When it comes to golf, getting “fit” really has two meanings. Since Tiger Woods came on the scene and started the fitness craze in golf people generally think of the term in the sense of getting into the gym and working out. Although important and beneficial to your health, this doesn’t always necessarily help your golf game. Recently I had the chance to experience the other type of “fit”, a professional fitting with the Titleist FittingWorks. I used to think I knew a lot about equipment; I really enjoy learning about the new models that are coming out, what each player on tour is playing etc., but after my fitting I realized that I don’t even begin to know anything about equipment.
A little background on me; I played 4 years in college, garnered All American, turned Professional and played mini-tours for 3-years, with nominal success. During that time however, I was never once professionally fitted for my clubs. I always just played with what felt good; almost always adapting to the clubs. Being tall, I am 6’ 5”, I figured I needed to have very long clubs, so I always had my irons 1” over length. I was a blade guy, so I had a couple of sets of Mizuno’s over the years, really strong shafts, a degree or so upright and of course, over length. They proved to be okay, but I definitely didn’t hit them the way I think I could have. I could hammer the driver, but was really short with my irons; that should have been enough to clue me in that something was amiss, but it wasn’t.
It was until a few months ago that I was lucky enough to play with my local Titleist rep, Ted Bacci, that my world changed. I was hitting the ball okay that day, nothing spectacular, when he asked what my specs etc. were; I responded, somewhat embarrassed, that I had never been fit for anything in my bag. Ted looked at me and said “I think we can really help you.” Fast forward 3 weeks and the Titleist Fittingworks Truck showed up at the local golf course and my name was on the fitting schedule.
I met with Glen Mahler, whose business card lists him as “mobile club fitting representative”. What it should really say is “Golf-Jedi-Master”, as he seemingly knows more about golf equipment than anyone. We chatted during a brief intro about my game, what worked (driver) and what didn’t (irons). He watched me hit a few shots with my irons and immediately went to work. First off my irons were too long; even though I was 6’ 5”, I had long arms, so I could handle standard length irons. What was great about Glen was he didn’t push me into any particular style of club; he asked me what I liked, I said blades, and he put a Titleist ZM iron in my hand. There was no “the AP 2 is really a much more forgiving club, give it a try”, he let me go with what I felt most comfortable with. After a few balls, he rigged me up to a launch monitor which provided me with information on how much spin was being imparted on the ball, the launch angle and estimated carry distance. With my 6-iron with a True Temper X-100 I was flying my 6-iron about 165 yards; not very far and with a ton of spin. I then hit some with the same shaft, but the ZM head, and my spin rate went down and my distance went up. We worked around this for about 35 minutes before we tried a Project X shaft in the iron; eureka; I could tell on the first swing that this was the magic combo. Distance was up, spin was down and ball flight was much more boring (I always fought hitting the ball way too high).
We then moved onto what Glen likes to call his “cage match”. He gave me a 3-iron and also a hybrid 3-iron replacement (in this case the new Titleist 909H 19 degree); the two clubs were to square off against one another, whatever showed the most consistent numbers would be declared the winner. I hit several solid 3-irons which provided so-so numbers; again, high spin and not the distance I should be getting. Then came the hybrid, the numbers did not lie. Even my mis-hits with the hybrid had better numbers than the flushed 3-iron. It was settled, the 3-iron was out and the hybrid was in. With 1-less club in the bag, Glen suggested that we make a change at the other end of the bag, namely the wedges. Again this process started with me hitting a few of my own wedges. I feel like I’m a pretty good wedge player, but my common miss is to the left. Glen picked up on this right away and suggested that I get some new Vokey wedges but have them 1-degree flat; because in his words “the ball flight does not lie; miss left, flatter lie angle, miss right, more upright lie angle”. Now the decision was what wedges to put in the bag. Before I had carried a 52 and 58 degree wedge, seemed to fill in the gaps, but Glen had fitted my irons to be 1-degree strong in order to bring the flight down a little more, this meant my pitching wedge was 46 degrees. To make up for this a 50 degree Vokey would be a 2nd pitching wedge, followed by a 54 degree wedge and finally a 60 degree wedge. This would mean that I had no gaps whatsoever.
The final pieces of the puzzle turned out to be the fairway wood and driver. I had searched long and hard for a 3-wood over the years, it was always the club that I seemed to have trouble finding, but I had a Sonartec in the bag for quite a while and liked it. It was 15-degrees and served its purpose, but I didn’t hit it that far, at least not comparative to the driver. Glen put the 909F2 in my hands first; 13.5 degree. I hit it well, but it seemed to have a fairly shallow face and I hit it a little high; Glen then armed me with the 909D3 13 degree. In addition to having .5 degrees of loft less, it’s also a deeper face. This club is a cannon, whether it be off the tee or fairway. A good friend of mine who was watching the fitting thought I was hitting driver. We settled on an Aldila NV 75 shaft in an X flex which provided me with a really nice flight. The final piece of the puzzle was the driver. Again, I always felt that this was the strongest part of my game, but I did struggle if there was any kind of wind due to the fact that I hit the ball so high. This was the number one priority for this part of the fitting; find a driver that gives me just as much distance with a better, flatter, trajectory. Titleist’s 909 driver series consists of 3 separate driver heads for 3 differing types of ball flights. Glen thought the 909 D3 would be the best fit for me. It would be the most traditional looking of the 3 and also have the deepest face, leading to, hopefully, a better trajectory. A few swings told me that we had begun to achieve the flight we were looking for. It was much lower, but the ball was landing in the same area that my current driver was; I wasn’t looking to pick up any distance, just have a more consistent and flatter trajectory. It was settled; a Titleist 909 D3 8.5 with the same shaft I had in the 3-wood. It had been a long time since I’d hit so many balls, and it showed, as I had a blister on my thumb, but what I had learned was priceless. After all those years playing with clubs that I thought fit, I found out I was wrong on just about every aspect.
What followed has really been an eye-opening experience. I got my irons, wedges, fairway wood and hybrid just before Thanksgiving and got the chance to use them for the first time the day after Thanksgiving. If there was any doubt to Glen fitting me with the right stuff it was erased right away as I shot 68, including a 5-under-par 31 on the back nine at the very challenging HiddenBrooke Golf Club in American Canyon California. Not to be outdone, I followed that up with a 67 (with 32 on the back) at Poppy Ridge in Livermore California a week later. Both rounds included me hitting 14 greens in regulation. I am a more consistent iron player and feel like I am hitting the ball a lot more solid; and I have not missed the 3-iron at all; the hybrid is much more consistent. The only question I have now is “why on earth did I not get fit years ago?”
Keywords: Titleist Fitting.
