If you had to trade one part of your game—driving, putting, approach, around the green—with another current player, what part would you change, and with who?

A question like this depends on a player’s willingness to play along, and if they’re not up for it, it can lead to a cold exchange. And who can blame them? Some players might find it intriguing, but I will admit that in the context of a major week, it might be a seriously annoying question. McIlroy’s answer was quite blunt:

“I wouldn’t trade,” he said, fixing me with a look that said “don’t ask a follow-up.”

I asked a follow-up.

“What if you were forced to?”

Again, the answer was brief:

“But I’m not.”

Some laughter ensued in the media center, at which point a smarter person would have taken the hint and dropped it totally.

I did not drop it totally.

“If I asked you what part of the game you admired in somebody else, who’s somebody you admire putting, for instance?” I asked, looking now like a picture of desperation to Rory, all my colleagues and anyone watching on TV.

“I’m focused on my game,” he concluded, and only at that point did I manage to shut up. I’ll do something stupid three times, but never four.

Again, I thought McIlroy’s response was totally fair, and in some ways a perfect representation of his confidence and focus at this point in his career. Lucky for me, and for this story, the other players I asked were slightly more forthcoming, including World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler.

“So today I played a practice round with Sam Burns, and I remember when we played the Presidents Cup here in 2022, it was like he was putting to a hole that was the size of a basketball hoop,” Scheffler said. “So I do a lot of practice rounds with Sam, and he’s a tremendous putter. I would trade that with him.”

Scottie Scheffler – Stephen Denton

Scheffler wasn’t done; he’s always looking at other players to see how he can improve his own game, and he went out of his way to compliment McIlroy in particular.

“You look at a guy like Rory, you’d be hard-pressed to find anybody that has drove the ball better than he has in the history of the game,” he said. “He might be the best driver of the ball that we’ve ever seen. You had a guy like Tiger who had a ton of speed, but Rory just has the accuracy [that] sets him apart, too. Not only does he hit it really far, he hits it really straight. Those are two little examples just off the top of my head of guys that I would trade with.”

And he still wasn’t done—he cited Jordan Spieth’s ability around the greens, Jon Rahm’s passion, and Tiger’s entire persona.

As for Rahm, the question seemed to stump him at first, and after saying it depended on the course, he took a long, contemplative pause before answering.

“Oh my gosh,” he began. “Based on the success he’s had here, you almost have to go with some part of Rory’s game. … I think the obvious answer for a lot of people probably would be his driving on this golf course, but I think, as a pretty good driver myself, I’m going to choose how well he’s been able to putt these greens.”

Rahm continued, name-checking Xander Schauffele’s putting and Scheffler’s iron game. When I asked what his answer would be if we separated it from Quail Hollow, he went historical, calling out Jack Nicklaus and Ben Hogan before settling on Tiger’s putting, especially in the clutch.

Justin Thomas was quicker in response, and also briefer, saying he’d take McIlroy or Scheffler off the tee. Jordan Spieth agreed on his choice of player, but not the part of the game.

“I’d probably replace approach with Scottie,” he said. “I think that probably would lend to the lowest score differential for probably most anybody … that would be my short, easy answer there. If you’re going to lead in approach at historic levels, you’re going to have a chance most every week.”

Bryson DeChambeau, unsurprisingly, took an analytical approach.

“I would probably take whoever the best wedger is right now from like 110 yards to like 60, 50 yards,” he said. “I feel like I’m pretty good from 40 yards in, but that area is where I’d trade it with somebody that’s really good in that area. I haven’t really researched that.”

Bryson DeChambeau – Ross Kinnaird

I researched it for him: The proximity leader this year from 100-125 yards is Scottie Scheffler, and the leader from 125-150 yards is Tom Kim, with Justin Thomas just behind him.

Xander Schauffele was the most on McIlroy’s wavelength in terms of what he thought about the question.

“That’s a weird question, considering we’re getting ready for a major where we’re just trying to be the best at all those things,” he said, although unlike Rory he was smiling. “If I’m nitpicking myself, I would probably give up my short game for someone else’s. There’s a big group of guys who are what I would call elite chippers. I don’t know, there’s probably five or six guys … that would probably take a little bit of stress off my putter at times.”

This year’s leader in SG/around the green is Matt Wallace, so even though Schauffele didn’t mention a specific name, we’ll give him the Englishman. Schauffele, however, made it clear that he’d prefer not to trade—he enjoys the challenge of improving.

In the end, the fascinating part of these answers was what it said about the players’ own games. Scheffler’s first response was about putting, DeChambeau’s about short wedges, Thomas about driving, and Spieth about approach—by strokes gained, each player’s worst category. Even Rahm answered strategically, realising that it would be a waste to trade out his own driving and opting instead for a Quail Hollow putting specialist.

And most of them referenced McIlroy. Which probably makes it appropriate that alone among the respondents, he had no time for the question. Why even entertain the hypothetical, when every part of your game is working so well?

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A midday thunderstorm blew through Quail Hollow on Tuesday, with a bolt of lightning coming so close to the property that the boom had those in the vicinity ducking for cover. As it had for much of the previous day, a deluge flooded the course and confined players for a time to the locker room. They got back out, only to get poured on again.

A bummer for many, but probably not for Bryson DeChambeau, who admitted that the nasty weather created a nice break for him. The man always seems to be on the move, whether it’s winning the LIV Golf event in South Korea only nine days ago, or working on his social media posts, or making personal appearances, as he did Tuesday morning at an event for First Tee Charlotte.

MORE: PGA Championship 2025 tee times

Then there was a scheduled press conference in the afternoon ahead of the PGA Championship that begins here on Thursday. DeChambeau had yet to play the course this week because he stayed home in Dallas on Monday—to practice, of course.

“Yeah, I think for me, it’s actually provided me a little bit of rest,” DeChambeau said of the weather. “I was hitting a lot of golf balls last week and had a bunch of work going on. It’s actually provided me a little bit of time off.”

There’s one thing we know about DeChambeau, though. Even if his body isn’t moving, the wheels in his head are forever spinning.

There was another example of that on Tuesday when he was asked about how he processes rounds or tournaments after they’re over. And, of course, DeChambeau has had plenty to ponder of late. He played in the final twosome with Rory McIlroy in the Masters, only to witness first-hand the Ulsterman’s triumph while fading into a tie for fifth. In his next start, at LIV Mexico, DeChambeau held the 36-hole lead but was overtaken on Sunday by Joaquin Niemann. Then came the LIV Korea win, as DeChambeau closed with a back-nine 30 to notch his first victory of any kind since last June’s U.S. Open.

So how does the so-called Mad Scientist’s mind process it all? Like few others, for sure.

“I reflect on it a couple days after, take away what I need to improve, whether it be my iron play or a little bit of this, a little bit of that. Why did I get so nervous over a tee shot? Why did I feel this way?” DeChambeau said.

“I take those sorts of things, and I translate it into the next week. I did that pretty well in Mexico, albeit I still lost and hit one OB on 13 randomly and didn’t know where that came from. I felt that at Augusta, but it never happened, and then it happened in Mexico, happened a couple times in Korea. So I’ve worked on that to kind of set that back to straight and square.

“I take on that and I just kind of evolve it over time,” he said. “I adapt and evolve and layer it on. All those emotions that I have and all the misses that I have and all the things that I’m thinking about, I layer it on over the course of time; Is this gone or is it still there? How do I fix it if it’s not fixed? Then if it’s fixed, let’s move on to the next thing I need to tackle.”

Whew. Anybody else have a headache?

The effort is nothing less than admirable and clearly has made DeChambeau what he is today. Despite getting zero Official World Golf Ranking points for any of his results on LIV, the 31-year-old Californian is No. 15 in the OWGR on the strength of five top-six finishes in majors over his past eight starts. A year ago, Xander Schauffele beat DeChambeau by a shot in the PGA at Valhalla, only for DeChambeau to bounce back by clipping McIlroy at Pinehurst to capture his second U.S. Open win. Then came contending in April’s Masters, only to collapse with a 75 on Sunday.

Other than the Open Championship, which may have too many vagaries for him to calculate, DeChambeau believes he has figured out how to play the major championships, and it shows, with at least two top-sixes in the other three. He would seem to have another setup in his favor this week, with Quail Hollow considered a bombers’ track at which DeChambeau has a T-4 and T-9, respectively, in his last two starts, though his most recent appearance in the Wells Fargo Championship came in 2021.

“I remember you’ve got to drive it well. So far, I’ve been driving it well this season. Hopefully it continues,” DeChambeau said. “Greens are tricky. Got to have great irons. You’ve got to come in with a full, complete set of clubs that you feel comfortable with attacking flags at and just strategizing your way around the golf course.”

Clubs are another piece of DeChambeau’s world that frequently occupy his time. He made headlines last year with Avoda Golf irons that he put into play before the Masters, and at the end of the year he was dropping hints about a different set of clubs he was working on with LA Golf. “I’m building some equipment that you guys might know or might not know about, but we are very excited to be showcasing that next year,” DeChambeau said. “We’re going to change the game. We’re going to ruffle some feathers I’d say, in a good way, a really good way. We’re going to innovate beyond what’s known so far.”

Apparently, those irons are still as work in progress.

“I’ve been working on my irons a little bit. I haven’t changed irons,” DeChambeau said. “I was hoping to have irons by this week, but it just didn’t work out that way. I played pretty well in Mexico … played OK at Augusta. My irons weren’t that great. But played better in Mexico. My irons were really good in Korea. I feel like it’s moving in the right direction.”

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Lottie Woad is the No. 1 ranked amateur in the world. The 21-year-old, who attends Florida State University, knows what it takes to separate herself from the throngs of talented golfers across the globe.

Her most notable win to date came in 2024, when she won the Augusta National Women’s Amatuer in stunning fashion—by birdieing three of the last four holes to win the tournament by one. During the event, she relied on a shot that she believes all elite junior golfers should know how to hit.

“I think they should be able to flight their golf ball down,” Woad said. “Coming from England, I’m obviously exposed to more wind than other people, and I think it’s a really important skill to be able to knock the ball down and take the spin off. It got really windy at the ANWA and that shot helped me. It’s not just for links courses. It’s an underrated skill.”

It’s a shot that you’ll want for the wind, of course. But it can help you in wind-free situations, too.

“They just want to get up high and stop it quick, but sometimes it requires the slightly lower shot,” Woad said. “When trees are in the way, or sometimes if it’s a back pin on a tier and you can’t land it on top, you might want to take the spin off and play a little low and chase it up.”

To learn how to hit the low-spinning, knocked-down shot, we talked to Trillium Rose, a Golf Digest Top 50 Teacher in America.

“The key adjustments that you would make when you’re trying to lower the ball flight is first to move the ball back slightly in your stance, maybe just an inch,” Rose says. “You want to maintain a flex lead wrist through impact. This can also help keep a forward press, keeping your hands ahead through impact.”

By keeping your hands forward, you’re delofting the clubface, which will help keep the ballflight lower. Rose also said you can use a three-quarter swing instead of a full swing, because people with longer swings can struggle to create this feeling of having the clubhead lagging behind. With a shorter swing, she said, it becomes much easier.

“You want to feel like your weight’s on the front side, that you’re not hanging back and flipping through. A lot of people don’t realize that when they are swinging, they may be adding loft so that’s something to be aware of,” Rose adds.

It’s easier to have the face open up when your weight is back. With your weight pressing forward, you’re more likely to close the face, promoting lower ball flight.

Rose said that this is a great shot for adult amateur players to know how to hit, too. Next time you find yourself playing in the wind, or trying to get back to a tucked pin, you’ll be happy you know how to hit Woad’s knock-down shot.

Main Image: David Cannon

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You probably remember it. The PlaneMate was a pandemic-era hit—the hottest training aid at a time when golf was booming—and it popped up everywhere. It was named the best new training aid at the 2020 PGA Merchandise show, sold more than 30,000 units. Some of the best swings in golf, most notably Rory McIlroy, were even spotted using it.

The success inspired co-inventor David Woods, who doubles as a Top 100 coach, to launch his own training company and a new line of products. That company became ProSENDR which, again, resulted in a series of hits you’ve seen littered across PGA Tour driving ranges.

 

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Now, Woods is bringing the PlaneMate back, but with a series of new features designed so it can be used with ProSENDR’s other popular products. The goal is to make things more efficient. To select the products your swing needs and use them together when you practice, so the changes stick when you get to the course.

With the PlaneMate launched and fully stocked (you can check it out on ProSENDR’s website right here), we reached out to Woods for a quick rundown on the rebooted product…

What are the new features and upgrades?

David Woods: The overall quality and aesthetics have been enhanced and I wanted to give it a few more uses so the golfer gains more value in their purchase. I’ve added alignment rod loops to the belt allowing for additional drills. Now that the PlaneMate is a part of ProSENDR, players can use different combinations of training aids based on what they need. We’ve put together some protocol videos on our website to help explain this, but for example: If players tend to get stuck on the downswing, they can use the connection sphere (which attaches to the trail hip and is sold separately) to fix that problem while using the PlaneMate to prevent them from overcorrecting.

Who is this training aid good for? What swing issues does it help fix?

DW: This product is for everyone! We have had many PGA and LPGA tour players use it as well as thousands of everyday golfers. It simply encourages you to be in tour level positions and provides great feedback to the golfer.

What are some mistakes to avoid using this training aid?

DW: The PlaneMate is designed to give feedback…good and bad. If you take your time and are responsible with your own improvement you will see results. However, it will highlight your errors which is exactly what you want. We all know that impact is the moment of truth but so is transition from backswing to downswing. Maintaining width and extension on the band will encourage appropriate shallowing of the shaft and rotation combined with measured forward shaft lean at impact will allow the PlaneMate to assist you in delivering great shots.

Is there a best way to use this training aid?

DW: Aka, five balls with the training, five balls without, etc. Yes, the PlaneMate is designed to offer guidance when used correctly. In order to re-create these feels and positions on your own, I definitely recommend starting slow and also hitting a few balls with it on and then a few without while comparing results and feels. Repeat this process, and gradually you’ll see the changes you want to make leak into your full speed swing.

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The common mistake because of the look of the club is to get into a setup where you can scoop the ball off the turf. Instead of hanging back with your body as I’m showing (above, left), which will likely cause you to hit it fat or thin, you should get in a more aggressive setup. Your sternum should be in front of the ball. I’m dangling a club from it (above, right) to show just how much my body and weight are favoring the target side of the ball. When you take the club back, feel even more weight on your that side.

All of this promotes a downward, ball-first strike. You’ll make crisp contact, allowing the club to deliver the shot into the green on a lower trajectory with a healthy amount of spin. This downward strike is exactly how the pros do it, which might run counter to what you’ve been told to do. If you can make solid contact and keep your pitch shots down like them, you’ll hit a lot more greens.

Jason Guss, Golf Digest Best in State Teacher, Naperville (Illinois.) Country Club.

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Occasionally safer off the tee; more conservative into greens.

But in talking about his strategy, a lot of golf fans glossed over what I consider arguably the more important piece: that Rory McIlroy went hard this offseason tuning up his technique and stripping away some bad habits in his golf swing.

Rory’s right arm

A lot of good golfers chase a lot of width on the backswing, which can be beneficial because it creates a big, powerful stretch. But when you overdo it, as Golf Digest’s No. 1-ranked coach Mark Blackburn explains here, it can cause your right arm to stay too straight.

That can keep your right shoulder high and, in Rory’s case, get his hands deep and across the line. That’s why this offseason, as you may remember in this video, he focused on this takeaway move.

After Pebble, Rory explained a little more why…

“I want to get my right arm and right shoulder more externally rotated on the way back. I feel like I keep my right elbow in front of my body at the top of the backswing. It’s a right-sided sort of takeaway feel. Then from there, it will hopefully stop the club from getting across the line. That’s the change I was trying to make. I have a big shoulder turn, so the club will probably always point right of the target for me. I just feel like over the past year it got a little bit too pronounced, so I’m just trying to tease it back into position where it’s a little more in line at the top.”

As Rory says, his goal is to keep his right arm a little more externally rotated, meaning slightly more twisted this way.

That helps keep his right elbow a little softer and more in front of his body, putting the club less across. It means that the club simply re-routes less in transition, which makes timing it all up a little easier.

These changes already seem to be sticking in his golf swing. The early returns are great—Rory’s striping it, and the club looks much more similar to where it was in 2014 compared to the past few years. If there is a big miss in there, we’ve yet to see any signs of it. It simply looks like a subtle upgrade on an already elite move.

So, good job, Rory. All the golf swing nerds are really excited about this.

Main Image: Jed Jacobsohn

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Alcaraz is a sneaky golf nut, seen working on his swing with a variety of different tennis equipment over the years. On Tuesday, that trend continued when he was spotted tinkering with his other forehand before his quarterfinal showdown with the men’s all-time major winner. Check it out.

Swing is looking sharp, Carlos #AO2025 pic.twitter.com/8DFOrCwwUc

— #AusOpen (@AustralianOpen) January 21, 2025

Alcaraz went on to lose to the Aussie Open king in four sets. Perhaps he was too preoccupied with bent grass instead of the hardcourt … or perhaps he just knew what was coming. Even at 37 years old, Djokovic is all but inevitable in Melbourne, winning the Aussie Open a record 10 times. There’s no shame in losing to The Serbian on the court he’s owned for well over a decade, but Alcaraz’s quest for the career Grand Slam will now have to wait until 2026.

On the bright side, though, we hear Royal Melbourne is pretty nice this time of year … if Carlos can score an invite, that is.

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We sat down with Rory as he discussed a range of topics: being back in Dubai, an insight into the process he goes through when choosing the TaylorMade equipment that goes into his bag at the start of the season, the importance of golfers getting properly custom-fitted and the benefits to their game, how many swings with a new club before it’s in his bag, and how TaylorMade Golf has evolved.

You can watch the whole interview below.

 

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Nike has been out of the golf hard-goods game for eight-plus years, but that hasn’t stopped some of the biggest names in the sport from keeping the Swoosh relevant at the highest level of professional golf.

Brooks Koepka and Tony Finau continue to carry a Nike Vapor Fly Pro 3-iron that’s developed a cult following amongst gearheads. The hollow-bodied club isn’t all that different from many of today’s players-distance model, which is probably why there’s some staying power. Vapor Fly Pro is familiar and still packs a punch from over 230 yards.

A few years back, I asked Finau how he was handling the possibility of the face caving in on his 3-iron. The hollow cavity puts additional stress on the face, increasing the likelihood of caving at some point.

“The one I’m using is actually one of my two backups,” Finau told me. “My original lasted me about six years. So with my math, if this one lasts me six years, and my other backup lasts me another six years, I’ll be about 50 years old by the time I’m done using both. It’s a great club. It’s one I’ve had in the bag since 2015, and I don’t think it’s going anywhere anytime soon. I hit it great.”

There’s a man with a realistic plan.

Koepka, on the other hand, doesn’t subscribe to the Scout motto: Always be prepared. During a recent content shoot with Koepka in Florida, Golf Digest Play editor Luke Kerr-Dineen caught a glimpse of the well-worn 3-iron, which led to a fascinating conversation. (Fascinating if you’re a gearhead.)

Koepka has been playing a Vapor Fly Pro 3-iron since 2016, but like Finau, there was always an assumption he’d replaced the original with a backup along the way. But you know what happens when you assume.

As Koepka revealed, he’s still playing the original that’s somehow managed to survive a myriad of blows at high speeds. Asked if he had a backup plan when the club face failed, Koepka offered a blunt response: “Don’t know and I honestly don’t care.” Fair enough!

If there’s one thing that separates Koepka’s 3-iron from nearly every club on tour, it’s the wear marks on the Fujikura Pro 95 Tour Spec shaft. Two thumbprint-sized divots have formed after nearly a decade of the shaft rubbing against the bag, something I’m not sure I’ve ever seen while covering the pro game.

The two wear marks are visible when Koepka addresses the club, but they aren’t enough of an eyesore to warrant replacing the shaft. If you’re keeping track at home, Koepka won’t test new heads and refuses to replace the shaft. The club has played a role in all five of Koepka’s major wins, so it’s easy to see why he doesn’t want to mess with a good thing.

“Once I get equipment that I like and I stick with it — I’m not a tinker,” Koepka told me a few years ago. “I don’t change. I keep it just how it is.”

Even if Koepka doesn’t have a backup plan, Ben Giunta, a former Nike Tour rep who owns and operates The Tour Van at LIV Golf events held in the United States, confirmed he has a backup head and shafts waiting for Koepka when the 3-iron finally bites the dust.

There’s a backup plan in place, even if Koepka doesn’t realise it quite yet.

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Scottie Scheffler is a generational ball-striker. Statistically, the best since Tiger Woods.

And yet, during the week of his second Masters win last April, Scheffler’s golf swing didn’t feel great. It was only thanks to an in-tournament adjustment from longtime swing coach Randy Smith that put Scottie on the road to his second green jacket.

The revelation came in the PGA Tour’s newly-released documentary Scottie 24 when, after a deceptively good opening round 66, he shared his grim assessment with coach Smith:

“I got the absolute most out of my round that day. Randy asked ‘how’d everything feel?’ and I told him, ‘I cannot go another three days of this tournament with my swing feeling like this. We need to figure something out.'”

The Mistake

So, what did the pair figure out?

It all had to do with the way Scheffler gripped the club, specifically with his left hand thumb placement.

Scheffler is incredibly methodical with his grip during his practice, but as Smith explained in Scottie 24, Scheffler’s routine involves gripping the club while holding it up towards the sky, before returning it down to the golf ball.

You can see him doing it below.

Kevin C. Cox

The problem was that when Scheffler returned the club to the ground, his wrist would change positions slightly, which would cause his left thumb to move about an eighth of an inch, to a quarter of an inch, toward the top of the grip.

This almost unnoticeable adjustment gave Scheffler, in the words of the legendary Lee Trevino, a “short left thumb.” It would close the clubface slightly, and result in him missing shots to the left.

The Fix

After Smith identified the cause, Scheffler and his coach set about fixing it. Mainly by feeling a “long left thumb” that ran further down the grip when he placed the club on the ground. This prevented the clubface from closing.

You can see the pair working through the change here.

David Cannon

Scheffler’s consistent fade returned. He was no longer missing unpredictably left, and it gave him the confidence to return to the Augusta winner’s circle.

A fantastic tidbit in a wonderful documentary, which you can watch in full below.

Main image: David Cannon

RELATED: Scottie Scheffler out of The Sentry with hand injury suffered on Christmas

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