Gear: Ping s159 wedges
Price: $197 each with Z-Z115 steel shafts and Dylawedge grips. $212 each with Alta CB Black graphite shaft.
Specs: Cast 8620 carbon stainless steel with water-repellant coating and vibration-absorbing polymer. Available in even lofts from 46 to 62 degrees in Chrome and Midnight finishes.
Available: February 22
Who It’s For: Golfers who want variety around the green and spin retention in wet conditions.
The Skinny: Taking feedback from PGA Tour players, Ping adjusted the look of its wedges while updating their spin-producing qualities, especially in wet conditions, to help golfers maintain control and feel around the greens.
The Deep Dive: From 100 yards and in, the name of the game is control and consistency. Practicing the proper technique is critical, but so is having wedges in your bag that can help you from various locations, whether that means a tight lie in the fairway or an awkward shot in a bunker.
With the release of the new s159 wedge family, Ping is attacking shortgame challenges on two fronts: spin retention and sole grinds.
Looking down at the s159 wedges in the address position, golfers will see they have a more square leading edge and an updated hosel transition area, so they look straighter than Ping’s recent Glide 4.0 wedges.
The s159 wedges have a soft feel at impact thanks to the use of 8620 carbon steel and an elastomer piece on the back of each head that rests against the face. It soaks up excess vibrations.
The Ping s159 wedges has a vibration-absorbing elastomer piece behind the hitting area. (David Dusek/Golfweek)
The 46 to 52-degree wedges have iron-style grooves because golfers use those clubs approximately 70 percent of the time from the fairway as an extension of their iron set. However, to enhance spin in the sand and lob wedges (54 to 62 degrees), Ping designed the clubs with its Micromax grooves. They are wider and shallower to help remove water, sand and debris from the hitting surface more efficiently. Ping designers also bunched the grooves more tightly together, allowing for the addition of three more grooves to each face to help increase grabbing power and spin.
In addition to machining the faces to make them absolutely flat before the main grooves are cut into the hitting area, Ping adds a face-blast treatment that increases the roughness of the face.
The hydrophobic finish encourages water to bead up on the metal and fall away to increase spin retention on wet turf and in the…
..
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at Golfweek…