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| by David Lake |
One of the most prominent buzzwords in the
golf industry today is "Hybrids" and there is
a lot of misconception as to what a hybrid
actually is and its designed function. The
simple answer is that it is nothing more than
a high lofted fairway wood (within the #7 or
#9 fairway wood range) that is built 1" to 2"
shorter in club length than a conventional
wood. This shorter club length coupled with
the high loft angle makes it easier to hit
than a conventional fairway wood. Also, its
inherent low center of gravity coupled with
the fact that it is designed to sweep the
ball from the turf like a fairway wood makes
it easier to hit than a conventional "long
iron" for the vast majority of golfers. In
fact, hybrids have replaced "long irons" in
many golfers' bags which I believe is the
entire marketing strategy behind their
introduction.
The fact that most golfers would be better served by using their conventional "long irons" as tomato stakes in their garden and replacing them with "hybrids" is not lost on the major golf club manufacturers. These hard to hit conventional "long irons" are forced on the customer when they purchase a set of clubs and then the golf club manufacturer suggests replacing them with "easy to hit" hybrids (makes great business sense if you are trying to maximize golf club sales). Basically there are three categories of golf club design with each having a specific purpose: 1) Driver 2) Fairway woods 3) Irons The function of the driver is distance off the tee, the function of fairway woods is distance plus getting the ball up quickly from any type of lie, and the function of irons is threefold: crisp ball striking from the fairway, precisely controlled distances, and imparting a high level of backspin to the ball for accuracy. In other words with a driver you aim for the width of the fairway; with a fairway wood you aim for the width and depth of the green; and with irons you aim for the pin. Hybrids certainly fall into the fairway woods category and, for the reasons mentioned previously, are easier to hit than conventional fairway woods or conventional "long irons". Therefore my advice to any golfer playing conventional golf clubs would be to replace both their fairway woods and "long irons" with hybrids to maximize their ball striking potential. We have received hundreds of emails asking if we are going to come out with a "Hybrid" in the future. My reply has always been the same - we already offer them. Our fairway woods are built to a shorter club length than conventional woods and possess one of the lowest centers of gravity in golf. Since they are built to the same club length within a set (based upon your W-T-F measurement) they produce a consistency between clubs that no set of hybrids can match. In comparative testing involving all of the major brand hybrids on the market our 1 Iron #7 wood ranked highest in every playability category. |
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