The TaylorMade SpeedSoft golf ball is a kind of uncommon merchandise for which the advertising division’s catchphrase tells you the whole lot you’ll want to know.
“Golf is difficult. Play a softer ball.”
SpeedSoft. Placing “Pace” subsequent to “Tender”? We’ve questions.
The press launch for the TaylorMade SpeedSoft golf ball tells us it’s a low-compression design, engineered for the “softest doable really feel whereas sustaining explosive speeds for the on a regular basis golfer.”
As with the lately launched TP5 and TP5x, TaylorMade believes it has cracked the code to mix tender really feel and ball velocity with this new ball.
And the corporate believes it’s performed it for $24.99 per dozen.
We’ve extra questions.
And what about that “on a regular basis golfer” factor? Are you an on a regular basis golfer? And does that imply you play each day?
So many questions.
Let’s see if we are able to discover some solutions.
TaylorMade SpeedSoft Golf Balls: Downy Tender …
Earlier than we get too deep, let’s put the TaylorMade SpeedSoft golf ball in the suitable spot. It’s a two-piece ionomer-covered ball for below $25 per dozen. For that type of cash, you possibly can anticipate a tender, low-spinning, high-launching ball that you just don’t thoughts shedding. The Wilson Staff Duo Soft and the Srixon Soft Feel are typical of the species.
One profit is a pleasingly tender really feel, which may be addictive. However the large draw is you will get twice as a lot of them in comparison with what you’d spend on a Tour-level ball.
However that “tender” factor has a double draw back. Whenever you go that tender, you sacrifice spin and ball velocity. Tour-level balls spin as a result of their agency, ionomer mantle layer pinches in opposition to the tender urethane cowl on glancing blows. Since a two-piece ionomer-covered ball has, properly, a agency ionomer cowl, there’s no tender/agency distinction. As a substitute, it’s a agency/tender distinction, which delivers significantly much less spin.
And relative firmness – that’s increased compression to you and me – is a key ingredient to ball velocity. And ball velocity, whereas not the only real indicator, is a key ingredient to general distance. To place it merely: firmness contributes to ball velocity, which contributes to distance. Tender, in different phrases, tends to be slower.
And the TaylorMade SpeedSoft is tender. As in sub-50 compression tender.
Nonetheless, in response to TaylorMade, the SpeedSoft exams proper to the utmost USGA restrict for preliminary velocity.
“To have the ability to create a product that’s that tender at that velocity is a really distinctive factor,” says Michael Fox, TaylorMade’s International Golf Ball Director.
PWR To The Core
How does TaylorMade squeeze velocity out of SoftSpeed? With its newest buy-a-vowel know-how, PWRCORE.
Based on TaylorMade, PWRCORE is an extra-large, tremendous low compression core. That’s coupled with a agency ionomer cowl with what TaylorMade describes as a low-drag, extended-flight 332 dimple sample. The corporate says you’ll discover the tender really feel totally on method and wedge photographs, sometimes inside 30 to 50 yards of the inexperienced.
OEMs inform us, with some justification, that, since softer balls are inclined to spin much less, they’re extra prone to keep in play for his or her goal golfers. That these goal golfers wrestle with a slice is usually left unsaid. But it surely’s truthful to purpose {that a} ball that spins much less is extra prone to discover proper fairway as an alternative of proper tough, or proper tough as an alternative of proper forest.
And I don’t know in regards to the programs you play on however low-spinning tee photographs are inclined to roll extra within the fairway than they do within the tough. They usually usually don’t roll in any respect within the forest.
Did TaylorMade crack the ball velocity versus tender velocity dichotomy? It’s extra doubtless that it has altered the recipe a bit of bit to squeeze as a lot velocity as it might probably out of a sub-50 compression ball.
However there’s something distinctive in regards to the TaylorMade SpeedSoft. That’s, in the event you like a splash of coloration in your recreation.
TayorMade SpeedSoft Ink
SpeedSoft Ink is, fairly merely, a splash of coloration. TaylorMade calls the brand new paint splatter design a “vibrant visible know-how” as a result of why the hell not?
Wait, it will get higher.
It’s a high-contrast, high-visibility paint job that’s, and we’re quoting, “a canvas of persona and elegance ideally suited for individuals who dare to interrupt conference.” It’s additionally a “palette of potentialities and roars with persona.”
Flowery verbiage apart, a splash of coloration by no means harm anybody. And in the event you like a splash of coloration, these are fairly cool.
TaylorMade SpeedSoft Golf Balls: Colours, Worth, Availability
The fundamental TaylorMade SpeedSoft golf balls will likely be obtainable in white and yellow in sleeves or in dozens.
The TaylorMade SpeedSoft Ink is available in three colorways, with coloration splashes obtainable in inexperienced, blue or pink. TaylorMade can also be providing purple and orange choices in ball jars at retail places so you should buy them one after the other.
They’re obtainable beginning at this time at retail and on-line. They’ll promote for $24.99 per dozen.
For extra info, hit up the TaylorMade website.