Anyone tested ‘21 V1X or TP5X vs Tour BX?

[tipperi]

Have been a ProV1X guy for quite a while, but i'm also someone who is constantly changing ball's trying to find a better fit.


For me TP5X is one of the most frustrating ball's I've ever played.  Crazy long off the driver, but unpredictable inside 100 yards. I think my ball striking is just not consistent enough to make the ball work the way its designed and I end up really struggling trying to figure out how much release to play for.  Sometimes they check great, other times they release and run off the back.  The 21' does feel softer which I think it needed, but I still have the same issues with it for my game.

I know what ProV1x is going to do and I've always gone back to it for that reason.  If I catch one thin, there's still enough spin there to save me and that's very desirable. To me, it's just a ball that eliminates variables.  

Tour B X has been a nice surprise.  Great window off the tee, really good in the wind and surprisingly doesn't give up much if anything around the green.  For me, it's also a little straighter off the driver and long irons, which always helps. 

Playing in my first "real" tournamemnt this weekend and fully intend to play the Tour B X. 

 

 

[tipperi]

Another 9 holes in my league Tuesday night with Tour B X.  Such a good ball, all around.  I really need to stick with it and adjust to how well it checks and holds around the green.  In my mind, it's not a ball intended to spin a ton off the wedges but for me it spins as much as ProV1X everywhere that I want, and somehow spins less where I dont.

 

I've also gotten a few really, really big drives with B X that have blown me away.  #1 at my home track is a 445 yard Par 4, dead straight with a narrow fairway.  Trouble left, Driving range right.  Normally, if I stripe one I'm just inside of 160.  Last night i stood there with 129 to a middle pin.  Obviously there's not 30 yards in the golf ball, but I have seen a couple of these freaky long ones with Tour B X.  Could just be the right launch and spin combo for my driver setup, but id be lying if i said it wasnt really fun hitting em out there that far.  

3 day tournament this weekend with the B X, more to follow!

[aramirez24]

Bought a dozen tourbx before the round Tuesday. I'm a TP5x player, or at least I was. From the first drive I just felt comfortable with the TBX. Where this really shined for me was the shots about 9-PW down. It was so much easier to take an aggressive approach instead of trying to account for run out which was my only gripe with the TP5x. Around the greens too I was able to get some action on the ball that gave my confidence chipping. I took it to into my garage to hit on the sim and really love the feel, launch, and consistent spin I'm getting. I think we may be on to something here. 

[Alan_Tom]

Ive been gaming the tour bx for the last year. I absolutely loved it. Great distance off the tee great short game control around the greens and good feel. I saw the MGS ball lab on them showing how a lot of the balls are poorly built and off center. I tried the 21’ prov1 and didn’t compare to the tour bx. Just purchased the new prov1 x ball gamed one round with it. Has similar feeling to the tour BX and on MGS ball lab is the best ball quality you can buy. I have to play more round with it. It did spin a little more with my full wedge shots than I would like. I spun 2 to 3 significantly. One of those even off the green. I’m excited to get back out there demo the ball some more.

[rwbloom93]

3 hours ago, Alan_Tom said:

Ive been gaming the tour bx for the last year. I absolutely loved it. Great distance off the tee great short game control around the greens and good feel. I saw the MGS ball lab on them showing how a lot of the balls are poorly built and off center. I tried the 21’ prov1 and didn’t compare to the tour bx. Just purchased the new prov1 x ball gamed one round with it. Has similar feeling to the tour BX and on MGS ball lab is the best ball quality you can buy. I have to play more round with it. It did spin a little more with my full wedge shots than I would like. I spun 2 to 3 significantly. One of those even off the green. I’m excited to get back out there demo the ball some more.

 

You played the B X well for over a year but stopped because a golf article convinced you too?....not the ball performance? I'm sorry, but that makes no sense at all.

 

 BTW... GolfspyMy acknowledged when questioned by readers that they don't know if any balls that miss their specification actually perform poorly.  You would think that would be important, but apparently not to them.

 

Good luck in your unnecessary ball search.

Edited June 26, 2021 by rwbloom93

[Alan_Tom]

17 minutes ago, rwbloom93 said:

 

You played the B X well for over a year but stopped because a golf article convinced you too?....not the ball performance? I'm sorry, but that makes no sense at all.

 

 BTW... GolfspyMy acknowledged when questioned by readers that they don't know if any balls that miss their specification actually perform poorly.  You would think that would be important, but apparently not to them.

 

Good luck in your unnecessary ball search.

Boom roasted. Guess I’m always looking for that upper edge. 

[hammergolf]

19 hours ago, Alan_Tom said:

Ive been gaming the tour bx for the last year. I absolutely loved it. Great distance off the tee great short game control around the greens and good feel. I saw the MGS ball lab on them showing how a lot of the balls are poorly built and off center. I tried the 21’ prov1 and didn’t compare to the tour bx. Just purchased the new prov1 x ball gamed one round with it. Has similar feeling to the tour BX and on MGS ball lab is the best ball quality you can buy. I have to play more round with it. It did spin a little more with my full wedge shots than I would like. I spun 2 to 3 significantly. One of those even off the green. I’m excited to get back out there demo the ball some more.

If you never noticed a noticeably difference in performance after playing it for a year, then there isn’t one. I wouldn’t believe everything you read. Wording makes a lot of difference. Tiger, Bryson, Fred, or Lexi wouldn’t notice a 2 or 3 point compression difference in a ball. Only 6 balls out of 100 had a concentricity issue. I think they use 3 dozen to do their test. The sample size is very small, and who’s to say if they tested 3 different dozen that the results would be flipped. Even though it wasn’t mentioned in their Pro V1X review, ALL the balls had irregularities. See attached screen shot, you will see compression, diameter, and weight. Regardless of what anyone tells you, NOBODY is making perfect golf balls. The better test would be to take balls that have the slight differences and test them on a robot to see if there is a negligible difference in performance.

 

 

Edited June 26, 2021 by hammergolf

[KWG86]

I switch to the 2021 TP5x this year. Feel like this is the best all around ball. Great distance of the tee. Also like the spin of this years model over past years seems to have better bite on the green. 

[North Butte]

Especially where my swing is right now, I might not notice if someone snuck a 1999 Maxfli Revolution into my box of Pro V1's. It's hard to know from a given swing or even a given round exactly what is a swing issue and what is a lack of performance from a club or ball.

 

That said, if Titleist sells balls for $50/dozen that have virtually no detectable Q/C issues and Callaway sells a similar ball for $48/dozen that does have various small Q/C issues I'd just as soon use the one that's least likely to mix a (slightly) dud ball into the dozen I just bought.

 

Now if we're talking more like $15/dozen for a Costco ball I'm going to figure as long as the likely Q/C issues are minor that's worth considering because it saves a bunch of money. But it looks to me like (unusual for them) the MGS are not really overhyping trivial random differences. Yes, they're setting arbitrary thresholds for what they'll label a "bad" ball versus one whose Q/C issues are so small they deem them inconsequential. But I think it's to their credit they don't make specious claims about how a minor compression inconsistency or tiny fraction of an inch diameter variance is going to produce such-and-such yards of extra slice on your slice. 

[nitram]

18 hours ago, hammergolf said:

If you never noticed a noticeably difference in performance after playing it for a year, then there isn’t one. I wouldn’t believe everything you read. Wording makes a lot of difference. Tiger, Bryson, Fred, or Lexi wouldn’t notice a 2 or 3 point compression difference in a ball. Only 6 balls out of 100 had a concentricity issue. I think they use 3 dozen to do their test. The sample size is very small, and who’s to say if they tested 3 different dozen that the results would be flipped. Even though it wasn’t mentioned in their Pro V1X review, ALL the balls had irregularities. See attached screen shot, you will see compression, diameter, and weight. Regardless of what anyone tells you, NOBODY is making perfect golf balls. The better test would be to take balls that have the slight differences and test them on a robot to see if there is a negligible difference in performance.

 

 

They're all perfect compared to what we had to play pre-2000. 

[North Butte]

9 minutes ago, nitram said:

They're all perfect compared to what we had to play pre-2000. 

I remind people of that all the time. My first exposure to golf was in the early 1990's and the ball choices for a high handicapper then were abysmal.

 

I ended up using horrible "rock" type distance balls because they were cheap. But no concept of expecting a ball to stop when it hit the green, the only short game shots you could play were bump and runs and in the winter every mishit shot rattled your hands.

 

The alternative were Balata balls or those wound Titleist DT with the firmer covers. Those balls were junk right out of the box. Half them weren't round to start with and if they were after nine holes they would be getting lumpy and even cut up. And in constant dollars, the "good" balls were more expensive than any golf ball today.

 

It's been a golden age of golf ball choice and availability for at least the past decade. I'll bet if the MGS guys did their ball-lab thing on even a top-dollar ball used by Tour players back in the day, they'd reject every single ball in a typical dozen. And they'd be right to do. 

[Jeff58]

2 hours ago, North Butte said:

Especially where my swing is right now, I might not notice if someone snuck a 1999 Maxfli Revolution into my box of Pro V1's. It's hard to know from a given swing or even a given round exactly what is a swing issue and what is a lack of performance from a club or ball.

You’re absolutely correct. The variation caused by the ball is masked by the variation of your swing and the effect of your swing variation on the club. Additionally, you have no tactile feedback of a ball’s variation, unlike a club, where the the “tells you” the quality and location of impact to some degree.

 

2 hours ago, North Butte said:

But it looks to me like (unusual for them) the MGS are not really overhyping trivial random differences. Yes, they're setting arbitrary thresholds for what they'll label a "bad" ball versus one whose Q/C issues are so small they deem them inconsequential. But I think it's to their credit they don't make specious claims about how a minor compression inconsistency or tiny fraction of an inch diameter variance is going to produce such-and-such yards of extra slice on your slice. 

There are several issues with the MGS data and how they represent it IMO.

 

1. If they claim that a cause has a specific effect, it must be tested for directly rather than inferred. If the claim is that decentering causes distance variation, then you would take a population of balls, mark them, measure the distance variation, then cut and measure those balls to obtain the correlation. They are able to do that and don’t.

2. If compression variance causes distance variation, you can quantify that variation. For example, the difference in compression between a V1x and a Chromesoft is about 25 points by their measure. The distance delta at 110mph with driver is about 10 yards. If that is entirely due to compression, then 1 point equates to 0.4 yards of distance. Or a 5 percent compression variation in a ChromeSoft produces a little less than two yards of distance variation. However, at the 85 mph swing speed, which is far more appropriate for the Chromesoft, the total distance variation is 3 yards, and the same compression variation results in about 1 foot of distance. 

 

3. The idea everyone should use a high compression ball isn’t born out in their data. Take a group of high compression balls, (V1x, TP5x, BX) and compare them to a low compression set (Chromesoft, Q Star Tour, Vice Pro Soft) using the MGS chart. At 115mph driver, the distance delta is about 10 yards in favor of the high compression balls. However, at 85mph, the difference is 2 yards. When we look at the 7 iron data though, the distance advantage is about 3 yards, but in favor of the low compression balls. Given that we tend to hit irons almost three times as often as driver in a round, the total distance advantage is clearly to the low compression balls for a moderate swing speed player. Additionally, the typical “need” of slower swing speed players on less than optimal impact is additional launch angle, which is also provided by the lower compression models.

 

4. Offline. There are two categories of variation in the MGS data: shot area (the average deviation of all shots) and offline (average distance from the actual target). This is a classic example of precision vs. accuracy. Low compression balls tend to have greater shot area (worse precision), but also less offline (better accuracy). For the specific example of the Chromesoft, with driver at 115mph, both shot are and offline are significantly higher than average. However, when we look at other examples for the same ball, 7 iron shots for instance, we see that the same statistics are now much better than average. If the variance with a high speed driver were due to some physical issues with the ball, we should continue to see the same trend for every shot/speed combination, since the deformations obviously can’t disappear when we pull our 7 iron. Instead, what we’re likely seeing is that some balls react worse than others when used far outside their designed use parameters, which is why Bridgestone for instance, wisely doesn’t allow their balls to be tested in that manner.

[hammergolf]

3 hours ago, nitram said:

They're all perfect compared to what we had to play pre-2000. 

No doubt.

[trackcoach13]

1 hour ago, Jeff58 said:

You’re absolutely correct. The variation caused by the ball is masked by the variation of your swing and the effect of your swing variation on the club. Additionally, you have no tactile feedback of a ball’s variation, unlike a club, where the the “tells you” the quality and location of impact to some degree.

 

There are several issues with the MGS data and how they represent it IMO.

 

1. If they claim that a cause has a specific effect, it must be tested for directly rather than inferred. If the claim is that decentering causes distance variation, then you would take a population of balls, mark them, measure the distance variation, then cut and measure those balls to obtain the correlation. They are able to do that and don’t.

2. If compression variance causes distance variation, you can quantify that variation. For example, the difference in compression between a V1x and a Chromesoft is about 25 points by their measure. The distance delta at 110mph with driver is about 10 yards. If that is entirely due to compression, then 1 point equates to 0.4 yards of distance. Or a 5 percent compression variation in a ChromeSoft produces a little less than two yards of distance variation. However, at the 85 mph swing speed, which is far more appropriate for the Chromesoft, the total distance variation is 3 yards, and the same compression variation results in about 1 foot of distance. 

 

3. The idea everyone should use a high compression ball isn’t born out in their data. Take a group of high compression balls, (V1x, TP5x, BX) and compare them to a low compression set (Chromesoft, Q Star Tour, Vice Pro Soft) using the MGS chart. At 115mph driver, the distance delta is about 10 yards in favor of the high compression balls. However, at 85mph, the difference is 2 yards. When we look at the 7 iron data though, the distance advantage is about 3 yards, but in favor of the low compression balls. Given that we tend to hit irons almost three times as often as driver in a round, the total distance advantage is clearly to the low compression balls for a moderate swing speed player. Additionally, the typical “need” of slower swing speed players on less than optimal impact is additional launch angle, which is also provided by the lower compression models.

 

4. Offline. There are two categories of variation in the MGS data: shot area (the average deviation of all shots) and offline (average distance from the actual target). This is a classic example of precision vs. accuracy. Low compression balls tend to have greater shot area (worse precision), but also less offline (better accuracy). For the specific example of the Chromesoft, with driver at 115mph, both shot are and offline are significantly higher than average. However, when we look at other examples for the same ball, 7 iron shots for instance, we see that the same statistics are now much better than average. If the variance with a high speed driver were due to some physical issues with the ball, we should continue to see the same trend for every shot/speed combination, since the deformations obviously can’t disappear when we pull our 7 iron. Instead, what we’re likely seeing is that some balls react worse than others when used far outside their designed use parameters, which is why Bridgestone for instance, wisely doesn’t allow their balls to be tested in that manner.

You could have saved a lot of typing by saying: "The guys at MGS are morons and should be ignored."

[Jeff58]

1 hour ago, trackcoach13 said:

You could have saved a lot of typing by saying: "The guys at MGS are morons and should be ignored."

The problem in my mind is that they’re not morons. The people doing the testing, and the tests themselves are generally very good. It’s the conclusions they draw from their data, and how they represent them that are troubling.

Either they believe that the data is too obscure for the average golfer to draw meaningful conclusions, or the person or persons writing the article aren’t the ones who did the testing, or there is some other agenda(s) that we’re not aware of.  I don’t know which. The Today’s Golfer test, which was similar in nature, certainly presented their data and conclusions in a better way IMO.

[North Butte]

Are we talking about weighing, measuring and cutting open a sample of balls? Or hitting a few dozen different models of balls with a robot?

[hammergolf]

2 hours ago, Jeff58 said:

The problem in my mind is that they’re not morons. The people doing the testing, and the tests themselves are generally very good. It’s the conclusions they draw from their data, and how they represent them that are troubling.

Either they believe that the data is too obscure for the average golfer to draw meaningful conclusions, or the person or persons writing the article aren’t the ones who did the testing, or there is some other agenda(s) that we’re not aware of.  I don’t know which. The Today’s Golfer test, which was similar in nature, certainly presented their data and conclusions in a better way IMO.

It seems like they only think their opinion is the only one that matters.

[hammergolf]

1 hour ago, North Butte said:

Are we talking about weighing, measuring and cutting open a sample of balls? Or hitting a few dozen different models of balls with a robot?

I think the fact that they refuse to use robot testing speaks volumes. 

[North Butte]

15 minutes ago, hammergolf said:

I think the fact that they refuse to use robot testing speaks volumes. 

Say what?

 

MGS did a robot test of must have been 40-50 different ball models with driver, 7-iron, wedge each at two different clubhead speeds. 

[hammergolf]

56 minutes ago, North Butte said:

Say what?

 

MGS did a robot test of must have been 40-50 different ball models with driver, 7-iron, wedge each at two different clubhead speeds. 

I was referring to their club tests. Yes in 2019 they did use robots for the ball study they did.

Edited June 27, 2021 by hammergolf

[North Butte]

4 minutes ago, hammergolf said:

I was referring to their club tests. Yes in 2019 they did use robots for the ball study they did. But even in that test, they didn’t break down performance, they just named a winner.

They provided a sortable Tableau chart of the ball speed, spin, launch angle, peak height, distance and dispersion for each ball with three different clubs at two different speeds. What more could they break down?

[trackcoach13]

5 hours ago, Jeff58 said:

It’s the conclusions they draw from their data, and how they represent them that are troubling.

 

The reason I call them morons...I can train a monkey to perform a good test. Not much in that. However, good luck with the monkey's conclusions...

 

Edited June 28, 2021 by trackcoach13

[North Butte]

Who cares about their click-bait when they let you see the actual results of the tests? 

[trackcoach13]

13 minutes ago, North Butte said:

Who cares about their click-bait when they let you see the actual results of the tests? 

Who are you responding too?
 

[Alan_Tom]

On 6/26/2021 at 12:07 PM, hammergolf said:

If you never noticed a noticeably difference in performance after playing it for a year, then there isn’t one. I wouldn’t believe everything you read. Wording makes a lot of difference. Tiger, Bryson, Fred, or Lexi wouldn’t notice a 2 or 3 point compression difference in a ball. Only 6 balls out of 100 had a concentricity issue. I think they use 3 dozen to do their test. The sample size is very small, and who’s to say if they tested 3 different dozen that the results would be flipped. Even though it wasn’t mentioned in their Pro V1X review, ALL the balls had irregularities. See attached screen shot, you will see compression, diameter, and weight. Regardless of what anyone tells you, NOBODY is making perfect golf balls. The better test would be to take balls that have the slight differences and test them on a robot to see if there is a negligible difference in performance.

 

 

I 💯 agree. Take the balls with deficiencies and then test those. I guess all the ball lab is depicting is that with the new prov1x 99% of the time the quality of the make will be good. Centered core and perfectly round. Out of the dozen all of them will be flawless. 

Edited June 28, 2021 by Alan_Tom

[BigtimeHC]

Soooo, anybody loving the BX as much as I am? 😅

[North Butte]

I have a feeling MGS could do their Ball Lab tests on 200 dozen of every ball on the market, provide the raw measurements as a downloadable CSV file and you guys would still be ragging on them.

 

Is anyone, anywhere doing anything beyond grabbing a handful of balls and slicing them with a pipe cutter on YouTube? However limited MGS's sample sizes might be and however you dislike their tendency to hype things, they are providing far, far more information than any other source out there.

 

I can forgive a lot of things from someone who does all the grunt work, then tells you their methods, then shows you their data. Including forgiving a click-bait top line "finding" of Soft Is Slow or whatever slogan they think will attract attention. They've come a long way from when they were basically pubilshing stuff like "Hey, we hit a bunch of these KIRKLAND balls into a net and they just destroyed the Pro V1". Remember those days? 

[tsecor]

On 5/30/2021 at 12:15 PM, UnderParfect said:

I am still struggling to find the ball I want to play this year. All last year I played the BX, I enjoyed it, but just felt something missing off the driver with it. Driver SS is 96. 
 

I am looking for high launch, firm, mid/low spin. Too firm for my liking (Zstar XV and ‘19 TP5X)
 

So far this year I have tried ‘21 TP5X, MTBX,  CSXLS, and CSX. I probably won’t try the ‘21 Pro1vx as every year I have tried that it just never works for me. Has the height but too much spin, I loose a half a club distance off irons. 
 

‘21 TP5X checks the boxes for me with height and feel off the irons and wedges, with the firmness off the putter. Driver it seemed like it wasn’t going anywhere and spinning too much. 
 

MTBX reminds me of the BX everywhere but around the green it has lower spin and off the putter it felt dead so that was a no for me pretty quick. 
 

CSX and CSXLS I thought the LS felt softer/hotter off the face, really liked it off the driver and woods, it was like a rocket. It plays a little low but feel was really good. Off the irons height was lower than I like but feeling was still really nice. The CSX felt harder than the LS, the CSX was lower off everything and didn’t have the pop for me like the LS did. Spin was fine into the greens and around the greens with the LS, I don’t play shots that require me to stop it next to the hole, I always play for a little hop and roll. 
 

If the LS was higher launching like the ‘21 TP5X it would be better for me. I will probably continue to play the BX as it close to what I like but doesn’t pop off the driver like the LS. 

 

same here.....the BX spun way too much for me off the driver at ~ 2550 rpms.....in comparison, the BXS spun 100 rpms slower and it was 7 yards longer on average.... The prov1 x was spinning around 2200 as well as the prov1, both going the same distance.... I love the left dash off the tee, but its way too firm in the short game... I am testing out the new TP5X this week in hopes ive found the best all around ball FOR ME....on the monitor it was spinning just over 2000 rpms and launched a degree higher than anything else ive hit...but flies just as far as the Titleist and BX...on the monitor.......moving to on course testing this week

 

Play a ball that SUITS YOUR GAME.....not someone elses game......

 

I hated the 2019 TP5x because it was way too firm but TM lowered the compression almost 12 points and apparently it feels firm but not hard and clicky any longer.....my time on the monitor confirmed it is definiytely softer and a tad slower....but still just as long......

 

i hope the TP5x is good from 50 yards and in. 

[G-Bone]

Here's a fun one for those of you that haven't seen it yet.

 

They mention at the end why they did not test Bridgestone... apparently they are not sold in the UK.

 

 

[ajestrada3]

On 6/27/2021 at 6:25 AM, North Butte said:

Especially where my swing is right now, I might not notice if someone snuck a 1999 Maxfli Revolution into my box of Pro V1's. 

🤣 this legit made me laugh

Edited June 28, 2021 by ajestrada3
Fix quote