DUBLIN, Ohio. — Summer Tour launch season is in full swing and Ping is the latest OEM to start offering up new irons to Tour pros this week at the Memorial.
The company is starting the seeding process of its new i240 irons and iDi driving irons at Muirfield Village.
As of now, Ping isn’t releasing any information on the new irons, but we can make some initial assumptions based on in-hand photos from Jack’s place.
i240 irons
Ping’s i-series lineup has been hugely popular for Tour pros and better players who are seeking a compact and precise iron that offers a little more forgiveness than the Blueprint T and Blueprint S irons. Viktor Hovland and and Sahith Theegala both still carry i210 irons — which came out in 2018 — among their combo sets, while several other pros use the i230 irons.
With the new i240, it seems Ping has gone away from the very clean and simple aesthetics of the i230 with the addition of some visible carbon fiber below the topline on the back of the iron. The “I” in i240 is also painted with red paintfill on the club’s badging.
The shapes appear very similar to Ping’s current Blueprint S, which is the company’s other workhorse Tour cavity-back iron. As players already combo Blueprint and i230, presumably that will also be a popular option with i240 in the longer irons and then going to Blueprint S or the muscle back Blueprint T in the short irons.
There could also be options to combo the i240 in the shorter irons with the hollow-body i530 in the long irons, which came out last year.
iDi driving irons
As we start to get into summer and the Tour heads to places with drier conditions (think the U.S. Open and Open Championships) driving irons become more of an option for pros seeking to take advantage of big run-outs off the tee.
That makes now a good time for Ping to start seeding its new iDi driving iron. Ping’s current driving iron, the iCrossover, set itself apart from others as it featured Ping’s Trajectory Tuning 2.0 hosel, allowing players to make the same adjustments quickly as Ping’s metalwoods.
With the new iDi, Ping seems to have dropped the adjustable hosel in favor of the familiar notch present in Ping’s other irons that allows for easy loft and lie adjustments.
The iDi also seems on the more compact side of driving irons, which should help it appeal to discerning pros who like clubs that don’t look as forgiving as they are.
On the range at Memorial, we already spotted Hovland with an iDi in the bag, but there’s no sign yet that it will go in play.
With two new options for players, lots of time at the range at Muirfield Village this week will be dedicated to testing the new models and ultimately determining if they pass muster to get added to a few players’ bags.
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