The game-improvement hybrid Cam Young played? It’s a weapon for me

When Cameron Young switched out of the Titleist GT1 hybrid he used to win the Players Championship, one of the coolest gear stories I’d seen on the PGA Tour this year lost some sizzle.

Still, that didn’t make me any less eager to see if the club could help my game, and it turned out this game-improvement hybrid is the “7-wood” I’ve never had.

I got fit into a GT1 hybrid last month at the Titleist Performance Institute, and much to my surprise, the club made my bag for a recent state amateur qualifier, easily beating out my previous gamer.

This is a part of the bag I’ve struggled to find the proper fit for years, but now I might have a solution you’ll have to pry out of my cold dead hands.

What is Titleist’s GT1 hybrid?

When it was released, the GT1 hybrid wasn’t a club I would have ever expected to wind up in my bag, let alone the bag of a Tour pro. The “1” in Titleist’s metalwood lineup has historically been the ultra-lightweight and high-launch model, aimed at slow-swing-speed players to get the ball up in the air.

But both the GT1 fairway wood and hybrid have found their way into the bags of some of Titleist’s staff players this season, including Young and Tom Kim. The hybrid features an oversized profile that places it between the size of a hybrid and high-lofted fairway wood, with a sharp leading edge that helps it cut through the turf.

The size is unusual in the industry, with only the Callaway Apex UW fitting into a similar profile.

Young and Kim both added the hybrid to their bags at the Farmers Insurance Open to utilize that versatility out of the rough and get extra launch. Young even put a fairway wood shaft in his to get what J.J. Van Wezenbeeck, Titleist’s senior director of player promotions, said was “more flight” from the softer tip of a fairway shaft. The GT1 hybrid has the unique ability to accept both standard .370″ diameter hybrid shafts and .335″ fairway wood shafts, although currently the only one available from Titleist is the Fujikura Air Speeder, the featured shaft in the club.

With a more standard-weight shaft, the club plays a more standard swingweight as well.

Given my search for a club to transition from my mini driver to my irons, I was instantly intrigued.

What I was looking for

I neglected hybrids for a few years because I just couldn’t find one that didn’t go left. Last year, I got one that was instantly better than anything else I had in a Ping G440 3-hybrid with a Nippon Modus GOST shaft.

I could hit it up in the air easily and fly it about 240 yards.

That shaft is a super-heavy and stiff beast that produced the powerful flight I was looking for. At the start, it also kept the ball from going left.

But for whatever reason, this year, I struggled with the club and the left miss reared its ugly head again. Perhaps relatedly, I saw a bit of a drop in spin, and the ball was going too far.

Both issues cost me at my first qualifier of the season, where I needed my hybrid multiple times off tees on a short and firm course. What good is hitting a hybrid 280 yards if the fairway ends at 260?

Luckily, I found a new shaft that partially solved the spin and left issues in the Fujikura Ventus Blue HB+. This new build is good, but because the old shaft was so heavy, the club feels a bit light, so I likely still have some tinkering to do with it.

Enter the GT1 hybrid

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During my fitting at TPI with ace fitter Louis Raynard, who previously fit me into my set of T-Series irons and SM11 wedges, we were comparing the GT1 to the new GTS3 7-wood and 5-wood.

The reason a hybrid has typically gapped better for me is that I tend to add a lot of loft at impact. When I get woods with a lot of loft, like a 7-wood, I typically hit them straight up in the air with way too much spin. Hybrids have a much flatter flight for me, which means more control.

Louis gave me the GT1 first, and, honestly, it never really gave anything else a chance. With the 20-degree GT1 “4-hybrid” lofted down a degree and flatted a degree, I instantly got 3 mph more ball speed than my gamer, 20 feet higher peak height and 300 rpm more spin. The club just cut through the turf like an iron and launched so easily. Each shot was just a simple high draw. Set to 19 degrees, the GT1 was the same loft and a .25″ shorter than my gamer.

We got close with a GTS3 7-wood turned down in loft on a 5-wood shaft, but the hybrid won out for the ease and consistency. It also seemed that I was timing up the Ventus Blue HB.

This game-improvement hybrid was the best “7-wood” I could have that day.

The GT1 on course

I don’t think I really discovered how valuable the GT1 hybrid was to me until I actually played with it on the course.

When I got the club, I first thought that I would use it situationally, knowing my Ping hybrid was a nice middle-ground trajectory-wise between the GT1 and my 3-iron. I would call on the GT1 when the course was really firm and I needed to hit the high ball to hold the greens.

But then I realized I could flatten it out, even into the wind. Suddenly, this became a club I could hit off the tee without worry that would go too far or balloon up in the air and go nowhere.

What really sold me was the turf interaction off the deck. In a practice round for a tournament, I faced a 220-yard shot into the wind and over water to a green with little bailout area. The lie was a bit thin with little grass and I had trouble hitting my gamer hybrid cleanly.

Then I grabbed the GT1 and flushed it into the heart of the green, clean divot and all, 15 feet from the hole.

Once I discovered how easily I could flatten the trajectory, the GT1 became the gamer. I ended up hitting four of five fairways with it the next day, including on a tight par-5 tee shot that kept me up the night before. It led to a birdie.

Bottom Line

Titleist GT1 Custom Hybrid

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ALSO AVAILABLE AT: PGA TOUR Superstore, Titleist

If a game-improvement club can enter the bag of the world’s best, why can’t it work for you?

What’s even more surprising is the GT1 comes standard in back-weighted configuration — you can move the heavy weight forward to lower flight — but I’ve yet to even touch it. I have no problem hitting the GT1 between 130 feet skyward or a flattened out 70 feet. What do I need to try it forward weighted for?

If you’re afraid of a left miss, you should also know that I actually moved the weight from the flat position back to standard lie because I was having trouble turning it over. Your results will vary, but for me, as someone who misses left, so far so good.

In short, the GT1 deserves your attention if you previously overlooked it, like I did.

The author welcomes your comments at Jack.Hirsh@golf.com.

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