Club Champion - Philadelphia fitting experience

millsan1

I've figured this game out! Oh wait, no I haven't
Joined
Jul 16, 2018
Messages
3,493
Reaction score
2,687
Location
Eastern PA
Handicap
14?
My fiancee turns 40 today, and one of the presents I gave her was a club fitting, at Club Champion, which we did yesterday.

I need to make some statements here, to level set:

I believe in fitted gear.

She is a beginner, recreational golfer.

She was not having a good swing day yesterday. Shots were much shorter than her normal, she can drive it 170-180 all day, every day. She was hitting 150. Her 7 Iron is her 100 yard, go to shot. She was hitting that 70. So something was up.

I am not bashing here. I am documenting one fitting, with one person, and putting up my opinions, not making statements of fact.




We arrived and were greeted and she was put out into the hitting bay to warm up.

The fitter was a great guy and was very pleasant.


I stayed out of the bay for the most part, but an hour in I was too bored, so I went in to watch and shag her balls, as she was fetching them after each round of shots, which I thought a bit odd. I would have expected the fitter to be shagging her balls.


As the fitting progressed, a few things came up where it would have been good of the fitter to help, where I had to step in. When she got to driver, she was badly topping almost every head he gave her to try. Why? Because she was teeing the ball up to her normal driver height, but with all the new heads, which are much larger, the ball was teed too low. I saw it. Let it go for a bit, but then had to tell her to tee it up higher. Once that was done, she was hitting the other drivers better.


The last hour of the fitting, she was shot, physically and maybe mentally. She was barely swinging at the ball, and basically hitting with a body language that said "I'm done, let's just get this over with". Her clubhead speed was way down from the beginning of the session, no backswing to speak of, no follow through, literally going through the motions. Given that, I don't think very useful info was being gathered at that point. I would have thought the fitter would have seen this, and suggested a break, or whatever, but the fitting went on.


Through all of this, I believe the only thing we found that improved over her current bag was irons. She hit the new Big Berthas pretty well compared to her clubs. Fitter agreed that her Driver is probably OK for now, and offered a refit on the driver, at a later date, if she wanted.

There were improvements available to her in the hybrids as well, but not as dramatic.

Putter fitting was offered, but she declined, mostly because she was completely fried at that point.


At the end, a set of clubs was suggested for her. Now I understand that Club Champion does not make their money doing these fittings. I know they need to sell clubs, and if she was hitting her normal shots, and we saw improvement that warranted a custom set of clubs, I was ready to pull the trigger. But that was not the case yesterday. She was off, physically shot by the end, and the improvements we saw on the irons were about 10 yards and tighter dispersion.

The suggested clubs were some hybrids, 7-GW and a wood or two, I don't remember, but it was a bit more than half a bag. The dollar figure made my eyes water. We are talking about a recreational golfer, who was having an off day, and I think it was clear she was not providing much useful info that last hour she was in the fitting.

When I declined and said that it was a lot more than what I was thinking coming in, the session became very used car salesy in my opinion. "Well how much did you want to spend?" "I can remove this, cut this down, go with a different head, etc to get closer to your number". So now we are not fitting her to the best equipment, we are trying to sell some gear. Again, I understand the need to sell gear, but the way they present themselves is one of "let's find you the best gear for you", not "Let's find the best gear for you, then downgrade the shafts, change the grips, go with the cheaper clubhead that you didn't really hit well, so I can make a sale"

So really, my biggest gripe is that I think the fitting went OK, but there were items I think could have been better (shagging her own balls, tee it up, doing something about her clearly physically or mentally shot state at the end).

It might make sense to ask budget range when starting the session, so you are not testing $300 shafts for a golfer who is not going to spend that kind of scratch. I understand that contradicts the idea of best for you, but it is really wasted effort if there is no way the customer is going to spend that kind of dollar figure.

I ended up buying a sand wedge that she hit pretty well, because she needs one, I felt bad about not buying anything and I am a softy at heart.

Overall, I think a more accomplished golfer, with a larger checkbook, would benefit from this. For a beginner, I think this level of fitting is probably too much, but a fitting definitely helps. I had my clubs fit a few months ago, which I documented in a different thread. I swung about 10-20 times, and he dialed me into much better fit. Changed a lot about my game. It is in no way as thorough and advanced and scientific as the Club Champion method, but I have seen noticeable improvements. I put all new grips, new shafts on all clubs and adjusted some of my clubs. Cost was less than 2 of the shafts that were suggested for her, and I am a lot better than she is and take my game a lot more seriously.

In a year or two, if I progress as I intend, I see myself coming back for my own fitting, and would be OK spending the $ figures I was presented with.
 
I think one thing that would be beneficial if you were to return of any fitting in that case, is that if budget is a concern, talk about it upfront. There's a difference between fitting what is best for someone's game and what is best for someone's wallet.

Worked with one of the better fitters in Canada for years. One of his first question was in regards to budget. Then he was able to fit what fit the golfer best within their budget.

This is more just a general thought for anyone being fit, not just this scenario. If the fitter doesn't ask, be upfront about it.
 
I think one thing that would be beneficial if you were to return of any fitting in that case, is that if budget is a concern, talk about it upfront. There's a difference between fitting what is best for someone's game and what is best for someone's wallet.

Worked with one of the better fitters in Canada for years. One of his first question was in regards to budget. Then he was able to fit what fit the golfer best within their budget.

This is more just a general thought for anyone being fit, not just this scenario. If the fitter doesn't ask, be upfront about it.

I am not broke, and am willing to spend $, but for what basically amounted to a little better iron set, the dollar figure was a decent used car.
 
I am not broke, and am willing to spend $, but for what basically amounted to a little better iron set, the dollar figure was a decent used car.

Then you did the right thing by making the decision to walk away.

Was more just a general statement, not about your personal willingness to spend.
 
You're probably right that a club champion fitting might be overkill for a beginner. I'd say get equipment that looks good, feels good, and is in the right ball park for length, shaft, and weight. The hard sell would be off-putting for me too...
 
OP, some of what you describe is precisely what terrifies me about CC. As with anything I am sure it is also very much also luck of the draw on which fitter you get, etc. Anyhow, sorry to hear it wasn't a good experience because fittings really should be something totally fun.
 
I went to a CC fitting yesterday. I went in prior to my fitting and told them my situation (getting fit for the Srixon Event) and told them what I wanted to do. I think it makes sense for a “serious” golfer to get fit. I can’t say that I would spend that kind of dough on the clubs that they present, but they can give good ideas. I didn’t have to deal with the hard sale, but they did sort of bad mouth the oem’s and how they build clubs and they wanted me to bring my clubs in to get them rebuilt. I won’t be doing that. I actually really liked my fitter and would go back to him. I am glad that I set up the parameters before the fitting.
 
I think they are a bit pricey myself. It's not like you can't get a good fitting elsewhere and spend a lot less money in the process, plus many places you are inside and hit to an outdoor range, and can see the actual ball flight as well as get all the number you would need. Might be just me, but I am not a big fan of indoor fittings.
 
Back
Top