The brief was simple, aspiring club designers were given the chance to bring their ideas to life with Wilson Staff and the winner would also be rewarded with $500,000. Well for Eric Sillies it was his big break and pay day. He took the prize and the Wilson Triton was born.
Wilson announced an open-call to innovators around the world to collaborate with their engineers and build a new driver in a TV show that was aired on The Golf Channel. Driver vs. Driver, as the show was called, was a huge hit and the winner has been announced!
So, what’s special about “the one that made the cut”? Well this driver is the first to be released with an interchangeable sole-plate option to alter the weight of the club dramatically. The club comes with a titanium sole-plate, weighing 22g, that will lower its centre of gravity and will result in high launch/low spin conditions at impact for optimal distance. The other option is a lighter carbon fibre plate, weighing 9g, that will provide an even lower spin/low launch with a penetrating ball flight. This will also reduce the weight of the club.
Another new feature is the 1:1 Visible Swing Active Technology of the crown designed by Sillies and the team to provide the golfer with an intuitive and consistent set-up for enhanced ball striking. This is a silver segment that sits proudly on the black crown of the driver to aid the player’s swing-path into the ball.
Customisability is king in contemporary drivers and Wilson have taken this to new levels with the Triton. Not only does it have two sole-plate options but it also has three interchangeable weight ports of the kind seen on many current clubs. The weights can be moved around to fine-tune the launch conditions further and to favour certain shot shapes for players. The club is also fitted with the usual dynamic hosel that allows the user to add or reduce the loft of the club by one degree and you can also add draw-bias to the club.
One of the highlights of this new club are the stock shaft options. Wilson have worked with Aldila to offer three of their Rogue options on this club as standard. The Aldila Rogue Silver 125MSI shaft is not a cheap one and is one of the most popular on tour, incredibly this is a standard option on the Triton! There is also a raft of top-quality shafts available as custom orders at no upcharge.
What Wilson have done here is great. They have introduced a new concept and ultimately brought a new club to market which should help modernise the image of the company. It is very early days but it will be interesting to see what kind of reviews start to surface for this new piece of kit.
