Back to Ping Original Rapture 3 wood

I’ve tried all the new stuff, but nothing beats the 2007 Ping Rapture 3 wood for me. I bought the club used in about 2010 and shafted it with a Proforce V2 67S. I had since upgraded to stiffer shafts in my bag as my swing got stronger, but didn’t want to mess with the Rapture. Every season, I would demo new 3 woods, but the Rapture wasn’t beaten. Lately it has been too erratic with being the only S flex wood shaft in my bag among Xs. On a whim, I had it shafted with a VS Proto 70x, a $30, 12 year old shaft. It has not lost any distance, but is now much more controllable. Ball speeds are within 5-6 mph of my fitted driver, with driver like launch conditions and completely controllable trajectory high-low and draw-fade.

Does anyone else have a magic older club that they can’t get out of their bag?

I have a few. Original Ping Rapture irons, a Taylormade R11s 3 wood and a Odyssey White Hot Tour #1 putter. They just simply work, and work well.

Im not one to upgrade every year. And I get that some clubs still work fine years later and that people are more comfortable with them.

But I'm not sure that means nothing is better if looking at strictly performance. Even Henrik would tell you the new 3 woods have better numbers than his Diablo Octane Tour. He just likes that one more.

I'm also of the opinion that it can be difficult to compare a new club that you've swung 20 times to your gamer that's been hit hundreds or thousands of times. Of coruse, there are things that just don't work for you and you can tell after a few swings. But there are also clubs that are better and you are just not familiar with them yet.

Have had a few Rapture v1 drivers andctried to buy the 5 wood a few years ago so still time and need to buy back tm200 3 wood.Bought back two G5 drivers plus The Tee 4 wood and someone here just mentioned mp001 fairways 2 days ago!!!!! The Past make a great Present !!

> @agolf1 said:

> Im not one to upgrade every year. And I get that some clubs still work fine years later and that people are more comfortable with them.

>

> But I'm not sure that means nothing is better if looking at strictly performance. Even Henrik would tell you the new 3 woods have better numbers than his Diablo Octane Tour. He just likes that one more.

>

> I'm also of the opinion that it can be difficult to compare a new club that you've swung 20 times to your gamer that's been hit hundreds or thousands of times. Of coruse, there are things that just don't work for you and you can tell after a few swings. But there are also clubs that are better and you are just not familiar with them yet.

You make some good points as the newer 3 woods have similar numbers for me when hit well (I have a home launch monitor setup), but I don’t hit them as well. The size and shape of the Rapture are just perfect for me to hit off a medium tee. Off the ground, the newer shallow faced woods perform better and if I were needing of a 3 wood to hit off the ground, I’d have to upgrade.

The familiarity point you bring up is good as well.

We can fully trust an old reliable, and that allows us to make better swings with it.

Another point to bring up would be sound and feel. I haven’t hit anything that sounds or feels as good to me as my Rapture. This is another item that gives me confidence to swing better.

I feel like the newer stuff is focused on maintaining distance on off center hits at the cost of being more offline on those hits. Older clubs like the Rapture will lose more distance off center, but seem to not veer offline as much.

In my last practice session, I hit about 30 balls with my SkyTrak. As a reference, my G410 LST driver with evenflow black 6.5 75 is 160 ball speed, 13 degrees and 2,400 on the same monitor. Most of the Rapture 3s were 152-155 ball speed with 13-15 degree launch and spin around 3,000. A couple dropped to closer to 149-150 ball speed that I just barely didn’t catch the screws. 4 were off center enough that I could tell where and how I missed the sweet spot. 2 were low on the face and likely heel side. I lost a good 30 yards with these as they spun up to and over 4,000 RPMs, but they stayed in the edge of the fairway. 1 was toe side and happened while I was trying to play a slight cut. I was worried gearing would take over and it would be a bad double cross. When I looked up, the ball started on line and still did cut slightly. The only indication of the mishit was a 10 mph loss in ball speed, but that was almost made up for with a drop in spin. The final mishit was a high strike. The shot still went straight, but lost about 12 mph of ball speed. Launch went up to 18 degrees and spin dropped down to barely over 2,000. It flew like a tall rainbow, but the total distance was only down 15 yards.