Ping G Le2 women’s clubs—driver through irons—get lighter to go longer

Equipment

If Ping’s G Le2 collection of women’s clubs proves anything, it is this: Contrary to what you might have seen on The View or read in books about men and women and Mars and Venus, all humans—at least when it comes to golf—basically are the same: They all want more distance. It’s just that getting women golfers in touch with their distance potential requires some different thinking.

That’s where the G Le2 clubs come in. The set includes driver, fairway woods, hybrids and irons, and the entire group reflects the commitment to distance through a different understanding of how women players create swing speed and ball speed and how clubs can be manufactured to better line up with the speeds these golfers create. First seen with the company’s original G Le set introduced in early 2017, this next generation G Le2 brings the learnings of Ping’s current lineup of G410 products to the women’s market.

“The G Le2 represents our continued commitment to providing women golfers of every skill level
with premium, high-performance equipment optimized to their swing speeds,” said Stacey
Pauwels, Ping’s executive vice president who oversees women’s initiatives and the granddaughter of company founders Karsten and
Louise Solheim.

That commitment to finding more distance for women golfers starts with a focus on lighter weight, said Ryan Stokke, Ping design engineer.

“Our G410 clubs have been about no sacrifice, but we had to develop an understanding of what that concept looks like for this consumer,” he said. What it looks like may be similar, but what it feels like is lighter. Across the entire lineup, the G Le2 clubs are two swingweight points lighter and total weights are 4-8 grams lighter, too. That lighter structure reflects a fundamental shift not merely in how women golfers swing clubs, but how women’s clubs should be made to optimize performance. It’s a bit of a technical concept, but put simply by changing the durability threshold, the build on the G Le2 clubs allowed for women’s swings to deflect the face (and thus get more ball speed) the same way the fastest male swingers deflect the face on standard designs. If the men’s products like the G410 drivers are designed for durability at 120 mile per hour swingspeeds, why design women’s products with that same level of durability when their average swing speeds are a third or more less than that?

“When we dial in and really understand who the target consumer is, recognizing that there’s a lot of performance gains just for designing specifically for the clubhead speeds and durability that we know this product will go through,” Stokke said. “It’s understanding how do we take our modern technologies and design them specifically for this consumer to maximize performance potential.”

Ping’s team went beyond making the G Le2 clubs just lighter, however. With thinner face structures, the saved weight allowed for lower and deeper centers of gravity for improved launch and higher forgiveness on off-center hits through improved stability (moment of inertia). Across the entire lineup, MOI improved between 5-10 percent, Stokke said. But lighter has another performance benefit, too.

“The majority of these consumers still miss it to the right, and that’s often because the clubhead feels too heavy,” Stokke said. “By bringing the swing weight down and the total weight down, it allows them to swing it faster, and the total system feels more manageable so they can swing better.

“So we kind of twofold make the golfer better by helping them better feel and swing the clubhead with more ease, but also see more forgiveness.”

The G Le2 driver, fairway woods and hybrids incorporate many of the technologies found in the G410 metalwood line. That includes the trademark but updated aerodynamic crown turbulators, which are softened and, like on the G410, have been nudged slightly back from the leading edge. There’s also the thin-walled body featuring the familiar veined crown and skirt construction that mimics a dragonfly’s wings and the eight-way adjustable hosel design. The driver uses a T9+ titanium face, as well as a Ti 9-1-1 body, while the fairway wood features a stainless steel body and a high-strength C300 maraging steel face insert. While not adjustable, the hybrid uses a high-strength Carpenter 455 steel face to provide better face flexing and save weight for a lower, deeper center of gravity.

Likewise, the G Le2 irons borrow from the learnings of the G410 iron design, while focusing on an overall weight that is six grams lighter than the original G Le irons. Those design features include the variable thickness face design, as well as the undercut on the top rail to expand the most flexible region of the face.

Another way of making the G Le2 clubs more playable for slower swings is through loft. The range of fairway woods extends to a 30-degree 9-wood, while the hybrid lineup reaches to 34-degree 7-hybrid. These options are designed to work in concert with the iron set makeup, which now has eliminated the 5-iron and starts with the TK-degree 6-iron. The wedges feature machined grooves for better spin potential.

The G Le2 lineup also includes a selection of three putters, including the classic heel-toe Anser blade build on the proven Dale shape; the mid-mallet Shea and a full mallet Echo model. Each model features Ping’s multilevel, dual durometer face insert with variable depth and pitch grooves for consistent roll. In addition, each putter features adjustable shaft length from 31 to 35 inches.

Available for pre-order starting today, the pricing for the G Le2 lineup is as follows (MSRP): Driver (11.5 degrees, adjustable +/- 1.5 degrees), $435; fairway woods (3W-19 degrees, 5W-22 degrees, 7W-26 degrees, 9W-30 degrees, adjustable +/- 1.5 degrees), $270 each; hybrids (4H-22 degrees, 5H-26 degrees, 6H-30 degrees, 7H-34 degrees), $200 each; irons (6-iron through pitching wedge, U-wedge, sand wedge), $137.50 per club; putters (Anser and Shea, $215; Echo, $270).

Articles You May Like

Golfer loses sight in one eye, to keep playing
Rain washes out third round of LPGA Japan stop
Lincicome to step away from full LPGA schedule
Wakimoto shoots 9-under 63 to lead Toto Classic
Wakimoto stays ahead by 2 at Toto Japan Classic

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *