In my humble opinion, after picking the right golf ball for your game, finding the right driver should be priority No. 2. Without a well-fit driver that you fully trust at the top of the lineup, your best golf won’t ever reveal itself. Remember the adage “You drive for show, putt for dough?” In the modern game, it’s more like “You drive and putt for dough.”
With the Ryder Cup just around the corner, I think back to Seve Ballesteros’s driving struggles at the 1995 matches at Oak Hill. In pure Seve fashion, he engaged his other super-powers (chipping, scrambling, putting) to stay in the game, but his driver undoubtedly was a liability to his partners. Seve’s driving had become such a problem in those years that it ended up costing him a few more years of greatness.
I cite this example, because, 30 years ago, when your bonded, 43.5-inch sub-300 cc driver went bad, there was little you could do in terms of pulling quick-fix levers.
In 2025, though, there is no excuse for not finding the perfect driver for your game. Here’s how to do it:
1) HIT THE MIDDLE:
Whenever I hear players say “my driver just isn’t working,” my instinct is to tell them, “That’s a code red. You better figure that out fast.” Lack of center-face contact is the first barrier to entry to great driving, and it’s also avoidable. With today’s drivers not only are heads adjustable but you also can manipulate CG at will. What we can do with drivers in terms of head and shaft adjustments for any grade of player is almost unfair vs. a generation ago.
2) CONSISTENT MISSES:
This is huge. The best drivers on Tour all have one predominant shot shape and one miss; for Tour fitters, protecting those two things above all else is paramount. Most recreational golfers have a few misses in their toolboxes, making consistency feel like something mythical. But this is more of a fitting issue than one related to technique; you can absolutely find a great driver for a faulty swing.
3) IN SICKNESS AND IN HEALTH:
If you have a driver that requires you to thread the needle performance-wise, it’s the wrong stick. A good driver shows up rain or shine and — even at its worst, it still should be pretty damn good.
4) OPTIMIZATION:
This is obvious, but if you can’t hit the ball solidly and with good patterns, launch, spin and speed will be nearly possible to get right.
The driver is the one club you can get dialed at the same level as the pros. The number of levers a good fitter can pull for any player allows you to truly find that unicorn for which you’ve been hunting. The only real requirement from you is some due diligence, an open mind and clear idea of knowing not what you want to play but what you need to play.
