The game Anthony Kim left in 2012 and then returned to in 2024 was very different, and perhaps no aspect was more different than the equipment.
Back in 2012, TaylorMade was still selling a white driver, Callaway just released their first adjustable one, Fujikura was still six years from releasing Ventus and Nike was still making golf clubs. Not to mention the practice of fitting had advanced leaps and
Needless to say, Kim did a lot of catching up between then and his breakthrough win earlier this year in Australia.
With Kim returning on LIV Golf, lot of that re-education fell to Ben Giunta, the owner of the Tour Van, LIV Golf’s lone Tour Truck. On this week’s episode of GOLF’s Fully Equipped, Giunta reflected on what it was like to reintroduce Anthony Kim to modern equipment.
Giunta worked with Kim previously back when he worked as the Nike Tour rep and Kim was coming up as a young player.
“I remember walking down, we were at Doral, and I was walking across the range and about halfway down the range, he sees me and throws his arms out,” Giunta said. “The funniest part actually is I still wear a bunch of Nike garb… He thought I still worked for Nike.”
After the two shared a laugh, they got to work and Giunta brought out a “this orange box” to watch him hit balls on the range.
“And he’s like, what the hell is this? Yeah, like he had no idea. He didn’t know anything about numbers,” Giunta said. Kim had never used a Trackman before.
Kim had always relied on his feel and watching ball flight to determine if equipment was working because launch monitors simply weren’t as useful as they are now.
But he and Giunta slowly got to work as Kim got back into the swing of playing regular competitive golf. As Kim got more in the groove, his speed came back and even increased, resulting in more changes to his bag.
It eventually culminated in his win at LIV Golf Adelaide in February.
For more from Giunta and co-hosts Johnny Wunder and Jake Morrow, listen to the full episode of GOLF’s Fully Equipped here, or watch it below.
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