Equipment

Inside the stoutest bag on the PGA Tour

Published

1 year ago

Mar 14, 2025

Editor’s note: The following is an excerpt of a piece our Andrew Tursky filed for PGATour.com’s Equipment Report in conjunction with our ongoing partnership. In it, Tursky talks with Aldrich Potgieter’s fitter, Nick Geyer, and the golfer himself on how (with his 125 MPH-plus swing speed) he sets up his bag. Read the full piece here.

According to Titleist fitter Nick Geyer, who works with Potgieter closely on his equipment needs, the 20-year-old rookie from South Africa uses clubs that are “probably some of the stiffest and heaviest out here” on the PGA TOUR. Case in point, Potgieter uses 132-gram X7 steel shafts in his Titleist MB 620 blade irons, and in his Titleist GT3 driver, he uses a Fujikura Ventus Black 8X shaft that weighs in at 85 grams.

Of course, Potgieter doesn’t use heavy-weighted shafts to boost club head speed; he uses them to maintain control.

Also, while most speed-chasing golfers work on increasing their angle of attack with the driver to hit it higher and with less spin, Potgieter actually does the opposite. Instead, he performs drills where he tees the ball lower – or even “off the deck” – to practice staying more on top of the ball.

He also uses a 2025 Titleist Pro V1x golf ball, which is the higher-spinning option between the Pro V1 and the Pro V1x. His fitter, Geyer, explains the uniqueness of Potgieter’s setup, and why it works for him.

“Obviously tons and tons of speed; the easiest 190-plus (ball speed) I think you’ve ever seen,” Geyer told GolfWRX.com on Tuesday at THE PLAYERS Championship. “So the setup is built for control, all the way down to his golf ball, the 25 Pro V1x … spin is his friend in terms of left-right, but we’re always trying to control the up-down. So you see things like X-Seven (iron shafts). You see things like Ventus Black 8X in his driver. That gives him the feeling of stiffness and stoutness that can control the speed. But we want left-right control, too, so that’s where 2025 Pro V1x comes in …

“I think that’s the cool part about the golf ball; super high-speed player, but he’s playing 2025 Pro V1x. Kind of unique, right? He wants the control, the spin, both around the greens and into the greens, and we’re going to control it with the golf ball.”

…Although he still has the T200 2-iron in the bag and says, “That’s not going anywhere,” he did recently add a Titleist GT2 13.5-degree fairway wood to his setup.

“Loving this thing at the moment,” Potgieter says about his new fairway wood. “(I) don’t usually play a 3-wood, but I’ve been hitting it well, so we put it in the bag.”

Mind you, the loft that’s printed on the head is 13.5 degrees, but Potgieter’s specific setup has added loft to create more spin.

“The 3-wood is interesting in the sense that it really is a driver-like weapon, but it’s got added spin to it for control,” Geyer said. “The 3-wood is probably really close to 300 (yards of carry). I think, again, when you’re trying to slow it down, we’re doing things with shaft weight. He’s in a 90-gram (shaft) in his 3-wood. We’re doing things with loft and head size, so (it’s a) bigger head. He’s in our 13.5 model, but we’ve added loft to it… to get that right window of, ‘OK, I’ve got a club that looks comfortable,’ but it’s got spin. It’s got control.”

Equipment

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

Published

5 mins 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.

Equipment

From the GolfWRX Classifieds: Titleist Vokey Proto Wedges 54M, 60T

Published

3 hours ago

Jun 11, 2026

Will Schube

At GolfWRX, we are a community of like-minded individuals who all experience and express our enjoyment of the game in many ways.

It’s that sense of community that drives day-to-day interactions in the forums on topics that range from best driver to what marker you use to mark your ball. It even allows us to share another thing we all love – buying and selling equipment.

Currently, in our GolfWRX buy/sell/trade (BST) forum, @Putt4Dough is selling some prototype wedges from Vokey Wedgeworks. These include a 54 degree wedge with the M grind and a 60 degree wedge with a T grind.

From the listing:

(1) Titleist Vokey Proto Wedge 54M with a Tour Issue DGS400 shaft and Golf Pride Tour Velvet (logo down). Standard length, lie, and loft. BB&F ferrule. Raw wedge in good condition. No initials. Price is $200 shipped. Buy both wedges for $380 shipped.

(2) Titleist Vokey Proto Wedge 60T with a KBS Tour 130X shaft and Golf Pride Tour Velvet. Standard length, lie, and loft. Raw wedge in good condition. No initials. Price is $200 shipped. Buy both wedges for $380 shipped.

To check out the full listing in our BST forum, head through the link. If you are curious about the rules to participate in the BST Forum, you can learn more here: GolfWRX BST Rules.