THE ONLY DRIVER TEST YOU’LL NEED THIS YEAR

I’ve never known so much hype around golf club launches as there’s been this year. Every man and his dog seem to have an opinion on the latest launches – and they’re very happy to share it on numerous social media platforms and online forums. There are so many comments and so much opinion – but not much in the way of facts. It seems the shoutier you are, the more ‘likes’ you’ll get, stoking the fire. The only issue is that so much of it is ill-informed nonsense.

Taylormade’s Stealth driver has attracted the lion’s share of comments, because it’s a very different technology. But some of the things we read about it were so far off the mark it’s embarrassing: That carbon-fibre will crack; It’s no better than my old SLDR; Driver distance has been maxed out for years; They’re forcing us to buy this stuff... and so on.

We don’t operate like that. Equipment Editor Simon Daddow is the most knowledgeable golf equipment writer in Europe and a man who spent 48 hours in the company of the designer of Stealth, plus another 48 hours testing it, along with TG pro Neil Wain. And then he spent several hours talking to Taylormade’s tour manager about fitting this new model for the likes of Rory, Collin Morikawa and Tommy Fleetwood. It’s fascinating.

The results of Simon’s labour can be found on page 42, in the world’s first group test of all the 2022 drivers that matter.

I don’t want to spoil it for you, but Stealth does pretty well – and that’s not our opinion, it’s fact, backed up with data and unrivalled insight. Chris Jones, Editor