The Live Update thread for the 2021 Project X Experience with Mizuno is here.
A couple of months ago we held a contest where the lucky winner was given an all expenses paid trip to GA and while there he will visit the Mizuno Production Facility in Braselton, GA get fit for a new custom Project X driver shaft and play golf at the beautiful Chateau Elan. Today that event kicks off.
You will be able to follow along with the entire THP Experience live below. Questions will get answered in the ask us anything portion of the week, golf will be played and everybody will have a front row seat. This lucky THP forum member is about to have a few memorable days and the updates will be coming fast and furious.
If you have Project X shaft questions or Mizuno equipment questions or anything else at all, drop them below and they will get answered over the next few days. Follow along both here and on our Instagram Stories for behind the scenes looks and course pictures.
We have a jam packed itinerary over the next few days that you will not want to miss.
Itinerary
Wednesday Evening: Meet and Greet Dinner at Chateau Elan with Keenan Phillips from Project X
Thursday Morning: Tour Mizuno Facility with Chris Voshall from Mizuno
Thursday Lunch: Fitting by Keenan Phillips and Chris Voshall for new driver and custom shaft. Thursday Afternoon: Golf with Chris Voshall and Keenan Phillips at Chateau Elan
Thursday Evening: Ask Us Anything Dinner with Keenan and Chris.
The 2021 Project X Experience with Mizuno is here.
Hole 10 is a long par, and I tried to play a big draw to cut the corner. Never gave it a chance and got a lucky kick out of trees to just short of the bunkers at the corner. Still a mile to go say I hit a good 5 iron that the PTX Pros gave some assistance on because it wasn’t flush, and thankfully it wasn’t because it probably reaches the bunker if I do. 125 left so I grab my 50 and proceed to hit a shank that stayed in play. Tough downhill lie, but hit a decent spinner again that needed another 5 yards and length to be good, but still just on the fringe. Grab putter and misjudge the speed (big surprise ?) and have two putts to get in for 7. Keenan absolutely annihilated his drive (see the circle for roughly where he wound up) on this hole.
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Wow this course looks tight. Did it feel like that from the tee too?
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It’s pretty amazing recapping how badly I scored just how much fun I had. The company I got I to keep during this round undoubtedly made it so.
Yes and no, there were certainly trees on every hole but I have little doubt we would have found nearly every errant shot if not for the leaves.
Honestly, that’s exactly how I felt after my round in San Diego back in 2019. Playing with THP’ers and KP was just a ton of fun!!
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The East Coast in the fall needs a rule that if you find any ball you can play it. But doesn’t sound like there were many to find.
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It was pretty wild, we all spent a fair amount of time searching leaves for each other’s shots and legitimately didn’t find any ball in the leaves until #16.
Wow! How busy was the course?
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Not remotely busy. We never saw anyone behind us and the only hole we had any wait on was approach on 14 and tee on 18. It was fantastic. We wrapped up our round in just over 3 1/2 hours which is pretty remarkable considering we did try to locate multiple balls in the leaves.
I mean yeah I’m back to reality but every time I reflect on what just happened that goofy grin reappears ?
One of the best feelings in the world ?
Wow!! 3.5 hours might be a THP record! That’s awesome!
Looks like an incredible trip. Thank you for all the detail and letting us follow along!
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That last for about 2 weeks then at least 2-3 times daily afterwards
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Fan of the course too, I would say?
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1000%. The course was challenging but fair and was in fantastic condition. The replica holes were very well done. It honestly reminded me a little bit of home with the trees, just a much more enjoyable grass to play off than I’m used to up here.
Bermuda like grass was more enjoyable? I think I missed the reasoning behind this after I blacked out in fear of being hit by your 170+ mph ball speed.
I enjoyed the turf interaction a lot. Vosh or Keenan did say that it’s tougher, especially the rough, when it’s not dormant but it felt great to me.
That’s fair, it was a bit dormant. It’s not so bad when dormant. It’s awful when it’s wet and when some courses let it grow just a bit more.
What is it like when wet? Anything long is a pain in the @ss for me ?
Thicc, with two C’s. So when Bermuda grass and its jerk like friends (zoysia) get wet, it clumps. So now you have a bunch of blades of thick grass, holding moisture, and clumping. The ball in bermuda doesn’t always settle down to the bottom, either. Sometimes it does, sometimes it sits on top of the grass a bit. So if it’s on top of the grass, what happens if you go down after it? Is it going to come out clean like it was on a tee? Are you going to go right underneath it and hit it on the top grooves aka this is going absolutely nowhere? If it’s sitting down, how clean of contact can I actually make? Or is this basically a total pitch out sideways?
Oh, yeah that doesn’t sound pleasant. So I’ll amend my original statement to I really enjoy the turf interaction of dry, dormant Bermuda ?
Here’s hoping you get into more THP events where you can experience awful bermuda, so we can have a great laugh about you saying this was your favorite grass ever.
@Canadan reading back through and this jogged my memory. So the way they forge is unique and patented in that they hand stretch the billet before they begin forging. This means the grain is all flowing the same way, whereas other forms the grain will not have the same consistency. This plays a key role in the feel and sound we all so love in a Mizuno product.
Oh fun fact, I canned this putt
Can confirm, I rolled what I thought was a solid putt just by that ran right off the green ?
Was really cool listening to a shaft guy in Keenan work with someone who could articulate what he liked or didn’t like about what he was feeling in the shaft. Think Vosh went through at least 3 before settling in.
This was first hole I hit with the RDX Smoke Blue, my ball flew over the right hand corner of the bunker seen on the left. Still think my drive on 14 was longer but I have the confirmed numbers on this one (#9)
Their team was definitely on the shorter side, not to throw shade at @JDax @chefkritter or @DannyLe since they did beat us. @MSEASU was the center for their team
Another good reference shot, my drive cleared the right side of the left hand bunker. Keenan had me by 15 yards and center of the fairway.
Yes Vosh and I both went Mule, they were perfection
And set up a GC on almost every tee box!
Funny thing was it accidentally got bumped to lh at one point. Took us a minute to figure out why it wasn’t reading ?
Not yet, at least not quickly ?. I was on the phone with @JeffreyRoy86 from Braselton to Atlanta running down the trip, and he gets golf. Someone who doesn’t I’ll have to pare down from hour and half so they don’t glaze over ?
The thing that continued to stand out was that I still don’t see wild fades/hooks. Don’t get me wrong I was all over the map today, but i wasn’t seeing something start down the middle of the fairway and hook or slice 50 yards. A 50 yard miss was the result of starting line of the shot (pull draw/push fade). Given how off I was all day that made me happy. My final swing of the day was the choked down, smooth tempo swing that produced a beautiful high baby fade that was my longest of the day at 305. If I can ever figure my swing out the ST-Z / Smoke Blue combi could be a legitimate weapon this year ?