Friday Gear – Parsons Extreme Golf

All Square 3 min read • 25 Mar 2016

What do you get when you cross an Internet billionaire with an obsession for golf and two of the greatest engineers in the sport? A storm of hype and some absolutely beautiful and unique golf clubs.

Today’s Friday Gear is about Parsons Extreme Golf (PXG) the new brand making big waves on the PGA Tour. Their company slogan is ‘play golf clubs unlike any other’ and today we’re going to explain to you just why PXG have been causing such a stir.

How it all started

It all started in September 2014 when Bob Parsons, founder of GoDaddy.com and golf holidays decided he wanted to make the best golf equipment available and really push the limits of club making technology. He hunted for the best club design engineers he could find and recruited two renowned guys from Ping Mike Nicolette and Brad Schweigert. The remit was simple and money was no object, just make the best golf clubs possible that look like blades, have the playability of irons, that fly high, go further, feel soft and have a sweet spot ‘the size of Texas‘. A total of 50 patents were awarded during the process of developing these clubs as the two engineers searched out new technology and the best way to deploy it in their designs. They designed a whole set of clubs and, with confidence that they had succeeded in their challenge, they were launched. ‘We wouldn’t bring the clubs to market if I didn’t believe they were the absolute best’ Parsons said.

A top line of ambassadors

PXG started to cause a stir when some of the biggest names in golf, including the current Open champion Zach Johnson, joined this unheard of brand. Now that’s bold but guys like Johnson, Kirk and Horschel all have pedigree and they’re not going to ditch playing contracts unless the product is top quality. Now this kind of development and technical craftsmanship comes at a price so a full-set of PXG clubs will cost you $5,000 but it was important that they didn’t want to compete with the big brands out there. This is a wholly different beast.

A whole range of equipment

So what have they created with their carte blanche project? Firstly they’ve done it all. There’s a driver, fairway woods, hybrids, irons, wedges and putters. One thing that stands out about these clubs and has become their trademark is the sixteen screw array that adorns each club head. In this new age of adaptable golf clubs PXG have created a whole set of clubs that can be precisely altered in weight distribution to enable you to get the most out of your game. With two different screw weights the golfer can move the center of gravity around and map the weight distribution they require with unrivalled accuracy on their club heads. This was originally created as a prototype and the plan was to create a more finessed weight management system but Parsons loved it instantly and it stuck. Not only is this an incredibly clever system, it means you can spot PXG clubs from afar.

Conclusion

What we have here is the product of obsession and willingness to go beyond current thinking. To push technological limits and look beyond golf to other areas of science and engineering to build clubs of unrivalled technical pedigree. PXG may be at the super-premium end of the market but if you have the money then they are definitely a company to look into. What is potentially more exciting is the prospect of what this company could do as they mature in the future.