The Green Fee One of the great joys in my life is walking into PGA Tour Superstore for a practice session and seeing new clubs to hit. I grab them as I walk to the back and throw them in my bay for testing.
A few weeks ago I wrote about the new EXS Pro line up from Tour Edge. Well until a few days ago I hadnt been able to get my hands on these irons to give them a good test. I finally saw them in store and decided it was time to give it a go.
Looks
I am somebody who doesnt mind a little meat behind the ball. I do like a good looking blade but things like the RF prototype are terrifying to me. Of course that doesnt mean I like the look of a big giant game improvement iron either. I need something in-between the two. Something like a players cavity. Think Callaway Apex pros or my current Srixon irons.
The top line of the blade didnt look razor thin, like most blades, and it actually looked like it had enough weight around the perimeter to help me on a mishit. Behind the ball the club didnt look tiny either. When it comes to the look of clubs every little thing matters behind the ball. Most golfers who are looking at blades want something with a short blade length and minimal offset. Since I have played golf with only cavity back irons those are not what I look for in an iron. Thats a good thing too because these irons have a good amount of offset for a blade and are not the smallest most compact iron I have come across. If I am being honest the clubs looked great. The contrasting milled bottom half of the club and chrome finish top was a very nice touch. While the two tone back was a nice touch the badging on the back could be cleaned up a little. I wouldnt hate seeing them knock off the Exotics badging and replace it with the Exotics E logo that they use on the CB. That would clean up the look a little. More killer than that though is that Milled Forging stamp. I would be ok with the Exotics name on the bag if Tour Edge took that off. Overall though its not a deal breaker for me.
Performance
This is without a doubt the most important part of this review. The club can be as pretty as it wants but with out performance its going to sit on the shelf and never sell.
This is where a blade can really cause issues especially if your ball striking isnt perfect. A simple mishit will cause the ball to lose a substantial amount of speed and reduce distance.
I didnt experience that with the EXS blade though. A mishit would be shorter but not any shorter than a mishit would be with my normal club. The forgiveness of these irons was absolutely incredible for a blade. In fact when looking at the numbers, the results were the same. The ball speed on the EXS was .8 mph lower. Launch was 17.6 for my current Srixon irons and 17.7 for the EXS Pro. Surprinsgly the spin was 200 RPM less than the Srixon.Recently I have been missing shots to the left. Its a small pull hook so anything I can do to improve that is much appreciated. After I did the test I was very happy to see the EXS blade got me closer to the middle of the green and kept the distance the same as my Srixon.
In regards to feel I didnt notice much of a difference from the two clubs. Both felt great. The biggest difference in feel was on a couple absolute missles from the EXS. It felt like the ball exploded off the face. I wouldnt say it was soft but it felt incredible. The best way to describe it is the feeling that the ball was stuck to the face then thrown. It felt great. Misses didnt felt much more punishing than the Srixons either.
Final Thoughts
Its hard to find any negatives on the club. The back of the club could use some changes but the performance was there. If your ball striking is decent and you want a forgiving blade you wouldnt waste your time looking at these. Tour Edge has been pumping out quality product for a long time and the EXS Blade is no different.