It's great to be able to play with a pro and see how they manage a course. You can learn a lot from them just by watching them work around the golf course.
TaylorMade Kingdom Experience Diary
- Staff
- #502
Glad to see you guys had such a great time as well. This is probably the coolest prize that I've seen and it really seems like it had a big impact on the winners. You guys are some lucky THP'rs and I'm happy to see that it was everything you dreamt it would be.
- Joined
- Aug 4, 2010
- Messages
- 19,618
- Reaction score
- 4,086
- Location
- Liberty Lake, Washington
- Handicap
- GHIN 7.1
Thanks...I had a blast doing the video.
Did you notice the "Popped Collar" on Dr. Teeth's photo? I just loved that shot. Steve is "too cool for school"!
Dr. Teeth
Well-known member
HOLY CRAP!!! That was the most amazing video EVER! DD you are awesome. I totally just laughed at my popped collar What a dork I am! What a perfect song to go with it. I am going to be singing "BOOM! BOOM! Give me your best shot?" All day long!
What a dork I am! What a perfect song to go with it. I am going to be singing "BOOM! BOOM! Give me your best shot?" All day long!
Mardin
New member
My Fitting Experience...
When I arrived at the Kingdom, I warmed up by hitting the Tour Pref CB's. Like I mentioned in the CB review thread these clubs are great and very smooth through the grass. I enjoyed hitting them and will be hopefully demoing them again shortly. I moved on to the short game area where I went to town on the wedges and new Ghost Putters. I got some really good advice from Robin English ("The Boss"), and within 5 minutes he completely changed my approach to my wedge game. The great thing about being at the Kingdom was trying out all of the new clubs and getting to hear the stories about their creation and TMag’s motivation behind each product line. The staffers were not hovering over you either. They let you do your thing and if you had any questions they were there to help you out.
So I was called up to do my fitting and was paired with Noel English to be my fitter. We busted out my original driver; a TM Burner, 10.5 degree, 49gram Re-AX Regular Flex. I then explained that my most consistent miss was a slice and he told me that we can fix that today. I hit about 10-15 shots with my driver as Noel stood by. About 8 of those shots were slices with a very high launch angle. Noel then ran off over to the equipment table and put together a 2.0 SF with a Matrix Ozik shaft and let me hit about 4 balls with it. After about the 4th ball he took the club and said, "this isn't going to work." He changed out the shaft and brought me back another shaft that felt heavier (I don't remember what kind of shaft it was). I hit about five balls with that and as I turned around after hitting my last ball I looked at Noel and he looked like a light bulb went off over his head. He headed over to the Equipment table again and got a R11 TP head. He came back and switched out the heads and put the R11 onto the existing shaft. I hit the R11 in an all Neutral setting with a weight in the heel for a draw bias and I could feel the difference in the club head dramatically. Noel explained to me that my old drivers shaft was way too light at 49 grams and that the club head could not keep up with my swing speed and because of this it would cause the club face to open up just before impact.
I hit a few more with the R11 and Noel asked me how it felt...I hesitantly said "It feels O.K." Noel replied with a smile and said, "It's not working for me either." He then changed the R11 settings; he kept the weight in the heel for a draw bias, set the ASP to closed, and he lowered the loft setting to bring down my spin rate. We tried a few other different shafts and nothing seemed to satisfy either of us.
So he went back to the table and got another shaft. He put on a Fubuki Tour 63 Regular flex shaft. With this shaft in the R11 I could feel a major difference without even taking a swing. I then set-up the first ball, and Boom! The ball exploded off the face and went super straight down the range. I turned around and looked at Noel and he was grinning ear to ear. I hit about 15-20 more balls with this set-up and everything was rocketing off the face of the R11. My accuracy with this club was also greater. Instead of a massive slice my balls were going straight down the range. I felt more control instantly with this club and that control factor instantly boosted my confidence. I’m not a big hitter at all, but this club gave me that confidence. I think I gained almost 30+ yards and cut my spin rate in half compared to my old driver. I will post a video of my TrackMan comparison session as soon as I get home from work.
I didn't have much time to post all of the videos last night because Delta decided to "misplace" my golf bag with my new R11 in it so I was dealing with that. Thankfully they called me this morning and told me they have my bag. Nevertheless I couldn’t cuddle with my new R11 last night.
When I arrived at the Kingdom, I warmed up by hitting the Tour Pref CB's. Like I mentioned in the CB review thread these clubs are great and very smooth through the grass. I enjoyed hitting them and will be hopefully demoing them again shortly. I moved on to the short game area where I went to town on the wedges and new Ghost Putters. I got some really good advice from Robin English ("The Boss"), and within 5 minutes he completely changed my approach to my wedge game. The great thing about being at the Kingdom was trying out all of the new clubs and getting to hear the stories about their creation and TMag’s motivation behind each product line. The staffers were not hovering over you either. They let you do your thing and if you had any questions they were there to help you out.
So I was called up to do my fitting and was paired with Noel English to be my fitter. We busted out my original driver; a TM Burner, 10.5 degree, 49gram Re-AX Regular Flex. I then explained that my most consistent miss was a slice and he told me that we can fix that today. I hit about 10-15 shots with my driver as Noel stood by. About 8 of those shots were slices with a very high launch angle. Noel then ran off over to the equipment table and put together a 2.0 SF with a Matrix Ozik shaft and let me hit about 4 balls with it. After about the 4th ball he took the club and said, "this isn't going to work." He changed out the shaft and brought me back another shaft that felt heavier (I don't remember what kind of shaft it was). I hit about five balls with that and as I turned around after hitting my last ball I looked at Noel and he looked like a light bulb went off over his head. He headed over to the Equipment table again and got a R11 TP head. He came back and switched out the heads and put the R11 onto the existing shaft. I hit the R11 in an all Neutral setting with a weight in the heel for a draw bias and I could feel the difference in the club head dramatically. Noel explained to me that my old drivers shaft was way too light at 49 grams and that the club head could not keep up with my swing speed and because of this it would cause the club face to open up just before impact.
I hit a few more with the R11 and Noel asked me how it felt...I hesitantly said "It feels O.K." Noel replied with a smile and said, "It's not working for me either." He then changed the R11 settings; he kept the weight in the heel for a draw bias, set the ASP to closed, and he lowered the loft setting to bring down my spin rate. We tried a few other different shafts and nothing seemed to satisfy either of us.
So he went back to the table and got another shaft. He put on a Fubuki Tour 63 Regular flex shaft. With this shaft in the R11 I could feel a major difference without even taking a swing. I then set-up the first ball, and Boom! The ball exploded off the face and went super straight down the range. I turned around and looked at Noel and he was grinning ear to ear. I hit about 15-20 more balls with this set-up and everything was rocketing off the face of the R11. My accuracy with this club was also greater. Instead of a massive slice my balls were going straight down the range. I felt more control instantly with this club and that control factor instantly boosted my confidence. I’m not a big hitter at all, but this club gave me that confidence. I think I gained almost 30+ yards and cut my spin rate in half compared to my old driver. I will post a video of my TrackMan comparison session as soon as I get home from work.
I didn't have much time to post all of the videos last night because Delta decided to "misplace" my golf bag with my new R11 in it so I was dealing with that. Thankfully they called me this morning and told me they have my bag. Nevertheless I couldn’t cuddle with my new R11 last night.
DawgDaddy
Old Coot
I am currently trying to upload a video to youtube on the MATT fitting system, it is over 12 minutes long and youtube is telling me it will take about 6 1/2 hours, is that normal? Am I doing something wrong? Help/advise needed.
Mardin
New member
1. I have a habit of choking the grips on chips and wedge shots.
- Robin told me to lightly grip the club and to let my right thumb almost float above my other fingers forming a "V" shape. It felt weird at first but after I got it down I felt more control over the club than I did when I was squeezing the life out of it.
2. It was pointed out to me that I don't follow through my wedge shots leaving me the ability to get "handsy" with the club.
- Combining the first flaw-fix in my game (see above) made this fix so much easier. Instead of stabbing at the ball and trying to make my hands do all the work, I slowly started to move my body in a very "rotary" movement. Robin noted that I'm extremley right-hand dominant and I need to practice not letting my right hand push or stab at the ball.
After hitting about 20 or so balls using these tips, It all started to come together.
Hmmmmm 6 1/2 hours?? That dosen't sound right. It should take 10-15 minutes at most.
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reading through 34 pages of this thread has been amazing so far. An experience of a lifetime for sure. I am going to the range in about an hour to hit the R11 line. Hitting it 15 feet into a net just isn't cutting it.
CharlieMoy
Well-known member
I can believe that! Its almost a tease!
Mardin
New member
The only time I think it wouldn't be a tease is if you were hitting it into the TaylorMade MAT-T system 15 feet into a net. Hopefully DawgDaddy and SWFLA can get their videos of the system uploaded because the stuff they do with the MAT-T system is absolutley amazing!
SW
Grinder
Wow has it been a busy day here, I've a got few minutes before heading out the door and trying to upload some video to youtube since we can't do that here at work.
I wanted to talk about my driver fitting for a bit. I had the pleasure of working with Jay who works at the Kingdom at Reynolds, pure genious that guy! I came into the day playing a Dymo2 and Jay wanted to know my typical ball flight, I tried to be as honest as possible and told him I generally play the left side and let it fall back into the fairway. After hitting a few so he could see what I was talking about he stopped me and said "Here's the cold hard truth, we've got to get you on plane." So the fitting process kinda stopped, he did assemble an R11 9* with everything maxed out to create a more leftward ball flight and then brought over an iron fitting shaft. In order to get me on plane he placed the shaft about a foot in rear of the ball and a foot to the right then instructed me to swing under the shaft to eliminate my OTT swing. We started off slow about 10% until I got the mechanics down before ever hitting the ball. The man has patience!
So now that I was thinking swing under the shaft and getting the hang of that Jay gave me a great litle swing tip though, right elbow, right pocket...I honestly remember saying that over and over to myself the whole day. Started hitting a few balls but Jay noticed I was swinging left (toward third base), he said this was due to my OTT and it was my of compensating, by swinging left I could hang the face open and allow the ball to cut back into the fairway. "We're gonna fix that," says Jay and we did. He took the same iron shaft and placed it on my left side this time as a reminder not to swing left. I was so worried I was going to hit the shaft and ruin the club I was timid, Jay quickly reminded me that he knew a guy and could get more clubs if I messed one up. Here come the hooks...hooks mean progress to a guy like me and Jay was loving it. He was wanting me to duck hook a few to get the feel of rolling my wrist through impact. I did not disappoint him.
So now I've gotten on plane, my right elbow is going into my right pocket and I'm swinging out to firstbase. Things were looking good, real good. Jay did some swapping and changed the sole plate to bring the ball up a bit, that worked but he wasn't satisified so he got a 10.5* head....BOOM!
Honestly fellas i've not been playing golf to long since picking it back up and I've never moved the ball how I wanted until Saturday morning around 10:30 AM. Every light bulb in my mind was going off, every thread I've read in the Ask the Pro section was making sense now, the lessons I took last summer were finally making connections...it was magical. Every ball was starting right of my target line and moving back to the left in the beautiful draw. Jay had a great analogy of why I'm not a long hitter, he told me to take a 250 yd string and run it along my ball path, with the cut/fade/slice I've been playing I was wasting energy with the sideways flight, he wanted me to stop wasting energy and get all of my 250 yd down the fairway. Well we did it.
I was fit to the R11 in 10.5* with 11 grams on the heel and 1 gram on the toe, ASP set to neutral with a Matrix Xcon 5 shaft in R. It's a friggin miracle club! The mind-blowing adjustability that is built into this club is so far beyond what I thought. The fact that of 10 golfers this weekend all but one was fit to the R11 shows just how remarkable this club is, that it can be changed so much to fit such a wide-array of golfers goes to show that Tmag put the man hours into making a truly special club that can be tuned and maximized to fit just about anyone on the planet.
I know I'm leaving out a ton of info but Jay if you get a chance to read this, I want to say thank you from the bottom of my heart. In a very short period of time you made me a better golfer, the knowledge you shared with me far surpassed any lesson I've ever recieved, bar none. I look forward to staying in touch with you and especially to that day when I meet my/our goal and start hooking the $#!t out of this wonderful club.
I wanted to talk about my driver fitting for a bit. I had the pleasure of working with Jay who works at the Kingdom at Reynolds, pure genious that guy! I came into the day playing a Dymo2 and Jay wanted to know my typical ball flight, I tried to be as honest as possible and told him I generally play the left side and let it fall back into the fairway. After hitting a few so he could see what I was talking about he stopped me and said "Here's the cold hard truth, we've got to get you on plane." So the fitting process kinda stopped, he did assemble an R11 9* with everything maxed out to create a more leftward ball flight and then brought over an iron fitting shaft. In order to get me on plane he placed the shaft about a foot in rear of the ball and a foot to the right then instructed me to swing under the shaft to eliminate my OTT swing. We started off slow about 10% until I got the mechanics down before ever hitting the ball. The man has patience!
So now that I was thinking swing under the shaft and getting the hang of that Jay gave me a great litle swing tip though, right elbow, right pocket...I honestly remember saying that over and over to myself the whole day. Started hitting a few balls but Jay noticed I was swinging left (toward third base), he said this was due to my OTT and it was my of compensating, by swinging left I could hang the face open and allow the ball to cut back into the fairway. "We're gonna fix that," says Jay and we did. He took the same iron shaft and placed it on my left side this time as a reminder not to swing left. I was so worried I was going to hit the shaft and ruin the club I was timid, Jay quickly reminded me that he knew a guy and could get more clubs if I messed one up. Here come the hooks...hooks mean progress to a guy like me and Jay was loving it. He was wanting me to duck hook a few to get the feel of rolling my wrist through impact. I did not disappoint him.
So now I've gotten on plane, my right elbow is going into my right pocket and I'm swinging out to firstbase. Things were looking good, real good. Jay did some swapping and changed the sole plate to bring the ball up a bit, that worked but he wasn't satisified so he got a 10.5* head....BOOM!
Honestly fellas i've not been playing golf to long since picking it back up and I've never moved the ball how I wanted until Saturday morning around 10:30 AM. Every light bulb in my mind was going off, every thread I've read in the Ask the Pro section was making sense now, the lessons I took last summer were finally making connections...it was magical. Every ball was starting right of my target line and moving back to the left in the beautiful draw. Jay had a great analogy of why I'm not a long hitter, he told me to take a 250 yd string and run it along my ball path, with the cut/fade/slice I've been playing I was wasting energy with the sideways flight, he wanted me to stop wasting energy and get all of my 250 yd down the fairway. Well we did it.
I was fit to the R11 in 10.5* with 11 grams on the heel and 1 gram on the toe, ASP set to neutral with a Matrix Xcon 5 shaft in R. It's a friggin miracle club! The mind-blowing adjustability that is built into this club is so far beyond what I thought. The fact that of 10 golfers this weekend all but one was fit to the R11 shows just how remarkable this club is, that it can be changed so much to fit such a wide-array of golfers goes to show that Tmag put the man hours into making a truly special club that can be tuned and maximized to fit just about anyone on the planet.
I know I'm leaving out a ton of info but Jay if you get a chance to read this, I want to say thank you from the bottom of my heart. In a very short period of time you made me a better golfer, the knowledge you shared with me far surpassed any lesson I've ever recieved, bar none. I look forward to staying in touch with you and especially to that day when I meet my/our goal and start hooking the $#!t out of this wonderful club.
Buddy,
You missed your calling. The video is fantastic..I can't tell you how much we all enjoyed meeting everyone and what a great experience it was to share the TM culture and passion for golf. You guys are the best!
Regards,
Pete
(sanchman)
You missed your calling. The video is fantastic..I can't tell you how much we all enjoyed meeting everyone and what a great experience it was to share the TM culture and passion for golf. You guys are the best!
Regards,
Pete
(sanchman)
DawgDaddy
Old Coot
Here are the pics of my new R-11 as built by Cory. I am a senior golfer (63) and have lost some flexibility and therefore distance. I was getting about 210 yards with roll with my TEE driver and now I fly the ball about that far, so roll will sometims get me out to the 240/245 mark. Pretty good increase IYAM. I am only able to give approximations as I was the 1st person through having their new driver built and could never seem to find a gap in launch monitor usage to get my final numbers.
When Cory was fitting me we went through both the Burner and R-11 drivers with several different shafts, we decided on the R-11 head and then went to work in earnest on the shaft, on the 3rd shaft change, I hit the driver and my instant response was "Oh WOW!!!" I turned around and Cory was grinning from ear to ear, he said he had been waiting for that. The whole fitting process was probably about 75 minutes and then he put the driver together in about 9 minutes. It was fantastic to see my new driver being assembled right before my eyes, I have the video and if I can get it uploaded on youtube tonight I will post it.
It is the 10.5* with an added loft of 1* to effectively make it a 11.5* driver, he put the face angle to the open position to help me fight the dreaded hook, then with the weights for the flight path he installed the heavy weight in the heel and the lighter weight in the toe to help me to close the open face to keep the ball straight. The shaft is the Martix Oxik Xcon-5 with a stiff flex shaft, the flex is stiff as I am about 6'4" and I need a longer shaft and can actually control it well enough to play the extra length.
When Cory was fitting me we went through both the Burner and R-11 drivers with several different shafts, we decided on the R-11 head and then went to work in earnest on the shaft, on the 3rd shaft change, I hit the driver and my instant response was "Oh WOW!!!" I turned around and Cory was grinning from ear to ear, he said he had been waiting for that. The whole fitting process was probably about 75 minutes and then he put the driver together in about 9 minutes. It was fantastic to see my new driver being assembled right before my eyes, I have the video and if I can get it uploaded on youtube tonight I will post it.
It is the 10.5* with an added loft of 1* to effectively make it a 11.5* driver, he put the face angle to the open position to help me fight the dreaded hook, then with the weights for the flight path he installed the heavy weight in the heel and the lighter weight in the toe to help me to close the open face to keep the ball straight. The shaft is the Martix Oxik Xcon-5 with a stiff flex shaft, the flex is stiff as I am about 6'4" and I need a longer shaft and can actually control it well enough to play the extra length.
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Ole Gray
Mayor of the Woodshed
- Joined
- Dec 31, 2008
- Messages
- 31,292
- Reaction score
- 100
- Location
- Watkinsville, Georgia
- Handicap
- Average
Great post buddy! Now you are officially a member of the Happy Hooker Club :thumb:
Great stuff Dawg and I have really enjoyed your pics and comments from the Kingdom experience!
Great stuff Dawg and I have really enjoyed your pics and comments from the Kingdom experience!
Mardin
New member
Here are a boat load of pictures from the Ritz Carlton, The Kingdom, and The Oconee course we played on Saturday...
Ole Gray
Mayor of the Woodshed
- Joined
- Dec 31, 2008
- Messages
- 31,292
- Reaction score
- 100
- Location
- Watkinsville, Georgia
- Handicap
- Average
Mardin - Awesome pics dude! Wow that is a beautiful place and you guys built memories that will last a lifetime. You must have one hell of a nice camera.
Puttin4Bird
Say what again mf'er!
Great pictures Mardin!!! Thanks for sharing, you guys did a great job with the coverage.
That course looks awesome. And the clubs are looking amazing guys. Still so jealous. Can't wait to see if you can get the video for the MAT-T system up, DD. That's one thing I'm really excited to see. Just curious, in case I win the lottery here pretty soon, do the staffers play a round of golf with everyone that goes through the entire experience? That is one thing that would excite me is to be able to pick the brains of these guys for an entire 18 holes.
That short game area looks quite good. It would be great to have a go at that area with their wedges and short irons, to be able to learn to dial in the distance like that. The more I see this stuff, the more I want to go!
That short game area looks quite good. It would be great to have a go at that area with their wedges and short irons, to be able to learn to dial in the distance like that. The more I see this stuff, the more I want to go!
SW
Grinder
Ryan its not as expensive as you think, and well worth the extra money in my opinion. I'll have my part of the MATT video up tomorrow as YouTube isn't playing well with me tonight.
Sent from my ADR6300 using Tapatalk
Sent from my ADR6300 using Tapatalk
Mardin
New member
All of the staffers played with everyone on the trip. Our THP group was lucky enough to play with Robin English. He is the Director of Sports Marketing for TMag and basically oversees everything at The Kingdom in GA. The guy has been in the golf business for over 40+ years and is choc-full of knowledge. I rode with him on Saturday and we just talked about golf and the golf industry most of the day. He gave us tons of pointers and tips to help improve our game, it was like a full day golf lesson for all of us. I will never forget it.
I was reading through the Kingdom website for Reynolds, and to get fit for the entire bag and have them built is well out of my price range. But, I guess just getting a fitting done with the MATT system probably isn't that bad,a nd since we are getting a Performance Lab here, probably even a little more reasonable. But, I'm one of those that if I'm gonna do something like go to the Kingdom, I'm gonna go through the whole thing, clubs and all. Probably because I'm just selfish like that, LOL.
kokogirl
I love golf
Thanks for sharing all the pics and experiences you had getting fitted!