Guys: I'll chime in on this hybrid wood/iron subject because I have done a lot of work in this area. There are hybrid wood/irons that are really fairway woods in their performance and then there are a few that are really long irons in their performance. Depends on the headweight and the shaft bore that the hybrid heads are made with. For example, back when I did the Snake Eyes Quick Strikes for GS, these were made with fairway wood headsweights and to accept a 335 wood shaft, so their assembly lengths were the same as a fairway wood. That meant the QS clubs were really an alternative for a fairway wood in terms of the distance and not to be a real replacement for a long iron in terms of achieving that distance in the set.
Then you have hybrids that are like the Taylor Made Rescue - made to a long iron length with an iron shaft. These types of hybrids will be a real replacement for a long iron in terms of distance. But because they use an iron shaft, 98% of golfers will never hit them as high as they will a hybrid that is made with a wood shaft. This is because wood shafts at wood lengths deflect and unload in their bending over twice as much as do iron shafts of the same letter flex. That greater bending happens because the 335 shaft is longer and smaller in tip section diameter than the iron shaft. So a hybrid that is made to be a real long iron replacement using long iron shafts and lengths will always be considered to be a little harder to hit high than will a hybrid that is made for fairway wood lengths with a wood shaft. But then the two have to be considered totally different animals because they are very different. In the end, when you pick a hybrid clubhead, you have to look at the headweight and the shaft bore diameter to know what is what - and you have to select on the basis of what you want in your set make up. If you want a real replacement for a long iron so you take up the gap in distance between the highest loft fairway wood and the longest iron, then you have to look for a true iron type hybrid. TOM W -----Original Message----- From: Dave Tutelman [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, June 26, 2003 7:04 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: ShopTalk: All woods - new thread At 08:38 PM 6/26/03 -0400, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: >In a message dated 6/26/03 12:51:52 PM Pacific Daylight Time, >[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: >>These "new" clubs are easier to hit because the lengths are shorter than >>woods yet with a "wood" shaped hollow head they give the "wood results" >>favored by people who are not successful hitting long irons.. Be sure to >>purchase heads that use shafts made for irons > >Hi Arnie, >Why be sure to purchase these type of heads that use iron shafts as >opposed to wood shafts? >David I was wondering the same thing. I have several hybrid utility clubs, some with wood shafts and some with iron shafts. The ones with wood shafts hit the ball higher for the same loft. Is that bad? Not necessarily. In fact, I have found I hit it better and more reliably that way. YMMV, but I don't see your "rule" as a universal truth. Cheers! DaveT
