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Why Rory McIlroy will likely use the new TaylorMade BRNR Mini Driver Copper at the RBC Heritage

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Although we spotted Rory McIlroy testing the new TaylorMade BRNR Mini Driver Copper last week during practice rounds at the Masters, he ultimately didn’t decide to use the club in competition.

It seems that will change this week at the 2024 RBC Heritage, played at the short-and-tight Harbour Town Golf Links in Hilton Head.

When asked on Wednesday following his morning Pro-Am if he’d be using the new, nostalgic BRNR Copper this week, McIlroy said, “I think so.”

“I like it,” McIlroy told GolfWRX.com on Tuesday regarding the BRNR. “This would be a good week for it.”

 

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According to Adrian Rietveld, the Senior Manager of Tour at TaylorMade, the BRNR Mini Driver can help McIlroy position himself properly off the tee at the tight layout.

Here’s what Rietveld told GolfWRX.com on Wednesday:

“For someone like Rory, who’s that long at the top end of the bag, and then you put him on a course like Harbour Town, it’s tough off the tee. It’s tight into the greens, and you have to put yourself in position off the tee to have a shot into the green. It kind of reminds me of Valderrama in Spain, where you can be in the fairway and have no shot into the green.

“I’m caddying for Tommy [Fleetwood] this week, so I was walking the course last night and looking at a few things. There’s just such a small margin for error. You can be standing in the fairway at 300 yards and have a shot, but at 320 you don’t. So if you don’t hit a perfect shot, you could be stuck behind a tree. And then if you’re back at 280, it might be a really tough shot into the small greens.

“So for Rory [with the BRNR], it’s a nice course-specific golf club for him. He’s got both shots with it; he can move it right-to-left or left-to-right. And the main thing about this club has been the accuracy and the dispersion with it. I mean, it’s been amazing for Tommy.

“This was the first event Tommy used a BRNR last year, and I remember talking to him about it, and he said he couldn’t wait to play it at Augusta next year. And he just never took it out of the bag because he’s so comfortable with it, and hitting it off the deck.

“So you look at Rory, and you want to have the tools working to your advantage out here, and the driver could hand-cuff him a bit with all of the shots you’d have to manufacture.”

So, although McIlroy might not be making a permanent switch into the new TaylorMade BRNR Mini Driver Copper, he’s likely to switch into it this week.

His version is lofted at 13.5 degrees, and equipped with a Fujikura Ventus Black 7X shaft.

See more photos of Rory testing the BRNR Mini here

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He played on the Hawaii Pacific University Men's Golf team and earned a Masters degree in Communications. He also played college golf at Rutgers University, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Journalism.

2 Comments

2 Comments

  1. Pingback: What’s the perfect mini-driver/shaft combo? – GolfWRXers discuss – GolfWRX

  2. Russell

    Apr 18, 2024 at 4:34 pm

    I’ve never heard of “bomb and gauge”. Do you mean “bomb and gouge”?

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Equipment

Callaway launches Paradym Ai Smoke Triple Diamond Max driver

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Give me a Callaway Paradym Ai Smoke Triple Diamond driver but make it Max. Callaway engineers have taken the tour staple triple diamond head and boosted its size from 450 to 460cc’s. “By doing that we’ve created a more forgiving head while still keeping the same great shape that’s beloved on tour,” said Callaway’s advanced R&D manager Nick Yontz. The driver offers more spin than Triple Diamond standard — and thus more workability and forgiveness.

In contrast to the standard Triple Diamond, which features 14 and two-gram weights. The Ai Smoke Triple Diamond Max is equipped with 10-gram and four-gram interchangeable weights, which contributes to greater overall stability. According to Callaway, the driver plays more neutral than the neutral-to-fade-bias Triple Diamond.

Comparison of the Triple Diamond and Triple Diamond Max faces.

Discussing testing on tour, Nick Yontz, advanced R&D manager, said:

“We first brought this head out for Tour testing in November last year. Players would step up and we had it matched up to their gamer driver specs. They would swing, and we saw consistently good ball flights – very stable. It was the word ‘stable’ that continued to be used by players.”

“They would continue to split the fairway and what that caused them to do was to start swinging faster. They had this excitement that, ‘This thing doesn’t go offline. I can keep swinging harder and harder and it maintains that straight flight’”

“We were seeing players. that would have small gains in ball speed from just the driver head alone, but then the swing speed would increase the more and more swings they made. By the end of it, they really saw meaningful gains in ball speed and distance.”

As a refresher on the Callaway Paradym Ai Smoke driver family — which now includes Paradym Ai Smoke Max, Paradym Ai Smoke Max D, Paradym Smoke Max Fast, Paradym Ai Smoke Triple Diamond, and Paradym Ai Smoke Triple Diamond Max — check out our launch piece.

Callaway Paradym Ai Smoke Triple Diamond Max: Pricing, specs, availability

Price: $599.99

Loft options: 9, 10.5 degrees

Stock shaft: Project X Denali Blue

At retail: June 7

 

 

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Equipment

Photos from the 2024 Charles Schwab Challenge

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GolfWRX is live this week at Colonial Country Club for the Charles Schwab Challenge.

Custom Camerons and some “super” new grips from SuperStroke are filling our galleries early in the week as well as WITBs — including the always interesting “Cashmere Keith” Mitchell.

Check out links to our photos below, which we’ll continue to update throughout the week.

And while you’re making your way through our photos, be sure to check out last year’s incredible gallery of prototype and personal Ben Hogan golf clubs.

General Albums

WITB Albums

Pullout Albums

See what GolfWRXers are saying in the forums.

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Coolest thing for sale in the GolfWRX Classifieds (5/21/24): New Ping i210 4-UW irons

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At GolfWRX, we are a community of like-minded individuals that all experience and express our enjoyment of the game in many ways.

It’s that sense of community that drives day-to-day interactions in the forums on topics that range from best driver to what marker you use to mark your ball. It even allows us to share another thing we all love – buying and selling equipment.

Currently, in our GolfWRX buy/sell/trade (BST) forum, there is a listing for a set of New Ping I210 4-UW irons.

From the seller: (@jblough99): “New Ping I210 4-UW with AWT 2.0 stiff shafts.  Standard length, standard loft, black dot lie.  Golf Pride Tour Velvet grips standard size.  All matching serial numbers.  There is a rub in the finish on the back of the 6 iron and a few spots in the hydropearl finish on the other iron faces (see pics) unfortunately the shop I got them from didn’t wrap each head individually for shipping.  These clubs are new unhit, most still have the protective stickers on the numbers on the soles. $1025 OBRO full clubs. $975 OBRO heads only.”

To check out the full listing in our BST forum, head through the link: New Ping I210 4-UW irons

This is the most impressive current listing from the GolfWRX BST, and if you are curious about the rules to participate in the BST Forum you can check them out here: GolfWRX BST Rules

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