Callaway’s Hyper X driver was introduced for 2008. On Callaway’s website, they provide a long list of patents for each of Callaway’s golf clubs. I like to skim through some of the patents on occasion, and the Hyper X patents are actually pretty interesting.

I guess being the second best driver in Rankmark.com’s listing doesn’t sound that great, but when you consider the competition, it’s fantastic. Tour Edge’s Exotic driver—the XCG-V—beat out ALL of the big names in the golf clubs industry, and lost out to only one little name (Bobby Jones). Rankmark’s competition turned out to be much like David and Goliath, except 3 Davids beat out many Goliaths.

Here are some of the technologies Tour Edge used to beat out the fierce competition.

Rankmark.com tested many drivers, and surprisingly, many smaller golf clubs companies were among the top finishers, and the Bobby Jones Workshop Edition Driver received first place.

The Workshop Edition is right at the maximum USGA allowable club head volume at 460 cc. It was designed by Jesse Ortiz in 2004. The club head has a triangular shape that concentrates the mass behind the sweet spot.

When I found out that the Lynx '07 Parallax Ti Driver was one of the best-selling drivers I was a little bit surprised. If you were to name the top golf companies, Lynx probably wouldn’t be on most people’s list. Names on the list would be TaylorMade, Ping, Cobra, Titleist, Callaway, Cleveland, Nike, and maybe Adams, Ben Hogan, Yonex and Powerbilt, but Lynx would appear out of place on such a list.

Beginning this month, Cobra golf clubs will start selling the 2009 King Cobra S9-1 line of drivers. Cobra says that there is a driver in the series for golfers of all skill levels, and it’s designed to create more, powerful, and accurate ball flight. Geoff Ogilvy used his Pro D S9-1 to win the Mercedes-Benz Championship in January.

Cobra decided to buck the trend of bigger and bigger club heads, and go with a more traditional look. It has a 460 cc head. There are several models and variations to choose from in the S9-1 line.

S9-1 Pro

Brandt Snedeker has signed on to play with Bridgestone golf clubs, including J36 Cavity Back irons (3-PW), WC Design gap wedge (52-degree), J33 3-wood (15-degree) and a Bridgestone X-Drive prototype driver (9.5-degree). I’m sure he’s making getting plenty of money in order to do this, but the all of those details remain private at this point. When I say that, I’m not implying that he doesn’t genuinely like Bridgestone clubs. I have no doubt that he wouldn’t play their clubs if he didn’t believe in them.

Below is a funny Callaway golf clubs ad, with a rock star making a 3-iron, a famous golf instructor screwing a shaft into a club head, and Johnny Miller doing play by play on all the action. It’s kind of funny to see all of those fancy pants guys involved in heavy industry.

Here’s another ad for Cobra golf clubs, and this time Geoff Ogilvy is in it, along with David Feherty. Cobra’s LV5 driver took the silver medal in Golf Digest’s January, 2009 issue’s hot list. Actually there are five drivers that took the gold medal, so I’m not sure that the LV5 really earned a silver medal, but I think it has a lot to do with the criteria that Golf Digest used to choose the top drivers. One of the criteria they used was how much demand there is for the club. If the club is popular, it receives a higher ranking.

Adams has a golf clubs set called the Idea Tech a4OS that is half hybrid and half irons. The 3-iron through 9-iron are actually hybrids, and the pitching wedge is a regular iron. They have patented their “Boxer Technology” which they say increases the moment of inertia for their clubs, which leads to longer, straighter shots.

Titleist released its new 909 series of drivers in early November, which include the 909D2, 909D3 and 909DComp. They’ve been in use on the PGA tour since June, and are designed for lower handicap players. Good players don’t all have the same swing characteristics, and with a series of drivers, Titleist hopes that each player will be able to find a driver that best suits his swing.
909D3 launches the ball on middle height trajectory with low spin. The club head size is lower than the other two at 440cc, and is made of titanium.