Taylormade SLDR fitting day

[Junior]

Excellent junior i wonder how long til it's in the spare club cupboard at home...

Haha, this ones staying big fella

 

[Junior]

That's what I thought for them to even go near one.

You have to be able to load the shaft to make it worthwhile using, if you have a 'late hit' and load the shaft into impact then I can see it happening. My estimate is that you need a 105 swing to carry 245 with any regularity and can get the ball out to 260-265yds fairly often when you play (especially on a centered strike and a bit of roll).

I was surprised when he put the x-flex 70g shaft in too. However I didnt really notice much difference. My swing speed with the driver was pretty much always in the high. 90's.

 

[Junior]

Great read that mate, I have similar driver to you, but its the TP version with Regular Rocketballz Matrix HD6. I've had my swing speed measured and told that I'm a "regular" so I've just bought all my clubs off the shelf. I've been in the same boat as you in that I had no idea where my drives were going, made some changes and really slowed down the swing to get control - it now goes down the middle most times but I'm lucky to get 200 yards so something isn't right and people have mentioned the kickpoint to me. If you've set the RBZ to 12 degree's, I assume its a 10.5 adjusted, doesn't that give you a closed face on the RBZ series, I think it's 0.75 Degrees for every degree of loft? - Was that mentioned? Does the SLDR have a neutral face setting? It's fascinating to hear about Tour players hitting slightly descending in to out blows.

He didnt mention the numbers Yosser , but you are right, when you add loft with the 10.5 degree head, the face closes. However, I dont think it sits too closed. I remember the earlier 'draw' bias drivers and to my eye the all pointed way left. The sldr certainly doesnt sit too closed at 12 degrees.

 

[Junior]

I'm sure I can turn that into a boring conversation and make you (and most others) lose interest almost immediately!!!!

However your fitter was correct, the average attack angle for tour players is -1.5 degrees DOWN, they tend not to lean back and fall off the shot as an amateur would, PLUS they have the swing speed to get the ball out there at 290yds without having to hit up on it. Many pros however DO hit up on the ball as the -1.5 figure is only an 'average'... some hit more down than that and some hit a lot more up,... so don't suddenly start thinking you have to hit down if it doesn't suit YOUR swing.

Exactly right mate. 1.5 degrees down is what Tom from tm said. It is an average though and im sure they can tee it up a hit it on the up if they need too.

 

[G1BB0]

Great write up Junior. Tom fitted me on the TM day and is a top fella the difference in shafts was quite noticeable, it really makes you more inclined to go custom fit for everything. Glad you had a top time. My R1 is at 12 deg but I still get a decent length (not as long as JO before he pipes up lol)

Wentworth is special isnt it, I would love to play the west course again

 

[Junior]

We want pics!!!!!!

Im sure you will see some soon, the photographer took plenty.

 

[Junior]

Great write up Junior. Tom fitted me on the TM day and is a top fella the difference in shafts was quite noticeable, it really makes you more inclined to go custom fit for everything. Glad you had a top time. My R1 is at 12 deg but I still get a decent length (not as long as JO before he pipes up lol)

Wentworth is special isnt it, I would love to play the west course again

The whole place is immaculate. I played the West a few years back before Ernie redesigned it.

Im confident with the 12 degree loft in hand Gibbo. The flight was perfect when I got it out the middle. Due to the weight being moved forward in the head, the spin rate is kept down and lauches it on a great tradjectory. I hit lower lofted versions pretty sweet too, just the numbers on the 12 degree were on the money.

 

[gjbike]

Great write up junior glad you enjoyed the day, think I will have to give one a test run

 

[Karl102]

I can safely say, my days of ebay driver purchases are over !!

Yeah right Will it be irons next then

 

[Junior]

Yeah right Will it be irons next then [/QUOTE

Nah, the irons are sweet as a nut. Well..,,,they helped give you a dusting today

 

[Karl102]

Yeah right Will it be irons next then [/QUOTE

Nah, the irons are sweet as a nut. Well..,,,they helped give you a dusting today

Very true... You hit your irons real well, good job mind cos I was 20 yards past you with the big dog most of the time

 

[pbrown7582]

Thanks for sharing a great write up. Enjoy the new shiney.

 

[HomerJSimpson]

Great write up and another top day organised by GM and top manufacturer. Some interesting points by the OP and others since and I was surprised when I went to the Ping fitting and was told I needed to hit down more. That's what a fitting can do and why I enjoy them. I hope the guys enjoy their new TM tour and look forward to the write up in the mag

 

[garyinderry]

glad to hear you are happy with the new big dogg! I really want to get fitted before next year!

 

[r11john]

Got back late last night after a bit of a horror m25, m40, m42 and m6 journey in the pouring rain......was it worth it ??? ABSOLUTELY !!!!!

Having negotiated my way down the drive way, past the sublime properties, and past the first tee box of the Wentworth estate it became quite apparent that the place does not do things by halves. The whole place echo's grandure and it was even more impressive than what I remembered from a previous visit 5 years ago.

I made my way straight to the driving range where we all met in the reception area of the TM performance lab. There were lots of nice touches around such as Justin Roses's Putter, Retif Goosens driver etc that just added to the whole professionalism of the set up there. We were chewing the fat over clubs and our games when Tom from Taylormade came over and introduced himself. We were straight into the fitting and I was first up......

After and explanation of the SLDR and the technology incorporated into it Tom asked me about my current game and what my strengths and weaknesses are ? where my bad misses were with my driver? and then also about my current driver and how I have it set up. I've always been an OK driver of the ball. When its good , its good, but when its bad, i'm often stood on the tee now knowing where the heck its going to go.....this usually ends up with either a big block or a toey snap hook!!! I've always suffered from chopping and changing the driver far too often and i'm always in search of the perfect shaft and head combo. My current driver is a TM RBZ tour ( set to 12 degree) with custom Matrix 6 stiff shaft. I say custom, it was custom for the guy who I bought it off ebay. I explained this to Tom and he quickly (and impressively) spoke about the charachteristics of the shaft and explained how the kick-point shafts could be hindering (or helping) my driving.

I hit a few drives with my current driver and managed to get a couple of ok ones out there, but I also hit a couple of hooks. It was quickly apparent that the inconsistencies in my driving was due to the kickpoint of the shaft not being suited to my swing. I was carrying the ball 215 /225 yards and the launch angle was way too low. This surprised me as I always though I hit it further. Im not a big hitter, but I expected to see 240/250...ego slightly dented. We loaded up the SLDR with the stock shaft and I hit a few on the neutral weighting setting and 12 degree's of loft. It ballooned a little bit so Tom changed to an Aldila shaft which immidiately brought the flight lower. The difference between the two shocked me, the ball flight and spin rates really were night and day. However, the Aldila didnt feel too great and the launch angle was lower than what we needed. We then Moved to a Diamana shaft and the results improved immeasurabley. The launch angle and spin rates were on the money and my distance had improved an average of 20 yards to 235/245 yards. I thought i'd hit the jackpot at that point but , as with the everything about the facility and location, it wasn't perfect, so Tom said he wanted to try some more. We stuck with the Diamana shaft and went up and down in weight and switched between an x-flex and a stiff flex shaft. All the time the weight bar was at neutral and the loft at 12 degree's due to my ball flight being pretty straight and on a good trajectory. The results between the x-flex 70g shaft and the s flex 60 gram shaft were very similar but my dispersion with the s flex was slightly tighter so we decided to go with that, set at 12 degree's.....job done, and more interesting and fun than I ever could have imagined. I can safely say, my days of ebay driver purchases are over !!

The SLDR itself felt really solid to hit. The weight is moved forward in the head to help get the spin rate down and Tom was explaining that as a result of this most players are increasing the loft of the driver. Tom also explained how a lot of the tour players are hitting slightly descending in to out blows with the driver which is in contrast to what a lot of people here about hitting the ball on the 'upswing'. Incidently, I had earlier found out that I slightly hit down on the ball with an in to out swing too so that made me feel a little warm and fuzzy inside. The key thing for me was how you always knew where the head was in the swing with the combo I had settled on. It felt heavier than other drivers that I'd tried, but easy and forgiving to hit. I mentioned this a few times during my jibbering videos piece. I was more nervous doing the video than hitting balls infront of a video camera and photographer and being.

It was great to meet Canary Yellow and Dufferman and i'm sure they enjoyed it as much as I did. Thanks once again to Paul and Neil from GM and to Tom and Jess from Taylormade, It was a proper Carlsberg day and one I wont forget !!!

Sounds like a smashing day. Did ya get to play any holes?

 

[Yosser]

He didnt mention the numbers Yosser , but you are right, when you add loft with the 10.5 degree head, the face closes. However, I dont think it sits too closed. I remember the earlier 'draw' bias drivers and to my eye the all pointed way left. The sldr certainly doesnt sit too closed at 12 degrees.

I've messed with the loft of my RBZ when I went through a slicing stage and to be honest even adding a lesser amount of loft, the closing of the face was still distracting for me at address, and guess what - I was duck hooking it big time set at 11 degrees. My driving lessons have concentrated on swinging inside to out and when I get it right, its straight or a draw. So the odd slice had me completely baffled until I worked out that it was when my left arm collaspes during a swing. I've also accepted I'm not going to get it right everytime, but I'd like to have an idea of what went wrong.

 

[Yosser]

Great write up and another top day organised by GM and top manufacturer. Some interesting points by the OP and others since and I was surprised when I went to the Ping fitting and was told I needed to hit down more. That's what a fitting can do and why I enjoy them. I hope the guys enjoy their new TM tour and look forward to the write up in the mag

That's interesting, how do you change your swing to hit down more?

 

[Junior]

Sounds like a smashing day. Did ya get to play any holes?

We didnt mate. The fittings did not start until 1300 so there was no time really.

Oh and I must apologies for all the gramatical errors in my write up. Ive just read it back and am regretting typing it all up on my phone with auto-correct on !!!

 

[gregbwfc]

Good stuff big fella, sounds like it was well worth the journey.
Wouldn't be worrying about the distances, you hit it plenty far enough.

 

[HotDogAssassin]

Thanks for the write up, it was a good read and you clearly had a great experience. More kudos for the GM team!