One range session so this is not a definitive answer. I tried a couple of times to overpower this shaft and I couldn’t. Maybe my swing speed just doesn’t get up that high. I think on that last shot it must have gotten pretty high though. Maybe my tempo is smooth enough so that the shaft will keep up with me no matter the speed. I don’t know but I will say that not once did I hit a shot and say the shaft was the problem. I will say it’s not the smoothest feeling shaft that I’ve ever hit. A touch boardy in fact. I don’t care though if it performs. On night 1 it performed very well.

Chewie sorry to hear about the wife. I am sending good vibes your way!
 
Nice start Chunky! Were the lofts of the Razr and D2 also 10.5? Curious for comparison purposes.


Tappin' from my iPad!
 
I just don't understand how one cannot feel the lightness of this driver. It comes with a <40gram shaft. That's at least 20 grams lighter than most everything else out there. Is is head heavy or something?
 
TC said:
I just don't understand how one cannot feel the lightness of this driver. It comes with a <40gram shaft. That's at least 20 grams lighter than most everything else out there. Is is head heavy or something?
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I'm my experience with it TC, I noticed it was significantly lighter in hand, but found that after a swing or two, it wasn't something that I notices or paid attention to.
 
Great initial thoughts. Can't wait to hear more.


Tapatalk
 
TC said:
I just don't understand how one cannot feel the lightness of this driver. It comes with a <40gram shaft. That's at least 20 grams lighter than most everything else out there. Is is head heavy or something?
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I just didn't notice it at the range. Could be that I noticed it at work when I first took it out of the box but I honestly don't remember thinking that it was light. The Swingweight of the driver is D2 which is normal for me. I don't know man. I just started taking swings and never once thought it was light. The shaft weight is actually 47 grams
 
mcook77 said:
Nice start Chunky! Were the lofts of the Razr and D2 also 10.5? Curious for comparison purposes.


Tappin' from my iPad!
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Knew I forgot something!! RH is 10.5 and the D2 was 9.5
 
TC said:
I just don't understand how one cannot feel the lightness of this driver. It comes with a <40gram shaft. That's at least 20 grams lighter than most everything else out there. Is is head heavy or something?
Click to expand...

Chunkylover77 said:
I just didn't notice it at the range. Could be that I noticed it at work when I first took it out of the box but I honestly don't remember thinking that it was light. The Swingweight of the driver is D2 which is normal for me. I don't know man. I just started taking swings and never once thought it was light. The shaft weight is actually 47 grams
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Picking the driver up, one will feel the weight difference in two drivers. However swingweight is what makes a club feel heavy or light in one's hands. Perception mind you altered through weighting and balance.
 
I feel the weight of the driver more while swinging it than holding it. If I can't feel the head of the driver on the swing it seems to monkey with my tempo.
 
Chunkylover77 said:
Knew I forgot something!! RH is 10.5 and the D2 was 9.5
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Cool - thanks! I would also love to see a distance comparison between the D2 and black when you get a chance.


Tappin' from my iPad!
 
Thanks for the write-up, Chunky! I finally got to check out your pics right before bed last night and they look great.
 
Good stuff CL, the high face shots were due to the high tee on the mat, correct. What did you do different to hit the middle of the face? Btw most range nets are about 275. If you hit high then that was a long ball.
 
Chunky has a much nicer looking version of my swing speed and tempo. I'm really liking the results he saw.
 
Tadashi70 said:
Good stuff CL, the high face shots were due to the high tee on the mat, correct. What did you do different to hit the middle of the face? Btw most range nets are about 275. If you hit high then that was a long ball.
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Freddie I wish I knew what I did differently on that last shot in terms of hitting a little lower on the club face. It felt like a normal swing. I did try and put a little into it though. I also was trying for a knucklefade and it came off beautifully. This driver might be perfect for that shot due to the arrows on the grip. It was a very long ball for me. The high face shots were definitely caused by the tee on the mat. Hopefully can get to the range today and hit off grass with my own tee
 
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