Equipment
What IS that on the back of Rickie Fowler’s Cobra King wedge?
Rickie Fowler is no stranger to using wedges that are custom-made… and with wild, Oklahoma State-orange stampings on them.
Back in 2015, I spoke to Ben Schomin, Cobra’s director of tour operations, about Rickie Fowler’s special Tungsten-plugged Cobra irons and wedges. Schomin told me that since Fowler likes his wedges a half-inch short and at a swing weight of D3, Cobra developed a special fixture to mount the wedges in order to be able to insert conical Tungsten rods into Fowler’s wedges to make them heavier. He also said that each wedge took to 2-to-3 hours to make.
Flash forward to 2018, and Schomin has a bit different, more time-efficient process to add weight.
As we spotted in his recent WITB, Fowler has new wedges (56 and 60 degrees) with metal protrusions on the back cavities that look like caterpillars. To find out more about Fowler’s new Cobra King wedges, I again spoke to Schomin to get the lowdown. Here’s what he had to say.
“The grind is a specific shape I’ve been making for Rickie the last couple of seasons. Since he plays his irons 0.5 inches short, we need to add weight to those clubs to get the swingweight back up… Typically we’ve added tungsten internal weighting for both, but for testing purposes, I’ve added weld beads to increase weight over the years, which helps speed up the weighting process. Now I clean up the weld heat tint and re-blast the head to make it look good.”
Here are the specs on Fowler’s new 60-degree wedge.
- Shaft: True Temper Dynamic Gold S400 Tour Issue
- Length: 34.5 inches
- Swing weight: D4.5
- Grip: Golf Pride Tour Velvet .600 Rib 1+ .5 RH
Next time you see Fowler get up and down using a wedge, know that he has a bead-welded, torched caterpillar on it helping out.
See all of the clubs in Fowler’s bag here.
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- Steve Stricker WITB accurate as of the Zurich Classic. More photos from the event here.
Driver: Titleist TSR3 (9 degrees, C4 SureFit setting)
Shaft: Fujikura Motore Speeder VC 7.2 X
3-wood: Titleist 915F (13.5 degrees)
Shaft: Mitsubishi Tensei CK Pro White 80 TX
Hybrid: Titleist 816 H1 (17 degrees)
Shaft: Fujikura Motore Speeder VC 9.2 X
Irons: Titleist T200 (3, 4), Titleist T100 (5-9)
Shafts: Project X 6.5
Wedges: Titleist Vokey SM8 (46-10F @55), Titleist Vokey SM10 (54-10S @53), Titleist Vokey SM4 (60 @59)
Shafts: True Temper Dynamic Gold X100 w/Sensicore
Putter: Odyssey White Hot No. 2
Ball: Titleist Pro V1x
Grips: Golf Pride Tour Velvet Grip Rite
Check out more in-hand photos of Steve Stricker’s clubs here.
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- Alex Fitzpatrick what’s in the bag accurate as of the Zurich Classic.
Driver: Ping G430 LST (10.5 degrees)
Shaft: Fujikura Ventus Black 6 X
3-wood: TaylorMade Qi10 (15 degrees)
Shaft: Fujikura Ventus TR Black 7 X
Hybrid: Ping G430 (19 degrees)
Shaft: Fujikura Ventus Black HB 10 TX
Irons: Ping iCrossover (2), Titleist T100 (4-PW)
Shafts: Fujikura Ventus Black HB 9 TX (2), Nippon N.S. Pro Modus 3 Tour 120 X (4-9)
Wedges: Titleist Vokey Design SM10 (50-12F, 56-12D, 60-08M)
Shafts: Nippon N.S. Pro Modus 3 Tour 120 X
Putter: Bettinardi SS16 Dass
Grips: Golf Pride MCC
Check out more in-hand photos of Alex Fitzpatrick’s clubs here.
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In our forums, our members have been discussing Mini-Drivers and accompanying shafts. WRXer ‘JamesFisher1990’ is about to purchase a BRNR Mini and is torn on what shaft weight to use, and our members have been sharing their thoughts and set ups 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.
- PARETO: “New BRNR at 13.5. Took it over to TXG (Club Champ but TXG will always rule) in Calgary for a fit. Took the head down to 12, stuck in a Graphite Design AD at 3 wood length and 60g. Presto- numbers that rivaled my G430Max but with waaaaay tighter dispersion. Win.”
- driveandputtmachine: “Still playing a MIni 300. The head was only 208, so I ordered a heavier weight and play it at 3 wood length. I am playing a Ventus Red 70. I play 70 grams in my fairways. I use it mainly to hit draws off the tee. When I combine me, a driver, and trying to hit a draw it does not work out well most of the time. So the MIni is for that. As an aside, I have not hit the newest BRNR, but the previous model wasn’t great off the deck. The 300 Mini is very good off the deck.”
- JAM01: “Ok, just put the BRNR in the bag along side a QI10 max and a QI10 3 wood. A load of top end redundancy. But, I have several holes at my two home courses where the flight and accuracy of the mini driver helps immensely. Mine is stock Proforce 65 at 13.5, I could see a heavier shaft, but to normal flex, as a nice alternative.”
Entire Thread: “What’s the perfect Mini-Driver/Shaft combo? – GolfWRXers discuss”
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Steve Stricker WITB accurate as of the Zurich Classic. More photos from the event here. Driver: Titleist TSR3 (9 degrees, C4...
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Alex Fitzpatrick what’s in the bag accurate as of the Zurich Classic. Driver: Ping G430 LST (10.5 degrees) Shaft: Fujikura...
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sid
May 9, 2018 at 10:19 am
Cobra club designers must wince painfully to see all that ugly weld bead on the back of their beauties. It’s a total rebuke by Rickie that must really sting… lol
William King
Feb 2, 2018 at 11:21 am
Is that club on the USGA and R&A approved list? No doubt the original is, but I think that the rules prohibit alterations to an approved club.
Milton Gombo
Jan 31, 2018 at 7:20 pm
He used as little welding heat as possible, so as not to warp the club head. Weld will crack and fall off if not ground down and finished properly.
Lesson learned: if you like a heavy wedge, look elsewhere.
George
Feb 2, 2018 at 5:18 pm
You don’t have a clue what you are talking about.
Milton Gombo
Feb 2, 2018 at 5:51 pm
Professional Certified Welding Inspector and consultant here.
Heard we can all learn something from everyone. Please elaborate.
M-Herd4
Jan 31, 2018 at 5:38 pm
If it doesn’t bother Ricky it doesn’t bother me. Most pros don’t care how pretty the club is as long as it feels right in their hands and they can hit the shots they need to on command.
Blake
Jan 31, 2018 at 4:55 pm
Did people not know this?
farmer
Jan 31, 2018 at 3:36 pm
Not a very good job of welding. Ugly, but it works. No way to clean up those welds and make them look good.
George
Jan 31, 2018 at 3:20 pm
It’s a tool. All these idiots that sit around looking at their clubs obviously have no idea how to use them.
Piney
Jan 31, 2018 at 1:57 pm
“Now I clean up the weld heat tint and re-blast the head to make it look good.”
If that’s your definition of “good”, please don’t ever touch my clubs. It looks ridiculous. Also, there’s physically no way that bead welding, then removing a finish, then re-blasting his clubs is faster than adding or removing a few strips of lead tape…
Ed
Jan 31, 2018 at 1:20 pm
What’s wrong with a neat patch of lead tape? The weld bead makes the Cobra wedge fugly.
Will Cobra provide me with a custom weld bead or do I have to go to a local muffler shop for a weld bead? 😮
deeo
Jan 31, 2018 at 2:01 pm
Maybe it‘s inefficient to use leadtape because of all the adhesive?
I honestly don‘t know, but this torched caterpillar seems more … condensed than adding layers upon layers of lead tape.
Zach
Jan 31, 2018 at 1:16 pm
Are those 56 and 60’s really those lofts? He has some 54 and 58 stamps on them that would elude one to think they are 54* 58*??
Brian
Jan 31, 2018 at 1:55 pm
They’re probably bent to 56/60 for bounce and/or offset purposes.
Zach
Jan 31, 2018 at 3:55 pm
Or is it the other way around? Looks to me like the stock on them is 56/60 and he has bent to 54/58?