Equipment

Bridgestone J36 Lineup Preview

Published

16 years ago

Dec 25, 2007

New for 2008, Bridgestone Golf has just announced the new J36 lineup of irons, hybrids, and wedges.

Ever since Bridgestone announced they would begin making golf clubs in the U.S. under the Bridgestone brand, they have maintained better players as the primary focus. The J33 Blade, Combo, and Cavity were all solid products that became favorites among better players for their performance and clean looks. Rather than attempt the "all things to all golfers" mentality of its Tour Stage sister brand in Japan, Bridgestone has embraced it’s niche category in the U.S. and the J36 line will seek to compete in the industry in a new way, while still paying homage to their 36 years of innovation as a company. The new line includes three sets of irons, the J36 Blade, J36 Cavity, J36 Pocket Cavity, a new J36 Hybrid, and new West Coast Designs Wedges.

Irons

Bridgestone has continued their commitment to forged irons and the J36 irons will be forged by the Endo Golf Manufacturing facility. The unique forging process utilizes a warm forging and then presses the irons four times at 1600 tons producing a precise initial forging which requires less grinding and finishing along with a more uniform grain structure in the metal. Designed with input from tour players like Fred Couples and Stuart Appleby, all the irons feature a sole that progressively widens from heel to toe making it easier to work the ball. Also, trailing edge relief on all the irons allows the club to drag less through the turf making it easier to play in a variety of conditions. The standard shaft for the line up will be Rifle Project X Flighted. The big change with the J36 line will be complete customization available from Bridgestone. Whatever combination of clubs, shafts, and grips a golfer wants will be possible. Also, since the the club heads were designed in tandem, the specifications were all designed to work in concert with each other. As a result, a golfer wanting a custom set of J36 Blade in PW-8, J36 Cavity in 7-5 J36, and Pocket Cavity in the 4-3 will have no problems doing so.

J36 Blade

The J33 Blade was a direct import from the Tour with input and approval from PGA Tour players like Stuart Appleby. The J33 Blade’s long hosel and heel biased center of mass gave better players the control they desire, but also required a tour caliber swing to achieve results. The new J36 blade will still provide players all the control they want, but in a much more playable package. Gone is the long hosel, replaced with a standard sized one making it much more playable.

However, traditional blade players will be glad to know that the muscle is still placed high on the club without cutouts other companies use to make their clubs more forgiving. This club will still be a great option for players looking to control ball flight and maintain accuracy. The topline of the J36 blade is still very thin and frame the ball very will for better players thanks to minimal offset. The thin sole has a slightly blunted leading edge to prevent digging accommodating players who like to hit down on the ball. With a center of gravity located more towards the center of the face, golfers will find a more playable J36 Blade that still provides them all the control they need.

J36 Cavity

A silver medal winner in Golf Digest’s 2008 Hot List, the J36 Cavity has recieved some updating. It also has the same trailing edge relief and tapered sole design as the rest of the line. With a slightly wider sole and slightly thicker topline than the blade, it is more forgiving, flies higher, but still provides control for better players and allows the golfer to work the ball in either direction.

J36 Pocket Cavity

The new addition to the J36 line is the Pocket Cavity, so called because of the cavity cut into the back of the club. The cavity moves the center of gravity lower and deeper than any of the other clubs in the line. While this provides the most forgiveness of the entire lineup, it still retains the looks even the most ardent traditionalists will like. Even in the longest irons, the cavity is not visible from address and provides quite a bit of forgiveness while still retaining the feel people have come to trust in other one piece forgings.

The Pocket Cavity is the highest launching club in the line. Although it has a slightly thicker topline than its brothers, it still flows well for those who might be interested in including it as part of a combo set.

J36 Hybrids

The J36 Hybrid is an extension of last year’s Gravity Chamber hybrid. The J36 shares the same channel in the sole which increases MOI by moving weight to the perimiter. However, it improves upon the previous version with an updated CAD designed sole, a completely neutral weighting and face angle. The hybrid’s deep face and short length make it very playable off the tee and rough as well as from the fairway. The hybrid comes standard with the eighty gram Aldila VS Proto shaft standard. The top line of the club has been fully painted, a look most better players prefer.

West Coast Liquid Copper Wedges

The Satin West Coast Wedges were a big hit for Bridgestone, and the newly updated version capitalizes on the basic design but adds a fully milled face and a raw oil can finish. The milled face allows for a perfectly flat hitting surface for accuracy and the addition of milling marks allows for increased spin on short shots.

Variable Bounce Technology is used on the sole to allow the club the play with full bounce when square and less when the blade is opened or closed. The wedge also has the same long hosel as previous versions giving the club a high center of gravity to help control ball flight height on full swings.

Your Reaction?

LIKE0
LEGIT0
WOW0
LOL0
IDHT0
FLOP0
OB0
SHANK0

Equipment

Masters gear roundup: Limited-edition bags, balls, and more

Published

11 hours ago

Apr 9, 2024

GolfWRX Staff

The Masters in itself is a huge tradition in the world of golf, but it also brings its own traditions with it. One of the big ones for us golf equipment fans is the limited edition gear that is influenced by the season’s first major championship.

Around tournament time, companies big and small offer bags, balls, and accessories that are designed with the colors and history of the Masters Tournament.

Here is some of the gear that we will see this weekend out on the lush, green grass of Augusta.

Callaway

The land Augusta National sits on was once a nursery. Callaway looks to be celebrating that history this year. Colorful flowers are used all over the side panels on the staff bag and on top of the headcovers. Callaway also did some limited edition Chrome Tour golf balls with azalea patterns.

Mizuno

There might not be a green bag here for Mizuno, but they know how to celebrate the Masters! This year, Mizuno is offering Mizuno Pro 241 “Azalea” irons to a limited number of lucky customers. A new green iridescent finish is applied to the heads and some beautiful colored ferrules bring some floral color to the irons. If you are lucky enough to grab a set, you will be impressed by the green display box the irons come in as well!

TaylorMade

This year’s staff bag goes a little heavier on a metallic green color to pay homage to the first major of the year. If you look closely at the details, you will notice shiny gold accent pieces, a small Amen Corner, and an inner lining with Georgia peaches. The headcovers are made from matching metallic green fabric and feature “88th” embroidery for the number of Masters tournaments that have been played. TaylorMade’s TP5x Pix golf balls come in a case that looks, and feels, like a peach!

Srixon

Srixon’s bag for the 2024 Masters goes heavy on green and white with a more simple and classic design on the outside. When you unzip the pockets you will treated to a hidden inner lining that has Georgia’s state fruit, the peach, printed all over. Heck, Srixon even included the pit! Headcovers are matching white and green but have a look that reminds you of the iconic Masters scoreboard.

Your Reaction?

LIKE5
LEGIT0
WOW0
LOL0
IDHT0
FLOP0
OB0
SHANK3

Whats in the Bag

WITB Time Machine: Tiger Woods’ winning WITB, 2019 Masters

Published

13 hours ago

Apr 9, 2024

GolfWRX Staff

At the 2019 Masters, Tiger Woods famously ended an 11-year major championship drought. When Francesco Molinari faltered during the final round, Woods pounced. With a Sunday 70, he captured his fifth green jacket and 15th major championship.

Check out what Tiger had in the bag below.

Driver: TaylorMade M5 (9 degrees)
Shaft: Mitsubishi Diamana D+ White 60 TX

3-wood: TaylorMade M5 (13 degrees)
Shaft: Mitsubishi Diamana D+ White 70 TX

5-wood: TaylorMade M3 (19 degrees)
Shaft: Mitsubishi Diamana D+ White 80 TX

Irons: TaylorMade P7TW (3-PW)
Shafts: True Temper Dynamic Gold Tour Issue X100

Wedges: TaylorMade Milled Grind Raw (56, 60)
Shafts: True Temper Dynamic Gold Tour Issue S400

Putter: Scotty Cameron Newport 2 GSS

Ball: Bridgestone TourB XS

Grips: Golf Pride Tour Velvet Cord

Your Reaction?

LIKE3
LEGIT0
WOW0
LOL0
IDHT0
FLOP0
OB0
SHANK1

Equipment

Best irons in golf of 2024: Pure enjoyment

Published

16 hours ago

Apr 9, 2024

GolfWRX Staff

In our effort to assemble the 2024 best irons, we have again compiled an expert panel of fitters to help you find out which of the 2024 irons is best for your game.

Ultimately the best way to find your personal best iron set is to work with a professional fitter using a launch monitor. The difficult part is a lot of people don’t have easy access to fitters, launch monitors, and club builders — so at GolfWRX, we have done a lot of the work for you.

We are in the era of not just maximizing distance but also minimizing the penalty of common misses for each player — this applies to irons just as much as it does with any other club in the bag. And of course, proper set makeup and gapping is essential. This is why, now more than ever, custom fitting is essential to help you see results on every swing you make.

We want to give you the tools and information to go out and find what works best for you by offering recommendations for your individual iron set wants and needs with insight and feedback from the people who work every single day to help golfers get peak performance out of their equipment.

Join the discussion about best irons 2024 in the forums!

Best irons of 2024: The process

The best fitters in the world see all the options available in the marketplace, analyze their performance traits, and pull from that internal database of knowledge and experience like a supercomputer when they are working with a golfer.

It’s essentially a huge decision tree derived from experience and boiled down to a starting point of options—and it has nothing to do with a handicap!

Modern iron sets are designed into player categories that overlap the outdated “what’s your handicap?” model, and at GolfWRX we believe it was important to go beyond handicap and ask specific questions about the most crucial performance elements fitters are looking at.

These are the best iron categories we have developed to help you determine which category is most important for your swing and game.

Best irons of 2024: The categories

Overall performance
Easiest to launch/Slower swing speed
Pure enjoyment
Shotmakers
Most technology-packed
Best blade

2024 Best irons: Pure enjoyment

We continue to see an overlap in the way fitters in this category define the top irons. The most playable irons are the most likely to be higher launching, and shots that fly higher make the game more enjoyable for everyone. This reiterates our belief that your iron selection should not be defined by your handicap but instead by what gives you the best opportunity to play your best — and most enjoyable — golf.

Join the discussion about best irons 2024 in the forums!

Ping G430

Their story: Billed as Ping’s “longest iron ever,” the G430 irons combine a lower CG with stronger, custom- engineered lofts and a thinner face that delivers up to two more mph of ball speed, per the company. At the heart of the new addition is the PurFlex cavity badge, an innovation that features seven flex zones that allow more free bending in design to increase ball speed across the face. In combination with a lower CG, the badge aims to contribute to a solid feel and pleasing impact sound.

Fitter comments:

“The best G.I. iron on the market. Easy to hit and launch while making great ball speed for distance.”
“The best iron in the game improvement category. High launch and packed with forgiveness on those off-center hits. It’s one of the easiest irons to hit. So easy to hit and look at for the average golfer.”
“Yeah, I mean, that’s definitely a go-to and in the matrix for sure. I mean, it’s just super easy to hit, super forgiving. They don’t mess that iron up.”
“Ping does a great job of building golf clubs. Their design is fantastic and it’s not for everybody, you know, it’s not the lowest-spinning club…but it sure is one of the most forgiving golf clubs and most consistent golf clubs. Ping G430 in that category of club, you can have something that a good player who needs a little help maybe can use because it’s consistent across the face, and you can’t do that with some of the other clubs because they’re not as consistent across the face for the ball speeds. It is a monster for us.”
“The best iron in the game improvement category. It’s one of the easiest irons to hit.”

For more photos/info, read our launch piece.

TaylorMade P790

Their story: Engineers utilized the variables of tungsten weighting, SpeedFoam Air, and internal mass — with an assist from AI — to precisely give golfers what they need in each iron. For example, launch and forgiveness in the long irons. More specifically, TaylorMade is using what the company calls FLTD CG (flighted CG) to strategically position CG throughout the set (lower in the long irons, higher in the short irons). CG is positioned almost a millimeter lower in the long irons compared to previous generations. In the shorter irons, the higher CG positions allowed engineers to dial in spin and promote accuracy.

Fitter comments:

“Best combination of everything. The amalgamation of all irons on the market blended into one mathematically perfect design.”
“I think people recognize the name. It’s a very popular club. It stands up to every model in a category.”
“That’s the staple in the players distance category. It’s year-in, year-out. It’s tough to beat TaylorMade — they don’t go wrong with that iron, for sure. They make little refinements, but it’s almost like, yeah, just keep making little refinements. Don’t kind of mess that up just because the, I mean, it, it fits such a wide range of players and it’s just such a good iron that fits a wide, wide range of handicaps.”
“I think where TaylorMade kind of struggled over the past is getting that spin on the golf club, and I think each generation it just keeps getting better. I think they did an awesome job.”
“If it’s not our best-selling iron in the fitting center, it’s always like number two. It’s such a great, great performer across the board. And yeah, it just keeps getting better every year. It’s really awesome; crazy distance on that thing too.”

For more photos/info, read our launch piece.

Srixon ZX5 Mk II

Their story: MainFrame v2 was developed with an Automated Intelligence process, flex-maximizing variable thickness pattern of grooves, channels, and cavities carefully milled into the backside of Z ZX5 iron faces for high ball speeds. Not only does MainFrame boost COR, but it also repositions mass away from the face and into the toe and sole for a lower CG for easier launch, more consistency, and forgiveness.

Fitter comments:

“I’m a big believer in the V-Sole. For high-speed guys who want a little forgiveness and are steep, it just doesn’t stick in the ground. Super soft and high launching. Not a ton of offset. It’s also been a good fit for moderate-to-high handicappers.”
“So I would say it, it kind of stands out in its category because it does launch higher than its competitors. It also sits in between some of the models, like, it doesn’t directly compete with a hollow cavity and it doesn’t compete with, like the Cobra King Tour. Like, it’s a degree stronger. For a forged iron, it performs great for us. The only problem is that it is a little bit light in a swing weight, so we have to be careful of who we fit.”
“It’s definitely one of our more popular irons for sure. You know, you get a guy who wants to play something small but still wants something more forgiving, and they don’t want kind of that full hollow body iron. I mean, that’s definitely one of our best sellers for sure. We’re seeing that a lot of combos — that’s a one iron that you can definitely combo with the ZX7 for sure.”
“I think a lot of guys like the concept of the V-Sole with them…If you’re talking an overall package, you know, for the guy that is looking for something clean. That’s a spectacular golf club. Good looks and good feel and great, you know, great performance, and it fits a lot of categories.”
“I think the one struggle a lot of companies have with that category is getting something to spin, so to try and give like guys so they don’t get those knuckleball shots or that fly out of the rough that goes 20 yards longer. I kind of think that that’s what I think makes that item so good is you get some spin on it, and I think it, it looks and feels good enough that like it, a guy that’s a mid-single digit can play it and be like, yeah, that’s good enough for me. But it’s also forgiving enough that a guy that’s in that kind of 12-to-15 kind of category if he wants to reach a little bit and play something that might look a little bit better. It just fits such a huge, huge range of players. I think it’s just awesome.”

For more photos/info, read our launch piece.

Mizuno JPX923 Hot Metal

Their story: “With the JPX923 Hot Metal, Mizuno introduces “4355 nickel chromoly,” which is 35 percent stronger than the original Hot Metal material and allows for an eight-percent thinner clubface. Cup face construction works in tandem with a deep center of gravity for high launch with stopping power. Mizuno developed Hot Metal Pro, Hot Metal and Hot Metal HL (High Launch) from 175,000 real golf swings recorded via Mizuno’s Swing DNA system.”

Fitter comments:

“These are great for a player who flips at the ball but also needs some help and forgiveness. The strong lofts help reduce a player’s launch and spin.”
“Great forgiveness with the feel that Mizuno is known for.”
“Great looking and great feeling irons.”
“If I had a player come in, that’s just your, you know, your average golfer. It’s one that is like, “Hey, this is, this is one to try.” This is gonna produce a lot of ball speed and is super forgiving. You can combo it really well. Mizuno does a great job where you can do combo sets just with lofts.”
“It’s very good. It’s one of the most popular. Always in the mix of game improvement irons when people come in and they want to hit something that’s forgiving and that also still feels less clicky.”

For more photos/info, read our launch piece.

Titleist T200

Their story: If there were gripes about the previous generation of T200 irons, it was probably because of feel and sound at impact. Titleist heard your feedback on the previous T200 irons, and it listened. The new 2023 T200 irons have a reengineered chassis to create a stiffer structure and create a more stable feeling and muted sound. They also refined the Max Impact Technology within the head to sit closer to the L-face, further solidifying the feel.

Fitter comments:

“Best overall for us. Great looks, workability. Plenty of forgiveness.”
“I like the great look of these and they are easy to play for the average golfer.”
“That’s a big combo iron for sure, especially, but it’s also, you know, in that player distance category, it’s one of the higher launching ones, and it’s gonna spin a little bit more. I would say some of those irons in that category they launch, you know, they’ve launched a little bit lower and they don’t spin, which it is great for some players, but also some still want to play a smaller package.”
“I think it was definitely a big jump from the previous one. Yeah, I mean, one thing I’ve noticed is compared to some of the other irons, even kind of equal loft, it tends to get a little bit more height on it.”
“It’s great for one of those guys that if I get in there that’s kind of hitting a little low. It’s one to kind of throw in my hands…you’re seeing that initial launch kind of pick up a little bit compared to some of the other ones.”

For more photos/info, read our launch piece.