7 cool gear finds inside Xander Schauffele’s golf bag

The gear crew at GOLF.com spends a variety of time at Tour occasions snapping images of the instruments utilized by the very best gamers on the earth. Posting membership photographs on-line with out context typically works, but it surely doesn’t assist the weekend golfer perceive the why behind a professional’s setup.

In this GOLF.com collection, tools editors Jonathan Wall and Ryan Barath reply these questions by highlighting attention-grabbing golf equipment in gamers’ baggage, distinctive weighting, loft sleeve settings and extra. Welcome to “Bay Spy.”

Weak weapons

The numbers don’t lie. Going again to the 2021 season, Schauffele has elevated his common clubhead pace from 119.8 mph to 123.1 mph this season, putting him within the prime 10 on Tour. Speed is a nice-to-have, but it surely typically requires modifications to the tools to hit particular yardages.

In Schauffele’s case, he’s weakened almost each iron and wedge within the bag by one diploma to maintain carry yardages constant throughout the board.

“He’s weaker on pretty much all the irons than pretty much anybody else,” mentioned Callaway Tour rep Kellen Watson. “He’s a 47-degree pitching wedge, which is quite old-school. That extends up and down the set simply because of the speed he’s added.”

It’s the alternative of “loft jacking.” The solely Tour professional who can declare a set of irons and wedges with weaker lofts is Tiger Woods, who nonetheless performs a 49-degree pitching wedge.

Constant reminder

See the purple line taking place the again of Schauffele’s Golf Pride MultiCompound Align grips? It’s not there for present. For years, some tour gamers have added a “reminder” to the again facet of the grip — a raised inner ridge operating the size of the grip — to advertise constant hand placement.

Released in 2017, Golf Pride’s built-in Align is a micro-diamond texture added to the rubber that serves the identical objective. Schauffele is a part of a rising group of professionals preferring the Align model to the old-school, inner raised reminder that needs to be added by a membership builder through the set up course of.

I give it a ten

We’ll be the primary to confess the 10-iron appears misplaced within the bag. Callaway has embraced a naming that many Japanese manufacturers at present use by changing the widespread “PW” with a ten. The 10-iron tag has been reserved for units with stronger lofts up to now, however Apex TCB is a better-player providing.

So what provides? According to Schauffele, there’s nothing particular occurring. “It’s just a pitching wedge,” he mentioned. In different phrases, Callaway merely needed to combine issues up with TCB.

Schauffele isn’t the one professional on Tour with a 10-iron within the bag. Callaway staffer Nicolai Højgaard’s Apex MBs have a 10-iron as a substitute of a pitching wedge as effectively. It’s the type of trivialities solely gear nerds can recognize.

Custom visuals

Schauffele’s mallet is inconceivable to overlook on the course because of the purple paint on the top. It’s a shade he’s come to embrace through the years, exterior of a quick stint with the identical putter in a silver end. Visuals matter on the prime stage {of professional} golf, and Schauffele’s hardly ever seen a have to shake issues up.

Go again just a few years and also you’ll discover an Odyssey O-Works Red #7 CH in Schauffele’s bag. The head shade matches up with the Odyssey Toulon Las Vegas Prototype he began utilizing final yr on the Arnold Palmer Invitational. So, too, does the black insert on the face. Or at the least it appears like a black insert at first look.

The insert discovered on the O-Works Red #7 CH was merely a White Hot painted black to tone down the distinction between the 2 colours. However, when Schauffele selected to go away from White Hot final to strive a special really feel with the diamond-milled groove sample discovered on his present wand, Odyssey designers had to determine a strategy to preserve the visuals constant sans insert.

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Schauffele needed to see a darkish end on the face that mimicked the black White Hot insert on his previous wand, so Odyssey added black paint to a big part of the face. The solely half that didn’t obtain black paint was a small part on the prime the place it transitions from the crown to the face.

“Transitioning from the topline and figuring out where we wanted the red paint to stop was tricky,” Toulon mentioned. “If you stop it at the edge of the topline, it can get chipped or look that way easier. So we took it over slightly to make sure it didn’t look choppy.”

Total package deal

If Schauffele had his method, Callaway’s Chrome Tour ball would’ve been within the bag from the soar. Unfortunately, the USGA has to provide the sign-off on prototypes earlier than they ever discover their strategy to Tour, so the latest main winner needed to wait till January to green-light the brand new pellet. By the time he arrived on the Sentry Tournament of Champions, Chrome Tour was within the bag.

Schauffele hasn’t regarded again. An enhance in pace led him to focus on different areas of enchancment throughout testing towards the tip of final yr. Two features that grabbed his consideration have been the improved spin and management across the inexperienced and stability within the air.

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“The [Tour reps] do a great job of dialing in the ball for us,” Schauffele mentioned. “But you can’t make on-the-fly adjustments to how it’s performing in the air. If the ball is getting moved around in a crosswind or into the wind, you tend to make compensations, which is never a good thing. With this one, I saw it going through the wind with a consistent flight from the start.”

Having the flexibility to decide to the shot and never have to fret about wind path or energy has made it simpler for Schauffele to not fear about his tools and decide to the shot. In virtually all instances, easier is healthier on the course.

Favorite stick

It ought to come as no shock that the favourite membership in Schauffele’s bag can also be the oldest. Released in 2021, the Apex UW “utility wood” options strategically positioned tungsten housed inside the top for a excessive launch and constant spin traits with a lowered draw bias.

Due to Schauffele’s steeper angle of assault, he makes one necessary modification to the top, decreasing the loft from 21 to 19 levels. Going stronger typically results in extra distance, however in Schauffele’s scenario, his steeper assault angle truly imparts extra spin on the ball. Less loft is one strategy to fight the surplus spin.

At 41.5 inches, Schauffele’s UW is barely shorter than most of right this moment’s 5-woods. The advantage of going shorter, on this case, is that it permits him so as to add one other “control” membership to the bag.

High ball hitter

The HL (high-lofted) providing in most lineups is made for the golfer who wants assist lifting the ball into the air. Pros have began to embrace them as effectively in recent times, particularly these with further pace within the tank. Years in the past, Dustin Johnson stopped utilizing a standard 15-degree 3-wood as a result of it went too far. The membership was finally changed by an HL model that flew greater and match the carry hole between his driver and 7-wood.

Similar to the choice to weaken the loft on his irons — attributable to an uptick in membership pace — Schauffele wound up discovering a 16.5-degree Paradym Ai Smoke Triple Diamond HL to be a greater match. The ahead CG on Triple Diamond retains spin numbers in verify whereas the additional 1.5 levels of loft ensures Schauffele isn’t too near his driver within the carry division.

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Jonathan Wall

Golf.com Editor

Jonathan Wall is GOLF Magazine and GOLF.com’s Managing Editor for Equipment. Prior to becoming a member of the workers on the finish of 2018, he spent 6 years protecting tools for the PGA Tour. He will be reached at jonathan.wall@golf.com.