The 3-wood remains one of the most important clubs in the bag for a weekend golfer. Even if you’re one of the lucky souls with a semi-reliable driver, it’s imperative to have a strong secondary option off the tee that also provides consistency from the fairway.
The second-longest club in the bag for most golfers — in some cases, it could be the longest — the 3-wood can truly do it all, provided you’re using one built to accentuate your strengths. Think of it as the Swiss Army knife in your bag.
As GOLF’s Fully Equipped co-hosts found out recently, there’s a plethora of worthy 3-woods in the marketplace. But which ones stood out? Here’s a look at several standouts during robotic testing with Golf Laboratories’ swing robot.
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TaylorMade Qi10
Kris McCormack (True Spec VP of Tour and Education): From what I’m seeing in the [hitting bay], for a majority of people out there, the TaylorMade Qi10 core head has been really solid in the fairway wood category. That’s going anywhere between a Tour player and some of the amateur and collegiate players. Even the higher-handicap players I work with come in and Qi10 has been successful for them.
Cobra Darkspeed LS and TaylorMade Qi10 Tour
Ryan Barath (GOLF’s senior equipment editor): I really like the Cobra Darkspeed LS. It has a smaller shape, really hot. My misses correlate with what the data shows. It explains why that 3-wood lines up so well for my game.
The other would be the TaylorMade Qi10 Tour. They took the Stealth 2 Plus, which was a really good product, and they said: What are the ways we can create a better option here? They shallowed the weight port and adjusted the head shape. As the data shows, it’s a little rocket. So you can build this rocket, but you still have 2 degrees of adjustability, so you can make yourself a strong 2-wood or a little 4-wood. It gives you that option that’s very unique.
PXG 0311 Black Ops and Mizuno ST-G
Gene Parente (Golf Laboratories founder): From a pure data standpoint, it was the PXG 0311 Black Ops if you want a solid 3-wood that’s going to hit it straight and not penalize you on misses. The 1A would be the Mizuno ST-G. It was at the top of the class as far as equal weighting and performance characteristics. But those were the two that jumped out to me in an overall category.
PXG 0311 Black Ops Custom Fairway Wood
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Ping G430 LST and Mizuno ST-G
Jonathan Wall (GOLF’s managing equipment editor): I’ll go with the Ping G430 LST. It was high launch, low spin for golfers who struggle with the longer length of a driver. The length can make it difficult to square up the face, so going to the shorter length of a 3-wood with those launch and spin characteristics makes it a great secondary option off the tee.
The other would be the Mizuno ST-G. I think they absolutely nailed this one. It was second in ball speed and right there in terms of carry consistency [across the entire face].
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