With water lurking around every turn at Le Golf National, letting down your guard isn’t an option. Accuracy off the tee takes priority over distance in an attempt to keep big numbers off the card. Winning an Olympic medal shouldn’t be a cakewalk.
Last week, Scottie Scheffler elevated his game and erased a four-shot deficit during the final round to win gold. On Saturday, Lydia Ko was able to write her own ending with a similarly impressive final round that netted her a gold medal and a spot in the LPGA Hall of Fame.
When Scheffler won gold, TaylorMade posted a “win ad” congratulating him on the accomplishment. Ko didn’t receive the same treatment after her triumph. This has nothing to do with prioritizing the men’s gold-medalist over the women’s gold-medalist. Unlike Scheffler, who’s attached to TaylorMade, Ko’s an equipment free agent playing Ping and Titleist gear without compensation.
Of the two brands represented in her bag, Ping has the biggest presence with nine clubs, including a 9-degree G430 Max 10K driver that Ko added earlier this season. On a layout where fairways hit far outweighed driving distance, Ko’s driver played a key supporting role down the stretch as she fended off the competition.
“One of the things [Lydia’s] been focused on is bringing spin down,” said Ping’s LPGA Tour rep Jack UIrich. “She tried 10K earlier in the year but ended up going to LST to get the spin rate she wanted. Then she asked to test 10K again at the [Mizuho Americas Open] and it stuck. She’s always played drivers with lower loft. Her current 10K is set at 8.5 degrees in the Flat Minus setting. There’s a little bit of weight forward (a couple grams) to get it in the window she likes to see.”
No one is confusing 10K with LST, but one of the things Ulrich has observed during head-to-head testing between the two drivers is 10K’s consistent spin rates across the face. When the pressure cranks up on Sunday afternoon, not having to sweat a noticeable dip in driver performance on mishits can be a godsend.
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“The 10K does spin a little more than the LST, but not as much as the standard Max,” Ulrich said. “It just goes so stinking straight. When players are willing to give up a little bit of distance — because LST is the fastest of the models we have — they gain a ton of stability across the face. The spin rates are super stable, too. The LST is forgiving in its self, but just gaining a few more fairways, players like the sound of that.”
During testing with Ko at the Mizuho, Ulrich watched her produce 2,300 RPMs on center face strikes, with the highest spin rate clocking in at 2,700 RPMs.
“It was impressive,” Ulrich said. “When she’s swinging really good, those spin rates stay extremely tight, even on the extreme misses. The ball flight is straighter, and from one of our last conversations, I remember her saying that erring on the side of higher spin — and it’s not like it’s crazy high — seemed to help. Her ball flight is usually left to right, and the LST was maybe curving a little more while the 10K was just staying really straight. Giving up a little bit of distance to gain accuracy has been a part of it for Lydia playing 10K.”
Ko’s experience with 10K matches up with what GOLF.com’s gear team saw during robotic testing. Looking closer at the numbers, G430 Max 10K earned high marks on toe strikes with a carry distance delta of 2.5 yards, due in large part to the tighter spin deltas. Low center strikes saw a similar drop-off in distance, to the tune of 3.1 yards with the 10.5-degree head.
The tight carry distance deltas give 10K products a slight edge over their Max counterparts, but there’s an even more impressive aspect that needs to be discussed.
On a geometric center strike, the 10.5-degree G430 Max 10K produced 12 degrees of launch and 2,700 RPMs of spin. With most of the drivers we tested, moving impact a half-inch lower on the face generally decreases launch and increases spin by anywhere from 200-400 RPMs.
But that wasn’t the case with 10K when the impact location was lowered. Launch decreased to 9.4 degrees, but spin remained constant at 2,700 RPMs.
The goal is to make the launch and spin deltas tighter on mishits so they mimic numbers you’d see on a center strike, which is exactly what the robot saw with Ping’s 10K offering on a common mishit.
It’s the kind of winning equipment formula that allowed Ko to focus on the task at hand and realize a dream in France.
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