Have you considered custom fit clubs? if so, consider the following:

Tom Wishon, president, Tom Wishon Golf Technology and Technical Advisor for Golf Digest wrote: "The best set of golf clubs any golfer can buy to maximize their potential for distance and accuracy is a set of custom fit golf clubs built by an independent professional clubmaker using the highest quality original clubhead, shaft and grip designs.

Not to be confused with people who assemble golf clubs as a hobby from poor quality components which are clones or imitations of brand name golf clubs, the community of independent professional clubmakers take pride in their ability to properly fit and build custom made golf clubs of the highest possible quality. These true professional clubmakers stand out in the field as a result of their training, experience and attention to every detail in the fitting and building of golf clubs that match the physical characteristics and swing mechanics of golfers of all abilities from the recreational golfer to the professional."

Do you know what real custom fitting is or is not?

Custom fitting is not simply measuring clubhead speed, length and lie requirements then sending these specs off to a club manufacturer to "build" them or worse selecting pre-made clubs and "adjusting them to fit".

For woods a true fitting session involves fitting the golfer for the most important performance specifications of face angle, loft, center of gravity, and headweight to address the accuracy, distance and trajectory needs of the golfer.
Iron fitting includes selecting the model of the golfer's preferred material, size and shape, and will address the correct specifications for the golfer in loft, center of gravity, headweight, offset, sole angle and lie angle.

In a true fitting session, shaft selection involves measuring the golfer's swing speed separately for the woods and irons, using a launch monitor to evaluate the golfer's individual characteristics of swing tempo, back-to-downswing transition movement, strength, wrist-cock release and swing fundamentals to determine the shaft with the best weight, torque, overall flex bend profile and length to allow the golfer to maximize their playing ability. A true fitting session will make the shaft recommendation for the golfer from hundreds of different models of shafts, covering a variety of shaft weights, torque and bending profiles.

For the grip, a true fitting session will analyze not just the proper size, but the proper size for both of thr golfer's hands, as well as the golfer's preference for the appearance, feel and texture of the grip.

Following a true fitting session, the clubs are accurately built to match the golfer's requirements.

How do I find a Professional?

Tom Wishon, president, Tom Wishon Golf Technology and Technical Advisor for Golf Disgest also wrote:
"One of the best ways to find a good clubmaker [one who does quality fittings] is to go to the web site of the Professional Clubmakers Society (www.proclubmakers.org) and look for the link 'Locate a PCS Clubmaker.' If you find a PCS member clubmaker who holds the accreditation of 'Class A Clubmaker' you will definitely be in good hand because the Class A examination is very detailed and very stringent to complete successfully to gain that accreditation. There is one other clubmaking accreditation program, which also requires solid knowledge to pass. Look in the yellow pages under 'Custom Clubs' or 'Custom Clubmaker'. If they advertise as an 'Advanced GCA Clubmaker,' that too is a strong indication of expertise in the craft.

Al Bezanson, owner of Al's Clubhouse, has been both a PCS Class "A" Clubmaker and an Advanced GCA Clubmaker, for more than 10 years.

Don't let your clubs handicap your game! Get fit by a professional.

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