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The Ultimate Titleist 917 Driver Fitting at TPI Oceanside (Launch Monitor Data Added Pg. 4)


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Added my experience on the 1st page.

Ping G400 LST 8.5* w/ Tensei Pro White 70 TX
TM '17 M2 15* w/ Kurokage Dual Core 80 TX
TM P790 UDI 2 w/ KBS Tour 130x
Titleist 718 CB w/ KBS $ Taper 130x
Fourteen Raw RM 22 50, 54, 58 w/ KBS 610 Tour Black Nickel
Scotty Cameron Circle T Futura 6M[/b][/color][/font][/size][/font][/size]

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Added my experience on the 1st page.

 

How much shorter was your improved 917 fit driver than your M1? Be honest.

Callaway Epic Flash SZ 7.5 - PX Hulk 65g

Callaway Epic Flash SZ 13.5 - PX Hulk 85g
PXG Hybrid 19 - GD HYB 95

Miura MC 501 - DG X100

Miura Tour 50, 54 - DG X100

Vokey 60V - PX LZ

Scotty Cameron 009 - Circle W
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I was lucky enough to be chosen to experience the Titleist 917 driver fitting at TPI Oceanside. An enormous thank you to Zak, Golfwrx and Titleist for this wonderful experience. This is the second time I have been to TPI. I was there a few weeks ago for the Vokey Tour Experience. I was thinking about scheduling a TPI fitting for the new 917 drivers so when I was chosen I was more than ecstatic. The experience and people at TPI are just amazing.

 

I arrived at 12:50 and was greeted by Dino and the rest of the Titleist staff. Many I had met a few weeks ago when I was there. Met Samuel Youn (pitchinwedge), who was also getting his fitting done in the same time slot. Went to my locker, which they have setup with name tags, and got ready. I skipped the tour since I had gone through it a few weeks before. We ran through a quick informational marketing intro to the 917 drivers and then headed out to the range for our fittings.

 

The weather was great. Warm with a slight breeze. Warmed up with some wedges and irons and then took a few swings with my driver before jumping on the trackman.

 

Here is some background on my game. I am a 15 handicap. I have plenty of swing faults from teaching myself golf and doing a poor job off it. Currently going through lessons to unlearn all of the bad habits but I still have a lot of work to do. I try and hit a straight shot with my driver swing. When I am in tempo and keeping the backswing short I can drive it with the best of them. When things are not going well, I have two misses, a fade / slide when I don't finish a swing and a pull hook from an over the top arm swing. I currently play a 915 D4 10.5 with a Speeder 661 stiff tipped 1" at A1 setting and 45". I was fitted 2 years ago at Cool Clubs, which is how I ended up with my shaft. I was fitted to a D2 back then, but along the way I wanted to try a D4 because I love the head shape and did not like the 915 D3 headshape. I also found that the D4's miss was better than the D2 from side to side. Sometimes with the D2 I can really slice it and the same miss with the D4 would be a fade or something that put me in the rough and not in the trees. My issues with the D4 were sometimes low launch if I wasn't swinging up on it well that day or a loss of significant distance on mishits. We'll ignore the pull hooks and fades which are more user error. So when the 917 line came out, I was really excited to try the D3 hoping it would give me a lot of what I like with the 915D4 but with more forgiveness.

 

My fitting was with Dino. I have heard amazing things about Dino from multiple people I know so I knew I was in great hands. I took a few swings with my current setup to record on the trackman. My swings weren't great but average and Dino definitely commented that he would like to see more launch. He put my shaft in a new head. I was trying not to pay attention to the changes he was making so I wouldn't mentally change my swing to adjust for his changes. The 917 with my shaft was better but pretty quickly we knew this shaft was not great for me anymore. My swing is too different from 2 years ago. It's too soft for my transition. Dino switched shafts and then right away I hit a few drives that had awesome dispersion and good launch and spin. It would turn out that Dino got things right with this combination right off the bat. We tried a bunch of tweak to the weights, the fade draw settings, and shaft length and weight. Nothing came close to the original setup. During all of the tweaks, we were mainly keeping the same 917 head until the very end. He switched to the other head with the shaft that had been working the best for me and we quickly determined I was still better with the original head.

 

So in the end, the winning setup was a 917 D3 10.5 with a Fujikura Speeder Pro Tour Spec 74s at 44.5". Everything else standard, A1, neutral weight.

 

The 917 D3 head feels soft like the 910 and sounds great. I never had an issue with the 915 sound, it wasn't great, but it didn't bother me too much. This is much better though. The 917 D3 head shape is perfect to my eye as well. The area where the 917 shines is forgiveness. Towards the end my swing was deteriorating from hitting so many balls, I missed a couple with the winning combo and it stayed straight and I ended up with a lot more distance than I would have seen with my 915D4. I really like the shaft too. I used to play heavier shafts but switched to a little lighter shaft and after today, I am seeing the benefits. I have a hard transition and the heavier weight shaft helps keep things under control.

 

This setup had better dispersion, more forgiveness, and helped me gain 9 or 10 yards (7 carry). The shorter shaft also helped me increase my angle of attack. I was roughly neutral to -1 at 45" and +1.7* with the 44.5" shaft.

 

I have played Titleist Drivers for much of my golfing life. Originally with the 975D when I didn't have the game for it, to the 975JVS which I loved, to the 910D3, 913D2, 915D2 and 915D4. In between I have messed around with Taylormade and Ping drivers, the only one that I have ever liked as much as a Titleist driver was the Taylormade R7 Superquad. Titleist drivers just work for me. I have even recently messed around with the TM M1 and M2 to see if I could recreate the same magic a lot of other golfers are seeing with those drivers. They just didn't work for me. They didn't feel as good either.

 

Again, I cannot thank Golfwrx and Titleist enough for allowing me to participate. And on to the swag we recieved. Here is a pic of the swag minus the surprise. At the end they told us we were getting a free 917 driver in the specs we were fitted.

 

 

I don't remember all of my launch and spin rates. I have asked for them so when I get them I'll try to update this post. In the meantime, if anyone has questions, happy to answer.

Titleist TS3 10.5 Kuro Kage DC 70 TX
Titleist TS2 3 Wood Evenflow 85
Titleist 818 H2 19* Tensei White
Titleist 718 AP3 KBS S Taper S+ 4 iron
Titleist 718 CB KBS S Taper S+ 5-9
Vokey Hand Ground by the Man himself 46F, 50F, 54K, 60V
Scotty Cameron Toolbox 009

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Very cool experience!

Titleist TSR3 8* / Fuji Ventus Black TR 6X               

Titleist TSR2+ / Fuji Ventus Black TR 7X               

Callaway UW / Fuji Ventu Black 8X

Edel SMS iron 4-5 / DG TI X100 /////  SMS PRO irons 6-PW / DG TI X100

Edel SMS 50V, 54T, 60T / DG TI S400/ BGT ZNE 130

Edel PROTO




 

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What an fantastic experience! I feel so lucky to have been chosen for the fitting. Thanks again to Glenn (my fitter), Zak K., GolfWRX, and all the folks at TPI for making this happen. Everyone was super friendly and welcoming.

 

My group of two was scheduled for 1:00 - 1:15pm. I arrived a bit early and was greeted by Eric and Glenn, who took care of my bag. After a quick intro to TPI, Eric took me upstairs to check out the view from the second floor patio. I was pumped already, and couldn't wait to start hitting some balls. Sadly, I didn't remember to take pics as I was too busy taking everything in. Good thing Zak was roaming the grounds with his DSLR. I know, I know, so selfish of me.

 

Next, Dino gave me the tour of the rest of the facilities. This included a fitness assessment area and a hitting bay with motion sensor tech and launch monitors. He explained how they first assess what a player is physically able to do (the fitness), then use body motion tech to analyze what the player actually does, and finally apply all of this data into the club-fitting process. Very cool.

 

I've been fit for clubs a number of times before so I had a pretty good idea what to expect. With a large head/shaft selection available, I wondered what the end result would be. Glenn had already taken note of what I had in the bag so I'm sure he had a good idea where to begin.

 

After some quick warm-up balls, we were on Trackman with my own 915D2 to start. The first two shots were good down the middle followed by the next four shots sliced pitifully to the right. Bummer, I guess the excitement got the better of me, I simply didn’t have my best swing today!

 

Regardless, we had a baseline. If I recall correctly, Glenn said the numbers with my two good shots were "optimal" but he wanted "excellent". The difference being my current decent angle was a bit steep. He believed a lower flight with less spin would not only increase my total yardage, but also reduce how far my balls were going off-line.

 

So with that, Glenn built up the 917D2 head with the current generation Diamana Blue shaft. I typically don't ask the fitter what he's handing me because I don't want the info to affect what I'm doing (I think we started at A1). Right away I was really surprised by how much I like the color of the 917. Looking at it indoors, it hadn't really caught my eye, but outside, addressing a ball... whoa, I like it.

 

We continued to try various combinations until Glenn was satisfied he'd gotten the best combination for me with the D2. While we were working on this, it occurred to me the sound of the 917 was less piercing than the 915. It had less of the high pitched ringing and more of solid thwack. A big improvement in my opinion. Part of me wished I could try the D3 and with other shaft combos, but I already knew it was a moot point since I was already struggling with a big push/slice. Instead, I just let Glenn work his magic to figure out the set-up that best helped me manage my miss. It was a good learning experience and I'm happy with the result. Even though I wasn’t swinging well, the new set-up gave me a yard or two more carry and about 7 yards more roll. Sweet.

 

Old Setup

915D2 9.5*, C1 setting

Diamana S+ Blue 62 Regular

 

New Setup

917D2 8.5*, A1 setting

Diamana Ltd. Blue 60 Stiff

 

 

Let me finish by saying TPI is clearly a top-notch facility as was everyone there. I'm definitely going to schedule another fitting at TPI before I buy my next Titleist club.

917 D2 8.50* - Tensei CK Pro White 60
917 F2 13.5* - Rogue Max 70
816 H2 19.0* - D+ Plus 90
716 T-MB (3i, 4i) - Modus 120
716 CB (5-PW) - Modus 120
Hogan TK15 - 49, 55
Edel Deschutes

[url="http://www.golfwrx.com/forums/topic/1457364-pitchinwedges-witb/page__p__15152218#entry15152218"][color=#0000ff][b]Photo WITB[/b][/color][/url]

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Hi all! I’m Marc, and I was one of the lucky six that were chosen for today’s event at Titleist TPI Oceanside. Let’s get right into it. (disclaimer: I don’t have my trackman numbers yet, so I’ll update my write-up as soon as I get them.)

 

A little about me: Straight up, driving is the strongest part of my game, and I’m very okay at everything else. I’ll have my runs where I threaten to break par, but it’s not as often as I’d like. I have two older brothers that I’m ultra competitive with. My oldest brother is short off the tee, but miles better than me at putting so to stay ahead, I had to figure out my own way to keep it in the fairway more than him and be able to swing freely off the tee. I’m currently an 8.9 handicap, and from the trackman numbers today at Titleist TPI Oceanside, I swung comfortably at 100mph on average. I can crank it all the way up to an incredible 103mph, but only when the cart girl is watching. (Kidding, or am I?) I’ve never been to Titleist TPI Oceanside before, but I’ve read other member’s write-ups on their experiences so I had a general idea of what it was going to be like. If you’ve read them too, they’re not exaggerated. This place is unbelievable.

 

Arrival: I arrived at the facility around 10:05am. The weather was perfect: barely 72 degrees and sunny. I was informed that I’d be fitted alongside Neil. Him and I actually arrived at the same time, but I didn’t know it was him until we were greeted with a warm welcome at the front desk by a mob of Titleist staff. (Forgive me, I only remember Glenn, Lucas, Dino, Eric, and Mike.) They gave us tour of the facility and explained to us that TPI wasn’t just a fitting center. It’s a place where they can also measure your swing dynamics (from motion capture technology) and based on the information they gather, give you an option to either tweak your equipment (club fitting), or work on parts of your body based on those swing dynamics to make you a better swinger of the club (fitness area).

 

Right before we headed out back to the fitting area, they gave us the details about the 917 drivers. They explained how they redesigned the channel (A.R.C.), the face of the drivers (Radial Speed Face 2.0), adjusted the sound at impact, kept the SureFit hosel the same, but added the new SureFit CG to help move the CG to tweak your ball flight to draw or fade a little bit more. They brought back the crown color which is reminiscent of the 905/983/975 heads which I heard they call “liquid slate”. That’s when we met Zak, the Editor-in-Chief here at GolfWRX. Really nice guy.

 

Fitting: I’ve never been fitted for a driver before. I’ve been meaning to, I just wasn’t in a hurry to as I was happy with my driving. I knew before hand that I’d be working with the same fitters who fit Titleist’s PGA Tour players, so I knew I was in the best hands and just let them do their thing. The entire Titleist staff are professionals, and the facility they occupy at TPI Oceanside reflect that sentiment. They mean business and I love it.

 

Glenn (sp?) and Lucas were my fitters today, while Dino (sp?) worked with Neil. They had me warm up to game speed and told me to take my time. I was excited to swing the 917 line so I had to constantly remind myself to take my time and just stick with my routine. I hit about 8-9 wedges, 3-4 eight irons, and a couple 5 irons and luckily I was ready to go. I felt really stiff until after a couple eight iron swings.

 

Glenn had me start with my driver to get find my baseline numbers. My game driver is a 915 D3 8.5 in the B1 setting with a Fujikura Speeder 661 Evolution Tour Spec, 44.5” tipped additional .5". Going into the driver, I felt good about my swing so I just swung away.

 

It turned out that my smash factor was good at 1.48, but my average carry numbers weren’t optimal. I don’t have the numbers at the moment but I was roughly around a 235 average carry with about 30 yards of rollout, roughly 265 total. My angle of descent is on the low-end of about 26-30 degrees. This makes sense because I get a good amount of roll on the course I’ve been playing recently that’s pretty dry right now.

 

The first recommendation was to increase my launch angle. In my 915, I was around 10* launch. They had me try a 917 D3 9.5 in the B1 setting with my Speeder 661 Evo TS AND tee my ball higher to encourage hitting the ball higher on the face. The idea was that the 9.5 loft would first increase my launch and spin, then when paired with hitting it a little higher on the face, it would increase my launch and LOWER spin. If I confused you, what essentially happened was that I increased my launch angle and kept the same spin, if not a touch lower, than my 915 head. This high launch and low spin combination did what you probably have guessed for me…longer drives. My average carry increased roughly 7-10 yards with the longest carry at about 252 yards. (Again, I’ll update these numbers when I get my trackman results.) This was great and all, but the next best part was that my dispersion was about 1/3 of the size of my 915 grouping, and I already feel accurate with my 915 D3! We didn’t even need to touch the SureFit CG, although I wished we messed with it just for kicks. At the end of the day, Neil told me “I wish I had that problem.” Haha.

 

I had a hunch that we weren’t going to get any better numbers than that. I later overheard Glenn and Lucas say something to that effect while I was swinging a 3 wood setup, but more on that later. Next up, they put me into another setup that felt lighter. I didn’t get a good look at the shaft weight or flex to prevent any bias. I did notice it was from the Speeder Pro line, though. Impact felt nice and softer, but I my dispersion worsened. They tweaked a few things, same result. That setup was a no-go.

 

Then we backtrack to a combination closer to my first recommendation. I hit this combination just as good as the first, but the whole setup felt heavier. Glenn revealed that it’s the heavier brother of the 661 Evo TS, the 757 Evo TS. He asked me which weight I preferred. I had none, so I eventually settled on the former.

 

My final build, if I’m not mistaken, is a 917 D3 9.5 with a Fujikura Speeder 661 Evolution Tour Spec 44.5" in the B1 setting, and neutral weight.

 

The feel of the new 917 line is incredible. I played the 910 since I started playing golf and I’ve been apprehensive to switch for years. I found a great deal on a 915 head recently and I haven’t skipped a beat. I love the 915 D3 feel. The 917 do sound better! It’s still a relatively high-pitched sound. (Don’t get me wrong, I must have bought a later production 915 D3, because I’ve never felt the 915 line was ear-piercing like many reports state, and I have pretty sensitive ears.) The best way I can explain it is the 915 D3 has a high-pitched TINK, while the 917 D3 has a high-pitched CRACK to it. It’s like a 910 sound on steroids. It’s really subtle, but it’s enough to give it a faster feeling sound. I was hooked.

 

Fitting, Part 2: I’m going to be honest, my driving was pretty on while I was there. I was so excited to be there that I kept reminding myself to not rush and stick to my pre-shot routine. It translated to a pretty efficient fitting. So since we had more time, Glenn was nice enough to ask me about my 915F. I told him I’ve never had the best luck with any 3 wood. He was adamant that he could find a better fitted 3-wood setup. I currently have a new-ish 915F 16.5* 3-wood with a Diamana S+ 80gram in the B1 setting. I don’t hit it great, but I can live with the misses. To some extent, I actually feel like this is the best 3 wood I’ve ever had. His initial thought was that it played too long at 43”, so he and Lucas put me into a couple of setups, and gave me some swing thoughts to think about. I honestly didn’t even bother to look at the shafts or settings of any of them. Some worked okay, and some didn’t. Now that I looked at Titleist’s new 917F fairway shaft offerings, one of the shafts I tried was the Diamana Limited Blue. Short story long, they recommended me the 917F2 16.5* B1 setting in a Fujikura Speeder 757 Evo Tour Spec at 42"

 

End of the fitting: Zak asked us a few questions about our experience, and then it happened. Zak hooked us up with some GolfWRX swag: a GolfWRX bag tag, sticker, and a serialized GolfWRX poker chip...And then Eric from Titleist gave us a grab bag of our choice of Titleist Pro V1 balls and a Titleist cap…And then Zak dropped the bombshell on us….He told us Titleist will be sending us the driver build that we were fit for today! I was BEYOND EXCITED! This was just icing on top of the regular icing that was my fitting. THANK YOU!!

 

Thank you very much GolfWRX and Titleist! This experience is one that I’ll never forget!

 

To Zak, and the entire Titleist staff, THANK YOU!!

http://www.golfwrx.com/406976/917-vs-915-results-from-the-ultimate-titleist-driver-fitting-experience/

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Great thread, cool experience for those that got to take part.

 

My club is a major fitting center for Titleist, so I've pretty much hit everything. The 917 line is great... not surprising people are seeing gains.

 

How great? Majority of what I've heard has been ho-hum, especially from guys hitting the M1/M2. Seriously curious to see some numbers, was hoping to see some of this info in an easy to read layout. 917 is definitely on my radar, but pretty happy with what I have now.. just a big fan of Titleist :)

Callaway Epic Flash SZ 7.5 - PX Hulk 65g

Callaway Epic Flash SZ 13.5 - PX Hulk 85g
PXG Hybrid 19 - GD HYB 95

Miura MC 501 - DG X100

Miura Tour 50, 54 - DG X100

Vokey 60V - PX LZ

Scotty Cameron 009 - Circle W
IG: https://www.instagram.com/pure745

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Great thread, cool experience for those that got to take part.

 

My club is a major fitting center for Titleist, so I've pretty much hit everything. The 917 line is great... not surprising people are seeing gains.

 

How great? Majority of what I've heard has been ho-hum, especially from guys hitting the M1/M2. Seriously curious to see some numbers, was hoping to see some of this info in an easy to read layout. 917 is definitely on my radar, but pretty happy with what I have now.. just a big fan of Titleist :)

 

Well, I will put this the best way I know how. Every Titleist staff member who was fit at my club (their staff fitting event was held there) had an increase over the 915. The club is an upgrade over the 915 in every respect in my opinion, especially in regards to looks and acoustics.

 

I personally cannot play any of the drivers. Love the look and sound, but I launch them too high and the angle of descent is almost always too steep. The 915 D4 was closer, but usually any Titleist driver is no go for me.

 

I will say, I do really like their fairways and hybrids. I have a 3+ that I wouldn't change unless something came along that was appreciably better.

 

I could play an M1 tomorrow and I agree... the M1/M2 is probably the longest club (or among the longest) out there for most people when correctly fit.

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Added my experience on the 1st page.

 

How much shorter was your improved 917 fit driver than your M1? Be honest.

 

This is a complete guess since I have not gotten my M1/M2 on trackman or any other launch monitor and is based from on course testing. It seems to be about 8-10 yards difference. It could be more or less.

 

The thing I like about the 917 is the weight of the head, you can definitely feel the heft of the club vs the M1/M2 can be on the light side.

Ping G400 LST 8.5* w/ Tensei Pro White 70 TX
TM '17 M2 15* w/ Kurokage Dual Core 80 TX
TM P790 UDI 2 w/ KBS Tour 130x
Titleist 718 CB w/ KBS $ Taper 130x
Fourteen Raw RM 22 50, 54, 58 w/ KBS 610 Tour Black Nickel
Scotty Cameron Circle T Futura 6M[/b][/color][/font][/size][/font][/size]

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I do need to get my numbers from Zak and the Titleist guys. As soon as I do, I'll post them in here.

Ping G400 LST 8.5* w/ Tensei Pro White 70 TX
TM '17 M2 15* w/ Kurokage Dual Core 80 TX
TM P790 UDI 2 w/ KBS Tour 130x
Titleist 718 CB w/ KBS $ Taper 130x
Fourteen Raw RM 22 50, 54, 58 w/ KBS 610 Tour Black Nickel
Scotty Cameron Circle T Futura 6M[/b][/color][/font][/size][/font][/size]

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Great thread, cool experience for those that got to take part.

 

My club is a major fitting center for Titleist, so I've pretty much hit everything. The 917 line is great... not surprising people are seeing gains.

 

How great? Majority of what I've heard has been ho-hum, especially from guys hitting the M1/M2. Seriously curious to see some numbers, was hoping to see some of this info in an easy to read layout. 917 is definitely on my radar, but pretty happy with what I have now.. just a big fan of Titleist :)

 

I have a 10.5 M1 and a 10.5 917 D2 and am going to get fit on trackman in the next week or two. The local fitter has just about every shaft under the sun so it will be interesting to see which club wins the battle. I had a "fitting" on Trackman during a Titleist demo day but there is only so much you can cram into a 20 minute fitting. Those demo days are nice but with them only having the stock shaft options and appointments crammed together there is only so much that you can get done in the allowed time frame.

 

The fitter didn't even change the Surefit CG to analyze the numbers. I am hoping to get my hands on a weight kit to give both clubs a fair shake at the fitting. Stay tuned for results.

TSR3 TSi3 3 Wood | 915H 18 |  T150 4-PW Vokey SM9  50, 54, 58 |  Ping PLD Anser 2D

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This is cool and all but it's still laughable to be that the 915 was not a max ball speed driver

 

I find it laughable that you didn't reference your love for Cobra first. Regardless, I think the point is max ball speed outside of the hitting area is what Titleist addressed with the 917. My miss has a tendency to be low, but still in the sweet spot and the combination of their 2nd generation face and newer technology around the Speed channel helped maintaining higher smash factor and low(ish) spin, which ultimately lead to higher ball speeds and more distance.

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Anyone have details on the new exotic shafts Titleist will be offering?

 

Everything can be found here http://media.titleist.com/images/titleist/files/US/Titleist-Custom-Club-Options/?_ga=1.35404706.245327687.1476970313

TSR3 TSi3 3 Wood | 915H 18 |  T150 4-PW Vokey SM9  50, 54, 58 |  Ping PLD Anser 2D

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Great experience and writeups. Kudos to Golfwrx and Titliest for this offering. Love to read all of the improvements with the new line. It was interesting to me that most of the fittings were into a 44.5" shaft length. Much shorter than the typical 45.5" stock lengths going out in drivers on the shelf today. Just a reminder to me that I need to shorten my driver shaft, since I'm always choking down on it.

 

Thanks for all the writeups!

Titleist TSR3 9* Diamana ZF 60s
Titleist TSR3 15* Kai'li 70s

TM SIM2 Ti 19* Kai'li 70s

Titleist TSR3 24* Atmos Blue 8s
Srixon ZX7 Project X LZ 6.0
Cleveland RTX6 46,50,54,58 
Betti BB46 or QB6 or Betti BB Proto

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Great experience and writeups. Kudos to Golfwrx and Titliest for this offering. Love to read all of the improvements with the new line. It was interesting to me that most of the fittings were into a 44.5" shaft length. Much shorter than the typical 45.5" stock lengths going out in drivers on the shelf today. Just a reminder to me that I need to shorten my driver shaft, since I'm always choking down on it.

 

Thanks for all the writeups!

 

Titleist has stuck to 45" as standard length in drivers.

TSR3 TSi3 3 Wood | 915H 18 |  T150 4-PW Vokey SM9  50, 54, 58 |  Ping PLD Anser 2D

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Finally the non-tech savvy "old guy" chimes in. I am the "Ken" or shivasi that was also invited to participate the the Titleist driver fitting in Oceanside. I was in the early group with Michael and while he was having breakfast I got stuck in some construction/rush hour traffic. Hope you enjoyed that breakfast, Michael!

 

I currently have a GHIN of 3.7 and have played golf for 60 of my 69 years of life. Really haven't adapted that well to the new age drivers and I feel that this is, by far, the worst club in my bag. Currently working on a swing change and due to my aging, have recently switched to all regular shafts in my clubs. So enough about me, on to the fitting:

 

My current set-up is a 915 D2 10.5* with a Diamana Red R shaft in the A2 setting. With this as a baseline we (Glenn, my fitter) and I went to work. Through Trackman we discovered that I have a descending, slight negative pass through the zone. Glenn, explained that the dynamics of the new woods perform at their best when hit with an ascending path. Too many swing thoughts already. My smash factor was in the 1.48-1.5 range with a launch or 9* and a carry of about 210-215 and roll-out to 220-230. These numbers are spot on because when the big guys (Adam Scott or Justin Thomas) want to know their numbers, well they don't need the BS. Side note here, my GolfTech numbers were within 2-5%, which I find commendable. GolfTech you can contact me through GolfWrx or direct (rimshot). So he explained that I was hitting the ball very solid, but let's look for an area for improvement. That area became many area's as we looked for upticks in launch angle, sidespin and roll-out.

 

The next step was that Glenn selected a club-shaft combination that would address my problem area's (this is based on his 14 years of fitting clubs on Tour). Slowly, probably too slowly for Glenn (man has the patience of a saint) we begin to find solutions. Yes I say solutions because I lost count on the combinations and permutations that we/he used. Finally on virtually my last swing he saw what he was looking for in my number's, he actually said "there is a Christmas". I'm just sorry it only comes once a year. On a ball that I thought was a sort of "wounded duck" we hit the numbers that we were searching for. My launch angle increased to +12* (up 3*), carry to about 5-7 yards and roll-out to 10-13. A gain in distance of approximately 15-20 yards and not with the "good" swing (smash was 1.48). To tell the truth I still don't know the set-up as I was completely into the fitting and the education that came with it. But I will post pictures of the club when I receive it (hopefully), not the club but to be able to post the pics.

 

All in all, a great experience that everyone should have on their bucket list. Thanks to Glenn, GolfWrx, Titleist and the Titleist TPI staff for an unforgettable, once in a lifetime experience. Zak, buddy ,a tremendous job on your event as co-ordinator.

 

K or Shivasi

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Great thread, cool experience for those that got to take part.

 

My club is a major fitting center for Titleist, so I've pretty much hit everything. The 917 line is great... not surprising people are seeing gains.

 

How great? Majority of what I've heard has been ho-hum, especially from guys hitting the M1/M2. Seriously curious to see some numbers, was hoping to see some of this info in an easy to read layout. 917 is definitely on my radar, but pretty happy with what I have now.. just a big fan of Titleist :)

 

I've been fit three separate times for the M1/M2. I have 5-6* positive AOA, and in my hands, I find the M's deliver incredible numbers. No kidding - 17*/1700rpm. I've seen easily 20yds more carry than anything I did yesterday but something's always kept me from biting the bullet. The numbers really don't tell the whole story....

 

My best shots pre-fitting with the 915D2 were around 16/2400, iirc. To be fair, I think Glenn was looking for closer to 13/2200 with the 917D2 to tighten up the dispersion of my misses. Tweaking ball flight and tendencies was what Glenn was working on. The club seemed to "move" very differently based on the adjustments he made. Much more so than with other clubs I've adjusted in the past. This was really eye-opening. Instead of hunting for every last yard, I think he was trying to make the club feel more "automatic". Help my bad swings instead of making a bad swing worse. IMO, this is where a properly fit 917 potentially wins over the M's.

 

FWIW, I think I owe it to myself to have another fitting. There aren't many drivers out there that can get me to 17/1700 and my hunch is we could have gotten very close with the right D3/shaft combo. Don't know if the the 917 would match the M's ball speeds but it sure looked like they'd be close. Would be cool to have a safety club for off-days and the long-drive machine for on-days.

917 D2 8.50* - Tensei CK Pro White 60
917 F2 13.5* - Rogue Max 70
816 H2 19.0* - D+ Plus 90
716 T-MB (3i, 4i) - Modus 120
716 CB (5-PW) - Modus 120
Hogan TK15 - 49, 55
Edel Deschutes

[url="http://www.golfwrx.com/forums/topic/1457364-pitchinwedges-witb/page__p__15152218#entry15152218"][color=#0000ff][b]Photo WITB[/b][/color][/url]

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The thing about the m1 isn't how good the good shots are, it's how bad the bad shots are. In my experience it's a very unforgiving face - you either hit it dead on the jaws and it's great, or you whiff. I had my best driving day ever with it a couple weeks ago. Hit it 10 times and hit 7 fairways. Measured approximate distances with google earth afterward. My 7 fairways were just a smidge over 299. My 3 missed fairways averaged right around 235. Catastrophically bad. The key is do you take a more consistent driver that maxes out at 294, or do you squeeze out as much distance as you can? I can tell you I hit the 917 D3 the other day and found it to be dramatically more forgiving than the M1. To my eye it didn't appear to be shorter, although it also didn't appear to be longer. What I assume this means is that I hit it ABOUT the same distance but found it much more consistent.

 

My $0.02.

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Great thread, cool experience for those that got to take part.

 

My club is a major fitting center for Titleist, so I've pretty much hit everything. The 917 line is great... not surprising people are seeing gains.

 

How great? Majority of what I've heard has been ho-hum, especially from guys hitting the M1/M2. Seriously curious to see some numbers, was hoping to see some of this info in an easy to read layout. 917 is definitely on my radar, but pretty happy with what I have now.. just a big fan of Titleist :)

 

Our local pro is one of the larger Titleist fitters in the midwest, and he said that the drivers are a big improvement over the 915, but that the fairway woods have blown everything else away in the fittings he's done. According to him, if you try one thing from the new lineup, it should be the fairways.

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Great thread, cool experience for those that got to take part.

 

My club is a major fitting center for Titleist, so I've pretty much hit everything. The 917 line is great... not surprising people are seeing gains.

 

How great? Majority of what I've heard has been ho-hum, especially from guys hitting the M1/M2. Seriously curious to see some numbers, was hoping to see some of this info in an easy to read layout. 917 is definitely on my radar, but pretty happy with what I have now.. just a big fan of Titleist :)

 

I've been fit three separate times for the M1/M2. I have 5-6* positive AOA, and in my hands, I find the M's deliver incredible numbers. No kidding - 17*/1700rpm. I've seen easily 20yds more carry than anything I did yesterday but something's always kept me from biting the bullet. The numbers really don't tell the whole story....

 

My best shots pre-fitting with the 915D2 were around 16/2400, iirc. To be fair, I think Glenn was looking for closer to 13/2200 with the 917D2 to tighten up the dispersion of my misses. Tweaking ball flight and tendencies was what Glenn was working on. The club seemed to "move" very differently based on the adjustments he made. Much more so than with other clubs I've adjusted in the past. This was really eye-opening. Instead of hunting for every last yard, I think he was trying to make the club feel more "automatic". Help my bad swings instead of making a bad swing worse. IMO, this is where a properly fit 917 potentially wins over the M's.

 

FWIW, I think I owe it to myself to have another fitting. There aren't many drivers out there that can get me to 17/1700 and my hunch is we could have gotten very close with the right D3/shaft combo. Don't know if the the 917 would match the M's ball speeds but it sure looked like they'd be close. Would be cool to have a safety club for off-days and the long-drive machine for on-days.

 

Between the two drivers in my sig, one hits it realllly far, and the other one is super accurate, and the one that is accurate is the one that comes to the course 95% of the time. TM markets distance, it's their thing, and they do a good job producing products that live up to it, but if you have a 917 that's "automatic" I'm sure you can guess which one you're going to see scores drop with.. that being said, it's tough to leave 25 yards in the garage.. lol.

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Our local pro is one of the larger Titleist fitters in the midwest, and he said that the drivers are a big improvement over the 915, but that the fairway woods have blown everything else away in the fittings he's done. According to him, if you try one thing from the new lineup, it should be the fairways.

I've heard the same. "Titleist finally made a hot 3W to compete with other manufacturers. About time!"

TI Taylormade SIM (9.0°) Tensei CK Pro Orange 70TX
TI Taylormade SIM Ti (15.4°) Tensei CK Pro Blue 80X
Callaway XR Pro (20°) Diamana White 90X
PING i210 (4i-UW) DG X100
Ping Glide 2.0 (54°) DG S400 TI
Artisan MT Grind (58°) DG S400
Taylormade Spider X Chalk SS

Taylormade TP5

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