Equipment

Club Junkie Review: TaylorMade Spider Tour V putter

Published

3 years ago

Oct 11, 2023

TaylorMade’s Spider putters have been some of the most popular on tour and in amateur bags since they were introduced in 2008. Spider Tour is the latest version from TaylorMade, and while the company is bringing back a very recognizable head shape, the putters feature new tech to make them the best Spiders yet.

For a more in-depth review, please check out the Club Junkie podcast below or on any podcast platform, just search GolfWRX Radio.

The Spider Tour V is a new and more sleek head shape for this 2023/2024 model line. Most of the Spider Tour putters have small “wings” on the sides of them to push weight to the outside and add stability and forgiveness. The Spider Tour V leaves the wings off and has more of a sloping shape from the face to the back of the putter. This more flowing shape also gives the V head the most compact look of the bunch. Even with those changes, TaylorMade packed a lot of technology into the head to ensure it lived up to the Spider name. Thin Wall Undercut Construction and Steel Wireframe are used to remove excess weight from the center of the putter to create a stable putter with an enhanced CG location. And speaking of CG, each Spider Tour model has a different CG location in order to fit different putting strokes and preferred feel.

Out of the box, I think the new Spider Tour models look good with their new Gunmetal PVD finish. The Gunmetal PVD looks and feels high-end and should be more durable so we don’t see as much chipping like some of the previous finishes. True Path Alignment is back and I like the simple, high-contrast look of the wide white line with a smaller black site line running through it. On the sole is the large, blue sole plate with small spiders etched in it and two TSS weights near the face. The putter is finished off with a nice gloss black KBS putter shaft and a Super Stroke Pistol 1.0 grip.

As I set the Spider Tour V behind my first ball on the practice green, I just felt comfortable with the putter. While the V head shape is new, it is undeniably a Spider and familiar to look down at. Another plus is that the sole design allows the putter to sit on the turf with the face being square to the target. You don’t have to manipulate the putter in order to keep the face straight. The putter moves very well through the stroke and has a good balance and feel to it. The #3V slant neck gives it 32 degrees of toe hang and the additional forward weights allow your hands to feel the putter head rotate through stroke a little more than the other Tour heads. Sound and feel are very good and to me the Spider Tour has a little firmer feel than my TP Hydro Blast Bandon 3 putter.

The Spider Tour features a White TPU Pure Roll insert that is a mix of surlyn and aluminum for a slightly more crisp feel at impact and just a small audible click. Even on longer putts the added force doesn’t really change the feel and sound much, it stay consistent on all but the shortest tap-ins. Pure Roll does its job and puts immediate forward roll on the ball that you can see when putting early in the morning. The dew on the green shows minimal, if any, hopping and the ball just rolls away from the putter. I sometimes can feel like grooved faces can make the ball seem like it comes off the face faster and rolls out farther than expected, but I never had that issue with the Spider Tour V. Distance control seemed on-point, and I didn’t even have to play a few holes or rounds to dial in the speed.

Off-center shots stayed online very well, as I missed out on the toe, and I was impressed with how close my misses came to the hole. Between the Pure Roll face and the stability of the Tour V, every time contact was poor, I felt like I had a chance for the putt to drop. Now the one knock I will give to the Spider Tour is that toe or heel strikes can sometimes be hard to differentiate from solid contact. The responsiveness is decent but a little louder click or firmer feel would be welcomed by my erratic putting! As I stated before, the True Path Alignment works for my eye, and I found it very easy to line up towards my target. The wide white line was also visible as the putter moved through the stroke, giving a little barometer of where the putter head was at all times.

Overall I have putted very well with the Spider Tour V, and it definitely has a place in the rotation of putters I use. The new Tour models offer so much more than just a new head shape or color; they each are built for a different stroke. If you are looking to upgrade your putter, I think you should give each one of the head styles a little time on the practice green.

Whats in the Bag

Christiaan Maas WITB 2026 (June)

Published

4 hours ago

Jun 11, 2026

GolfWRX Staff

Driver: TaylorMade Qi4D LS (8 degrees)
Shaft: Fujikura Ventus TR Blue 6 X

3-wood: TaylorMade Qi10 (15 degrees)
Shaft: Fujikura Ventus Black 9 TX

Irons: TaylorMade P770 (3), TaylorMade P7CB (4), TaylorMade P7TW (5-PW)
Shafts: Fujikura Ventus Black HB 10 X, True Temper Dynamic Gold X100

Wedges: TaylorMade Prototype (50-SB09), TaylorMade MG5 (56-HB12, 60-LV07)
Shafts: True Temper Dynamic Gold S400

Putter: TaylorMade TP Juno

Ball: Titleist Pro V1x

Grips: Golf Pride Tour Velvet Cord

Check out more in-hand photos of Christiaan Maas’ clubs here.

Equipment

TaylorMade MySpider Tour and Tour X: More customizable build options now available

Published

4 hours ago

Jun 11, 2026

Alistair Cameron

TaylorMade Golf’s MySpider program underwent a substantial overhaul over the last month. Firstly, the company launched the option to customize the Spider ZT model, and now the program has returned with the MySpider Tour and MySpider Tour X.

The revamped page now gives golfers complete control over every visual and functional detail of their putter on the popular Tour and Tour X head, with every cosmetic idea thought of. In MySpider Tour, golfers can choose from four head finishes, 16 paint fill colors, nine Surlyn face insert colors, three aluminum insert options, six sightline configurations, and four hosel options — L-neck, small slant, double bend, center shaft. Six sightline options are available in MySpider Tour, including the optically engineered True Path alignment system. MySpider Tour X gives builders the option of four head finishes, four hosel configurations, and five sightline options, also including True Path alignment.

One of the more interesting features of the new MySpider program is the availability of three distinct face insert options. Along with the usual Surlyn Pure Roll insert trusted by Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy, which can be customized from nine colors, golfers can now also select firmer options. Two are offered with the black aluminum Pure Roll insert, slightly firmer than the traditional insert, or for the firmest feel, golfers can choose from two colors of milled aluminum inserts.

Another fun addition to the MySpider Tour is the ability to use the “Tommy Sightline.” The custom alignment aid design, which was first drawn onto Tommy Fleetwood’s putter by PGA Tour Rep James Holley, is based on the milled sightline on his Spider ZT head. There are five shorter lines on the left and right of a longer central line serving as the traditional short line alignment aid.

See below for the full specifications sheet for MySpider Tour and Tour X:

MySpider Tour

MySpider Tour X

Equipment

Then and now: Comparing Rory McIlroy’s current setup to his record-breaking 2019 Canadian Open victory

Published

7 hours ago

Jun 11, 2026

Alistair Cameron

In Rory McIlroy’s first appearance at the 2019 RBC Canadian Open, he crushed the record books to earn his 16th PGA Tour title in dominating fashion, winning by seven shots over Shane Lowry and Webb Simpson.

McIlroy’s score of 22-under-par 258 is the lowest 72-hole score to date at the Canadian Open, and his closing 61 is also the best final-round score in the history of one of golf’s oldest tournaments. Finally, with his win in 2019, McIlroy became only the sixth player to win the career Triple Crown, adding to his victories at the U.S. Open in 2011 and The Open Championship in 2014, joining Tommy Armour, Walter Hagen, Arnold Palmer, Lee Trevino and Tiger Woods in a coveted list.

So, with that, why not compare his current setup to the clubs he used to break all the records?

Driver

2019: TaylorMade M5 (9 degrees), Shaft: Mitsubishi Tensei CK Pro White 70 TX
2026: TaylorMade Qi4D (9 degrees @8), Shaft: Fujikura Ventus Black 7X (45 5/8 inches)

McIroy led the Tour in Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee in 2019; he’s doing the same in 2026. Between now and then, McIlroy has switched from the Mitsubishi Tensei CK Pro White 70 TX (a shaft with slightly more feeling in the tip) to the original Fujikura Ventus Black 7X, having just made the change to the heavier version from playing the 60X.

What’s interesting about McIlroy’s 2019 setup is that the weighting on his driver is actually set in the high-draw setting, using the T-Track weighting system, whereas in the Qi4D, he’s currently using a heavily rear-weighted setup. (Two 13-gram weights in the rear and only two 4-gram front weights.)

The TaylorMade M5 driver he played in during his Canadian Open win was the company’s first head that they claimed to design to initially exceed the USGA’s COR limit, and then injected with tuning resin to bring it back in bounds.

Fairway woods

2019: TaylorMade M6 3-wood (15 degrees), Shaft: Mitsubishi Tensei CK Pro White 80 TX; TaylorMade M5 5-wood (19 degrees), Shaft: Mitsubishi Tensei CK Pro White 90 TX
2026: TaylorMade Qi4D 3-wood (15 degrees), Shaft: Fujikura Ventus Black 8X; TaylorMade Qi4D 5-wood (18 degrees), Shaft: Fujikura Ventus Black 9X

The TaylorMade M6 fairway wood that McIlroy was using during the 2019 season is still in the bag of some of the best golfers on Tour in 2026. Just check out Justin Rose’s winning setup from the Farmers Insurance Open earlier this year. This year, though, McIlroy has still been searching for his top-end-of-the-bag setup, having played both the new Qi4D and the Qi10, which he won the Masters with.

The same shaft swap can be seen in the fairway woods as the driver, along with slightly less loft on the 5-wood.

Irons

2019: TaylorMade P750 (4) Buy here, TaylorMade P730 (5-9), Shafts: Project X 7.0
2026: TaylorMade P760 (4), TaylorMade Rors Proto (5-9), Shafts: Project X 7.0

The biggest difference between McIlroy’s custom set and the stock P730s is the groove design. While the P730s were constructed with 14 MX-9 grooves on their milled faces, McIlroy’s proto heads instead use the higher-spinning, 16-groove layout of the TW2 grooves. Other big differences between the sets are that McIlroy’s 7- and 8-irons have thinner toplines, are 1 degree stronger in loft, and are 1/4 inch longer than the original P730 builds.

With McIlroy’s 4-iron, the switch from P750 to P760 sees a transition to a two-piece construction with Speed Foam in it, which allows McIlroy to launch the ball slightly higher, with more workability.

Wedges

2019: TaylorMade Milled Grind (48-09SB), TaylorMade MG Hi-Toe (52-09SB, 56-09SB, 60-LB09), Shafts: Project X Rifle 6.5
2026: TaylorMade MG5 (46-09SB, 50-09SB, 54-11SB, 60-08LB @61), Shafts: Project X 6.5 (46-54), Project X 6.5 Wedge (60)

Between 2019 and 2026, McIlroy’s focus on his short game has been much more apparent. It was the reason why he switched back to the TP5 golf ball, to help with launch, spin and control with his wedges leading up to his career Grand Slam victory in 2025. The most apparent changes to McIlroy’s wedge setup are his lofts and bounce. He’s slowly delofted his pitching to a sand wedge, but has increased the loft on the lob wedge, bending his current 60-degree to 61. With that, adding more loft to his lob wedge also slightly increases the bounce and leading-edge sit point, so, as a result, he plays a lower-bounce lob wedge compared to 2019. The MG5 wedges are also softer than the first Milled Grind option from 2019. McIlroy also no longer plays the full-face grooves found on the Hi-Toe.

Putter

2019: TaylorMade Spider X
2026: TaylorMade Spider Tour X

Notice anything similar. Yes, the copper finish on Rory McIlroy’s Spider X putter in 2019 is a slightly more reflective finish than the recently released torched PVD finish. McIlroy was using the True Path alignment system, but now uses only a single white sightline.

Ball

2019: 2019 TaylorMade TP5 (#22)
2026: 2025 TaylorMade TP5 (RORS)

As mentioned above, McIlroy had transitioned from the TP5 to TP5x golf ball since his victory in Canada in 2019, but now is black with the same style of golf ball as his victory at Hamilton Golf & Country Club.

Grips

2019: Golf Pride Tour Velvet Cord
2026: Golf Pride MCC

Interesting, McIlroy actually used Golf Pride’s Tour Velvet Cord grips during his victory in 2019 (it was during a 2+ year switch to the corded TV) as opposed to his usual MCC grips, which he has played for most of his career.