Equipment Insider: Johnson's weapons, Couples' new irons

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EDITOR'S NOTE: Each week in the Equipment Insider, Adam Barr -- PGATOUR.COM's equipment columnist -- will provide breaking news, notes and analysis focused on PGA TOUR players. Adam will also appear in video segments for PGATOUR.COM.

Check out more of Adam Barr's equipment coverage at AdamBarrGolfGearGuide.com.

Video: In the Bag

What do players carry when they head out on TOUR? We take an inside look at the adjustments they make to their clubs ... and they show us other things (ball markers, training aids) that make their tools of the trade unique. Archive: In the Bag MORE IN THE BAGS Phil Mickelson Tim Clark Zach Johnson

For his successful AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am defense, Dustin Johnson was nearly wall-to-wall TaylorMade: R9 TP driver with 10.5 degrees of loft, R9 3-wood (15 degrees), a Rescue TP hybrid with the Flight Control Technology (that is, the proper angles determined by the position chosen for the screw-in shaft; this club had 22 degrees of loft), R9 TP irons (3-9), two prototype RAC wedges (48 and 54 degrees), and a Penta TP golf ball. The driver-ball combination was working; Johnson was first in average driving distance for the week (303.3 yards) and T11 in accuracy (he hit 76.4 percent of his fairways).

The age of adjustable equipment hasn't completely obsoleted the bending bar and the loft & lie machine. When Retief Goosen decided to update his driver at Pebble Beach, he chose a TaylorMade Burner SuperFast -- which is a non-adjustable head. Retief, being of a scientific bent, likes to get on the launch monitor to check his numbers. Being also of a winning bent, he likes to banish his death-miss, which is left.

So as he hit his new SF on the range, technicians working with him had to run back up the muddy slope to the TaylorMade truck (a distance of about 40 yards) every so often to the club's hosel could actually be ... y'know, bent. In the end, the techs bent Retief's driver four degrees flat so that his natural swing didn't allow any leftward ideas to creep in.

Fred Couples probably didn't plan to get his first Champions Tour win at the ACE GROUP Classic on Valentine's Day, but it didn't hurt his image. Neither did hitting more than 90 percent of his greens for the tournament. Couples was using Bridgestone J38 Dual Pocket Cavity irons and a Bridgestone B330 golf ball.

Plenty of people in golf were pulling for David Duval Sunday at Pebble. The 2001 Open Championship winner and former world No. 1 was chasing his first win since that Open, and had his third shot into the par-5 18th skipped forward a bit, he might have done it.

Despite his troubles of recent years -- at one time, his Official World Golf Ranking dipped way below 800 -- Nike never even thought about abandoning Duval, treating him instead as a trusted brand ambassador. In David's bag now is a Nike SQ Dymo prototype driver, an SQ Dymo fairway wood, Victory Red Forged TW blade irons, and One golf ball.

These days, new products know no season. The major manufacturers, competing vigorously, always seem to have something in the bags of top players for trial. Nonetheless, late winter seems to be a particularly busy time for product testing as the golf season ramps up and companies hope that sales will rise with temperatures.

FG Prototype irons

In Padraig Harrington's bag is a bunch of new arrows, FG Prototype irons by Wilson. (Ricky Barnes was also testing them.) These are a version of Wilson's new FG Forged irons, which are in stores now. The market model has a shallow cavity that moves weight to the heel and toe. It also has a PGA TOUR-inspired sole and a clean, thin top line, so it's likely to appeal to elite and better amateur players.

TaylorMade is testing a new hybrid that is intended to perform more like a driving iron. It has a smaller head, plus a taller face with less bulge and roll than other hybrids. The club has Flight Control Technology, like the Dustin Johnson hybrid mentioned above. Pebble champ Dustin Johnson has been working with it; so has Rory Sabbatini.

Some players are grinders on the course; others insist on doing their own grinding off of it. Both Retief Goosen and Sergio Garcia have been known to put on the gloves and belly up to the wheel to grind their own wedges. Indeed, at Pebble, Garcia was at it again, stopping by the TaylorMade truck Wednesday to pick up some new shoes and two new wedges -- and promptly grinding them into shape himself.