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Big Bertha Alpha Driver Review

SuperStroke
Anyone who is pondering the Alpha holding out until the 10.5* comes out? I know you can adjust the loft up to 9* right now but I would rather start out at 10.5 and go from there. Now the wait until 4/1...
 
greggdrews said:
Anyone who is pondering the Alpha holding out until the 10.5* comes out? I know you can adjust the loft up to 9* right now but I would rather start out at 10.5 and go from there. Now the wait until 4/1...
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For that low spin monster to have a shot at working for me, I would much rather have the head that starts at 10.5. I know you can get the 9 up to that range, but I'd rather not have the closed face that would correspond with increasing the loft.
 
adwillingham said:
For that low spin monster to have a shot at working for me, I would much rather have the head that starts at 10.5. I know you can get the 9 up to that range, but I'd rather not have the closed face that would correspond with increasing the loft.
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I have the 9* dialed up to 11* and its not an issue (re. closed face).
 
greggdrews said:
Anyone who is pondering the Alpha holding out until the 10.5* comes out? I know you can adjust the loft up to 9* right now but I would rather start out at 10.5 and go from there. Now the wait until 4/1...
Click to expand...

I like my face to be super open (2° or more) so I'm holding out for the 10.5 on 4/1. I'm in the last part of my selling spree to make sure I have enough money when it comes out. Going to do one last shootout vs the SLDR 12° before I pull the trigger.
 
fupresti said:
I have the 9* dialed up to 11* and its not an issue (re. closed face).
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Agreed. I don't notice the closed face. I have it at 10*.
 
ATLGolfer said:
Agreed. I don't notice the closed face. I have it at 10*.
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Noticing and knowing for me are on the far ends of a spectrum. If you handed me a closed face driver and tell me it's 6° open I will hold the face that way and probably be fine. If I know the face is 2° closed I'll do nothing but over draw the ball. Sucks to be weird in my head sometimes =-). Th silliest things eat at me. LOL
 
Had a chance to hit the Alpha at PGA Tour Superstore today and I was very impressed. I hit the 9* switched up to 11* and got great spin numbers but launch was still a little low. Still got roughly 260-265 carry so figure I get that launch up I'll be golden. Gonna hold out til the 10.5* comes out as I prefer more of an open face than a closed face. Can't wait.
 
I know this is the Internet and everyone hits the ball 300, but today I was on a 281 yard par 4 and decided to just let loose with the Alpha. My swing has been feeling good so I just ripped one with a bit of a draw and sure enough the ball lands on the green on the fly and it bounces back into the fence behind the green. It wasn't about the length, it was the confidence that I had that shot in the bag and pulled it off.

I love this driver.
 
Ordered my Alpha today! Can't wait to get her in and get her tuned up. Decided to go with the Aldila Tour Blue stiff at 45 inches instead of the stock shaft to help get my launch up just a bit more.
 
I mussed around with the Alpha more over the weekend in the 11* setting. I'm still getting a touch too much draw and would like to see a bit more launch angle. Getting 15* and 1800 spin hitting above the center line. Can't wait for the Alpha 10.5 and SLDR 14 to hit the market and figure out what's going to possibly replace my G25.

Does anyone know if they offer weights in the 14g range? I would like to get the swing weight up a touch higher.
 
Lead tape not work?
 
That is pretty good spin and launch angle though.
 
I'm leaning towards flipping the gravity core up on the Alpha. It's more so to help my misses than enhance my hits.

When I strike the driver well (with core down), I have a nice ball flight that seems to carry well and then gets some rollout. As I've noted before, I'm hitting the Alpha in spots where I haven't been before on the course.

At the same time, the lowered spin gets pretty penal on misses, especially bad misses. Mishits low on the heel (the "pro" corner, as I like to call it) have caused some low sinkers that seemed to fall out of the air quickly. I'm thinking that the gravity core up may help with forgiveness a little bit.

With that said, I need to see how the Alpha reacts to well struck shots with the gravity core up. The ball definitely gets higher from my range testing, but I don't know how distance is affected (although it seems shorter). The answer may be that I just need to get back to being more consistent with my driver swing.
 
I played probably my 10th round with the Big Bertha Alpha today, and I am loving it. I am hitting it 10 to 15 yards longer than my Optiforce 440. I attribute most of that to optimizing launch angle and minimizing spin with the BBA.

Today I got a nice surprise. I hit 3 drives badly off the heel. I felt like these would have been shanks had I been hitting an iron. The surprise was that the ball flew high and straight down the middle of the fairway. Each of these drives were only about 10 to 15 yards behind where a really good drive would have been. In the past, heeled drives have always been a low slice with considerable loss of distance. I've heard some say the BBA is not very forgiving, but I'm finding it to be at least as forgiving as the Optiforce 440.
 
The forgiveness of the Alpha has surprised me as well. I've put some pretty terrible swings on this driver that have still given me pretty good results. Distance is affected, but I'm still in the field of play.
 
ATLGolfer said:
The forgiveness of the Alpha has surprised me as well. I've put some pretty terrible swings on this driver that have still given me pretty good results. Distance is affected, but I'm still in the field of play.
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Have you finished your testing with the core up for more forgiveness?
 
I had an R1 in play at the Grandaddy and it was the club that was directly compared to the Alpha during fitting. Yesterday I played my first full 18 with the Alpha on a course I last had my R1. I hit twice as many fairways, and was longer on my longest drives with the Alpha! I was even asked about what driver I was playing because the sound was liked by those in my group. Now, I went down from 46" and stiff with the R1 to 45" and X Stiff with the Alpha. Inexperienced fitters have always told me that I would be giving up distance for accuracy by going stiffer... This was not the case yesterday. I was straighter AND longer. I wasn't even trying to kill the ball either. I was just hitting the ball with the center of the face more often; distance came with the better quality hit.

So, if anyone is playing an R1, this should be a step-up, if you can go through a fitting and get the right shaft and the correct length. One thing to note on club length, only one tour player fit at ECPC plays a club longer than 45", and it's only a 1/4" or 1/2" longer. I would HIGHLY recommend that when anyone goes through a fitting to get a fitter to fit for length. Maybe the Alpha wouldn't be misconstrued as being for "accomplished" golfers and not for amateurs then.

Just be careful. If you get fit, start hitting the center of the face, and see the ball landing in places you previously thought impossible; you'll be figuring out how to find the $ for this bad boy!!!!
 
Finally got together with my instructor today and got my BBA set up and ready to go, since coming back from the winter I've been really struggling with my weight transfer which has been causing me to hit some really incredibly crappy low pull hooks but I think we were able to get a good starting point to begin from then possibly tinker a bit more when my swing really gets back in order. As of right now I'm set up at 11 degrees, 1 gram weight in the heel, 7 gram weight in the toe, and gravity core down. I was so impressed with this driver and the ball flight I was getting on a good swing but I'm also blown away by the forgiveness of this club. The roll out is just sick, can't wait to get her our on the course!
 
ChristopherKee said:
Have you finished your testing with the core up for more forgiveness?
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I still have the gravity core up right now.

My swing is actually a mess, and I'm finding that increasing the spin rate is giving me a little more forgiveness on miss-hits. I need to get my swing straightened out before locking in on any particular settings, though.
 
ATLGolfer said:
I still have the gravity core up right now.

My swing is actually a mess, and I'm finding that increasing the spin rate is giving me a little more forgiveness on miss-hits. I need to get my swing straightened out before locking in on any particular settings, though.
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Was in golfsmith Friday took about 10 - 15 swings with the BBA. It was in Core up, 9* with the X-stiff shaft, 7 in heel, 1 in toe. This is the opposite of what I had it set to last time (11*, reversed weights, core down), and it was like hitting a completely different driver. Spin was averaging about 800 more (close to 3000), launch was lower and distance was less.

Its amazing how much changing that core affects dynamics of the club. I can see what you're saying about more forgiveness, it curved less on my bad swings, but it was killing me everywhere else. So cool the same driver can act so differently.
 
Played in a company tournament today. Long drive hole? Alpha nets me a 295 yard bomb for the win.
 
I hit JBs this weekend. I think it was set to 11* with the gravity core up down. My swing has been out of sorts lately but I was very surprised by the forgiveness. As far as can tell, the Alpha is a winner.
 
Jeff Spicoli said:
I hit JBs this weekend. I think it was set to 11* with the gravity core up down. My swing has been out of sorts lately but I was very surprised by the forgiveness. As far as can tell, the Alpha is a winner.
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You hammered that ball. Hammered it.
 
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