Lowest Spin Tour Ball off the Driver

[bluedot]

14 hours ago, LCP said:

pollock, at about the same time you picked up a more forgiving driver head (G410 Plus), I did too, and am chasing this same exact thing.  I've watched the same videos.  My current ball is a Tour B X.  I plan to generally keep playing it, but I've thought about getting some Titleist ProV1 left dash for long bombs.  They are expensive though.  I've theorized that the AVS is the "almost as good" alternative, and the only other ball I might consider would be the Taylormade TP5x, but I think those go too far with irons.  That said, that can be an advantage if I'm hitting into a strong wind, since those will be less affected with their lower spin.

 

It's too bad no one wanted to share their experiences of what makes different balls different.  I'll freely share I think both versions of the ProV1 and Chrome Soft are short, spin too much and don't fly straight.

 

With all due respect, the reason that there haven't been more people sharing their experiences is because the differences in spin rates off the driver among "tour quality" golf balls just aren't very large; there just isn't much way around that.  (The term "tour quality" was used by the OP, fwiw.)  And it was made clear early and often that the OP wasn't interested in testing data, so the options for answers were pretty limited.  How much a golf ball, ANY golf ball, is spinning off a driver is impossible to assess by just hitting the ball and "eyeballing it; it isn't like a shot off an iron that either hits and stops or rolls out, or a wedge that sucks back, or whatever.  It's sort of an impossible question to answer if you throw out testing data; you can say that this ball or that ball was longer or shorter off the tee, but that's about it if you only want personal observation.

 

The two balls that have been mentioned relatively frequently are the ProV1 left dash and the AVX.  With the AVX, the term "tour quality" comes into play; I suspect that the AVX is not a ball that would appear in the bag of a professional golfer.  The left dash is a ball that Titleist has offered because the spin rate off irons is in between the two retail versions; I haven't seen anything to indicate that the launch characteristics off a driver are any different than the other two. 

 

Also, and again with all due respect, the Chrome Soft (at least the 2019 version) is NOT similar to the two ProV1's.  The CS is significantly shorter off the driver, spins significantly less off irons, and is significantly less consistent in dispersion.  It is (or was) an inferior ball to the two ProV1's in pretty much every respect. 

Edited September 8, 2020 by bluedot

[jons1]

ProV1x Left Dash 

[pollock21]

On 9/8/2020 at 8:39 AM, bluedot said:

 

With all due respect, the reason that there haven't been more people sharing their experiences is because the differences in spin rates off the driver among "tour quality" golf balls just aren't very large; there just isn't much way around that.  (The term "tour quality" was used by the OP, fwiw.)  And it was made clear early and often that the OP wasn't interested in testing data, so the options for answers were pretty limited.  How much a golf ball, ANY golf ball, is spinning off a driver is impossible to assess by just hitting the ball and "eyeballing it; it isn't like a shot off an iron that either hits and stops or rolls out, or a wedge that sucks back, or whatever.  It's sort of an impossible question to answer if you throw out testing data; you can say that this ball or that ball was longer or shorter off the tee, but that's about it if you only want personal observation.

 

The two balls that have been mentioned relatively frequently are the ProV1 left dash and the AVX.  With the AVX, the term "tour quality" comes into play; I suspect that the AVX is not a ball that would appear in the bag of a professional golfer.  The left dash is a ball that Titleist has offered because the spin rate off irons is in between the two retail versions; I haven't seen anything to indicate that the launch characteristics off a driver are any different than the other two. 

 

Also, and again with all due respect, the Chrome Soft (at least the 2019 version) is NOT similar to the two ProV1's.  The CS is significantly shorter off the driver, spins significantly less off irons, and is significantly less consistent in dispersion.  It is (or was) an inferior ball to the two ProV1's in pretty much every respect. 

 

You mean like this? I'm clearly crazy, but this really doesn't look the same to me, nor does it do much to back up opinions that "all tour balls perform the same off of the driver".

 

This doesn't mean that these balls will perform like that for me, but it does prove that there are differences and gains to be had. And this is all I was asking for to begin with, just player validation on what individuals have found. They all work the same for you, that's cool, I can respect that. But clearly that's an inaccurate blanket statement to make with data that proves otherwise. The point of this thread was to ask others for their findings. I appreciate your findings and input, but I think we all get your point. Hopefully more people will chime in with personal testing they have done similar to what TXG did here and share their results. Ultimately, I think this is a topic that a lot of people haven't considered and likely haven't tested as much, but the picture below should help prove that it is worth looking at.

 

 

I do agree that the AVX is a very lacking ball everywhere except off the tee. I'm gonna track down some of these left dash balls to test out against TP5X.

[North Butte]

28 minutes ago, pollock21 said:

 

You mean like this? I'm clearly crazy, but this really doesn't look the same to me, nor does it do much to back up opinions that "all tour balls perform the same off of the driver".

 

This doesn't mean that these balls will perform like that for me, but it does prove that there are differences and gains to be had. And this is all I was asking for to begin with, just player validation on what individuals have found. They all work the same for you, that's cool, I can respect that. But clearly that's an inaccurate blanket statement to make with data that proves otherwise. The point of this thread was to ask others for their findings. I appreciate your findings and input, but I think we all get your point. Hopefully more people will chime in with personal testing they have done similar to what TXG did here and share their results. Ultimately, I think this is a topic that a lot of people haven't considered and likely haven't tested as much, but the picture below should help prove that it is worth looking at.

 

 

I do agree that the AVX is a very lacking ball everywhere except off the tee. I'm gonna track down some of these left dash balls to test out against TP5X.

 

 

If you went out and hit five shots each with every ball on the market, I guarantee that you'd get 2mph of ball speed and/or 300rpm difference in spin between some pair of balls out of all those tests. If you believe that you can find 2mph more than 300rpm less from among the usual suspects suggested on this type of thread and you believe 2mph/300mph on driver shots makes enough difference in your game to be worth the effort then get testing.

 

But I suspect that search will lead you to do what every other GolfWRX'er before you has done at one point or another. Go try different ball after different ball until one seems to go farther...then after switching to it for a few months go out and start trying them all over again because you didn't actually notice much difference in your game after all. We've all been there, it's fun for as long as you have the patience to keep it up.

 

But you won't find that by watching YouTube videos and picking the ball that some OTHER guy happened to hit 2mph faster on five shots into a net. It will vary from person to person and day to day.

[rwbloom93]

1 hour ago, North Butte said:

But you won't find that by watching YouTube videos and picking the ball that some OTHER guy happened to hit 2mph faster on five shots into a net. It will vary from person to person and day to day.

 

Is the point being missed here (not sure?)

 

The OP has read some robot data as a starting point......wants human data input or real world experiences to add to the robot data....in an effort to generate a list of balls he can test himself...... in order to find the ball with the lowest spin for the new driver.

 

Sounds fun, not sure the need for this thread to go off the rails.  Ultimately, the endeavor is likely fruitless but he wasn't asking for a critique of his plan, right?

 

To the OP,  add me to the Tour B RX suggestion but I have no data for you.

 

Regards

 

[bluedot]

7 hours ago, pollock21 said:

 

You mean like this? I'm clearly crazy, but this really doesn't look the same to me, nor does it do much to back up opinions that "all tour balls perform the same off of the driver".

 

This doesn't mean that these balls will perform like that for me, but it does prove that there are differences and gains to be had. And this is all I was asking for to begin with, just player validation on what individuals have found. They all work the same for you, that's cool, I can respect that. But clearly that's an inaccurate blanket statement to make with data that proves otherwise. The point of this thread was to ask others for their findings. I appreciate your findings and input, but I think we all get your point. Hopefully more people will chime in with personal testing they have done similar to what TXG did here and share their results. Ultimately, I think this is a topic that a lot of people haven't considered and likely haven't tested as much, but the picture below should help prove that it is worth looking at.

 

 

I do agree that the AVX is a very lacking ball everywhere except off the tee. I'm gonna track down some of these left dash balls to test out against TP5X.

 

I would be curious to know where this came from, including things like how many shots the data on each line includes.  Is it two different players, or one player with two different clubs?  As it is, I can't tell what I'm looking at because there is no context.  The takeaway, at least to me, is that the second line appears to be somebody who can launch the ball higher with less spin (should be suspect a really positive AOA?), so the same ball went farther.  If it's the same guy with two different clubs, I'd buy the second club, I believe.

 

I don't believe that I have written what you quoted me as writing; ""all tour balls perform the same off of the driver", which is clearly not true.   I didn't write anything like that in the post that you quoted, so the quotation marks aren't accurate, and I don't remember writing it anywhere else, though that's possible, I suppose.  There ARE differences between tour balls; I pointed out the differences between the Chrome Soft and the two ProV1's in that very post.  You bolded what I wrote about not knowing the launch number for the Left Dash; that was a specific comment about a specific ball, and NOT a blanket statement about ALL tour quality balls.

 

I know that you don't like robot testing, so I won't get into the testing data on those three balls, which were referred to in a previous post by another, who characterized all three balls as being short and crooked, which only true of one of them.  The CS, as I wrote, is clearly shorter and less consistent than the two ProV1's (and, I think we can assume, the left dash as well), but those differences are NOT about launch angles and spin rates off the tee.  You'll have to look elsewhere for that answer.

 

 

[North Butte]

2 minutes ago, bluedot said:

 

I would be curious to know where this came from, including things like how many shots the data on each line includes.  Is it two different players, or one player with two different clubs?  As it is, I can't tell what I'm looking at because there is no context.  The takeaway, at least to me, is that the second line appears to be somebody who can launch the ball higher with less spin (should be suspect a really positive AOA?), so the same ball went farther.  If it's the same guy with two different clubs, I'd buy the second club, I believe.

 

I don't believe that I have written what you quoted me as writing; ""all tour balls perform the same off of the driver", which is clearly not true.   I didn't write anything like that in the post that you quoted, so the quotation marks aren't accurate, and I don't remember writing it anywhere else, though that's possible, I suppose.  There ARE differences between tour balls; I pointed out the differences between the Chrome Soft and the two ProV1's in that very post.  You bolded what I wrote about not knowing the launch number for the Left Dash; that was a specific comment about a specific ball, and NOT a blanket statement about ALL tour quality balls.

 

I know that you don't like robot testing, so I won't get into the testing data on those three balls, which were referred to in a previous post by another, who characterized all three balls as being short and crooked, which only true of one of them.  The CS, as I wrote, is clearly shorter and less consistent than the two ProV1's (and, I think we can assume, the left dash as well), but those differences are NOT about launch angles and spin rates off the tee.  You'll have to look elsewhere for that answer.

 

 

Those look like the numbers (from my vague memory) from the TXG video comparing Left Dash to regular Pro V1x. One guy, same club, hitting something like six or eight shots with each back all in one session.

[theboypinoy]

1 hour ago, bluedot said:

 

I would be curious to know where this came from, including things like how many shots the data on each line includes.  Is it two different players, or one player with two different clubs?  As it is, I can't tell what I'm looking at because there is no context.  The takeaway, at least to me, is that the second line appears to be somebody who can launch the ball higher with less spin (should be suspect a really positive AOA?), so the same ball went farther.  If it's the same guy with two different clubs, I'd buy the second club, I believe.

 

I don't believe that I have written what you quoted me as writing; ""all tour balls perform the same off of the driver", which is clearly not true.   I didn't write anything like that in the post that you quoted, so the quotation marks aren't accurate, and I don't remember writing it anywhere else, though that's possible, I suppose.  There ARE differences between tour balls; I pointed out the differences between the Chrome Soft and the two ProV1's in that very post.  You bolded what I wrote about not knowing the launch number for the Left Dash; that was a specific comment about a specific ball, and NOT a blanket statement about ALL tour quality balls.

 

I know that you don't like robot testing, so I won't get into the testing data on those three balls, which were referred to in a previous post by another, who characterized all three balls as being short and crooked, which only true of one of them.  The CS, as I wrote, is clearly shorter and less consistent than the two ProV1's (and, I think we can assume, the left dash as well), but those differences are NOT about launch angles and spin rates off the tee.  You'll have to look elsewhere for that answer.

 

 

 

 

TXG video comparing left dash to standard. The screenshot OP had is from approximately 7:25 in.

 

 

[pollock21]

That’s exactly where it came from. Same player, same shaft, same club, same day.

 

Its just more data to look into. Also gonna have to try some B-RX’s. Seems like more and more higher speed guys are getting really surprising numbers with them. 

[arbeck]

The one big problem with TXG's ball test is that they are performed indoors. A big part of what makes a ball do what it does is how it reacts after you strike it. Dimple patterns can create more or less lift and change the ball flight considerably.

 

TXG's tests on initial spin, launch, and ball speed are good. But I'd take any carry distances with a grain of salt, because there's a lot more that will influence the ball that they simply don't test.

 

I don't think anyone will argue that there's a few hundred RPM's and a few MPH of ball speed difference between all the tour balls off the driver (this pales in comparison to the difference with other clubs). The issue is that a human would need to hit 100's of shots with each (even with those deviations you'd need to hit 25 with each ball to be 95% confident you aren't plus or minus 100 RPM) to achieve the deviations that were posted above. And that's indoors on a launch monitor. Once you get outside and you try to compare in the elements with bounces on the ground and everything else, you're unlikely to be able to ever hit enough to spot a difference (unless you are lucky enough to be able to hit hundreds of shots on Trackman). 

[elwhippy]

Indoor testing. Warm environment. Absolutely flat floor. Loose clothing. Take the figures with a pinch of salt. The guy on TXG is longer than most of the PGA Tour. Add in a crosswind, softer fairways and a few layers and see how a ball performs in the real world. 

[bluedot]

18 hours ago, elwhippy said:

Indoor testing. Warm environment. Absolutely flat floor. Loose clothing. Take the figures with a pinch of salt. The guy on TXG is longer than most of the PGA Tour. Add in a crosswind, softer fairways and a few layers and see how a ball performs in the real world. 

 

Deleted.

Edited September 11, 2020 by bluedot