Wide soled irons?

[Sandy]

Ok, I'm going to pick the forum brains for some opinions on an issue that's got me scratching my head just recently...

I'm currently playing Cobra 3400 I/XH irons with the 55gm YS5.1 graphite shafts in them. A 'super game-improvement' club that is ridiculously easy to hit and to get the ball in the air, and that I've been playing for all of this year. These have a VERY wide sole on them to prevent digging.

But digging has never a problem for me, and neither has getting the ball up in the air - I'm very much a 'picker' and if I make a bad swing it always results in hitting the ball thin and I very rarely hit anything other than chips fat.

I bought a new bag last week and decided to put my old irons into my old bag, but for old time's sake I took them down the range to see how I hit them after all my swing changes and general improvement. It was unbelievable. My old irons are the old King Cobra Oversize irons from a good 10 years ago, with graphite shafts, perimeter weighting and not particularly wide soles. I was catching them great and it was noticeable that not only where they a good 5 to 10yds longer than my new irons, but much more accurate. Even more stunning was that I was hitting the 3 and 4 irons, and hitting them well! Bear in mind I only ever carried up to 6i when I used these as I could barely hit the 5i let alone the long irons.

I went back to the range with my 3400s today and noticed they flew considerably higher, but my distance was back down again, and my accuracy nowhere near as good. I also carry a Ping S59 6i with Z-Z65 shaft that I bought cheap in my bag, which I used to use at the range to see how well my swing was going. I was hitting this beautifully today, and it was also a good 10yds longer that my Cobra 6i. I also tried hitting the Cobra 4i (that I never use) and found it barely went any further than the 5i in that set, both only going about the same as this Ping 6i.

What's going on in my head now is wondering what is the reason for this. The lofts on the two sets of Cobras are identical. I can't work out whether the issue is that the ultra-high trajectory of the new Cobras is way too high for me, and robbing me of consistency and distance, or whether it's that the sole is sliding under the ball too easily and giving me these mega-high shots. On top of that I'm wondering how much the heavier shafts in the old Cobras and Ping club are contributing to the extra length and accuracy. Or whether it's all three!

Any help unpicking this is appreciated! My thoughts at the moment are to switch back to the old Cobras, at least for a round or two, and see how they go with my new swing. If they go well, maybe I need to get some 'ordinary' game improvement irons with narrower soles, and probably with heavier steel shafts. Does that sound right?

[RickinMA]

your current irons may be too light for you to hit consistenty. If you were hitting the less forgiving, light-weight (but heavier than graphite) steel shafted Ping well, you might want to try another steel shaft to see how you do.

I'm surprised to hear you were hitting graphite shafts from 10 years ago more consistent than your current sticks - again, I have to imagine it has something to do with weight and perhaps you would benefit from a heavier club?

I'm also more of a "sweeper" than a "digger", so I don't usually like wide soled clubs.

Keep us posted on what you try and your results

[Sandy]

Originally Posted by RickinMA

I'm surprised to hear you were hitting graphite shafts from 10 years ago more consistent than your current sticks - again, I have to imagine it has something to do with weight and perhaps you would benefit from a heavier club?

I'm guessing that the 10yr old graphite shafts weight a heck of a lot more than the modern ultra-light ones - again, not as much as steel but still more than the ones in the 3400s.

These are the old irons I was hitting - considerably less perimeter weight than the 3400s and a much narrower sole:

[RickinMA]

Originally Posted by Sandy

I'm guessing that the 10yr old graphite shafts weight a heck of a lot more than the modern ultra-light ones - again, not as much as steel but still more than the ones in the 3400s.

That's what I was thinking - people used to complain about consistency of graphite too - nowadays graphite iron shafts can be just as consistent as steel, but I'm pretty sure 10 yrs ago you could hit that 7iron 140 yards one shot and 155 the next

I'm not sure how much the head design is impacting you here - I personally don't think irons have changed that much in the past 10 yrs -not sure how the thicker soles impact this though - I'm curious to hear what the more knowledgable guys have to say

[Sandy]

Originally Posted by RickinMA

I'm curious to hear what the more knowledgable guys have to say

Me too!

I've just measured to see what the difference actually is - the 3400s have a sole that's 1.1" wide, the old KC Oversizes have a sole that is 0.6" wide. So the newer irons have a sole nearly twice the width of the old ones!

[Youngun5]

may not be a matter of so much the width of the sole as it is how low the COG is on the newer irons compared to your older ones...i'm not quite sure what the 3400's look like, but if they're "super game improvement" like you said then i would imagine they definitely moved the center of gravity much further back and lower...which, if you're a picker will send the ball into orbit

if you're hitting the old ones good, stick with them! irons haven't changed a whole lot, and as you've experienced, the changes may not help you.

good luck

[Sandy]

I suspect the low CoG has a lot to do with it as it's noticeable that when I swing harder the trajectory gets a lot higher but the distance doesn't improve by much - to get more distance I have to play the ball further back in my stance, and really deloft the club...

[warbirdlover]

I've always been a "picker" but am seriously considering learning to be a "digger". I'm just too inconsistent with my irons this year and also am wondering about how much "offset" is too much? I might 'ho a six iron off GG to try an iron (cavity back) with less offset and sole width to see if I can "dig". I also wished I had bought the Ping i5's instead of the G5's for this reason. Anyone have an idea about offset also?

GG has some used individual irons for sale. What would be a good one to try that has less offset and sole width?

[ezra76]

You might be ready to move up to more of a player geared CB soon. Forgiveness kills distance on a pured shot. The mishits are dispersed over the large sweetspot to give them distance but so are the pured ones. It's the same way with the super forgiving drivers. If a scratch golfer hits a Sumo2 or a Hibore dead on the sweetspot, then hits an R7425TP or a Titleist 905T, the latter will be longer. The forgiving drivers will still "forgive" a purely struck shot. This is the Ezra theory.

[warbirdlover]

I think the "Ezra theory" has merit!!

[Sandy]

Originally Posted by warbirdlover

GG has some used individual irons for sale. What would be a good one to try that has less offset and sole width?

That's why I got the Ping S59 - to see how I could hit it, and to use down at the range based on the idea that if I could hit *that* club well, hitting my super-forgiving irons would be a doddle. I actually picked mine up for $4 from Golfsmith when they were selling off all their demo/fitting clubs, so mine has all the specs printed on the sole! At the same time I picked up a Mizuno MX-17 and Cobra 3400 demo club to see which felt better, which led to me getting the full set of 3400s. But I always wanted to see what a real 'players club' felt like, so bought that Ping and now understand what 'feel' really means when you hit it well. It's also amazing how much you can tell the differences between the balls you hit with it too, compared to the forgiving irons. You can always tell the massive difference when you hit a 'real' ball down at the range that's found its way into the range balls.

I think EZ is right though, and that the ultra-forgiveness is now holding me back more than helping. I suspect some new irons will be in the bag by the end of the year, but for now I'm going to swap over to the old irons for a bit and see how they go...