Equipment Insider: Bubba's extreme driver, wedge specs

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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.

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Bubba Watson put Captain's Pick politics aside and focused on job No. 1, winning the 2010 Travelers Championship. And kidding aside, that probably did more to impress captain Corey Pavin than to annoy him, even though Pavin and Scott Verplank were the disappointed parties in the two-hole playoff that ended with Watson hoisting his first PGA TOUR trophy.

It almost happened in half the time. After clobbering his drive on the first playoff hole, Watson darted a 56-degree wedge to about an inch from the hole. The wedge was one of three Ping Tour W models Watson carries. The other lofts are 52 degrees and a 60-degree bent much weaker, to a nearly-straight-up-hitting 63 degrees. The Tour Ws feature a milled face and grooves, providing more friction and therefore more spin, Ping says. There's a tungsten toe weight, very dense, in the teardrop-shaped head for added forgiveness, which in this case would result in making the toe drag a bit to prevent pulled wedge shots.

Sixty-three degrees is extreme lob wedge territory, real don't-try-this-at-home stuff for anyone who hasn't practiced with so much loft. The same could be said of Watson's driver, a Ping G15 with 7.5 degrees loft, much less than the 12 or so degrees most recreational players should be using. But then, Watson, a perennial driving distance stat leader, brings a different set of launch conditions to the ball. Coming in at the angle he does and at such fearsome speed, he generates enough spin to get the lift he needs over the space of 300-plus yards, so a lower loft will help him to keep the RPMs in a reasonable range.

PING S59

But even though it works well in expert hands, the G15 has game improvement features that Ping intended for all kinds of golfers. The face is bigger and more consistent over a larger area, Ping says, and the shaft in the stock model has a high balance point to enhance ball speed and resist twisting of the head on the way to impact. There's also a weight in the sole that fine-tunes the center of gravity and knocks down distance-robbing spin some more, whether you're Bubba or the rest of us.

Although known for his length, Watson has also earned a reputation as an aggressive shaper of the ball -- not unlike Pavin, who is definitely not his distance twin. Watson does his artwork with Ping S59 irons (3-PW), a brush-finish, cavity back head that's shorter heel-to-toe with a thin top line and a narrow, cambered sole -- in other words, all the features you'd expect in a shotmaker's club.

But like so many modern player's irons, the S59s have a little modern tech in them as well. In this case, it's a stabilizer bar across the cavity, which helps solidify feel and even out distance control issues. But also like a lot of modern player irons, the high-tech features are pretty much invisible from the hitting position.

The S59, along with its partner the S58 (also popular with pros), is listed in the classic club section of Ping's website; both are still available. The "current" version of Ping's player's iron is the S57, which features a hefty tungsten toe weight. And a forged Ping iron, the first ever for the company, is expected in the U.S. this fall.

Watson played a Titleist Pro V1x golf ball; he rolled with with a Ping Anser Redwood putter.