Death, taxes and Bryson DeChambeau testing new gear at a major.
For gearheads, it’s the best time of the year, and at The Open Championship, hosted at Royal Birkdale, DeChambeau was at it again, testing what looks like a new set of irons ahead of the final major of the season.
The shiny new set of sticks was spotted on the range Monday in DeChambeau’s Open Championship-themed Crushers bag, and while it’s not the in-hand images taken by our Tour Photographer Greg Moore, it was clear to see that the irons weren’t his usual Avoda prototypes.
Looking at images from on-site, the club heads look similar to the 3D-printed head he had earlier in the year, with what looks like either heel and toe weighting. Nothing particularly groundbreaking when it comes to clubs, especially used by DeChambeau.
Something that is, and the biggest change seen when looking at his irons, isn’t actually the heads themselves. It’s the steel shafts he’s using.
DeChambeau, who had been using his own LA Golf Bad Prototype shaft, an ultra-stiff graphite option created for him, has now reverted back to steel. Hopefully, DeChambeau shares more on the reason why he’s changed back to steel, but it comes after DeChambeau and LA Golf, who first announced their partnership in 2018, ended their collaboration earlier this year.
When one door closes, though, another one opens. Case in point, DeChambeau’s last appearance at a major championship was punctuated by a mysterious prototype driver that he and the designers at TaylorMade had put together. The Qi4D 200+ Proto driver he used at the U.S. Open was one of a few driver heads that they had put together for players seeking clubhead speeds as high as DeChambeau.
“I’ve been working on something that can maybe go a little faster with the same curvature, and it’s quite interesting what’s gone on so far,” DeChambeau told GolfWRX at Shinnecock Hills. “So it’s working well. We’ll see how it works on the golf course.”
The change in driver head, away from the Krank Formula Fire Pro, also came with a switch in shaft as DeChambeau played a Project X Prototype D70 instead.
DeChambeau’s latest equipment changes come after he also moved into new wedges at LIV’s Singapore event, dropping his 50-degree Ping S159 and 56-degree Ping Glide 4.0 wedges from the bag. In their place, Bryson now uses Bettinardi’s HLX 6.0 Forged wedges.
DeChambeau will be looking to stop a run of three missed cuts in a row at major championships, having finished in the top 10 in six of the last eight before that, including his U.S. Open victory in 2024. He’ll be teeing off at 4:58 a.m. ET on Thursday for Round 1 in a pairing that should suit him well with fellow LIV golfer Tyrrell Hatton and world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler.
