Last week I had the opportunity to attend the Titleist National Fitting Centre in Maple, Ontario Canada with my coach and I wanted to share my experience with Team Titleist. Truth be told thinking of getting to the Titleist National Fitting Centre is an idea that has (or had) been running through my head for over a year. It was during the 2013 Niagara Golf Show when I demo’d the 913 series of woods and Vokey wedges when the area rep for Titleist (Paul Oehring) mentioned that I should get up to Eagle’s Nest for a fitting. Ever since then… I had wondered about it. Let me fast forward the clock to the present.

 We arrived at Eagle’s Nest yesterday morning and it didn’t take long to realize that this facility was First Class. We pulled into the parking lot, unloaded and walked up to the fitting centre. Upon walking up to the area there were bags upon bags with shaft options, every current model of head, Trackman and so on. The deck itself was likely the nicest turf I have seen on any range or course for that matter. Anyways, we had time to kill and warmed up with our current sticks at their request. Once warmed up Coach went with fitter Cory Southon and I continued to make swings with my sticks. Titleist fitter Chris Welton introduced himself to me and we started talking. He asked me about my current wedge set-up and irons. Upon completing that discussion we went over to the short game area and my wedge fitting started.

We started the fitting with SM5 wedges on a tight lie to the nearest pin which was sort of short-sided and tricky. The first grind (F Grind) that I tried saw very mixed results. While I liked the feel I didn’t like the inconsistent results with this grind. So Chris gave me wedge #2 which was the M Grind. Right away we saw very improved results. No digging and I think it was shot #2 that holed out. Anyways we changed shot types, targets, lies and grinds a few more times and it wasn’t very long when Chris determined that I was definitely a “Slider” and that the M Grind was the grind for me. As a matter of fact he stated “if I wasn’t here watching you I wouldn’t have known that you were here. There’s no evidence.” In other words… no real divots to speak of. We headed back towards the testing area and I hit full wedge shots and we got along real well. I should note that my current wedges standard length are a full inch longer than Vokey.

So next we started to determine which shaft and irons would work best. I have always said that when it comes to golf “you’re only as good as your ability to check your ego at the door". I went into this fitting with the mindset of not caring what shaft, flex or head I went with. I just wanted to go with what gave me the best numbers. So we started with the AP2 irons and the True Temper XP95 shaft. I loved the look of this head at address but the ballflight had too much curvature. We also started to have a look at lie angles too. We abandoned the XP and moved onto the Project X PXi first in the 5.5 flex and then 6.0. The dispersion was improved. Chris explained that the dispersion was better because of the stepless pattern and the ability of these shaft types to stay with the player more. So we now had a baseline shaft and lie angle to work with.

We made our way over to the Trackman seeing that John and Cory had completed their session and off to work Chris and I went. We continued to use the AP2 irons and the results were pretty good. My Angle of Attack was consistent and my Smash Factor was 1.38 using the AP2 irons and the 6-iron was right in line with the PGA Tour average… also for spin. Oh by the way… I tried both the ProV1 and 1x during my session and V1x was determined to be the best fit. So we dabbled with a few more shafts and moved on. The results were pretty good and based on the Trackman results these irons were already providing better results than my current sticks. I’m not going to lie the AP2 heads are a thing of beauty… it was the first time that I looked at them.

Next Chris put me into the AP1 irons. My initial response was “Whoa”as I was a little surprised by the overall profile and size of the heads. The elongated blade length was noticeable for sure especially after swinging the more compact AP2. Remember the ego thing? Anyways, a couple of things became apparent with the AP1 irons. The shots were deadly accurate and it really felt like that I was cheating. More ball speed, a higher smash factor 1.42 with a little less spin (just shy of the Tour Average 6,100 rpm and even though my ball speed and smash improved the swing speed actually dropped. Likely due to the heavier Project X 6.0 shafts which led me to feeling the club better through the hitting area. I should also add that thebalflight was a little lower with the AP1 vs AP2 (and my own) even though the Launch Angle was higher. All in all... all of the numbers were better and longer by some 5-7 yards with the AP1 over AP2. The only thing was a somewhat tighter dispersion with the AP2.

So here are the recommendations as per Chris Welton at the Titleist National Fitting Centre. AP1 irons 4-W with a 52* SM5 and 56* SM5 M Grind. Project X 6.0 shafts (Project X 5.5 in the SM5) standard length, standard lie (could go 1* Flat) and Mid-Size Grips. Quite the difference compared to my current set-up. The only thing that remains the same are my woods and putter.

*** I cannot say enough about the experience I had. It was educational, rewarding, validating and Chris and Cory are both true and consummate professionals. They are tremendous at what they do and I am very thankful. #TeamTitleist