0:00 In this golf bag, we have got some of the most iconic and gamechanging golf clubs ever made. And in this video, me, an average golfer, is going to try them and compare them against the latest and greatest irons of today. See how much has changed in the last 55 years, if there's been loads of improvement or not really at all. Let's find out. Okay, so you might know these irons for a number of reasons. First of all, they are genuinely one of the most iconic irons ever made. These are the Ping Castm one. And they came out, you ready for this? 1969,
0:47 one month after the moon landing. They are old and they are iconic. And you might have also seen a video Rick did. I think it was in 2019 where we went and played with a full set with these very irions and played some quite good golf. However, Rick is a good golfer, isn't he? So, maybe he can play great with any golf clubs. What are these like today in 2026 with me? A bit of a decent player, but also an occasional hacker. We're going to find out. But before we hit them, let's talk a little bit about why these irons are so iconic and why if you've not heard of these irons before, you need to know about them. because these irons really changed the game. This was Ping's second set of irons, what really the first they ever brought to market properly and they were
1:34 revolutionary because of this toe and heel waiting. Caron Solheim, the founder of Ping Golf. He wanted he made a putter first of all that was very well known, made a huge noise, a ping, hence the name Ping. And then he came to the iron space and his putter was so popular and revolutionary because he had his toe and heel waiting. The pink answer putter, you'll have seen it lots of times and every brand now has their own version was really revolution with it waiting and more forgiving and you hold more putts with it. So with this iron, it was very similar idea. Let's move the weight around. Let's shove a lot more weight towards the toe and to the heel, make the head more stable, make them more forgiving, make golf easier, and help golfers out there. And that's exactly what Ping did. And even today, let's be honest, these irons clearly look quite old. But considering from 1969, if you
2:21 compare anything, whether it be a car or television, no matter what, from 1969 to today, let's be honest, they look worlds apart. But these don't look that many worlds apart. They kind of look like a golf club. They're like a ping golf club. So, was in evolution, of course, have over time, but not crazy different. So, this iron really created that kind of revolution with this kind of perimeter weighting. But what was also very revolutionary about these irons and Ping is a brand. They were the first irons you could get custom fitted. So these very irons be could be four degrees flat up to 3° upright as well. So for those golfers out there who wanted a set bespoke to them, this was the first set could do that. And now everybody talks of the level of custom fitting, how important custom fitting is to you guys out there, these irons
3:09 started it. However, how do they compare to today's golf clubs? Cuz they're so old. Surely they can't be anywhere near as good. Surely we'll lose distance. We're going to find out. The lofts of these golf clubs, by modern standards, are quite weak. So, I've got a full set here, but in this video today, we're going to test the 5iron, 7 iron, and the wedge. The five iron loft is 28°. The 7iron loft is 36°, and the pitching wedge loft is 50°. So, as I say, quite weak. However, the golf clubs I currently play with, the brand new on the market for this last year are the Titus T 100, the fourth generation. And I have my irons actually one degree weaker. So, my five iron is 27° of loft. My 7 iron is 34° of loft, and my pitching wedge is 46° of loft. So, my
3:56 pitching wedge and my 7 iron, yes, are stronger than these by a few degrees, but my five iron's not too similar. So, I'm very interested to see how these perform against my Titus irons. I've already hit my tightest irons today. In here, I've hit a few shots with the five, seven, and wedge. Hit them quite well. And this is the data. Okay, so in hand here, I've got my beloved Titus T100s, and I've got these iconic Ping cast and one irons. They do look obviously quite different. However, how do they perform? We'll find that out. But first of all, my seven iron today at testing was an average carry of 169 yards. to 170 which is what I'd expect. My five aim was 195 and my pitching wedge is 134. So they're kind of numbers I would I would expect to see. But what
4:41 I'm also looking at here is the number underneath the carry distance which is a standard deviation. So that's obviously a little bit down to me. But what that shows me is how good my good one goes versus how bad my bad one goes. So for example with the 7i and it's a 169 average but my good one can go up to 10 yards more than that at like a 179 carry. But my bad one can be like a 159 carry. So quite a big drop off when it hit a bad one and obviously a big difference when hit a good one. So with these older irons with these lovely looking old school ping, what will we see with that? Will we see massive drop offs cuz they're older, the technology wasn't quite as good or we see very limited drop offs? And I'm really keen to find out because we all get pumped this marketing from these big brands every year, every two years, new irons,
5:27 new drivers, bye bye bye, you'll play better golf. But if these golf clubs from 1969 can still perform in my hands a relatively average-ish golfer with technology with the GC quad showing us the data, it does leave you scratching your head. What are we paying for with these new clubs? Okay, so with these clubs in hand, this seven iron I've got from the set. The first thing is it's got the original grips. They're quite slippy now, so hopefully I don't let go of it and smash one of Rick's rather expensive cameras. Fingers crossed. And the original shafts as well. What you'll notice is the number is actually on the toe of the golf club here, which is quite different to how we see today's golf clubs and it says US patent. What's really interesting, if you go to Google and type in the patent, you will find the original drawings of these irons, which is quite a cool little find. They do look quite unusual behind the golf
6:13 ball, very pingesque, a huge high up toe, quite a lot of club head, but they're still quite sleek. And other than the fact the grips are so kind of slippery, they don't look bad at all. I've got the flag at 170, which for this lofted 7i might be quite ambitious, but enough talking. Let's get hitting. I am very, very, very excited to hit these. Wow. Now, first of all, I think there's a stone in the in the shaft. Yeah, there is. I can hear something. Little stone in there. I'm impressed. That went 158 yards of carry for 166 total. I won't lie to you. wasn't hit flush. I'm also going to put a GC quad on see how fast I'm swinging it. But that was a
6:59 decent sound. It felt good. Oh my days. That felt absolutely incredible. That hit the flag. My god. Absolutely incredible. 94 mph club head speed, 123 mph of ball speed, 6,700 spin, 170 carry on the nose, hit the pin. I believe it actually must have hit the pin cuz it's told us into 169. So it's carried 170 then come back a yard cuz it hit the flag 0.0
7:45 yards offline. Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow. That was hit so good. Well, that was a bit fat. That was definitely a bit fat. I'm playing off a mat so I won't get punished too much. I would in real life. That wasn't hit anywhere near as good. But in this test on the green, it's going to sound obvious to say it doesn't feel as powerful off the face as modern irons. It doesn't. But distance is not short and it feels nice. It feels like a soft hit. That was a thin golf shot. Let me show you on the GC quad in a sec. That was terrible. But it's gone right. That was me. Of course it was. So you can see in my last few shots there, but the red is the very last shot. Now obviously that
8:31 missed the green by quite a long way right. That was me. An open face and a bad swing. But it didn't fall off in yardage by too much at all even though it was super super thin. So it goes to show you again these irons they are forgiving. You know forgiveness is two things. It's accuracy and it's distance control. That was always going to go right. It was an open face. Bad swing. The fact it was so thin and still went so far. That's impressive. Really is impressive. That's a bit better. High up the face fractionally, but it should do. All right. Go, go. Big jump. Big jump. Big jump. Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow. And wow. Once more. One more shot with a 79. I have to test a wedge. I don't want to get too carried away, but pitching wedge at the minute is my go-to golf club. I don't know why. Hitting them well. So, I'm expecting
9:18 maybe naively, but expecting to hit the pitching wedge well, but then they're going to test the five iron and we might even hit a few of the three iron because the three iron in this set. That could be the real test. But so far, this is incredible. Oh, that was nice. Getting a little bit pushy. That's definitely my shot today. I need to work on that. But controlwise, distance control-wise, I'm still kind of making roughly the side of the green. It's on the green. Ping Mr. Castton Salheim in 1969. man landed on the moon and a month later arguably a bigger feat was these golf clubs. Wow. Okay, so this club does look very ping naturally and it does have a very high big toe. But one thing I love about this actually is it's 50° of lock.
10:03 So I've only put the pin at 120. Hopefully I can get this there. But this gives me huge confidence that little chip shots. I just hit one now. Obviously I'm not going to monitor the distance and data too much. It's a nice little kind of squared face. That just feels lovely. That just feels like you could really be on the golf course. You know, you're at the side of the green. Whereas modern pitching wedges now are so strong in loft like low 40s degrees. This is 50. You can even open the face a bit. Get a bit creative. That was a bit thin, granted, but still it just popped it up. Stopped pretty quickly. Let me try a bit more before I hit these full shots. One more. bit of a lobby style one cuz I just look so open that face. It really is that nice golf club.
10:50 A little bit chunky but down the line. Anyway, that's just messing around. Let's hit these full shots of the 50 now. That felt gorgeous. That felt absolutely amazing. Oh my days. Oh my days count. I'm sorry for annoying people by saying that, but I just can't think of what other than swearing, which I'm not going to do. Don't know what else to say other than wow. I'm going to have to stop. I'm getting too excited. I'm going to try the five iron cuz that'll probably bring me back to reality cuz that won't be quite as easy to hit as this. Okay, now this is when the wheels will inevitably fall off. Longer golf clubs out, my friend at the minute. does look a bit odd. It is.
11:36 Again, it's very ping looking golf club and it bit of offset high up toe. It's not the most beautiful looking of golf clubs. I'll be honest. However, if it performs like the other two or even half as good, I'll be so impressed. The grips are quite hard to get used to if I'm honest with you cuz they they were great in the day, these grips, but there are golf pride. So, this is from 1969. They're very very slippy, very very thin and worn. Come on. Let's see what the five I can do. Let's hit at least one absolute rocket. Oh, the fracture at the top of the face. It's right down the pipe though. Bit have to go a bit. Yeah, I lost quite a bit of distance there. Now, I'll be honest. This might be the first negative I'm going to say for these irons. That with my iron, which is a lot lot newer. Would have gone a bit further. Would have had a bit more out of it than that.
12:22 Maybe I'm starting to find something out here. Yeah, that's a fat one. Again, these It's my fault. I'm sorry. Bad golf shots. I do hit them a lot. And you definitely see that's dropping off a bit. It's rolled out to be fair. One one or two more with this. Let's try and get some good ones cuz I can do it. That was nice. Fraction left the target. Good. Good speed. Go. Now that that was absolutely flushed. That felt a million dollars. That honestly I the feel when you catch one, you really know when you've hit it. It just feels different and the flight is lovely. I really do like that.
13:08 Come on. Couple more. And I might hit the three iron for a bit of fun. The thing is though as well, trying to trying to think to myself realistically, if I'm hitting five irons to the green, how many actually would be hitting the green? How many just want to get close? Obviously, I want everyone to hit the green, but in reality, they are a little bit spread out those golf shots, but I'm not a tall player. Let's try the three iron. Okay, I've really really enjoyed this. I can't wait to tell you my full kind of findings, but just for a few fun ones and the three iron does look very very daunting. It does. I'm going to place like it's a furway find. It's a par 4T in my head. So, I'm not aiming at a green to get it down and focus on strike. No idea how far it will go and no idea how it will
13:55 feel. Oh, it felt amazing. It felt incredible. It's right down the middle of the fairway. 238 yards of the old 1969 Theron. I'm sorry the amount of times this video I'm saying 1969, which almost reinforces myself as how old these clubs actually are. I was born in 1990, so they were 21 years older than me. Oh, pulled it like crazy. That's the out of bounds. We put up the scorecard kind of shot. That was terrible. It feels quite mentally drained when I look at these golf clubs and think, "Hit them well. Hit them well." I don't want to hit bad shots for you guys, but inevitably I do.
14:42 Yeah, that again. I mean, I'll take it, but it definitely doesn't feel quite as forgiving on a missit. One more. Let's have a bit of a chat with the data. No, it's thin, but roll. It's so far left. Go. Let's have a chat. Okay. Well, first of all, that was incredibly fun. I really enjoyed hitting those golf clubs and thankfully hit the majority pretty well. Look at the data. This data really is a bit of bit of fun because it's not quite fair reviewing a set of golf clubs that are so old versus the absolute latest and greatest. But what it does show us is really really interesting. And the first one is the pitching wedge. My pitching wedge title 200 was going 134 yards on average. The ping caston was 122. So, it was going shorter. There's no question about that.
15:29 It was going shorter. However, it's four degrees weaker in loft than my pitching wedge. And it's lost by about 12 yards. So, if you work off roughly one degree of loft, should be about 3 yards of distance. It actually marries up perfectly. So, it was actually doing exactly what it should do. So, huge tick there. Okay. So, moving on to the 7 iron. My 7 iron was going 169 yards average carry. The ping 163 yards. So, 6 yards less. But once again, the ping are two degrees weaker. So again, if we go three yards per degree, that would equal six yards. Exactly what we're seeing. And what's really interesting as well in these old ones, the standard deviation, the front to back bad shots was only four yards. So my good ones went out to like 167 carry and the bad one was only
16:17 159. So for me in this test, you could almost argue the 7 and the ping would be better for me. It was really, really good. Nice. Nice and high spin at 6,800. Ball speed was great at 118 mph. Average ball speed. I mean, you really genuinely can't fault it. And what's crazy is if I was having a custom fitting and this was somehow rebadged or made to look different, I would not have no idea this is this golf club from 1969. That's crazy. Then we go to the five iron and we do see a bit of difference, but again, not loads. Although I hit the five iron not brilliantly in the pings. My average was 191 carry whereas my own Iins was 195 carry quite close to each other and there's only one degree of loft difference. So again one degree being 3 yards it was four yards off old
17:03 versus new. So overall genuinely I am almost lost for words at how impressed with them with these irons and how much credit you have to give to Carson Salheim and the Ping family because these golf club really revolutionized golf that we know today. They were the first real pioneers of cavity back irons, this kind of perimeter waiting. And not only did they pioneer it, their product from 1969 still performed so incredibly well. There's a lesson for you guys watching, a lesson for me as well. If you've got golf clubs in the golf bag that you like and that you enjoy playing with, unless there's an absolute genuine reason why you need to replace them, don't ever be afraid to have old golf clubs in the bag. If I went to a tournament play with these, people might laugh at me, but look at that performance hitting that flag with a few bad ones, granted, but
17:51 they still work. Well done, Ping. Very, very impressed. See you next time.
