Inside Viktor Hovland’s pre-Masters gear change

Not all bag changes on Tour are massive, especially at a major championship.

This week at the Masters for example, players are simply doing the basics, like loft and lie checks, regrips, etc. Any additions to the bag were planned and dialed weeks ago. So if a 7-wood or mini driver lands in the bag, that decision was made well in advance of this week.

However, on the Ping truck, something “big” did go down. Viktor Hovland finally put a new driver in play — the Ping G440 LST.

Hovland is the poster boy for Ping and its Tour operations, so Viktor being in new product is a big deal. Although regardless of how he is playing, he’s never been a huge club tinkerer. If it works, it’s staying in the bag unless something comes around that makes a more compelling argument.

Check out his bag, for example: he had a four-year-old driver (G425 LST), seven-year-old irons (Ping I210) and six-year-old 3-wood (TaylorMade SIM).

The whole setup screams “hard switcher.”

Another reason why this is such a big change? It’s the first major of the year and he’s coming off a win not even three weeks ago. The whole situation is quite bananas and not optimal as club-switching goes.

But what I’ve learned about Hovland the past few years, the guy only does things his own way.

On-site at Augusta National this week, Tour representative Kenton Oates explained to me this was five or six months in the making, and it was a game of putting bait on the hook and waiting for the perfect moment. Sometimes that big bite takes a long time to manifest and sometimes it happens when you don’t see it coming.

As Oates told me this week at Augusta National, the process started last October when Viktor wasn’t in the mindset to look at anything new. His swing was in flux and a new variable wasn’t helpful. Good Tour reps back off in this case as each player responds to testing differently and part of the art of being a good rep is knowing when to engage. Pushing to get new product in is never a path to success, as we’ve seen with literally all the major OEMs and some of their big staffers not putting in-line gear in at launch. It’s a process.

The other moving target in that Ping didn’t have exactly the head they knew Viktor would respond to. The G430 and at the time 440 only came in 9 and 10.5 degree lofts and Hovland requires something with a neutral face and a sub-8 degree loft to even start the conversation. So you can’t just get a 9 degree head and loft it down, as that opens the face and Viktor won’t look at it.

There’s only one way to fix that — make a special 7.5 head that doesn’t need adjusting. That’s exactly what happened, but it wasn’t until February that those heads made it into the Ping WRX dept. At this point Kenton knew he had at least a shot.

Check out the embedded video for the rest of the story.

I did get a chance to chat with Kenton a bit more on some of the other variables, and this is what he had to say:

JW: Has Viktor always been flat on the lie angle of his driver?

KO: Viktor has primarily played the flat dot setting in his drivers since going to longer length 45 3/4. The flatter lie angle allows Viktor to hit the center of the face more often and it ensures a proper start line. This also matches what we see with the rest of his bag from a lie angle POV. 

JW: From a numbers standpoint, what got significantly better? 

KO: The biggest initial takeaway from his Ping G440 testing was what he described in his interview at the Masters Tuesday.  The 440 allowed all his little misses on the face to have almost the same launch and spin. So instead of his toe miss dropping below 2000 and his heel strike going above 3000 spin, they have stayed much closer to his solid strikes, which range from about 2200-2500. 

JW: Speeder TR to Ventus Black Velo+? What’s the story there?

KO: From our initial testing in October to when we got the 7.5* degree heads in, our entire Tour group got a lot of time to work with 440. Fujikura Velo+ Black TX is a shaft that we felt was not only very close to his gamer shaft but tested very well with other players in 440.  We included it in the stuff we sent to Orlando last week for testing and he loved it right away.  

Viktor Hovland’s new Ping G440 LST

PING G440 LST Custom Driver

The G440 driver family (MAX, LST, SFT) is optimized to deliver more ball speed through multiple advancements, including PING’s deepest CG in a driver to date and a shallower, thinner face, while continuing to ensure the game-changing forgiveness expected from a PING driver. The G440 LST (Low Spin) design appeals to players with faster swing speeds, providing lower spin and more control in 9° and 10.5° lofts with the three-position back weight. HIGHLY FORGIVING Lighter head weight allows for heavier back weight.  FASTER FACE  Shallow, thinner, face increases ball speed for more distance, higher launch.  SOUND DESIGN New shaping, carbon crown and internal ribs produce muted impact experience.  FREE-HOSEL DESIGN Saves weight to lower CG, increase forgiveness. Allows for more heel-side face flexing for consistent ball speed across face. 

$599 from Fairway Jockey

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ALSO AVAILABLE AT: PGA Tour Superstore

Loft: 7.5@7.25 w/ 3g heel, 35g backweight

Shaft: Fujikura Ventus Black Velo+ 6-TX (Tipped 1″)

Fujikura Ventus Black Wood Shaft

$350 from Fairway Jockey

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Length: 45 3/4″

Sleeve: Flat dot setting

Swing Weight: D5

Grip: Golf Pride MCC 58R Blue/Black

Looking for the right clubs for your own game? Find a fitting location near you at True Spec Golf.