Equipment
7-woods are back (did they ever really go away?)
With the commotion surrounding Dustin Johnson’s double-digit win at the Northern Trust along with, what some would call a disappointing 60 on Friday (seriously, a disappointing 60) at TPC Boston, there was one club in his bag that flew under the radar—his TaylorMade SIM Max 7-wood.
Yes, you read that correctly. One of the longest players on tour recently put a 7-wood in his bag, and he’s not the first one in the pro ranks to put one into play this season either. 7-woods have been popular on tour for quite some time but recently they have seen a resurgence caused by longer golf courses and changing golf swing dynamics.
The old stereotype was 7-woods were reserved for seniors and female golfers—but I absolutely hate segmenting golfers that way, and it couldn’t be further from the truth. They are the perfect club for any golfer looking to add height and spin to longer approach shots and can be a big help when not in the fairway—this writer included.
Don’t call it a comeback
Digitally lofted persimmon 5 wood at 21°
Modern 7-woods are not the same clubs they were 15 years ago, and if we go back further, it’s easy to see that “7-woods” have been around a lot longer than you might think. Similar to irons, thanks to hotter faces, lower centers of gravity, and the modern golf ball, fairway woods have gotten progressively stronger to help launch the ball through optimal flight windows.
A persimmon 5-wood is a modern 7-wood playing at a loft of 21 degrees, and when you consider the fact, how much slower the face of a persimmon wood is, puts it right in line with a modern 3-iron—perfect gapping if you ask me.
Why now?
The biggest reason we are seeing more 7-woods in the professional ranks goes beyond longer courses, it has to do with club gapping and player dynamics. Since most PGA Tour players don’t have an issue with distance or accuracy with the driver, strong 3-woods (12-14 degrees) on tour have almost completely gone extinct—although they continue to be popular amongst amateurs. Instead, they have been replaced with traditional-lofted 3-woods (15-16 degrees), even 4-woods (17-18 degrees) to create enough launch and spin to either place a shot in the fairway or hit an approach into long par 5s. This is where the 7-woods fit it.
Modern fairway woods are designed to hit the ball as far as possible and to do that engineers have created fairway woods that don’t spin as much. For players with higher swing speeds, this can create a gapping issue and actually cause the 3-wood to go too far. Speaking of the Northern Trust, the newest Mr. 59, Scottie Scheffler, made this exact comment when talking about his trusty 3-wood in a 2019 PGA Tour video (starting around the 40-second mark).
So instead of carrying a 5-wood that could end up gapping to close to the next club, 7-woods are the big play.
Examples on Tour
My absolute favorite 7-wood on tour belongs to Jason Dufner—his Titleist 915F with Aldila Rogue Silver 125 MSI 80 TX. It’s also the club that was at the top of my Favorite “classic clubs on the PGA Tour list, compiled in April. Other great examples spotted on tour include:
- Dustin Johnson’s SIM Max 7-wood with Project X HZRDUS Black 105, 6.5 flex
- Matt Fitzpatrick’s Ping G410 7-wood with Graphite Design Tour AD 8X
- Bubba Watson’s Ping G410 9-wood ( set to 21° ) with Fujikura Ventus Black 8-X in custom pink
- Correy Conners Ping G410 7-wood with Project X HZRDUS Black 85, 6.5 flex
- Tyrrell Hatton Ping G410 7-wood with Diamana DF 80X
Now it’s your turn
As I originally touched on here—Why your traditional 3-wood might be extinct—finding the right fairway woods is entirely about gapping and tuning your launch conditions to match your swing. If you are a golfer who has struggled with hybrids in the past, a 7-wood could be your ticket to hitting and holding more greens and solving the common top-end-of-the-bag gapping issues.
In other words, if it’s good enough for Dustin Johnson, maybe it’s time to try one yourself.
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- Kevin Tway what’s in the bag accurate as of the Wells Fargo Championship. More photos from the event here.
Driver: Ping G430 LST (10.5 degrees)
Shaft: Fujikura Ventus Black 6 X
3-wood: TaylorMade Stealth 2 (15 degrees)
Shaft: Mitsubishi Diamana D+ 80 TX
5-wood: TaylorMade Stealth 2 (18 degrees)
Shaft: Mitsubishi Diamana D+ 90 TX
Irons: Wilson Staff Utility (2), Titleist T100 (4-9)
Shafts: Mitsubishi MMT 100 TX (2), True Temper Dynamic Gold Tour Issue X100 (4-9)
Wedges: Titleist Vokey Design SM10 (48-10F @47, 52-12F @51, 56-14F), SM7 (60-10S)
Shafts: True Temper Dynamic Gold Tour Issue X100 (48-56), True Temper Dynamic Gold Tour Issue S400 (60)
Putter: Scotty Cameron T-5 Proto
Grip: Scotty Cameron Black Baby T
Grips: Golf Pride Tour Velvet Plus4
More photos of Kevin Tway’s WITB in the forums.
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Editor’s note: This is an excerpt from a piece our Andrew Tursky originally wrote for PGATour.com’s Equipment Report. Head over there for the full article.
The timing of Lowry’s putter changeup was curious: Was he just using a Spider putter because he was paired with McIlroy, who’s been using a Spider Tour X head throughout 2024? Was Lowry just being festive because it’s the Zurich Classic, and he wanted to match his teammate? Did McIlroy let Lowry try his putter, and he liked it so much he actually switched into it?
Well, as it turns out, McIlroy’s only influence was inspiring Lowry to make more putts.
When asked if McIlroy had an influence on the putter switch, Lowry had this to say: “No, it’s actually a different putter than what he uses. Maybe there was more pressure there because I needed to hole some more putts if we wanted to win,” he said with a laugh.
To Lowry’s point, McIlroy plays the Tour X model, whereas Lowry switched into the Tour Z model, which has a sleeker shape in comparison, and the two sole weights of the club are more towards the face.
Lowry’s Spider Tour Z has a white True Path Alignment channel on the crown of his putter, which is reminiscent of Lowry’s former 2-ball designs, thus helping to provide a comfort factor despite the departure from his norm. Instead of a double-bend hosel, which Lowry used in his 2-ball putters, his new Spider Tour Z is designed with a short slant neck.
“I’ve been struggling on the greens, and I just needed something with a fresh look,” Lowry told GolfWRX.com on Wednesday at the 2024 Wells Fargo Championship. “It has a different neck on it, as well, so it moves a bit differently, but it’s similar. It has a white line on the back of it [like my 2-ball], and it’s a mallet style. So it’s not too drastic of a change.
“I just picked it up on the putting green and I liked the look of it, so I was like, ‘Let’s give it a go.’”
Read the rest of the piece over at PGATour.com.
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Equipment
Webb Simpson equipment Q&A: Titleist’s new 2-wood, 680 blade irons, and switching to a broomstick Jailbird
With seven career wins on the PGA Tour, including a U.S. Open victory, Webb Simpson is a certified veteran on the course. But he’s also a certified veteran in the equipment world, too. He’s a gearhead who truly knows his stuff, and he’s even worked closely with Titleist on making his own custom 682.WS irons.
On Wednesday at the 2024 Wells Fargo Championship, I caught up with Simpson to hear about his experience with Titleist’s new prototype 2-wood, how Titleist’s 680 Forged irons from 2003 ended up back in his bag, and why he’s switching into an Odyssey Ai-One Jailbird Cruiser broomstick putter this week for the first time.
Click here to read our full story about Simpson’s putter switch on PGATOUR.com’s Equipment Report, or continue reading below for my full Q&A with Simpson at Quail Hollow Club on Wednesday.
See Webb Simpson’s full WITB from the 2024 Wells Fargo Championship here
GolfWRX: It seems like you’ve been a little all over the place with your irons in the past six months or so, and now going back to the 680’s. Is that just a comfort thing? What’s been going on with the irons?
Webb Simpson: Titleist has been so great at working with me, and R&D, on trying to get an iron that kind of modernizes the 680. And so the 682.WS took the T100 grooves, but kinda took the look and the bulk and the build of the 680’s into one club. They’re beautiful, and awesome looking. I just never hit them that well for a consistent period of time. It was probably me, but then I went to T100’s and loved them. I loved the spin, the trajectory, the yardage, but again, I never went on good runs. Going through the ground, I couldn’t feel the club as well as with the blade. So last week, I’m like, ‘Alright. I’m gonna go back more for…comfort, and see if I can get on a nice little run of ball striking.’
So that’s why I went back.
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OK, that makes sense. I know you had done some 2-wood testing recently. Is that in the bag right now?
It’s like day-by-day. I used it at Hilton Head every day. Valero, I used it one round. And this week, me and my caddie will do the book every morning, and if it’s a day where we think we need it, we’ll just put it in and take the 3-wood out. I love it because it’s a super simple swap. Like, it doesn’t really change much.
Yeah, can you tell me about that club? I mean, we don’t really know anything about it yet. You know? I haven’t hit it or anything, obviously.
It has grooves like a 3-wood. Spin is perfect. And it’s honestly, like, everything is in the middle of a 3-wood and driver number. Trajectory, spin, carry, all of it. So, a Hilton Head golf course is almost too easy to talk about because, you know, there, so many holes are driver 3-wood.
Valero, our thinking was we had two par-5’s into the wind, and we knew that it would take two great shots to get there in two. So instead of hitting driver-driver, we just put it in. And I used it on those holes.
Hilton was a little easier because it was off-the-tee kind of questions. But Colonial will be a golf course where, you know, there’s a lot of driver or 3-woods. It’s kind of like a backup putter or driver for me now. I’ll bring it to every tournament.
So it’s, like, in your locker right now, probably?
Well, it would be. It’s in my house [because Webb lives near by Quail Hollow Club, and is a member at the course.] It’s in the garage.
Oh, yeah, that’s right. Do you know what holes you might use it out here if it goes in play?
Potentially 15, depending on the wind. Second shot on 10. Could be 14 off the tee. The chances here are pretty low (that he’ll use the 2-wood). But, like, Greensboro would be an awesome club all day. I’m trying to think of any other golf courses.
There’s plenty that it’ll be a nice weapon to have.
It’s interesting, the wave of 2-woods and mini drivers. Like, it’s just really taken off on Tour, and all the companies have seemed to embrace it.
Yeah. The thing I had to learn, it took me, like, at least a week to learn about it is you gotta tee it up lower than you think. I kept teeing it up too high. You need it low, like barely higher than a 3-wood. And that was where I got optimal spin and carry. If you tee it up too high, you just don’t get as much spin and lose distance, I don’t know if that’s just a mini driver thing.
And you obviously have a Jailbird putter this week. What spurred that on?
Inconsistent putting. I’m stubborn in a lot of ways when it comes to my equipment, but I have to be open minded – I just hadn’t putted consistently well in a while. And I’m like, ‘Man, I feel my ball-striking coming along. Like I feel better; for real, better.’
If I can just get something in my hands that I’m consistent with. Being on Tour, you see it every year, guys get on little runs. I can put together four to five tournaments where I’m all the sudden back in the majors, or in the FedExCup Playoffs. You can turn things around quick out here. I’m like, ‘Man, whatever’s going to get me there, great.’
My caddie, David Cook, caddied for Akshay at the Houston Open and he putted beautifully. Then, I watched Akshay on TV at Valero, and he putted beautifully. And, I’m like, ‘I’m just going to try it.’
I’ve never tried it for more than a putt or two, and I just ordered what Akshay uses. It was pretty awkward at first, but the more I used it, the more I’m like, ‘Man, it’s pretty easy.’ And a buddy of mine who’s a rep out here, John Tyler Griffin, he helped me with some setup stuff. And he said at Hilton Head, he wasn’t putting well, then tried it, and now he makes everything. He was very confident. So I’m like, ‘Alright, I’ll try it.’”
And you’re going with it this week?
Hundred percent.
Alright, I love it. Thank you, I always love talking gear with you. Play well this week.
Thanks, man.
See Webb Simpson’s full WITB from the 2024 Wells Fargo Championship here
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duke
Oct 10, 2020 at 1:09 am
I recently put a 7 wood back in play. Never going back to left hitting hybrids again. The 7 woods hit higher, go further, land soft like a butterfly, isn’t hook biased like those dab gum hybrids. Every motha luvin hybrid I’ve hit even the fade biased ones still go left. The only hybrids that were not hook left biased were the og Adams Peanuts.
Kope
Sep 18, 2020 at 8:36 am
I switched out my 20* hybrid for a 21* wood and am loving it. Goes higher and softer with less runout for when you need to hit a number off the tee or into a green, and going long is not an option. Fits perfectly between my 16* wood and 23* hybrid. The 20* hybrid (or 18*) would be more suited for low running tee shots under the wind, for me.
gticlay
Sep 8, 2020 at 12:56 pm
I have been playing a 7 wood for a very long time now. It’s a great 240-245 club and served me well from the back tees at Pebble beach on holes like #3 and for second shots. My go to is a Sonartec SS-05 that appears open at address (weren’t those fantastic looking clubs?). I don’t know what I’ll do if it ever breaks… constantly on the lookout for another 7 wood but there’s nothing quite like it… perhaps if I can ever try one of those special TM tour paintbreak van only ones but TM ain’t sharing the van with me…
Sebyas
Sep 6, 2020 at 6:58 pm
Dustin does not hit the 7 wood in tournaments
Bob Jones
Sep 1, 2020 at 9:35 am
Some people are wood players and some are hybrid players. I’m a hybrid player, but can’t hit the longer ones any more, so I’m getting used to a 20.5* fairway wood. My 24* hybrid is still a money club, though.
JK
Aug 31, 2020 at 8:15 pm
As far as the 7 wood I haven’t ever felt any shame in bagging one. Use what works best for your game & helps you shoot a good score.
joro
Aug 31, 2020 at 12:58 pm
Personaly I don’t like Hybrids but I love the 7 AND 9 woods. They are much easier to hit and work from everywhere from rough to sand.
Jack Nash
Aug 31, 2020 at 9:11 am
I don’t need a hybrid now that my new fav club is my 7 Wood. Have had it since late spring and it’s working great.
Phil
Aug 30, 2020 at 9:02 am
I have struggled with consistently hitting the hybrids clean off the deck. Last moth I picked up a SIM Max 7 wood after having hit enough of the the new 3/4 hybrids and the Max 7 at the store’s sim… wow! Loving my new club, my approach shots to the green are consistently sweet and crisp. It makes me look good. I’ve been winning more skins and my confidence has shot through the roof. The store guy was dissing the club hard, like it was old tech. I loved how it looked at address, how the ball flew and bought it, added a new grip too.
studatnu
Aug 29, 2020 at 2:34 pm
I’ve had a Callaway RFX 7W for 2 1/2 season super easy to hit off the tee and the deck…
Jason
Aug 28, 2020 at 5:13 pm
It’s nice to know that after I put a 7 wood in the bag, everyone else started thinking about it. Let me just say that the SIM Max 7 wood is the first 7 wood that I didn’t spin too much. I needed a club that I could carry 235-255, especially into greens. 7 wood is stupid easy to hit and is almost like cheating.