I was fortunate enough to be the recipient of a THP giveaway last week. The only request in return was that I post a review of the club. This all came about in part because I recently posted about some wedges I'd purchased from GolfWorks. Long story short, that order was finally delivered after parts were initially on backorder. This is an important part of the review because one of the clubs was a 60° lob wedge with which I've been practicing all weekend.
This afternoon I received the Cleveland CBX2 60°/10° wedge. The intent was to wait until a practice facility was open - one with rough, fairway, sand and hard pan surface to hit from. But one will not be available for a month or longer. Since we've had enough warm weather to melt some of the snow, I instead took it to the field to try it out.
A couple things worth noting. As I talk about probably more than I should, I'm not a very good player and am particularly poor with a 60° wedge in my hands. In addition, it's in my nature to question marketing claims. As a result, I have some opinions regarding OEM equipment and just how much their latest releases can help a player of my ability. The thought did cross my mind that even if legitimate, the technology would be wasted on someone like me. But I was given a gift and simply asked to give this club an honest review. In the end, that's what mattered the most. So the plan was to give it an honest assessment and if the club did not perform, be truthful about it and maybe re-gift it to another THPer.
Testing
The first test for the club tonight would be chipping. This is going to sound very redneck, but all week I've been using two wood piles and the space between them to practice chip shots. In part because it provides a real-world test of loft and roll out, and in part because it had been the only place in my yard free of snow. The goal is to chip it high enough to get over the first pile without it reaching the second pile some 15-20 behind it. As a benchmark, the best I've been able to do with my other lob wedges is about 50%.
On the first attempt, I hit a little thin and the shot failed to carry the first 4' pile. But after that, I was successful on 5 in a row. This got my attention as something just felt different. Up to this point, I believed a 60° wedge would only be useful for short-sided chips or popping a ball over greenside bunker. But that opinion was about to change with my next test.
I collected a dozen or so golf balls, picked a target of thawed ground about a third of the area of a small green. I then went out about 60 yards and started taking 3/4 swings to the target. Of all the things I do poorly at this game, distance control from <100 is as close to a strength as I have (which isn't saying much). But there's no way in the world I'd choose a lob wedge when I have a perfectly good 56° or 49° wedge in the bag. That was before the first three shots with this wedge landed within 5 yards of one another. The next several shots were mixes a bit too high, a bit too low, some decent... BUT... all were online.
Just for grins, I moved up to within 20 yards of the target and tried my version of a flop shot. While I absolutely cannot execute this shot, I opened up the face, took several nearly full swings and was fairly happy with the results.
For the next test, I brought my other 60° wedges out and took turns hitting to that same target some 60 yards away. I'm not going to lie, things went downhill at that point - even with the new Cleveland. Of the three, the Maltby I just built performed the worst - which is very disappointing. Even the old Orlimar did better. After struggling with all three, I finally left the two other wedges in the bag and was soon hitting decent 3/4 approach shots with the CBX2 once again.
Conclusion
Is one evening of hitting from soft, matted-down winter grass enough of a sample size to develop an objective review? Not entirely. I still have to take this club out on the course and play several actual rounds of golf from all the different crappy lies my approach game provides. But there is something very, very good about this wedge. While there were a couple of ugly shots, the Cleveland is simply a better fit of a 60° wedge than my other ones. Maybe it's the grind, or the 10° of bounce. Maybe it's the TT 115g Dynamic Gold shaft, or the weight distribution, or the "Feel Balancing Technology" stamped on the club head. I don't know why it feels better or why I hit better shots with it and honestly, I may never know.
While I might not be ready to drink the golf marketing Kool-Aid yet, I was wrong about equipment not making much of a difference for a high capper. Tonight's two hour workout opened my mind a bit - at least to the possibility that certain clubs and certain tech fit certain swings.
