You’ll most likely have seen (if you haven’t get your head out of the bunker) that TaylorMade just released their new TaylorMade Qi10 Driver Series. A driver that’s focused on helping us Golfers push our distance and ball speed whilst giving us more forgiveness than ever. It’s also currently the driver of choice for a couple of the tour pros. Rory McIlroy, used the Qi10 LS at the Dubai Dessert Classic and won and Tommy Fleetwood used the same Driver the week before at the Dubai invitational and won. So, in terms of Driver performance its racked up some pretty decent wins already!
Now TaylorMade have always been up there with the better golf drivers when looking at speed and distance but they do seem to lack a little when it comes to forgiveness.
However, we started to see a change towards improved forgiveness when when they decided to get rid of titanium face drivers and roll out of their Stealth and Stealth 2 Drivers and they’ve stepped up that focus on forgiveness (without losing ball speed and distance) saying that their new driver has “lower CG projection and higher MOI” than their previous generations.
I mean even the name focuses on TaylorMade’s increasing quest for forgiveness (Qi10 stands “quest for 10,000 inertia“…. fancy!).
Does this mean no more shanking it off tee…. I’m not sure a new driver can stop that but here’s hoping it can help. Anyway, let’s get into it!
TaylorMade Qi10 Tech and Specs
New Infinity Carbon Crown
The new infinity carbon crown covers a massive 97% of the total crown area, previous designs only had 80% coverage of the top of the club. This clever design choice means the club is better able to redistribute weight more effectively in other parts of the clubhead. This redistribution of mass can help influence things like the center of gravity (CG) and moment of inertia (MOI) and by doing this the club becomes more forgiving.
The new Infinity Carbon Crown also comes in a new colour compared to the Stealth series Drivers
3rd Generation 60X Carbon Twist Face
The 60X Carbon twist face is back again but with some slight tweaks in this 3rd iteration. In this generation the inside of the head has a new supporting structure which is crucial to the clubs increased performance.
The support structure holding the face to the rest of the clubhead has been designed to flex more. Basically, this flex means that it helps keep better ball speed and distance when you don’t quite make contact with the center of the clubface off the tee.
The 3rd generation of 60X Carbon Twist Face also It weighs 24g (2g lighter than the original Stealth face) and is designed to have an expanded COR area for a larger sweet spot and boosted performance across the entire face.
And for a for a nice added bonus TaylorMade have added an embedded a high contrast white topline on 3rd gen 60 X face which gives a way cleaner address view.
Shape
There’s some design changes when it comes the head shape and size. TaylorMade introduced what they’re calling “Inertia Shaping”. Essentially it means that the driver head is bigger and the increase in size helps to improve the MOI of the driver with the Qi10 Max stretching to the limit of the USGA’s rule of what’s allowed.
Mass Reallocation
The Qi10 features mass pads, another fancy word that just means internal weights. In fact the driver features 3 of them in various areas, the back of the club, the back of the club, the high toe and the hosel.
TaylorMade Qi10 Driver Series
The Qi10 driver series has 3 head options, so hopefully that means there is an options for all us. You’ve got the Qi10 LS (Low spinning), the Qi10 and the new Qi10 Max (Max Forgiveness).
To make it easy we’ve done a quick breakdown of the differences for you below.
| Driver | Aimed At | Benefits |
|---|---|---|
| TaylorMade Qi10 LS | Players with fast swing speeds | Combination of forgiveness and distance. Only Driver to come in the series to come with a moveable sole weight (18g) |
| TaylorMade Qi10 | Those that don’t need or want all the forgiveness on offer | It’s more of a ‘standard’ driver so you have a better understanding of what you’re probably buying. |
| TaylorMade Qi10 Max | Slicers and faders & those who connect with shots all over the face. | 9% larger footprint makes in the most forgiving driver in the series |
So, with all that to wrap your head around and the release the of the Qi10 series not far away (2nd February) will you be picking one up and taking advantage of the extra forgiveness or will you be sticking to old faithful?
I have a sneaky suspicion that one of them (max forgiveness, cough cough) might just find its way into my bag!