One Shaft To Rule Them All.....

[Duffner's Waggle]

Played in a captain's choice tourney last friday with my brother-in-law as a guest of his older brother. He happens to be an investment guy and helps with a lot of private equity projects. He's not much of a golfer, but he's pretty cool and we had a blast. Won some gift certs and what not, but the thing that stood out to me were the older brother's clubs!

 

Turns out he and his investment group have come along side DV8 sports as investors and helped raise some private capital for the company and as a result, he gets an early trial set of DV8's travel golf clubs.

 

 

Now in theory, the idea is cool. In today's era of disastrous airline screw ups and TSA corruption, I don't know anybody who is thrilled to check their clubs. Sure we all do it, but if you could somehow take them on the plane like a pro flyin NetJets or somethin, some of us would definitely do it. So the WHOLE SET (14 clubs) comes in a backpack size bag that would definitely fit as a carry on.

 

There is 1 shaft and then each club head has a different length shaft adapter on it so that the clubs progress in length as you move from putter towards the top of the bag.

 

I'd never seen anything like this in my life!

 

Here are a couple pics before I go on:

 

 

 

SO WHAT IF I CHOSE TO PHOTOGRAPH THE 3W?!? IT WAS COINCIDENCE!!! Kind of.

 

OK but seriously....I felt like a true WRXer for the first time as I looked at my white GolfWRX stand bag and then chuckled to myself 'Not a snowball's chance in hell I'd play those....'

 

Well we were off to the first tee and both the older brother and his business partner (who was our fourth, and who had the 'starter' set of DV8 clubs.....I think it was like odd number clubs, a wedge, a putter and hybrid and driver or something) were both terrible so we just relaxed, had fun and essentially played a 2 man scramble with 4 putts at each hole. Had a blast, shot 61.

 

Couple thoughts on the clubs:

 

1. Apparently you can custom fit them and then the company makes each adapter the exact length you specify. This way, the clubs still screw together and there's still only 1 shaft, but each club is the correct length for you. Kinda cool.

2. The components are kinda legit, except for the clubheads. I'd assume you could possibly turn any clubs into DV8 clubheads, assuming you just epoxied the adapter into the hosel, but the heads I saw were all DV8 brand club heads. The grip on the shaft was a golf pride black and orange NDMC, and the putter head was a SeeMore mallet! pretty cool (Really weird putting with a normal round golf grip).

3.The Custom fit clubs cost approx $1100! SAY WHAT?!?!?!? Pretty steep in my opinion. Anybody willing to pay that much would probably just use FedEx and ship their miuras to Pebble....amiright??

4. The backpack needs some work. It doesn't strap into the cart very well and it needs more pockets, but the idea of a travel set is kind of cool for the guy who isn't a WRXer and just wants to play a cheap muni on vacation or something.

5. I hit the driver....steel shaft.....3 pieces....felt completely ridiculous...and it flew about 275 lol! I was in shock. The older brother said they tested it with some pros to get feedback and all of them said the same.....feels really really weird, but the performance isn't bad at all.

 

 

 

Anybody else ever seen or heard of these things? Apparently they sold like $87k worth of product on Kickstarter (https://www.kickstar...s/dv8sports/dv8) without anybody ever touching a club.....so it seems there's a market for this stuff.

 

I'll be interested to see where it goes in the days ahead!

 

 

Hit em straight, or if not straight, then at least far,

 

Duff

[atlambert2]

I had heard about these and read a little write up somewhere (just about their existence, not any sort of performance review), but that’s awesome you got to see/hit them in person. I don't travel enough to ever need something like this, but it is one heck of an idea. I would love to hit them just out of curiosity.

[Golf64]

Might slow up play?!? Under the rules of golf, not allowed to 'adjust' a club. Wonder if this falls under that rule?! Just playing devil's advocate.

[Duffner's Waggle]

[quote name='Golf64' timestamp='1413828133' post='10320355']
Might slow up play?!? Under the rules of golf, not allowed to 'adjust' a club. Wonder if this falls under that rule?! Just playing devil's advocate.
[/quote]

It is actually NOT conforming, but for a casual round nobody is checking, and it actually doesn't seem to slow play at all. It is INCREDIBLY quick to change the clubs from one to the next. I was shocked,

[Golf64]

You would be the talk of your 4 some if you went with those?! lol

[Duffner's Waggle]

[quote name='Golf64' timestamp='1413828459' post='10320393']
You would be the talk of your 4 some if you went with those?! lol
[/quote]

Yea my bro in law and I looked at eachother like WTH have we gotten ourselves into out here today? haha

[Golfingfanatic]

Interesting concept for sure. However, I usually go with rental clubs if I am on vacation

[L_L]

Haha, amazing I want those!
I would call it gadgets of the golf world!
We can all agree on that a gps watch or laser range finders are NOT gadgets!
Golf needs more gadgets

[MrFlapjack]

Do you know how hard I got razed for using iron headcovers!! Sweet zombie Jesus...

But hey, it might be perfect for someone out there.

[markheardjr]

[quote name='MrFlapjack' timestamp='1413860114' post='10323489']
Do you know how hard I got razed for using iron headcovers!! Sweet zombie Jesus...

But hey, it might be perfect for someone out there.
[/quote]

I use iron headcovers to travel, but not for everyday use.

[MrFlapjack]

[quote name='markheardjr' timestamp='1413911959' post='10326553']
[quote name='MrFlapjack' timestamp='1413860114' post='10323489']
Do you know how hard I got razed for using iron headcovers!! Sweet zombie Jesus...

But hey, it might be perfect for someone out there.
[/quote]

I use iron headcovers to travel, but not for everyday use.
[/quote]

Ya that's what I do now as well. I like the idea of iron headcovers but they were a pain in the a** after a while.

[Free swingr]

I admire their ingenuity. With that said I personally would never use something like that. I can see a market for them although I'm not sure at that price point they would become mainstream. Regardless somebody is thinking outside the box and I applaud anyone with the gumption to take a chance.