The marketing engine goes on every year saying, “This new driver will go so far,” and “These new irons will hit so many times.”
So how do you sort through all of that and decide if this year’s technology is really worth buying new golf clubs for?
That exact question was posed by GOLF multimedia wiz Darren Riehl to our gear team, and his partners Johnny Wunder and Jake Morrow answered it in this week’s episode of GOLF’s Fully Equipped.
Basically, as Wunder puts it, you know when every OEM has amazing products and 2026 could be one of those years.
“This year is one of those years where you just go, you know what? I’m going to spend a few bucks this year, because there are some great things, because you can’t go wrong this year,” he said. “And I’ve had it in the past, like this year, I always feel like everybody’s got bangers all the time. Some are better than others, but this year, I feel like neck and neck is a truer statement now than ever. And that’s for the little guys and the big guys.”
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Morrow compared this year of driver releases to 2016, when TaylorMade had the M1 and M2 – the latter is Rory McIlroy’s favorite driver – Callaway was about to unveil the GBB Epic driver (the first to include Jailbreak technology) – Titleist had a line of 915 drivers Jordan Spieth used for years and Cobraau Beryson the King DeC LTD.
“One of the things that made that year successful for everyone was that they were all doing their own thing,” said Morrow. “And depending on the type of player you’ve been, you fit the better type.”
He said there is a difference now, because each OEM offers three or four different driver types, as opposed to one or two back then, but he expects many to get into the same machine they played 10 years ago.
“I think if you were an Epic or Epic Flash player, I think you’re going to love the new Callaway stuff,” added Morrow. “I think if you’re an M2 person, you’re going to really like the Qi4D stuff. And the same thing, I think, and Cobra said this to us, the new system is the closest they’ve gotten to the inside and tour hype on the LTD then the F9.”
