OUT OF BOUNDS By Gary Van Sickle

OUT OF BOUNDS

How I got shafted

WORDS BY GARY VAN SICKLE

Ispent $1,325 on new golf clubs this year.

Correction. I spent $1,325 on ONE new golf club this year.

That is not standard operating procedure for me. I am what you call “value-oriented.” You might say, “cheap,” although I prefer “thrifty.” But hey, if the spikeless golf shoe fits...

So what convinced me to spend about what it costs to put a hotel on St. James Place, only in real dough and not Monopoly money?

The AutoFlex shaft. It’s new and it’s from South Korea, made by Dumina. The AutoFlex is shrouded in mystery. The manufacturer has declined to file a patent on the process, the better to stymie Asia’s rampant industrial counterfeiting. A patent is a blueprint in countries without law enforcement.

We do know this: AutoFlex is ultra-light and ultra-whippy. And mainly, it helps deliver drives that are longer and straighter.

This sounds like a paid political advertisement or a spam call in print, right? But it’s not. Ask senior golfers, such as myself, what they would pay to pick up 12 to 15 yards in carry distance with their tee shots and the popular answer would be, Just about anything.

The answer in this case is $790, the price of the Dumina AutoFlex shaft.

You’re wondering how the AutoFlex shaft works. I can’t tell you, because Dumina is mum on the makeup of its hot shaft.

Lighter and whippier is supposed to equal shorter and less accurate, according to conventional golf wisdom. But two months into my AutoFlex experience, I can tell you conventional wisdom doesn’t apply here.

Obviously, the $780 price tag is a stopper for some. Normally, I’d be one of them. But I was tipped off about AutoFlex by a PGA of America club professional who was already using it and thought it might be worth a story.

I soon learned that assorted tour players either have used it or tried it. Louis Oosthuizen played it in the Masters’ final round and Branden Grace put it in play at the PGA Champion-

OUT OF BOUNDS

ship. Others photographed with it include Adam Scott, Fred Couples and Michelle Wie-West. The shaft is easy to spot on TV. The top half of the shaft is hot pink, the bottom half is black.

Visiting the company’s website will not fill you in on specifics. There’s a photo of the shaft titled, “Korea Hidden Technology.” I’d shorten that to KHT except it gives me a sudden urge for crispy fried chicken.

So I don’t know why AutoFlex works, exactly. The shafts vary in weight from 41 to 57 grams, depending upon the model. That’s ultra-lightweight to medium lightweight. Yes, less weight should lead to an increase in the average player’s clubhead speed.

If you’re going to drop $780 on a shaft, this is not the time for a do-it-yourself project. Fitting the AutoFlex shaft requires an experienced pro because AutoFlex has its quirks. You need an expert like Joe Corsi, a clubfitter and good senior amateur player who runs Corsi’s Indoor Golf in Greensburg, Pa. Greensburg is just a few miles down the road from Latrobe, the home of a beloved golfing legend who had a tea drink and a regional airport named after him. Yeah, Him.

I visited Corsi’s shop with no intention of buying the AutoFlex. In fact, I thought I might be getting spoofed.

“What’s funny is, the shaft is so soft, it whips all over the place when you wave it yet somehow it returns at impact to make the ball go straight,” Corsi said. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Dumina/Twitter @AutoflexShaft Dumina/Twitter @Autofl exShaft

Corsi became intrigued after watching a YouTube review by two Canadian residents who review clubs for their store, TXG (Tour Experience Golf). Ian Fraser and Matt Blois are known for telling it like it is. Blois is a powerful lefty with 122mph clubhead speed, just the kind of guy who shouldn’t be able to hit AutoFlex in the right direction.

Wrong. Even he was surprised when he hit his rst two swings with the lightweight shaft 353 and 374 yards right down the middle (on a simulator screen). His clubhead speed jumped to 127 mph and after Fraser tinkered with the specs, it got as high as 130 mph. Meanwhile, Blois saw his ball speed rise from 170 mph to 180 mph, an increase that translates to about 15 additional yards.

Corsi was still skeptical but ordered some AutoFlex shafts, tted a few drivers for some friends and they got similar results as the video—increases in 7-10 mph of ball speed. Within two weeks, Corsi sold out his initial order of ten shafts. As word of mouth grew, Corsi sold more than 200 AutoFlex- tted drivers and even a few 3-woods.

He found that AutoFlex performs best at a light swingweight of D-1 or D-0, and at a shorter length of 45 to 45.25 inches. Due to its higher launch angle, Corsi lowers the loft for buyers. In my case, from 10.5 degrees of loft to 9.0. e shaft works well with the driver heads of all the major brands.

“I’m a believer,” Corsi said. “I went out on a 50-degree day last spring and hit drives to places I haven’t reached in a long time.”

When I got tted for AutoFlex, my Titleist TS2 driver couldn’t get me past 230 yards of carry on the launch monitor with my best e ort. Corsi slipped the shaft into the newer Titleist TSi3 driver and I regularly inched past 240 on the monitor. ose ten or 12 yards I gained weren’t simulator ghosts, they were real. I reached both par-5s in a nine-hole golf league on my rst outdoor usage, something I hadn’t come close to doing before. It doesn’t hurt that the lower spin rate from AutoFlex makes the ball land hot and run out. e AutoFlex shafts come in ve specs, based on clubhead speed. e 305 is for swing speeds of 70-85 mph; 405 for 85-95 mph; 505, 95-105 mph; 505 X, 105-115 mph; and 505 XX, 115 and above.

If you’re good at math, you may wonder, if the AutoFlex shaft is $780, why did I spend $1,325? Well, I opted for the newer Titleist driver head and that meant I had to buy the whole new Titleist driver.

I have no buyer’s remorse. I’m driving it better than I have in a few years. It was worth every peso.

My next big game-improvement purchase? I hope it’s those bionic body parts I was promised on TV four-and-ahalf decades ago. Don’t just x me, make me better! And hurry up, docs, my clock is ticking.

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