The new Ben Hogan Golf Equipment Company has been at it for about a year now. It was just last April when the first Ft. Worth 15 irons and TK 15 wedges started rolling out of the former Fort Worth Star-Tribune building and into the hands of some early Hogan adopters.
And one year later the Hogan line is expanding. The new PTx irons, VKTR hybrids and the utility-like Ft. Worth Hi irons are ready to take center stage. Hogan says it will be taking orders over the phone for these new products starting today while they revamp and relaunch their online fitting program, which they say should be ready by the end of the month.
We’ve discussed both the more forgiving game-improvement PTx irons and the variable weight VKTR hybrids already on MyGolfSpy. Today all eyes are set on Hi.
The Long Iron Conundrum
Last spring six MyGolfSpy Forum members reviewed Hogan’s Ft. Worth 15 irons. The irons scored very well with all of our testers, although - surprise surprise – some of them struggled with the long irons.
“…inconsistent distances with huge variances from shot to shot, especially with the 21 degree. It’s absolutely a skill issue and not a club issue. No matter the reasoning, the issue is there. I’ve taken the 21 degree iron out of my bag and replaced it with a hybrid”
“I’ve hit the 22 degree Hogan on the range and it performs well, just not something I would be comfortable putting in the bag. This is not a knock on Hogan, but more a testament to my lack of confidence in traditional long irons.”
“I did struggle hitting the 23 degree. Even slight mishits lose a good amount of distance - I hit some pretty miserable shots with this club. I was hoping to have a little more joy with it, but did struggle to hit the center of the clubface.”
Hmmm, blade-like long irons that are kinda hard to hit consistently? Stevie Wonder could have seen that one coming. But if we’ve learned anything about the new Hogan in its first year, it’s that they have a Big Picture plan. The route to their destination may waver at times - that’s to be expected with any startup – but the Big Picture is in focus.
Introducing The Ft. Worth Hi
The duh solution to hard-to-hit long irons is, obviously, hybrids. Unfortunately, some better players struggle to find hybrids that aren’t hook machines. A second, and fairly common, solution is to go progressive with game-improvement long irons. The challenge is getting a progressive set to match not only in looks and feel, but also in proper gapping. It’s done all the time, but a set can look cobbled together and some players may find the difference in topline appearance and sole width difficult to reconcile.
Perhaps for those reasons the last two years have shown a growing trend toward a let’s-split-difference utility-like long iron: the PING Crossover along with Utility irons such as the Wilson Staff V4, Callaway Apex, or Titleist T-MB.
The Hogan Ft. Worth Hi is sort of a utility iron, but not really. And it’s sort of a game-improvement long iron, but not really. I guess you could call it a better player’s game-improvement utility blade.
Sort of.
The Ft. Worth Hi’s are meant to be long iron replacements for Hogan’s flagship Ft. Worth 15 iron set, matching the look, feel and playability of the originals. Here’s the tale of the tape:
- 1025 carbon steel forging
- 2-piece hollow body construction redistributes mass for more forgiveness across the face
- Slightly larger profile than Ft. Worth 15, 15% lower CG
- Available in 12 lofts, from 20 to 31 degrees (roughly 3-iron thru 6-iron)
So what we’re talking about here is a long iron that plays like a game-improvement iron but doesn’t look, sound or feel like a game-improvement iron, with a slightly larger face profile and slightly wider sole than the Ft. Worth 15 irons.
“It really is the best of both worlds,” says Hogan President Terry Koehler. “You can have the forgiveness of a game-improvement iron without sacrificing traditional looks.”
A Logical Progression
Most any better player’s iron set you look at today has some sort of built-in progressiveness. The short irons are a bit more blade-like, while the longer irons have features such hollow cavities, tungsten toe-weighting or wider soles for greater forgiveness. A certain level of progression was built into the original Hogan Ft. Worth 15’s, but even low single-digit ‘cappers can use a little more help.
Koehler says the Ft. Worth Hi’s hollow construction and perimeter weighting makes longer irons more playable for a larger segment of golfer.
“Independent robotic testing showed significant improvements in launch angle, spin and balls speeds,” says Koehler. “That equates to more carry and very stable ball flight.”
As with all Hogan irons, the Ft. Worth Hi’s feature the V-Sole®, although the Hi’s sole is noticeably wider than the standard Ft. Worth’s. From the top down the Hi’s topline is slightly thicker than the Ft. Worth’s, but the only people who might mind are the folks who want top lines so thin they could shave with them.
Who’s It For?
The Hogan Ft. Worth Hi is most definitely a niche product, aimed at better players who game blade-like irons but want easier-to-hit long iron options that aren't hybrids or traditional game-improvement long irons.
Up 'til now that niche has been filled with utility irons, crossovers, and other driving-iron like non-hybrids. If you wanted something with the look, feel and playability of a blade, you were pretty much out of luck. It’s a presumably small void, but Hogan appears to have filled it with the Ft. Worth Hi.
The Hi comes stock with either the KBS Tour V or KBS Tour 90 shaft in steel, or the UST Mamiya Recoil 660 and 680 shafts in graphite, with the Ben Hogan Performance Plus grip standard. The Hi sells for $169 per club with stock steel shafts, $184 with stock graphite, and other shaft options are available at an upcharge. Phone orders are being taken starting today, and shipping will be first come, first served.
from MyGolfSpy http://ift.tt/1SaQQg8
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