Bending a ”forgiving player distance” weaker and win?

[Brokensticks]

Hello. 
 

Tinkering what clubs is a good fit for me, Im trying to balance the cool factors of a pro using them, to the feel factors and obviously performance for me. 
 

Ive been back and forth here with blades, player irons and whatnot but there is always something missing.

 

Now I just found out the Rickie Fowler, a golfer that is astronomically better than me using Cobra Tour irons, recommended for a 10hcp player. Im like wtf? 
 

Can I just bend a Cobra Tour, T150 or similiar 2 degrees weak to get the spin, descent and height that I want and have a more forgiving club with slightly wider sole that looks good enough?

 

Can I try this in a normal fitting with sleeves or do I need to find someone bending them or is the change to sole geometri not big enough to even care?

[Milfordlefty]

My two cents, yes/no. Can you bend them 2° weaker, yes, but will they be more forgiving, no. It is still a player head, and if you deliver the head to the ball with a less than poor swing, you'll see poor results. GI/SGI heads are designed around the swings of those golfers who need them. Give a Cobra Tour 7i weakened 2° a try, it might just give you the results you are looking for.

[Nessism]

Most irons can be bent for loft and lie adjustment.  If you want higher launch and more spin, bending weak is a great idea.  Only high bounce irons like Ping, would give me pause when it came time to bending them weak.  Pretty much everything else, it's green light.

[Jeff58]

You’re overthinking. Normal in this situation.

 

Buy 4-PW plus the gap wedge. You now have a traditional 3-PW configuration. If you want to be extra cool, write numbers on the backs like Vijay 👍👍

[Redpro]

52 minutes ago, Nessism said:

Most irons can be bent for loft and lie adjustment.  If you want higher launch and more spin, bending weak is a great idea.  Only high bounce irons like Ping, would give me pause when it came time to bending them weak.  Pretty much everything else, it's green light.

Having the time of my golfing life (74 yrs old, playing since I was 12) . . . played P770's this year until the new P790's came out. Loved the look, but not the stronger lofts. So, I weakened the lofts two degrees, and installed my trusty Mitsubishi Rayon Japanese Spec Adams Golf 55g shafts in R-flex, but soft-stepped 1x, into the P790's. Goes through the turf just fine, and are more forgiving than the P770's, and only marginally larger (heel to toe). 

[Brokensticks]

1 hour ago, Nessism said:

Most irons can be bent for loft and lie adjustment.  If you want higher launch and more spin, bending weak is a great idea.  Only high bounce irons like Ping, would give me pause when it came time to bending them weak.  Pretty much everything else, it's green light.

Can it be done on a fitting or do I have to guess?

 

The thing is every fitter has be into some CB-variant. T100, Apex CB for example. I have and still playing MP64s, Nike VR blades and while I can hit them all good enough in a controlled setting I lose some strokes on the course. 
 

I want that little extra protection in the ruff, on elevation with feet/ball etc. I dont want the extra distance that comes with the loft, Id rather take the spin and height. 

46 minutes ago, Jeff58 said:

You’re overthinking. Normal in this situation.

 

Buy 4-PW plus the gap wedge. You now have a traditional 3-PW configuration. If you want to be extra cool, write numbers on the backs like Vijay 👍👍

Sounds sound that bad but removing some offset aswell would be a 10/10 if it hits the spin numbers I want 

[BlueDragonKorea]

How much of a change are you hoping for by bending clubs weak? There's only so much you can do by bending lofts.

[GoGoErky]

Wait til you find out how many pros played ap2 before the T series, currently play i230, i210 before than and the i20s back in day.

 

[Brokensticks]

52 minutes ago, BlueDragonKorea said:

How much of a change are you hoping for by bending clubs weak? There's only so much you can do by bending lofts.

 

Essentially I want for for example an Apex CB performance but in a Apex Pro package . I just hit the right numbers all over, but Im losing some strokes here and there because forgiveness.

 

If I bend the Apex Pro to 34 loft just like the CB, will I hit the same amount of height, spin etc? 

[Binson]

Are you sure they're not giving you the ideal / optimal flight at stock specs for your swing? I'd say just do the fitting and let the fitter adjust as necessary to the head you want.  

 

It may be 1 degree weak, or 1 degree strong, stock, or whatever that actually ends up delivering the ideal dynamic numbers with your swing.  

[WristySwing]

Why not just play the club that works and forget what it looks like?  1* is not going to make hardly any difference at all and will come out in the wash over time given the normal flux of good and bad swings amateurs will put on the club. The number on the bottom means nothing, play the shot to the yardage you need, not the club you want to hit to that yardage.

[Brokensticks]

20 minutes ago, Binson said:

Are you sure they're not giving you the ideal / optimal flight at stock specs for your swing? I'd say just do the fitting and let the fitter adjust as necessary to the head you want.  

 

It may be 1 degree weak, or 1 degree strong, stock, or whatever that actually ends up delivering the ideal dynamic numbers with your swing.  

To be honest I tinker way too much with my swing to say much. 
 

Usually I have some excess shaft lean but its a thing I adjust without even thinking about it. 
 

Why I dont want to just get whatever is that it will create gapping issues. I want my 7i to go 170-175y with 100ft of height into 46+ plus descent angle with 86ish mph behind it.

 

I just want to know if a Apex pro gives the same numbers as Apex CB loft for loft, all things the same. 
 

If they do, I see no reason to play the CB. 
 

My ideal numbers are a traditional cb iron, 34° loft but I want more forgiveness behind that for the occasional s*** that needs some extra behind it

[Pnwpingi210]

27 minutes ago, Brokensticks said:

To be honest I tinker way too much with my swing to say much. 
 

Usually I have some excess shaft lean but its a thing I adjust without even thinking about it. 
 

Why I dont want to just get whatever is that it will create gapping issues. I want my 7i to go 170-175y with 100ft of height into 46+ plus descent angle with 86ish mph behind it.

 

I just want to know if a Apex pro gives the same numbers as Apex CB loft for loft, all things the same. 
 

If they do, I see no reason to play the CB. 
 

My ideal numbers are a traditional cb iron, 34° loft but I want more forgiveness behind that for the occasional s*** that needs some extra behind it

I think the apex pros will be fine for what you are looking for based on this post.

[Jayjay_theweim_guy]

1 hour ago, Brokensticks said:

If I bend the Apex Pro to 34 loft just like the CB, will I hit the same amount of height, spin etc?

I have not done this.  A fitter likely has the adapters/tools to do this and get you an exact set of numbers for that session.

 

As a guess though, I would anticipate the Pro@°34 to launch higher, maybe spin more too, than a CB@°34.  Would this depend on VCOG differences between the heads, everyone?

 

I'd thought there was a rough rule of thumb for: "Increase loft 1°, results in addding 1/2° launch and N rpm spin, depending on clubhead speed."  240 RPM rings a bell, but I could be way off.

[Binson]

1 hour ago, Brokensticks said:

To be honest I tinker way too much with my swing to say much. 
 

Usually I have some excess shaft lean but its a thing I adjust without even thinking about it. 
 

Why I dont want to just get whatever is that it will create gapping issues. I want my 7i to go 170-175y with 100ft of height into 46+ plus descent angle with 86ish mph behind it.

 

I just want to know if a Apex pro gives the same numbers as Apex CB loft for loft, all things the same. 
 

If they do, I see no reason to play the CB. 
 

My ideal numbers are a traditional cb iron, 34° loft but I want more forgiveness behind that for the occasional s*** that needs some extra behind it

I'm not saying to just get whatever, I'm saying the fitting / testing should dictate the alterations to the clubs. 

 

Static loft for static loft is tough to say when comparing different heads.  CG location can affect dynamic loft for the same static loft and face construction can increase ball speed on the same dynamic loft.

 

If the Apex Pro "8" iron ends up delivering what you wanted in your "7" iron, does it really matter what it's called?  Does it really matter what its static loft is if it gets you the ball flight numbers you mentioned?

 

That's why ideally, the right sequence of actions for proper decision making is to first try them, then adjust them as necessary to get the ball flight you want. Adjusting them first is more of a shot in the dark since you won't have the baseline of what they do for you stock. 

[bg3putts]

You can do it fairly easy, just be aware that to add loft you also add bounce to the club, plus those players improvement irons normally have more weight in the sole which makes for a higher flight.

[PuffyC]

At my last fitting I told the fitter I wanted something that performed more like my Wilson blades but had modern forgiveness. Because that’s apparently impossible, as a compromise we went with ZX5s custom bent 2 degrees weak and so far I’ve been happy with the results. They’re still a full club stronger than the blades but the forgiveness is far better and it helped deal with the lack of spin that plague modern distance clubs. You might think that would mess up the bounce but he said it would be a nonissue and he was right. 

[Brokensticks]

13 hours ago, bg3putts said:

You can do it fairly easy, just be aware that to add loft you also add bounce to the club, plus those players improvement irons normally have more weight in the sole which makes for a higher flight.

Using a small sole like T150 is essential for this to work the way I want it. High flight is nice, if its too high I can go a spinnier ball to bring the flight down a bit. 
 

Many amateurs seems to be afraid of high shots or thinking they are launching it high. 100ft is high, not often seen at the range. 

9 hours ago, PuffyC said:

At my last fitting I told the fitter I wanted something that performed more like my Wilson blades but had modern forgiveness. Because that’s apparently impossible, as a compromise we went with ZX5s custom bent 2 degrees weak and so far I’ve been happy with the results. They’re still a full club stronger than the blades but the forgiveness is far better and it helped deal with the lack of spin that plague modern distance clubs. You might think that would mess up the bounce but he said it would be a nonissue and he was right. 

This is pretty much what I want. Now I dont like the sole of Srixon but a ZX7 can be bent to 34°, pick up some launch and spin.

 

T150s soles are thin enough for this to be done I think, hopefully Apex Pro and Cobra tour aswell.