“It’s been obviously, from my point of view, the news of the week, for sure.”

Justin Rose surprised many on Monday morning ahead of the 2026 Cadillac Championship, the fifth Signature Event on the PGA Tour’s schedule, hosted at Trump National Doral’s Blue Monster Course, with his equipment switch to newly announced McLaren Golf, where he’s almost become an investor. 

But for Rose, it has been something in the pipeline for over a year. 

“McLaren Golf has been something that’s been on the back burner for a good number of months,” Rose said Tuesday ahead of the Cadillac Championship. “Obviously, to launch a brand out of the ground obviously has been going for a lot longer than a year. It’s something I’ve been involved with from the outset, really helping the engineering team, really testing the very first editions of the club. So yeah, I’ve been kind of working with the project for well over a year probably.”

The real question on everyone’s lips tough … how are the clubs performing?

“Clubs are feeling great,” Rose said. “Obviously, a lot of my own preferences have gone into the irons that I’m playing. I’m excited to finally get them in the bag and sort of just enjoy them now for the rest of the season. But it’s been a lot of fun.”

Rose will tee up at Trump Doral off the back of another close call at the Masters, where he finished tied for third. He currently ranks seventh in Strokes Gained: Approach on the PGA Tour; an interesting nuance for somebody switching the tools he’s used to perform so well with already this season. 

“Do you know what, I don’t think I’ve been playing the perfect set of clubs for me, I’ve been just kind of playing – I think when you’re not with an equipment manufacturer it’s, there’s a little bit of temptation just to bounce around anyway, there’s so many good options out there,” Rose said about the switch.

So, is it a risk for a player to change equipment while enjoying a renaissance in his career? Since last August, Rose has won twice on the PGA Tour, along with winning a road Ryder Cup with Team Europe. 

But, it’s not the first time Rose has decided to change equipment to a lesser-played brand on Tour. In 2019, the Englishman at the time, who was ranked second in the Official World Golf Ranking, moved to Honma Golf. It came after representing TaylorMade as a staffer for almost 20 years, with whom he won the 2013 U.S. Open, 2016 Olympic Gold medal and 2018 FedEx Cup. 

But, in less than two weeks after Rose signed the multiyear contract with the Japanese-based golf company Honma, he was world No. 1 and earned their first victory at the Farmers Insurance Open. The honeymoon period soon wore off, and the following year Rose was already testing different brands in his bag. 

Rose says he’s learned from his previous experience and also the time he’s spent as an equipment-free agent. 

“I’ve learned so much from being brand agnostic for a while that I kind of have my own preference list now,” Rose explained. “I feel like I’m in an environment where I can take all my preferences to one place where they can execute on that for me. So from my point of view, no, I’m actually looking at what can be better. I’m looking to mitigate risk.

“Yeah, I’ve done this once before as well in 2019, obviously, and I kind of learned a lot from that process,” Rose added. “So I feel a bit better place now to kind of go down this path. I think yeah, I think there’s some best practices that we’re kind of, we’ve sort of put into development really that I think are giving me what I feel are a fantastic set of golf clubs. I’m looking at some of the performance data that I’m getting on the range and places like that, and outperforming what I have. So that’s the exciting part for me.”

Rose, 45, who has already won this season at Farmers Insurance Open, is looking to use a combo set of irons, with a cavity-back design in the 4-iron and then a bladed 5-iron through Pitching Wedge set in Miami.

“Basically, right now it’s irons is the offering,” Rose said. “Yeah, 4-iron through. I got the two sets available. I got the 1s and 3s. The 1s are very much a good player blade. The 3s are very much more your approachable mid handicap style club, which is just performing so well in my long irons that I can’t not put it in. I’m just refining that last end of the bag. Like do I put a 5-iron with the blade or the 3s in. So I’m making those final little decisions.”

He enters the Cadillac Championship, off the back of another heartbreaking near-miss at the Masters, but Rose is ready for a tough test at Doral, and what better way than with new tools to test around the Blue Monster. 

“Obviously, there’s going to be a refinement process,” said Rose. “You can test all you want, you got to get the clubs in play, and there’s going to be little mini situations out there, different lies, all sorts of things, just getting comfortable. But in the long-term, no, I don’t see there being an issue at all.”