Equipment
That one time Dustin Johnson got super protective over his M3 weight setup
Recently, I recounted conversations with Dustin Johnson and Keith Sbarbaro (VP of tour relations at TaylorMade) regarding DJ’s switch into a TaylorMade P-790 long iron, DJ proto irons, and TaylorMade Hi-Toe wedges, including a 64-degree wedge.
At the time, TaylorMade’s M3 driver, which is currently in DJ’s bag, was off limits to write about. Given that TaylorMade has officially launched its new M3 and M4 products, however, I can now reveal some very interesting tidbits about DJ and his M3 driver.
As previously addressed, DJ does not like to change driver shafts and will likely continue to play a Fujikura Speeder 661 Evolution II Tour Spec for the remainder of his playing career — I joke, but he really might. So aside from the shaft, let’s get into 3 things I learned about DJ and his M3 driver based on discussions with Keith and DJ, and from a hitting clinic at The Kingdom last month in front of 50 or so media members.
1) Dustin’s thoughts on Twist Face
“Twist Face” is TaylorMade’s new design that makes the high-toe area of the face more open and more lofted, and the low heel portion more shut and lower lofted. The goal here is to reduce the slice off the low heel and reduce the hook off the high toe. For Dustin, he seemed most excited to get relief on his high-toe miss.
“Twist Face really helps my miss on the high toe that goes left,” Dustin told me. “So this will definitely help with that. It works, and it’s gonna help the consumer.”
You gotta love the world No. 1 golfer thinking about the consumer.
2) The Long Get Longer
In 2017, Dustin Johnson ranked 12th in ball speed on the PGA Tour, averaging 180.06 mph per drive, with his fastest recorded speed being 184.65 mph. If his early testing with the TaylorMade M3 is any indication, however, he may be picking up some speed this year.
Have a look at this Tweet from the driving clinic at the Kingdom. DJ says his ball speed is up 3 mph, and the 185.1 ball speed is higher than any of the drives he recorded in 2017.
.@DJohnsonPGA‘s Trackman numbers with an unreleased @TaylorMadeGolf driver (he says ball speed is up 3mph from his M1 ’17) ???? pic.twitter.com/H2erLRaoZK
— GolfWRX (@GolfWRX) December 14, 2017
That could partly be due to how DJ and his fitter Keith have the weights adjusted…
3) Do NOT touch DJ’s weight setup in his M3 driver
Since the clinic was put on by TaylorMade, of course the company wants to show how much influence the weights in the M3’s new Y-track have on trajectory. That’s a reasonable thing to expect from a company, especially with a new CG adjustable driver and arguably the world’s best driver of the golf ball to use as your experimenter.
As such, the speaking host of the clinic asked DJ’s fitter to adjust the weights in his M3 driver to showcase the different settings and how the golf ball would react.
DJ, however, did not want his weight settings to be touched. It seemed he was joking at first, but after he expressed his discomfort with adjusting his weight setup that had been dialed in based on testing, it was obvious he was dead serious.
I’m paraphrasing, but DJ said something to the effect of… “if you move the weights and then when we move em back and it’s not performing the same, I’m gonna be mad.”
So, in order for the show to go on and have DJ hit shots with different settings, the TaylorMade team had to fetch an entirely new driver to play around with. The M3 driver they used, however, didn’t even have his Fujikura Speeder shaft in it! While DJ didn’t mention anything about the wrong shaft, you know that hitting a different shaft probably didn’t sit well with him since he’s been “essentially playing the same shaft since coming out on Tour.”
Funny stuff, and lesson learned: Don’t touch Dustin’s adjustable weights, or you will have earned an enemy.
Related
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Whats in the Bag
Russell Henley WITB 2024 (March)
- Russell Henley WITB accurate as of the Cognizant Classic.
Driver: Titleist TSi3 (10 degrees, B1 SureFit setting)
Shaft: Project X HZRDUS Smoke Black 70 6.5 TX
3-wood: Titleist TS3 (16.5 degrees, D1 SureFit setting)
Shaft: Project X HZRDUS Smoke Black 80 TX
Hybrid: Titleist TSi2 (21 degrees)
Shaft: Mitsubishi MMT Hybrid 100 TX
Irons: Titleist T100 (4-9)
Shafts: True Temper Dynamic Gold AMT (4-6), True Temper Dynamic Gold Tour Issue S400 (7-9)
Wedges: Titleist Vokey Design SM10 (48-10F @47, 50-08F @51, 54-10S, @55, 60-04T)
Shafts: True Temper Dynamic Gold Tour Issue S400
Putter: Scotty Cameron T5 Prototype
Grips: Golf Pride Tour Velvet
Ball: Titleist Pro V1x
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Whats in the Bag
Vince Carter WITB 2024 (March)
- The NBA legend was teeing it up in the Arnold Palmer Invitational Pro-Am.
Driver: Ping G430 Max 10K (9 degrees)
3-wood: Ping G430 Max (15 degrees)
7-wood: Ping G430 Max (21 degrees)
Irons: Ping i230 (4-PW)
Wedges: Ping Glide 4.0 (50, 54, 58)
Putter: Ping
Ball: Renegade Mbu
Check out more photos of Vince Carter’s WITB here.
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Equipment
From the Forums: I need more forgiveness in my irons – Looking for recommendations
In our forums, our members have been discussing the most forgiving irons currently on the market. WRXer ‘TheShark1’ is on the hunt for a new set of irons, saying:
“Currently gaming the Mizuno Pro 225’s but think I need more forgiveness in my irons. My well struck shots are real nice, but my mishits are not performing as good as I had hoped anymore. I really like hollow body irons so if I could find something more forgiving in a hollow body iron that would be great.
Open to any and all recommendations other than Ping. Can’t hit Ping irons at all.”
And our members have been sharing their best suggestions in our forum.
Here are a few posts from the thread, but make sure to check out the entire discussion and have your say at the link below.
- AvidSwampThing66: “Another vote for the super forgiving and fast Paradym irons. They look really good for being a GI iron.”
- bobfoster: “I just went from MP20 MMCs to the new 245s in my scoring irons (just played my first round with them today). If you have a chance to try them, you might find them worth a serious look.”
- vman: “Shoot me down, but spend the money on lessons.”
- J_Tizzle: “i525s are great off the heel in my opinion.”
Entire Thread: “From the Forums: I need more forgiveness in my irons – Looking for recommendations”
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JP
Feb 1, 2020 at 10:18 am
How could moving them and putting them back how it was change anything? I don’t even see that as possible.
L BRANDT
May 31, 2018 at 11:43 pm
“if you move the weights and then when we move em back and it’s not performing the same, I’m gonna be mad.”
LOL, I can totally relate to this…even if you think something is different, but really isn’t, it’s going to mess with your head
Simms
Feb 12, 2018 at 12:52 am
Never had much luck moving the weights around with drivers (have had several with movable weights) then I read an article that made sense..It basically said a player with a firm grip will see very little difference with movable weights where a player with a lighter grip will be more likely to see results moving those few grams around….
Kaven
Jan 7, 2018 at 9:06 am
Lolll it’s funny because Dustin uses a M4 for the Hawaii first tournament???
Jack
Jan 10, 2018 at 3:43 am
Yeah LOL> Guess he really didn’t want the weights adjusted so chose one that didn’t have adjustable weights!