Tour News

Simpson reaches Olympic heights

Published

12 years ago

Jun 18, 2012

There is something about the U.S. Open that creates historical parallels and loops. Some of them are flat out weird, like a guy named Lee hitting his ball on Sunday into the exact same tree that another guy named Lee hit his into 17 years ago. And some of them are pleasing in their symmetry. At the 2012 U.S. Open at Olympic, Webb Simpson claimed is first major championship and also became a part of one of those historic loops.

Simpson, who shot rounds of 68 on Saturday and Sunday to finish one shot clear of 2010 Open winner Graeme McDowell and Michael Thompson, became the ninth consecutive first-time major winner. Simpson played his college golf at Wake Forest as a recipient of an Arnold Palmer scholarship. How fitting that The King was responsible for mentoring the man who won at the site of one of his most bitter defeats, a loss to Billy Casper in 1966 when Palmer lost a seven-shot lead on the final nine holes of the tournament. Simpson also won 25 years after another Scott Simspon (no relation), who took the U.S. Open at Olympic for his only major title. Scott Simpson was born in 1955, the year that Ben Hogan famously lost to Jack Fleck in a playoff at Olympic that is considered by many to be the greatest upset in golf history.

And on and on.

A two-time winner and contender for player of the year honors in 2011, Simpson had never really contended in a major and had missed the cut in the two events he played in prior to the U.S. Open. But in the closing holes that pitted him against some to the toughest and most seasoned professionals, Simpson performed like an old pro in top form. Of the last 18 players to tee off on Sunday, he was the only one to break par. And when faced with a difficult chip shot out of an old sprinkler head depression on the 18^th, Simpson executed the shot brilliantly, leaving himself a 3-footer that he rolled in for the par that was the difference between winning and a playoff.

While calm on the outside, Simpson admitted that he was a jangle of nerves on the inside while trying to track down a major title on one of the toughest tests ever set before a group of professionals.

“On that back nine, I was thinking to myself, ‘How did Tiger ever win 14 of these things?'” Simpson said after the round. “I couldn’t feel my legs for most of those holes.”

He managed his nerves well enough to post four birdies around the turn, post his 281 and make it the clubhouse where he could watch the NASCAR-like crashes of the remaining contenders.

On a course where a good prayer could have been as essential as a good putter, Simpson was right at home. A devout Christian, he has said that if he were not a pro golfer he would likely be a minister. A father of one and expecting his second, Simpson is the quintessential “old soul” in a young man’s body. His game and his life seem grounded in the fundamentals.

Simpson is only in his fourth year on Tour, and he clearly has the talent to take his career to whatever level he aspires to. But when he talks about what’s important to him, it’s all about his wife Taylor and the family they want to raise and the community that they want to serve. Who knows; Webb Simpson may very well achieve more off the course than on it. But history will note that for one week in June in this Olympic year, Webb Simpson’s game reached Olympic heights.

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Equipment

Spotted: Putter roundup from the 2024 3M Open

Published

2 days ago

Jul 25, 2024

Brian Knudson

Every week we spot some really cool and custom putters out on the putting green and in tour players’ bags. This week is no slouch with some really interesting and beautiful putters being tested. Let’s take a look at some of the standouts we found.

Tyler Duncan: Scotty Cameron Phantom T-11.5

The Phantom 11 is a pretty wild putter by Scotty’s standards with a multi-material design that boosts MOI for more forgiveness. Duncan’s T-11.5. takes the stock model and moves the shaft to the center of the putter head. We don’t mean a center shafted version, but the shaft is installed in the center, behind the face as well. We don’t have any official details on this T-11.5 but it looks like that setup should create a putter where the face points towards the hole or target, similar to a L.A.B. putter.

Zac Blair: Scotty Cameron 009.M Cameron & Co. “Longneck”

Blair might be in possession of the largest Scotty collection on tour! It seems like every week he has something new, and flat-out gorgeous, that he is trying out. I have seen a lot of 009.M putters over the years, but never one with a long plumbers neck on it. This 009 is a Masterful that utilizes additional CNC machine work to reduce the amount of hand polishing needed to complete the putter. The long, or tall, neck on the putter usually is used to reduce the amount of toe hang and make the putter more face balanced. The face contains a very shallow milling while the sole features a tour truck, tour only, diamonds, and the rare Circle L stamp. The Circle L was made for Scotty’s close friends who lost matches or games and was meant to poke a little fun at their misfortune.

Paul Barjon: PXG Prototype

There are a lot of putters out there that become so widely used and popular that other manufacturers will borrow some of the design cues. The Spider is one of those putters and it looks like PXG has made a prototype putter for Barjon that has some similar features. This proto has a tapered mallet shape with twin wings that come out from either side of the rear. Twin movable weights sit in each wing on the sole and the sole features a plate that is bolted in place at the corners. The top contains a single siteline and the face uses PXG’s advanced pyramid face structure.

Odyssey Ai-One Cruiser Broomstick #7

More and more long, counterbalanced, and alternative putters seem to be showing up recently. The long, or broomstick, putter is making a comeback and more than a few players have joined Adam Scott in using that style. Odyssey has thrown its hat in the broomstick arena with a new Ai-One Cruiser model. The head shape is the very familiar #7 model, but with the shaft going into the center of the club head. An Ai-One face is there to help keep ball speed consistent on off-center hits and three white lines are on top for framing ball and aligning the putter.

TaylorMade Spider Tour S Broomstick

Another option in the long putter is TaylorMade’s Spider Tour S broomstick that we saw around the putting green. The head looks to be a little larger than the standard Tour S and that makes sense with the broomstick-style putters demanding heads near or over 400g. A TPU Pure Roll insert is installed in the face and the shaft is a more traditional double-bend design, just much longer! There isn’t the True Path alignment on top, just a full darker grey finish with a single siteline. Two moveable weights are out in the wings of the putter to dial in the specific weight a player might want.

Check out the rest of our photos from the 2024 3M Open

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Tour Photo Galleries

Photos from the 2024 3M Open

Published

4 days ago

Jul 23, 2024

GolfWRX Staff

GolfWRX is on site this week at TPC Twin Cities for the 2024 3M Open for the penultimate event of the PGA Tour’s regular season.

The photos are flying in from Blaine, Minnesota. We’ve already assembled general galleries and a fresh Tony Finau WITB.

Check back throughout the week for more photos!

General Albums

WITB Albums

Pullout Albums

Chris Gotterup’s TM P-7CB irons – 2024 3M Open

See what GolfWRXers are saying in the forums.

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Equipment

Collin Morikawa’s pre-Open equipment adjustments

Published

1 week ago

Jul 18, 2024

GolfWRX Staff

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.

Three years later, Morikawa has once again changed his irons to deal with the unique Scottish turf.

Morikawa has been using TaylorMade P730 blade short irons (7-PW), P7MC mid irons (5-6) and a TaylorMade “Proto” 4-iron with a cavity-back construction this year.

However, he switched into a new set of TaylorMade P7CB irons (5-PW) before finishing T4 at last week’s Genesis Scottish Open, to go along with his familiar “Proto” 4-iron. TaylorMade’s P7CB irons are the finalized versions of the “Proto” 4-iron that Morikawa has been using, except they remain unreleased to retail.

According to TaylorMade, Morikawa switched into a full set of the new P7CB irons to aid with turf interaction, just like he did prior to his 2021 Open victory.

Morikawa is honing in on his winning formula overseas.

Morikawa also has switched from his usual TaylorMade Qi10 5-wood to a lower-launching TaylorMade P790 3-iron equipped with a Project X HZRDUS 105 Hybrid shaft. The loft of the club has been bent down to 19 degrees.

TaylorMade says that Morikawa switched into the new driving iron In order to “have an option to hit something lower that will roll out in the fairways.”

Head over to PGATour.com for the full article.

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