Its time for Cobra to throw their hat into the 2022 driver competition. Cobra has been quietly throwing out incredible release after incredible release. With Bryson Dechambeau on staff Cobra’s driver is going to be a huge focus. For the last few years Bryson has been using an older Cobra driver called the LTD. Seeing its popularity Cobra decided to bring back that technology AND refine it to make it even better.

H.O.T Zone Face Tech

For about a decade now Cobra has had a face technology called E9. It was based around the idea that the face had 9 different zones and the ball performed differently in those 9 zones. It was essentially twist face before twist face. The new LTDx has completely changed the E9 structure. They have used thousands of shots to reengineer their face. Cobra is now using variable thickness across the face in 15 (!) different zones. Pretty impressive stuff. When forgiveness is discussed it often means keeping the ball straight but it also means retaining ball speed across the face. That high toe shot going only 5 yards short of the center shot, that kind of thing. If Cobra can keep our misses long and in the fairway itll be a winner.

PWR COR

The biggest knock Bryson and others on the Cobra staff have complained about is the spin on the drivers. Higher speed players can easily produce spin so they are constantly looking to decrease the spin to maximize distance. To lower spin you need to get weight forward. The problem with that is you lose a ton of forgiveness. When you are also trying to market to the masses you cant exactly bring that to market. The first step in getting spin lowered is to create a new weighting system. Cobra is calling this new system PWR COR. You will see this tech in every LTD club this year. In the driver it is a multi material internal and external weighting system that moves that weight forward. If it works like its supposed to it will produce BOMBS. As I said in my 2022 takes video, this driver could see some fitting issues. Moving weight forward is going to produce a lot of knuckle balls. I have Cobra as my brand of the year but it is dependent on their ability to get the fit right on these drivers. The PWR COR tech could make this a real winner but could lead to a massive miss as well.

Multi Material Construction

To be able to move more weight forward and utilize that new PWR COR you have to find the weight to move around. How did Cobra find those precious few grams? They used 30% more carbon fiber and redesigned the T bad chassis that they use. That saved them a total of 8 grams which they presumably pumped into the PWR COR

3 Models

Cobra thinks the right number of driver models to put out is 3. Callaway went 4 and Taylormade went 3 as well. I lean towards the 3 being the right number myself.

Lets start with the LTDx Max. That is going to be the draw bias driver. If you need some help getting the ball to turn left this is going to be the driver for you. It is also the most stable of the drivers. You can take the heavy weight, place it in the back and it will have max MOI. If you place that heavy weight in the heel Cobra is claiming 11 yrds of draw bias. Thats pretty damn good and could be the difference between a bunker or a fairway.

Next up is the LTDx LS. This is the one with the weight moved super far forward. There are 2 weights one 10 and one 3 grams for golfers to fine tune that ball flight. Now they dont seem very far apart so call me skeptical about how much the weights will change the flight but they are claiming you can fine tune it to hit that fade or draw based on where you put the heavier weight. This is going to be the driver for those guys that find the center of the club face often and produce a lot of speed. This driver was made for Bryson.

Finally we have the model most of us mortals will use. Its the standard LTDx. No fancy letters after it. It includes a 10 gram fixed weight in the back. The internal weighting gets its CoG to 0 but the MOI is a very impressive 5200. This could be an incredible blend of low spin high launch and forgiveness.

Final Thoughts

Overall a very impressive lineup. I worry about the fitting of these drivers though. There is a ton of weight forward and we could see that leading to golfers needing more loft without realizing it. I think if they train fitters its going to be a really good product.