Taylormade Warranty

I’ve gotten to a stage in life where I’m not often surprised anymore.

I must admit however that recently I was.

Most companies offer warranties on their products.  I’ve found, though, with automobiles as an example, that whatever ails your car, despite the expressed warranty, frequently falls outside the provisions of the warranty by way of some exception in the fine print.

I recently had the opposite experience.

I’ve bought many Taylormade products over the years and never had an issue.

Recently I experienced an issue with a 2014 Taylormade SLDR 430 driver.  I was not certain if the warranty would cover it so I emailed Taylormade and made an inquiry.  I was advised to take the club to a local retailer and ask them to send to club in to Taylormade so they could examine the club and make an evaluation.

So I took the driver to Golftown and explained the situation to them.  They forwarded the club to Taylormade.

Yesterday I got a call from Golftown to advise me that Taylormade had returned my club.

Imagine my surprise when I went to Golftown to pick it up and they handed me a brand new Taylormade M1 430 with a Kurokage 60 gram shaft as the replacement from my SLDR.

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M1

Now that is what I call a warranty and standing behind your product.

 

Defending Olympic Gold

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Olympic golf venue in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

 

Golf has only been played at the Olympics on two occasions: 1900 in Paris, France and the 1904 Summer Olympics in St. Louis, Missouri.

After an absence of 106 years, golf will once again be an Olympic sport this summer at the 2016 Olympics in Brazil.

Who is the defending champion?  Well its Canada of course.

The individual gold medal at the 1904 Olympics was won by George Seymour Lyon of Canada.

Lyon, (July 17,1858 – May 11th 1938) was born in Richmond Ontario.  Lyon, a cricket batsman did not take up golf until 1896, at the age of 38.  Eight years later he won Olympic Gold.

Just in case you might think his Olympic Gold win was a fluke, Lyon  won the Canadian Amateur Championship eight times between 1898 and 1914.  He also won the Canadian Senior Golf Championship a total of 10 times between 1918 and 1930.

In 1908 Lyon went to London England to defend his Olympic Gold title but golf was removed from the Olympics because of a dispute between English and Scottish representatives over the format of play (Lyon won the title in St. Louis at match play).

Lyon was posthumously inducted into the Canadian Sports Hall of Fame (1955) and the Canadian Golf Hall of Fame(1971.

Who will defend the title for Canada

The field for the Olympics is restricted to 60 players in both the men’s and ladies divisions.

Eligibility will be determined by the World Golf Rankings.  The top 15 players on the world rankings are eligible to play, the only restriction being that no country can have more than four players.

Apart from the top 15 players in the Wold Rankings, each country  that does not already have two or more players in the top 15 can send two eligible players.

In the case of Canada those two players based on the rankings as they stand today would be Dave Hearn (ranking 38th) and Graham DeLaet (41).

Based on the current standings on the women’s side,  Canada will be represented by Brook Henderson (9) and Alena Sharp (38).

New Irons for 2016

Many of the major golf manufacturers have released their new line of irons for 2016.   These are the clubs that will go longer, fly higher, go straighter… well you know, the usual advertising hype.

What was of special interest to me were the lofts of these new weapons.  A few months ago I wrote a post  about how the lofts of irons have been inching downward in an attempt to convince golfers that a particular brand of clubs goes further.   What becomes readily apparent is that there is no longer a  ‘standard’ loft.  I’ve listed the lofts for 6 irons and pitching wedges.  Some of the manufacturers are really pushing the envelope on lofts with 6 irons as low as 25 degrees.  In the 1970’s 3 irons were 24 degrees.

With a variance of six degrees (the equivalent to a club and a half) it is a no brainer that the Taylor made M2 6 iron with a loft of 25 degrees will go further than the Wilson FG Tour 6 iron with a loft of 31 degrees simply based on loft.

 

Manufacturer/model                  6 iron         Cast/Forged         PW        Price

Tour Exotics  CB Pro                   26.5                  C                      45            $700

Ping G Max                                    27                     C                       45           $800

Cobra F6                                        26                     C                       45            $700

Wilson C200                                 28                     C                       44            $800

Wilson FG Tour                            31                     F                       47            $800

Callaway Apex                              27                     F                       45             $1200

Mizuno JPX EZ                            28                      C                      45             $800

Taylormade M2                            25                      C                      43.5          $800

Titleist 716 AP1                             28                      C                      43            $900