Driver Fitting and resulting indecison

[Flooder]

Lately I've been pondering whether I'm gaming the right driver/shaft for me. So, yesterday I went to Joe & Leigh's Discount Golf (a top 100 fitter according to Golf Digest) and decided to put myself in their hands. Hitting out onto the range from an indoor bay gave the best of all worlds - sheltered from the elements, trackman data and the ability to see actually ball flight. I did however have some definite frustrations with my experience. $100 for an hour sounded ok to me, but we got so little accomplished and as you'll see from my notes below, moved so fast that I wasn't even able to retain many of the things that happened - what I hit, what the results were, etc. Here's a quick overview...

My fitter gave me some time to warm up while interviewing me about my game and current driver results. For reference, when combining my swing with the SuperTri with regular flex shaft, I get lower than desired ball flight, too much back spin and a fade. When I miss it can be either a higher slice or snap hook. Obviously a lot of that is my swing, but I felt it likely that some could be improved with the right combination of equipment. After the warm up I hit half a dozen with my driver and the results were fairly typical. I was pleased to see that as I wanted to know I was having a "normal" swing day. Ball speed 144, launch 9*, side spin mostly low enough to be in play but with one 800 R and one 800 L, backspin over 3000, carry 240.

At this point it was time to start trying the new toys. The fitter handed me a Titleist D3 with 72 stiff shaft (sorry I forget brand but i'm pretty sure it was the stock offering). Hated everything about this one. Sound, feel, . It was a little longer and the spin was down but my personal dislike was too strong so we moved on. Next the Ping I25. Nothing good happened here. Honestly, I can't even remember what happened with this one. 5 minutes later we're on to the next... We moved to the Callway Big Bertha and immediately I liked the look, feel, etc. The results were ok with the standard stiff shaft and we agreed it was in the running.

I'm thinking, "oh this is fun, wonder what's next?" but no, here he comes with that damned Titleist again touting a change in shaft. So, I hit it and still hate it and now he's got the Big Bertha back in his hands and telling me that he has switched shafts to the Fubuki ZT60 stiff which apparently comes in the Alpha but can be had as a no charge upgrade. Well, I hit this and the results are even better. Ball speed 148, Launch up to 10.5*, side spin all left but moderate and he had it set to draw so probably could be tweaked, backspin down 500 revs to 2500, carry distance up to 248.

You're probably thinking, what's the problem you improved across the board; and you're right. The thing is, I hit 3 clubs in 5 configurations. What about all the other stuff out there on the market. And for the Big Bertha I only hit two of the multitude of possible shafts - are these really the two best options for me? Did this guy know what I needed and guide me to the right driver for me or did we just hit a few and now he's recommending the best of those 3? I may have been unrealistic but kind of thought that for $100 I might get some clarity - I could have done most of what we did yesterday alone in the simulator at Golfsmith for free. What say you?

 

[rtparty]

I know your frustration well. One issue I constantly run into is that fitters only have a couple shafts to mess around with. (Unless you're at a THP event and they have like 50!) The fact is it would cost a TON to carry adapters on a multitude of shafts. Think about needing a dozen different adapters and then a dozen shafts for each. It would get crazy expensive for a store IMO.

Knowing your numbers is the key though. Then you can come on here and post those numbers. There are a ton of great threads and members that will contain all the knowledge you need. The fitter can look though and know what drivers will fit your swing based off those numbers. He may know that the Alpha and SLDR are too low spin for you and take those out of the running. He may know the stock shafts in some other brands won't work and he doesn't have the "upgrades" for you to hit. So knowing your numbers is a very valuable tool.

Hope that helps a little.

 

[blugold]

Devils advocate. Maybe the fitter saw something in your swing that narrowed it down to a few choices from his experience.

 

[Flooder]

I know your frustration well. One issue I constantly run into is that fitters only have a couple shafts to mess around with. (Unless you're at a THP event and they have like 50!) The fact is it would cost a TON to carry adapters on a multitude of shafts. Think about needing a dozen different adapters and then a dozen shafts for each. It would get crazy expensive for a store IMO.

Knowing your numbers is the key though. Then you can come on here and post those numbers. There are a ton of great threads and members that will contain all the knowledge you need. The fitter can look though and know what drivers will fit your swing based off those numbers. He may know that the Alpha and SLDR are too low spin for you and take those out of the running. He may know the stock shafts in some other brands won't work and he doesn't have the "upgrades" for you to hit. So knowing your numbers is a very valuable tool.

Hope that helps a little.

Thanks for the thoughts. Appreciate what you're saying. For what it's worth, they did have dozens and dozens of shafts with each type of tip.

Devils advocate. Maybe the fitter saw something in your swing that narrowed it down to a few choices from his experience.

That's kind of the whole point for me - did he or was it just a matter of not enough time to actually vet all the options? Thanks for your thoughts, man.

 

[Golf Ghost]

If you still have concerns and have his or her contact, I would send then an email with your concerns. Majority of the time they'll be more than happy to answer your questions and follow up with you.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

[tgtt]

Repeat the process at the same place with a different fitter whilst giving the new fitter no info on previous visit and see what clubs he has you hit. Also, read up on all the new toys and request one or two that you find to your liking.

 

[lmh3]

5 set ups, with analysis of each one, seems a little low as far as combinations to try, but nothing that I would feel cheated about. How many combinations did you want to try? It takes time to hit shots with each one, to give feedback, and to analyze the results if they are tight to the one hour time limit, I could see there being time for five to seven different club/shaft combinations.

 

[blugold]

That's kind of the whole point for me - did he or was it just a matter of not enough time to actually vet all the options? Thanks for your thoughts, man.

I can't answer that for you. Did you ask the fitter why only those few options? Also, I got fit for a driver over the winter and am already pondering shafts. It's the nature of the beast. A little bit of knowledge can be dangerous. I know the grass isn't always greener, but I still look at options.

 

[tahoebum]

I think you're frustration with driver fitting is justified. The possible combinations of driver heads, lofts and shafts is infinite so it's difficult for us amateurs to truly optimize our club head/shaft/loft setup. Probably explains why I have 20 drivers in my garage and just bought another one a few minutes ago on ebay(a new Cleveland Classic XL Custom with a Miyazaki JDL shaft).

I honestly swing differently inside on a simulator than I do outside on a range or on the course during a round. The best fitting results for me have been outside with a Trackman but a fitting session is still only a guide. It can certainly eliminate shafts/clubheads that don't agree with my swing but I certainly don't swing a driver the same every day and the odds of going through one fitting session and finding your holy grail driver are slim. I have to actually put the club in play for a few rounds before I really know. I also can't swing it as fast early in the season or if I haven't played in a few weeks so I own a few driver heads in both an x flex and a stiff flex.

 

[rtparty]

I will also add that it took Freddie (Tadashi70) about 2 swings from me to know the shaft and driver head for my swing.

 

[golfinFF]

Like was said earlier the fitter could have seen something in your swing that just wasn't gonna work with many options. I think if that is the case maybe he should of said something about it after the fitting.

From your numbers I am guessing the fitter was trying to lower your spin with out dropping your LA. Based on the numbers with the bertha and fubuki your SS is right around 100.

 

[mark blanchard]

First I want to thank you for your extremely candid summary of your fitting experience. You have highlighted, either intentionally or unintentionally, many of the shortcomings and limitations of the fitting process. I'd like to revisit a couple of them and give you my take on what you experienced.

First thing you discovered -- one hour isn't enough time. Too true. Your fitter squeezed in as much as he probably could have in an hour, but there's only so much can be done in that time. You were fairly served in this regard, I believe. Which raises the question -- how much "professional fitting" can the average Joe be expected to afford? The answer is "not much". If you really want to make some good progress and see a broad spectrum of stuff, you'll have to do most of the work yourself. Use your pro fittings for big picture details only and fine tune on your own from there. If you established your basics of shaft weight, flex, launch, length and SS in your pro fitting, you've done well. Go back and ask to rent other heads and shaft combo that utilize what you learned in the fitting to see if you improve or get worse slightly as you bang balls. Play with the tip adapter settings on your own time. You might eliminate a bunch more possibles this way, before you go back for a verification session with your fitter.

Second, you were REALLY smart to spend your money where you did. Respected fitter, outdoors to see real ball flight, and with a doppler system. For my two bits, the photo systems hit indoors are pretty much useless. Doubly so if you have an inexperienced knucklehead manning the machine. Hitting indoors, into the net, off a matt is just too foreign, and the photo systems (even the vaunted GC2) just guess too much. Example, I saw a famous British Youtube club reviewer do one of his 5 ball driver match-ups recently and I saw him keep (and not discard as aberrant) one anomalously long drive that only had a backspin number of about 1500. This was about 700 rpms lower than any other drive in the set. Since he was using a GC2 which guesstimates distance using the inputs of ball speed, launch angle and spin, if it fails to read spin correctly, it will screw up the distance estimated. I would have tossed that aberrant drive out as a miss-read, but he didn't catch it, and that long drive enabled its club to "win" its 5 ball match. With doppler, false reads are much less frequent. Good choice going with Trackman or Flightscope.

Thirdly, the one factor that is hardest to see in a quick fitting is FITTER BIAS. While it is true that your fitter may have pushed you towards certain shaft and head combos because: a) that's what he had available, or b) that's what he thought you'd do well with; it's equally possible that he kept pushing the Titleist under your nose because he's a Titleist Staff pro or he makes more money selling Titleist. If you find a good way to eliminate the Fitter Bias factor, let me know. In the meantime, be cognizant of it.

Fourthly, be aware that making any big buying decisions based on A HALF DOZEN SWINGS per club in ONE SESSION is the height of stupidity. Your sample size is simply too small to glean much concrete information out of your experience. Stats 101 teaches that the smallest statistically valid sample size for any test is 40. That's forty good swings per COMBINATION, not forty swings overall. And if you're really being objective about your test, ask yourself how many "bad" swings should you toss out in your test as aberrant? A driver that gives you 30 beauties but 10 wicked duck hooks probably shouldn't be considered, should it? You shouldn't ignore all the bads.

All in all, I think you've done well by eliminating the clubs and shafts you didn't like. Now you can focus more on what you did like and you've established a baseline from which to compare other clubs. If you've mated well to the Alpha with Fubuki Stiff, you'll very quickly begin to see how far it goes on the range and how consistent it is. Then you'll be able to bring in a similarly configured rental demo and hit half a bucket side by side with your preferred driver and see which is better. You can do this on your own time for very little money. That's what I do.

Good luck and thanks for sharing!

 

[arydolphin]

I would contact Joe and Leigh's tomorrow and tell them about your frustration. Your thread interests me because I'm thinking about getting fit there later this year. Did you ask to check out other clubs before you left the fitting? Sometimes even though fittings are scheduled for a particular time, fitters will work with you for longer if they don't have another fitting scheduled behind you, perhaps you could have asked for that. That said, hopefully they will make it right for you if you talk to them about your fitting and how you don't feel like it was thorough enough.

 

[Flooder]

First I want to thank you for your extremely candid summary of your fitting experience. You have highlighted, either intentionally or unintentionally, many of the shortcomings and limitations of the fitting process. I'd like to revisit a couple of them and give you my take on what you experienced.

First thing you discovered -- one hour isn't enough time. Too true. Your fitter squeezed in as much as he probably could have in an hour, but there's only so much can be done in that time. You were fairly served in this regard, I believe. Which raises the question -- how much "professional fitting" can the average Joe be expected to afford? The answer is "not much". If you really want to make some good progress and see a broad spectrum of stuff, you'll have to do most of the work yourself. Use your pro fittings for big picture details only and fine tune on your own from there. If you established your basics of shaft weight, flex, launch, length and SS in your pro fitting, you've done well. Go back and ask to rent other heads and shaft combo that utilize what you learned in the fitting to see if you improve or get worse slightly as you bang balls. Play with the tip adapter settings on your own time. You might eliminate a bunch more possibles this way, before you go back for a verification session with your fitter.

Second, you were REALLY smart to spend your money where you did. Respected fitter, outdoors to see real ball flight, and with a doppler system. For my two bits, the photo systems hit indoors are pretty much useless. Doubly so if you have an inexperienced knucklehead manning the machine. Hitting indoors, into the net, off a matt is just too foreign, and the photo systems (even the vaunted GC2) just guess too much. Example, I saw a famous British Youtube club reviewer do one of his 5 ball driver match-ups recently and I saw him keep (and not discard as aberrant) one anomalously long drive that only had a backspin number of about 1500. This was about 700 rpms lower than any other drive in the set. Since he was using a GC2 which guesstimates distance using the inputs of ball speed, launch angle and spin, if it fails to read spin correctly, it will screw up the distance estimated. I would have tossed that aberrant drive out as a miss-read, but he didn't catch it, and that long drive enabled its club to "win" its 5 ball match. With doppler, false reads are much less frequent. Good choice going with Trackman or Flightscope.

Thirdly, the one factor that is hardest to see in a quick fitting is FITTER BIAS. While it is true that your fitter may have pushed you towards certain shaft and head combos because: a) that's what he had available, or b) that's what he thought you'd do well with; it's equally possible that he kept pushing the Titleist under your nose because he's a Titleist Staff pro or he makes more money selling Titleist. If you find a good way to eliminate the Fitter Bias factor, let me know. In the meantime, be cognizant of it.

Fourthly, be aware that making any big buying decisions based on A HALF DOZEN SWINGS per club in ONE SESSION is the height of stupidity. Your sample size is simply too small to glean much concrete information out of your experience. Stats 101 teaches that the smallest statistically valid sample size for any test is 40. That's forty good swings per COMBINATION, not forty swings overall. And if you're really being objective about your test, ask yourself how many "bad" swings should you toss out in your test as aberrant? A driver that gives you 30 beauties but 10 wicked duck hooks probably shouldn't be considered, should it? You shouldn't ignore all the bads.

All in all, I think you've done well by eliminating the clubs and shafts you didn't like. Now you can focus more on what you did like and you've established a baseline from which to compare other clubs. If you've mated well to the Alpha with Fubuki Stiff, you'll very quickly begin to see how far it goes on the range and how consistent it is. Then you'll be able to bring in a similarly configured rental demo and hit half a bucket side by side with your preferred driver and see which is better. You can do this on your own time for very little money. That's what I do.

Good luck and thanks for sharing!

Thanks for the pep talk and insights. You make many good points especially about how much was accomplished in the time I had. Looking back, there's no question I was expecting too much out of an hour. That said, I might have saved the $100 bucks and just fit myself. I'm pretty well informed about my golf swing and stats. Oh well; still a fun experience.

I would contact Joe and Leigh's tomorrow and tell them about your frustration. Your thread interests me because I'm thinking about getting fit there later this year. Did you ask to check out other clubs before you left the fitting? Sometimes even though fittings are scheduled for a particular time, fitters will work with you for longer if they don't have another fitting scheduled behind you, perhaps you could have asked for that. That said, hopefully they will make it right for you if you talk to them about your fitting and how you don't feel like it was thorough enough.

Thanks Ary. Let me just make clear for everyone though that it was not my intention to disparage this facility. They were very welcoming to me, professional, knowledgeable and WELL stocked. I was more disappointed in how little an hour can accomplish than in anything that they "did". Unfortunately there was another fitting waiting to go when we finished, so I don't know whether he'd have given me a few more minutes or not. I know what I would do if I were doing it over. I'd make a deal with them for two hours with two golfers and have him bounce back and forth (if they'd agree to it). I didn't need him to stand there and watch every swing, but I did need more time with the clubs I liked and more opportunity to hit a larger variety for my own peace of mind that I tried "everything".

 

[Wicked Cool Bearded Man]

Thanks for the thoughts and feedback. I think that everything you experienced was legit, from excitement to anger to disappointment. My gut feeling is he kept pushing the Titleist because the numbers were good. Even though you weren't crazy about it, numbers don't lie. I had a similar experience with irons several years back. Same deal, I couldn't get myself to like them no matter what even though the numbers were good. Fortunately I found a set up that was even better numbers wise and that I loved. Hopefully you find the same thing. Sorry you felt disappointed. Hopefully it gives you some good information to go on in the future.

 

[mark blanchard]

Thanks for the thoughts and feedback. I think that everything you experienced was legit, from excitement to anger to disappointment. My gut feeling is he kept pushing the Titleist because the numbers were good. Even though you weren't crazy about it, numbers don't lie. I had a similar experience with irons several years back. Same deal, I couldn't get myself to like them no matter what even though the numbers were good. Fortunately I found a set up that was even better numbers wise and that I loved. Hopefully you find the same thing. Sorry you felt disappointed. Hopefully it gives you some good information to go on in the future.

I agree with this statement.

Sometimes you just have to overcome your own dislike or first impression if the numbers tell you a different story. All my current clubs, save the putter, are clubs I did not set out to purchase. All were adopted after either fitter recommendations or after side-by-side comparisons where they kicked my gamer out of the bag. To be honest, I hated my RBZ fairway woods' white-crowned, art deco tops so much, I spray painted them black. And I've never liked my Speedblades blue zig-zaggy backs. Fortunately I don't have to look at them much. My Optiforce is a pretty driver head to look at, but I never thought I'd settle on it and I tried to boot it out of the bag with both the Berthas. Sadly, I failed. I must just have a good head/shaft combo on that Opti that works for me.

While it's true that numbers don't lie, monitors can lie (through misreadings or intentional set-up manipulation). and monitor technicians certainly can -- if they have ulterior motives. I think getting good numbers on a monitor is only the first step. Then you have to take it to the range for multiple buckets and then on-course for real world situations.