Local course sent patrons an email to sign up for a Taylor Made club fitting so I signed up. Looking for a new driver. Had some trouble the last two years hitting my Epic Flash with Project X Evenflow 65g S shaft.

Used a Foresight GC-Quad for the ball/club tracking. This was outside on grass.

Warmed up and then hit a few with my Driver as a baseline, then switched to the Qi4D, guy played with the weights some and tried a few shafts. Immediately my ball speed went up 7mph from my driver, but I noticed the smash factor was only 1.31 (100mph swing speed, 131 ball speed). After it was all done, settled on one that seemed to work well (Qi4D LS/Mitsubishi REAX 50 Mid-Rotation Blue) but my ball speed vs swing speed was still 130/100ish and carry was only 208 yards. Impacts were generally in the middle of the face.

I later thought about it and we were hitting the course range balls. So was my fitting basically useless? I for sure hit the TM driver better and my misses weren't as bad, ball was more in the center of the face, but what's the point when a good quality ball would have given me 140+mph ball speed and the spin would have been different as well, which impacts ball flight, distance, etc. I wonder if they did not have a net available so you could hit real golf balls and not range balls. The GC-Quad only needs a few feet of ball flight to get good measurements.

Does GC Quad normalize ball like trackman?

So I slice bad like all bad golfers and I bought a ping 440k driver and adjusted the weights and shaft for slicing

My nephew is playing with me and the airline lost his clubs so he had rentals and is warming up

So he has rentals so I say hit mine and he swings and the ball hits the left mesh at the driving range. So the technology works !

I googled

The GC Quad can take poor quality balls and normalize the ball data so range balls shouldn't have that big of an impact if they used this setting

Aggie369 said:

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I googled

The GC Quad can take poor quality balls and normalize the ball data so range balls shouldn't have that big of an impact if they used this setting

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Fitter said he adjusted the software to normalize or factor in the range balls. My hits were mostly in the center (had a couple of bad ones that he kept so we had those to look at, and a few horrendous heel strikes that he took out). But how can I have a 100mph swing speed, a 1.3 smash factor and such a lousy carry distance with a new driver? My swing path was a little out to in and when do manage to hit my current driver, it has a small cut flight, as did the ball flight at the fitting, even a few perfectly straight balls.

Current Driver
Calloway Epic Flash, Project X Evanflow 65g S
Launch 15 deg
Spin 3200 RPM
Ball 126 mph
Carry 190

Final Fitting
TM Qi4D LS, 10.5 deg, Mitsubishi REAX 50 Mid Rotation Blue Flex: R,
Front Track: TAS 2026 Black 15,
Head Weight: TAS 2026 Black 04
Launch 12-deg
Spin 2413 rpm
Ball 132
Carry 204

Id need more data to say for sure but if your swinging it 100 mph with 1.3 smash factor its not a crazy number to get

Getting RPMs to 2400 is good

It's gonna be hard to get that smash up with slower swing speeds. That's just physics.

If you have something that tells you where in the clubface you are hitting that would help.

IMO your new fitting has the ball getting out there and down quicker. The higher ball speed is getting you more distance yes but 12 deg launch is low. It's coming off the clubface hotter and as a ping g440 player myself - 100% expected. The club is awesome.


2400 spin rate is good but more advantageous with faster ball speed. Work on getting your clubhead speed up to get the ball speed up. You're maxing out with your current abilities.

Better techniques and contact will up the ball speed so here we are all trying to do the same thing.

Work with a launch monitor and understand your numbers and what each does. In a little
Over a year I have gone from 151 ball speed to 159 just on technique alone.

Spin drop from 3200 to 2400 is a win and the fitting worked in my opinion. The one thing I would have tried to play with is your launch angle…try to get it closer to 14. You could likely get a longer carry and if you can do that with the same 2400 spin, you're adding good distance.

Trackman data will provide attack angle and you want your attack to be + anything above 2 is good

Higher is better

How did u gain 8 mph

Im at like 155 and if i got to 160 it would change my game

Aggie369 said:

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Trackman data will provide attack angle and you want your attack to be + anything above 2 is good

Higher is better

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good point, I guess look at that and maybe increase club loft if your attack angle is where it needs to be? I think with this swing speed, he could go to 11.5 and that would help.

Maaaaybe

Increased loft will raise spin rate which we don't want

Hit up on it and more center strikes

Aggie369 said:

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Id need more data to say for sure but if your swinging it 100 mph with 1.3 smash factor its not a crazy number to get

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Oh, don't disagree that the 1.3 smash factor gives me the distance the GC Quad showed, my question is why was the smash factor so low?

I hit a Calloway Ai Smoke 5w at a store a few weeks back (ended up buying it) and at 92mph my ball speed was close to 130mph (1.4 smash) with a carry of 205 yards. This was indoors with a TM TP5 ball (as in, not a range ball). When I got fit for new irons a few months back, my 6i swing speed was 83mph with 114mph ball speed....1.4 smash.

Why would the driver be so low?

Did the range ball not kill my ball speed since it squished against the face of the driver vs a quality ball (like a Pro V1, TP5, etc.) and also kill the distance? Would a quality ball not only change the ball speed, but also the launch angle, spin, etc....

Were they using reflective club head markers on all of your mentioned fittings above? Indoor, outdoor etc.

I'm wondering if different fitting environments or setups might be to blame.

Gotta be careful at those big box stores. They sometimes setup those monitors to juice up the ball distances.

Some drivers will show artificial speed jumps all because of the head shape and how the monitor is measuring how fast the toe closes

Your smash factor is basically how efficient u are hitting it. 1.5 is your goal. 1.3 is a miss hit and could also mean not fast enough to get to 1.5

So a higher smash factor with 5 wood likely just means its a shorter club and u are able to have more center face strikes

1.4 smash factor on a 6 iron is PGAT level so maybe not accurate data

As far as the ball goes....the GC Quad can basically make every ball a premium ball with its algorithms. I don't know how they set them up though

Data inside off of a mat will also be different tjan data outside on grass if your hitting irons. Typically more spinny on a mat and ball also tends to hit higher on the face because the club bounces off the mat

Fdsa said:

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Were they using reflective club head markers on all of your mentioned fittings above? Indoor, outdoor etc.

I'm wondering if different fitting environments or setups might be to blame.

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On the Irons and recent Driver, yes.

The 5W was Trackman which did not need the reflective markers.

Irons were done at one of the top fitters in the country (Golf MD in Lenexa). I have no reason to doubt those numbers were pretty close to accurate. This place is known for exception service and has been around for 40+ years. They have zero reason to lie to me about my fitting. Their goal was to get me in the best clubs that worked for me, not upsell me crap that didn't work to make a few extra $$. The two we settled on, I actually got the ones that were $50 more for the set.

At the end of the day it seems like all these places and launch monitors are not calibrated very well, if at all. I've been to the local Golf Galaxy to try out a few used drivers and their hitting bay showed my driver swing speed is 82mph and a 180-yard carry, which I know is just plain wrong. I can carry it 220-240 on course and occasionally further when I really hit it well.

Just having trouble believing a 100mph driver hit near the middle would only generate 131mph ball speed. I know I hit my current driver further than ~200 carry.

Aggie369 said:

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1.4 smash factor on a 6 iron is PGAT level so maybe not accurate data

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If you hit it center and make good contact, I don't think you need to be a PGA tour pro to get a good smash factor/ball speed. And I'm probably remembering some of the better strikes, they certainly weren't all 82/114.

Aggie369 said:

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Gotta be careful at those big box stores. They sometimes setup those monitors to juice up the ball distances.

Some drivers will show artificial speed jumps all because of the head shape and how the monitor is measuring how fast the toe closes

Your smash factor is basically how efficient u are hitting it. 1.5 is your goal. 1.3 is a miss hit and could also mean not fast enough to get to 1.5

So a higher smash factor with 5 wood likely just means its a shorter club and u are able to have more center face strikes

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I'm not sure the swing speed is going to change the efficiency all that much, will it?


I used Google AI to check things;

Quote:

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You currently have the TaylorMade Qi4D LS in its "Absolute Max Speed, Lowest Forgiveness" setting.

The 15-gram weight in the Front Track pulls the driver's center of gravity (CG) right up against the face. While this kills off backspin and creates a piercing flight for elite tournament players, it simultaneously shrinks the club's Moment of Inertia (MOI) and forgiveness window. With this forward-weighted setup, missing the microscopic sweet spot by even a fraction of an inch allows the clubhead to twist severely at impact. That structural twisting absorbs energy instead of reflecting it into the ball, plunging your smash factor down to 1.32

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It appears the LS model is not as forgiving as the standard model, but when I hit the standard Qi4D my spin was 3200 RPM which will kill my distance. I also was hitting it with only a 12-deg launch. So it appears to be a delivery problem.

Smash factor is just ball speed divided by club head speed

No you dont need to be PGAT pro to get 1.4 on 6 iron but solid contact in the center wont get you there either

Learning to use legs more to create the leverage that lets the club do the work, that's the best I can do to explain it. Less inside out also. I was between 4-5 deg and now ~2.

Very subtle things but all of a sudden 4-5 mph get added

And honestly I'm battling age. I'm 54 so length strength is a challenge.

Something sounds off with the driver. I have an old taylormade stealth 9 degree off the rack driver and if I swing 99 my carry is 235 to 240 and smash factor in the low 1.4s.

I used to swing faster (105) but I have lost speed and I am trying to get some of it back and then go do a driver fitting myself. If I am not able to get any back that will be okay but I will probably want a higher lofted driver to match my new old man speed.