Question

133 views17 hours ago

CJH 16 1 day ago 1 Comment

My 17 year old took up golf last summer. His instructor gifted him a set of clubs that are around 30 years old except for the sand wedge & driver. Only fairway wood is a Taylor Made Bubble Shaft 3 wood that fits him poorly.

He is in the process of practicing with three GolfWorks 7 irons (TS1-IM, STi2 Gen2, KE4 Max). I thought I had an original TE 7 iron from ~22 years ago but I can’t seem to find it) & we plan to build out a set for him & gift his donor set back.

I would like to have a KE4 TC Pro Adjustable 7 wood built for him but am not sure what length to have it built to nor what shaft to use.

He is 5’7″ tall. Wrist to floor in socks is 32″. With his natural address his TM 3 wood sits very toe up which he finds distracting.

Natural shot shape is a draw. Miss is a block.

My inclination is to put in a heavier steel shaft with the heaviest Torx weight. I would like to shoot for D2 swingweight approximately. Goal is to keep clublength short to make it play with an effectively shorter lie angle.

So we are looking for recommendations for a shaft & what length to enter when we fill out the club fitting form, assuming we’ll go with the heaviest weight in the weight port & have the D2 swingweight goal.

Thanks in advance.

statechamp Edited comment 17 hours ago

statechamp commented 17 hours ago

41”-41.5” should be no issue at that height. I’d highly recommend the Maltby pro series shaft. Install the heaviest weight you can in the head.

Mine is built to 41.5” with the pro series shaft x flex. It comes out to a D4 (based on 50 gram grip) with a 12 gram weight.

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41”-41.5” should be no issue at that height. I’d highly recommend the Maltby pro series shaft. Install the heaviest weight you can in the head.

Mine is built to 41.5” with the pro series shaft x flex. It comes out to a D4 (based on 50 gram grip) with a 12 gram weight.

Answer 1 · 2026-07-06T14:24:37+00:00

Difficult to recommend a playing length for the #7 wood without actually fitting him, but can offer some things to consider. First, the toe sitting a little up is not unusual for a fairway wood. There is shaft droop that occurs, so you don’t necessarily want the sole flat on the ground at address. We would do a dynamic lie fitting, having him hit a lie board to determine what the best lie angle would be for irons, and work to get the fairway wood length shaft head weight combination to be where it would potentially perform the best for him. Fairway woods usually are not going to be adjusted for lie like irons, so we use any adjustment in the adaptor that may help, plus the playing length of the club to dial in what is the best combination. We do not use fingertip to floor. All that does is tell you what his fingertip to floor measurement is. Has nothing to do with determining the best club length for a player. We would observe, use impact labels to evaluate impact consistency and discuss what is comfortable to the player.

All that being said, sounds like you are wanting to go short and heavy, which is OK, but I would never let a swing weight determine the length of club for someone. Of course it has to be taken into consideration, but I will always want the player to have the proper length, then adjust the swing weight as needed to give the player the feel they like. I do not care what the swing weight number is (C8, D0, D2, D4) as long as the combination of the correct length, shaft weight and flex and head set up are set to give them the best chance to perform.

I would consider our Pro Series Graphite if you might consider a graphite option. Not sure what flex he needs, but if you need a heavier option in graphite, might need to look for a 70+ gram wood shaft and trim for a #7 fairway wood. The heaviest graphite options will be in the S and X flexes. There are no .335 steel wood shafts made anymore. There may be some out there and you may have one from some old woods, but no new ones being made.

The #7 wood is a great option for him and hopefully this will give you a few things to think about in setting it up for him. Let us know how the iron testing goes. Really not a bad option in what he’s testing.

Britt Lindsey

Thank you. Iron testing is going okay. He was striking the ball poorly the day I went to the range with him but the STi2 really stood out for his thin misses.

Strangely, he hit no good shots with the KE4 that day & says it was the same when he was testing them on the course. His results with the TS1-IM really aren’t that different from the STi2 except for the STi2 being seemingly better on thin shots.

I’m not surprised by the STi2 results but was surprised by the TS1-IM. I only added it to our order as I wanted him to try a spectrum of irons & picked those three.

I’d like for him to get another lesson or two before he decides. I also want his instructor’s input on shaft flex.

As far as the toe up issue, to give you an idea of the degree, when he chokes his lower hand down to the graphite on his three wood he is still very slightly toe up. 42.5″, 56° lie angle if AI is correct.

My hope is to get him close. If I have to trim or re-shaft I can do that. I should have my ~30 year old GolfWorks swingweight scale around here somewhere.

Back to the swingweight question, if we used the shaft you recommended, the GP Z cord grip & built it a half inch under, what would be the approximate swingweight with the heaviest weight screw?

I can do the rest of the math for further adjustments from there.

Thank you again for your input.
By half inch under I mean 41″ instead of the 41.5″ listed under your standard playing lengths for a men’s 7 wood.