June 2011: Hot List 365: Golf Digest

Callaway CEO George Fellows resigns

Wednesday, June 29, 2011

After nearly six years as president and CEO of Callaway Golf,. George Fellows resigned from that post today citing personal reasons. Tony Thornley, a member of Callaway's board of directors since 2004, was named interim president and CEO. Until his appointment today, Thornley, 65, served as chair of the audit committee of Callaway's board and was the company's designated "financial expert."

"Tony Thornley has a deep knowledge of Callaway's business and the steps we must take to improve results going forward," said Ron Beard, Callaway's chairman of the board. "He brings decades of experience, including the financial and managerial skills and discipline to execute on our immediate priorities and to lead a transition to new leadership as the company charts a path for the future. As an avid golfer with a low single-digit handicap, he also brings passion for what we do."

Callaway also concurrently announced preliminary results for the second quarter which included revenues of $270 million and an expected net loss of $55 million (including $48 million of noncash charges). Callaway also announced reorganization measures including expected reduction in headcount at all levels of the organization. Callaway's stock price closed at $6.33 a share today, more than 50 percent off the $13.64 share price when Fellows took over, and about a third of the $19.25 mark it reached in July 2007--the highest it reached in Fellows' six years at the Callaway helm. Callaway has led the Golf DIgest Hot List in number of products earning medals in each of the last five years.

"While it is clear that it was the global economic recession that derailed our record sales and earnings pace, it is also clear that our business is not keeping pace with the industry recovery," said Thornley. "It is therefore necessary for the company to take immediate and aggressive actions to reduce costs in order to return the company to profitability as quickly as possible."

(Discuss this story at Golfwrx.com.)

--E . Michael Johnson and Mike Stachura

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Titleist's new iron line getting lots of looks at Aronimink

Tuesday, June 28, 2011

Titleist is known for bringing equipment to the tour prior to release as part of its "validation" process and is holding to that strategy with the new 712 iron line. The clubs--new MBs, CBs, AP1s and AP2s (the latter two shown below)--are out on tour for the first time this week at the AT&T National. Visually, the MBs and CBs are not a big departure from previous iterations, but the AP1 and AP2s have revamped cavity designs and a higher moment of inertia for more consistent results on mis-hits. According to Titleist, the AP1 and AP2 irons each have a better application of multi-material design (both in terms of location and densities) that have allowed engineers to more effectively use the weight in the clubhead.

(Click here to follow the discussion on GolfWrx.com)

At Aronimink today Titleist's tour reps gave GolfDigest.com the lowdown on what players have been working with the irons and who may put them in the bag this week. In all expect at least 10 players to use the new irons this week including Geoff Ogilvy, Troy Matteson and Jason Dufner.

Kris Blanks - CBs (in the bag)

Greg Chalmers - CBs (in the bag)

Eric Compton - CBs (will pick them up)

Mike Connell - MBs (short irons), CBs (long irons)

Ben Crane - AP2s (withdrew, sending home)

Ben Curtis - AP1s (testing)

Brian Davis - trying CBs tomorrow

Brandon de Jeong - AP2s (in the bag)

Graham DeLaet - MBs (6-P), CBs (3-5 irons)

Jason Dufner - AP2s (in the bag)

Rickie Fowler - MBs (testing)

Harrison Frazar - MBs (6-P), CBs (3-5 irons), (sending home)

Bobby Gates - MBs (in the bag)

Tom Gillis - CBs (sending home for testing)

Bill Haas - CBs (testing)

Hunter Haas - AP2s (testing)

Charley Hoffman - MBs (testing)

Ryuji Imada - CBs (in the bag)

Matt Jones - MBs (sending home)

Chris Kirk - CBs (in the bag)

Marc Leishman - AP2s (sending home)

Troy Matteson - CBs (in the bag)

Kevin Na - AP2s (testing)

Geoff Ogilvy - MBs (in the bag)

Adam Scott - MBs (picking up tomorrow)

Michael Sim - AP2s (testing)

Kyle Stanley - MBs (picking up later)

D.J. Trahan - MBs (testing)

Cameron Tringale - MBs (hasn't picked up yet)

Bo Van Pelt - MBs (testing, unsure what he'll do)

Johnson Wagner - CBs (tried them, sticking with old irons. "He's not one to make a quick change.")

Jimmy Walker - MBs (in the bag)

Gary Woodland - MBs (testing)

-- E. Michael Johnson

Follow on Twitter @EMichaelGW

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Dialing in your swing: Equipment Q&A, Benoit Vincent, TaylorMade

Thursday, June 23, 2011

Six drivers on this year's Hot List utilize some measure of adjustability, whether it be lie angle tweaks, face angle effects or center of gravity manipulation. Or maybe all three. Certainly, it's long been clear that the leader among major companies in this area is TaylorMade. While some examples of adjustable drivers have been around literally for decades, it was TaylorMade's r7 Quad, introduced seven years ago, that launched the idea to the greater golfing public.

Its most recent foray into adjustability, the R11, has dominated the industry in almost every conceivable metric since it debuted in January. The idea of adjustability, though it's continued to expand over the last seven years, remains fairly simple: allowing the golfer (or better, and what we prefer, a qualified fitter) to precisely set up a driver to match and or compensate for a player's specific swing tendencies or flaws.

Benoit Vincent, chief technical officer at TaylorMade-adidas Golf, has directed the company's innovation efforts throughout the adjustable era. In today's Equipment Q&A, we share some highlights of our conversation with him as we researched the NBC Golf Digest Equipment Special.

Golf Digest: What brought you to some of the challenges to creating a driver with triple adjustability? How did we get from the movable weights of r7 to the three layers of R11?

Benoit Vincent: From the very beginning for us, we have been trying to deal with manipulating the launch parameters of the golf ball. It's so complex because there are so many parameters and individual requirements coming from the golfers concerning the way the golf club is going to function at impact, to the way the golf ball is going to react, to where you hit it on the golf club and how that can change. There are so many things that contribute to the characteristics of the ball upon impact and the way it is going to fly.

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One-thousandth of an inch might not be as much as Johnny Miller thinks it is

Monday, June 20, 2011

When Johnny Miller uttered on Saturday's broadcast that "one-thousandth of an inch on a driver is 20 yards of hook," I was perplexed. Now that I have some data in front of me, I want to revise my opinion. That calculation is monstrously wrong.

I'm looking right now at some of the robot testing numbers for the 14 drivers that made the 2011 Hot List, many of which are being used by players on tour and competing in this year's U.S. Open. As a group, for a toe hit these drivers produced 98 percent of the ballspeed of an on-center hit. In other words, on 95 mile-per-hour, average-golfer swing speed, you might lose three miles per hour of ballspeed. Let's call that 6-8 yards.

As a group, the average launch angle and spin rate differed compared to an on-center hit by 17 rpm (virtually the same) and .02 degrees (again, virtually the same). What about dispersion? On off-center toe hits, as a group, the average was about 5.5 yards off the center line.

But here's the thing, Johnny. Our off-center toe hits are measured at THREE-QUARTERS OF AN INCH from the center of the face, or approximately 750 times one-thousandth of an inch.

Maybe he's referring to face angle. If so, and doing a little noodling in my head, let's say one degree might mean .03 inches of face rotation (a driver face is about 4 1/2 inches wide so a full, 360 degrees of driver rotation would equal about 14 inches). So "one-thousandth of an inch" would be equal to about one-thirtieth of a degree of face closure. The effect of rotating the face one-thirtieth of a degree closed at impact? Not sure, but you can bet it's a whole lot less than 20 yards. I can tell you that TaylorMade once documented that its R9 drivers accounted for 40 yards of flight correction with a range of four degrees of face angle change. That's 10 yards for each degree, so one-thirtieth might mean .33 yards.

So let's add it up: Maybe 0.1 yards shorter, maybe 0.33 yards off line. I'm no math expert but even if you put those two together it doesn't add up to 20. TaylorMade's chief technical officer Benoit Vincent, who is an expert, actually did the math, if you're interested. "One-thousandth of an inch miss is not making a 20-yard hook for a driver. This is only 0.0254 millimeters off the center, which is in the noise for off center hits. With the bulge and roll of the face, there is no deviation there. We don't know how to calculate what angle this could be. Here is another way to estimate the effect: if the face is lagging by 0.0254 millimeters at an impact of one-inch from the center, then this angle would be 0.06 degrees, which would have minimal effect because one degree of face angle equals approximately 10 yards of deviation, so 0.06 degrees would equal approximately 0.06 yards or two inches deviation.

"Sorry for the complex math, but the answer is: one-thousandth of an inch creates a deviation of two inches, not 20 yards, because it would correspond to a 0.06 degrees open or closed face."

As John McPhee, a professor of systems design engineering at the University of Waterloo and a member of the Golf Digest Technical Panel put it, "I doubt that one-thousandth of an inch off-center would cause a significant hook. Otherwise, by extrapolation, my own drives would be several hundred yards in the woods!"

Miller's the most entertaining analyst in golf. He is quick, controversial and speaks with a rare and refreshing insight. But in terms of modern equipment physics, he might be off here. Way off.

The good news? Today's drivers are a whole lot more forgiving than Johnny Miller thinks they are. Of course, the converse is true, too. Since we occasionally hit it out of bounds, what that really means is that we've mis-hit it by a mile.

--Mike Stachura

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Another option in the shorter tees movement?

Thursday, June 16, 2011

The U.S. Golf Association and the PGA of America, by way of equipment executive Barney Adams, garnered a lot of attention recently by announcing an initiative to get golfers to play their games from a more reasonable (a.k.a., shorter) set of tees. The Tee it Forward program includes a recommended chart for course lengths based on driver distance.

The announcement sparked an e-mail to me today from Chris Mile, president of Miles of Golf in Ypsilanti, Mich., one of America's 100 Best Clubfitters. Mile actually researched the question more than a year ago, and came up with a unique formula that is at once sophisticated and simple. His answer: Take your driving distance and multiply it by 28.

Read through his post here to get the details, but what it really does is offer serious golfers a starting point for rethinking their tee choice on their home courses or when they schedule a round at a new course. (By serious golfers, I'm not talking low-handicappers exclusively. Think of it more as golfers who appreciate a fair challenge without signing up for a torture test.) Mile has thought this question through from the perspective of a golfer who knows the game of golf asks of us many varieties of questions (true/false, multiple choice, fill in the blank and essay), yet he also has seen in his award-winning shop how far average golfers don't hit the ball.

It's worth a read. My favorite line: "Shouldn't the length of the course be adjusted by your handicap? NO. There are tons of examples of high handicap golfers who can hit it a ton. Are they going to like playing a real short course? The same for a low handicap golfer who is a short hitter. Will he or she enjoy hitting fairway woods into most par fours?"

--Mike Stachura

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Clubfitting: Don't forget the putter!

Thursday, June 16, 2011

When we mention the term "fitting" in this space, is your first thought "Drivers"? Maybe "irons"? There might even be a few golfers who think "golf ball." But it's a rare golfer whose thoughts on fitting initially turn to the putter.

That's unfortunate, because other than the ball, it's the one piece of equipment you use the most, it's the easiest to adjust and it's where you'll see almost immediate results.

Putter fitting is getting some attention thanks to the increasing availability of devices like the SAM PuttLab, which does for putters what the launch monitor has done for drivers. And putter fitting is gathering more steam with the annoucement by Ping this week of an iPhone App to analyze your putting stroke and help you get in the right putter for your stroke.

The iPing Putter App works with the device's imbedded accelerometer and gyroscope to detect the movements in your stroke. The accelerometer determines stroke tempo, while the gyroscope hones in on your stroke's rotational acceleration to determine face angle and stroke type (arc vs. pendulum, for example). It's user friendly and a highly practical training device. The app is a free download from the iTunes App Store for the iPhone 4 and the iPod Touch (4th generation). The App works in conjunction with a Ping cradle attachment that clips on to the shaft of your putter just below the grip. The cradle and app will be available June 20.

The app allows you to both measure and practice your stroke where it provides feedback about the consistency of your face angle at impact, your tempo and the type of stroke you have. It also allows golfers to compare their session results with past efforts, as well as against tour players on the Ping staff. Scores in the measurement mode are used to determine a putting handicap.

Tuesday I spent the day with the team at Pete's Golf in Mineola, N.Y., one of America's 100 Best Clubfitters, and in addition to the usual suspects, they walked me through a putter fitting with the SAM PuttLab device at their shop. What I essentially discovered was that it's a miracle that I ever finish a hole with the ball ending up in the cup. The SAM PuttLab, which works with a small lightweight, tuning fork device that clips to your putter, measures all sorts of movement and calibrated disorientation with your flatstick, including face angle at aim and impact, swing path, impact locations, timing and effective loft. There's a lot in there, and it's probably too much for regular human golfers like me to fully digest and implement, but it can be a motherlode of data for a fitter or a teacher. In short, like a launch monitor, it lets them detect what's wrong and what fix will work.

After looking at the reams of information communicated to his laptop computer about my stroke, fitter Kevin Gregorios tried to be kind. "The length of your putter is perfect," he said. "I wouldn't change that."

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Prototype Mitsubishi shaft at the U.S. Open

Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Mitsubishi shafts are used by some of the game's best players, including Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson. At the U.S. Open, a prototype Mitsubishi shaft was seen being used (photo courtesy of golfwrx.com). The shaft, which is black and white with white stars, is a next generation Fubuki that is set to formally debut later this year.

-- E. Michael Johnson

Follow on Twitter @EMichaelGW

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U.S. Open week means it's time to fix what's in your bag, too

Monday, June 13, 2011

We know golf weather in the northeast, and perhaps just about everywhere has been slow to fully materialize, but now that we're at U.S. Open week, you've probably started to realize that those holes in your game are no longer the result of early-season rust. It could be the indication that you've got some problems that practice won't fix.

So with that thought in mind, here are five things you probably haven't thought about, but should seriously consider investigating before the season gets too far along:

1. Driver survivor. It is surprising how many average golfers have not been fit on a launch monitor for their current driver. Surprising mainly because it is so easy today to find and get on a launch monitor. Still, the insidious problem with a driver that doesn't fit is that most golfers don't know how bad they've got it. Ken Collins at the Kustom Clubs Fitting Center in Manchester, N.H., one of America's 100 Best Clubfitters, explains: "Most amateurs golfers are notorious for making swing compensations for something that is not right. They will buy one of the latest and greatest drivers driver off the rack (with the wrong shaft type, flex, length, loft and face angle) and spend half of the season adjusting their swing to hit it better. Then, with next driver they buy off the rack, the same process will start again. That is why most amateur golfers never play to their full potential."

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What 'better' means: Equipment Q&A with Bill Morgan, Titleist

Friday, June 10, 2011

You would think we figured out the golf ball years ago. You would be wrong, and Bill Morgan, senior vice president of golf ball research and development at Titleist, has a never-ending supply of evidence to prove the point. In this week's Equipment Q&A, we talked with Morgan during our research for the NBC-Golf Digest Equipment Special, and he offered his thoughts about the introduction of the Pro V1 and Pro V1x balls, and on how golf balls can still be improved.

Much of the conversation centered on two themes: consistency and fitting. The goal of a designer is to figure out the best way to make a ball that equally meets the demands of the wildly different impacts of a flop shot and a driver smash. That challenge involves understanding how the inside of the ball works with the outside of the ball, and vice versa. In addition, Morgan takes issue with the idea that certain players should only play certain types of balls, and he also stresses that what gets lost too often in golf ball discussions and debates is how in the formula for what happens in a golf shot, the ball is subservient to the club and the club is subservient to the golfer. Hence, the value of fitting.

Golf Digest: What's your approach to ball fitting? Is it for everyone, or just a certain level of player?

Morgan: I think ball fitting is very important for all golfers. In our system, we will walk you through a process that is identical to what we use with tour players. The first thing we do is characterize the nature of your game, and then based on that select two golf balls that you can go onto the golf course and try in different shot scenarios. We think it's very important in ball-fitting to try the balls on the golf course because that's where you play the game, and that's where you can see the results of the shot you're trying to make. If you don't see it on the golf course, it's not real.

GD: What is the role of swing speed in ball selection?

Morgan: We believe it's a myth that moderate and lower swing speed players need special balls. We think in terms of influencing a golf shot that the club is more important than the ball and the golfer is more important than the club. Now, while we know different players apply a different level of force to the ball than others, it is clear to us that the range of force applied by a better player includes the level of force applied by by lesser players. We strongly believe that a ball must be designed for all speeds or it won't work for any golfer.

GD: So how do you make a ball better?

Morgan: When we work on how to make a ball that's better for Nick Watney, those are the same things that are going to help you and I play better, too. Of course, what's "better" is different every time. The change we're seeking for the next generation of golf balls is coming from what golfers want today. So "better" changes. What we call better today might not have been better in 2005. It might have been worse.

GD: Consistency is part of that improvement process, right? What have you done to make the ball more consistent?

Morgan: The entire history of dimple development has been one in which we've tried to make the surface of the golf ball more and more uniform to improve upon the consistency of the aerodynamic performance of the ball. We think we've taken a big step this year, which takes us to a place we've never been before. This year we've introduced what's called a spherically-tiled, tetrahedral layout, which has a different count and a different arrangement of dimples on the surface of the ball. In fact using the specific geometry of spherical tiling in the tetrahedral layout, we've subdivided the golf ball's surface into 24 identical tiles that are all exactly the same and produce the most uniform surface coverage we've ever had. We also dug into the process of making the core and in doing so we found a way to make cores more consistently. And if we can make a more consistent core, then we can be more precise with our formulations. So we developed a new formulation to go hand-in-hand with our new molding process. The two together have enabled us to make a core that's more individually consistent, and more consistent core to core to core.

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'Opportunity to cross-pollinate': Fila Korea/Mirae Asset on Acushnet

Wednesday, June 8, 2011

Those wondering about the logo on Brittany Lincicome's hat when she won this weekend's LPGA ShopRite Classic might remember that it's not just another financial company, but the company that provided the primary funding for Fila's recent acquisition of Acushnet.

Fila Korea partnered with Mirae Asset, Korea's leading independent financial services company, for the $1.2 billion purchase of Acushnet last month, and the purchase has led to speculation about what the Asian influence might mean for the future of company behind the Titleist and FootJoy brands.

The word from a spokeswoman at Fila Korea, reiterating similar statements from Acushnet CEO Wally Uihlein, is that not much will change, although the belief is that Fila Korea will make the Titleist and FootJoy brands stronger in Asia.

"To summarize, it will be business as usual," a spokeswoman at Fila Korea told Golf Digest in an e-mail. The spokeswoman, who requested anonymity, relayed the message after presenting Fila Korea's CEO Gene Yoon a list of questions e-mailed by Golf Digest. "Fila Korea recognizes that Acushnet has done a great job with the current marketing strategy and there are no plans to change that strategy. Fila Korea & Mirae will continue to support Acushnet's great innovation, which has become the cornerstone of Titleist and FootJoy and the products they make. The company is exceptional because of their innovation and focus on research and development. Innovation is the cornerstone of any brand."

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