19th Hole
Bryson DeChambeau talks 48-inch driver progress, haters and physique goals
Bryson DeChambeau is taking some time away from tournament golf this week, and on Tuesday evening the Californian featured on Pat Perez’ SiriusXM show, “Out of Bounds” where the two discussed a range of topics related to his game.
*All quotes courtesy of SiriusXM Radio*
One of those topics was Bryson’s 48-inch driver which has got the golf world’s attention ahead of next month’s Masters. When asked by Perez how close he was to putting the driver in play for the year’s final major, DeChambeau stated
“We’re 50 percent of the way there. It will get there. I’ll get there. We’ve got some pretty cool prototype stuff coming here in the next week that, yeah, I hope will forever make a difference in the game. It’s something that’s pretty cool.
It’s something the long drive guys do all day long. They already have it in their drivers alone, but it just allows them to be a little more accurate. That’s what we’re doing with what I’m doing.”
In terms of an ‘endgame’, Bryson also teased how much room for improvement ball speed wise still could be reached, saying
“No, there’s no endgame. You look at Kyle Berkshire, what he’s doing. Justin James, Tim Burke, Fast Eddie [Fernandes], all these guys. I mean, Fast Eddie is going to be hitting 200 mph ball speed on the Champions Tour. He’s going to be driving almost every green, par-4, out there. He’s going to try to at least.
You look at these guys who are 225 mph ball speeds. That’s 25 mph faster than what I was able to produce on the golf course last week. For the first time in PGA Tour history I think I hit 200 mph ball speed, which is the fastest ever recorded I think. They’re still 25 mph faster than me. I mean, there’s so much more room for improvement, I feel like.”
The 27-year-old has faced his share of ‘naysayers’ since the Tour’s restart, but once again he explained how he takes criticism of what he’s doing as a compliment.
“Well, you know, look, I guess so. Like I said last week, it’s a compliment to me, man. You know, I appreciate it. When anybody does anything that’s a little controversial, a little different or whatnot, there’s going to be naysayers…(inaudible). And you just gotta keep going your way. You look at [Albert] Einstein, you look at [Isaac] Newton, you look at all these big-time names in the science field, there’s been a lot of people that have been called crazy. Decades later they’re like, wow, that person was actually pretty interesting, he did a lot of amazing things. I’m not saying that’s what I’m going to do but, shoot, I hope so one day. That’d be fun.”
On his physique goals, Bryson revealed that he is continuing to build up his strength, hoping to successfully manage back extensions of up to 300 pounds isolated by the time the Masters rolls around.
“It’s a lot of work. I was dedicated a year ago to changing my body and for those first few months I saw a pretty decent amount of change immediately and I’m like, ok, let’s just take this to the next level. As I kept doing it I kept personally getting healthier, stronger, better and ultimately got to the point where I felt like there’s no end in sight. I’m going to keep going.
Right now I’m trying to do back extension up to 300 pounds isolated. That’s my goal by the end of this little break before Augusta. I’m at 250 now, I’m going to try and increase it 50 pounds. We’ll see. Just never stopping.”
19th Hole
‘Don’t think I’ll sleep well tonight’ – LPGA pro offers candid take following rough AIG Women’s Open finish
An opening round of 77 left LPGA pro Jenny Shin with a mountain to climb at last week’s AIG Women’s Open.
However, fighting back with rounds of 69 and 67, Shin found herself six shots off the lead and just outside the top 10 heading into Sunday as she went in search of her first major victory.
Shin, who won the US Girls’ Junior at just 13, couldn’t back those rounds up on Sunday, though, and after playing her opening nine holes of the final round in level par, she then bogeyed three holes coming home to slip down the leaderboard and eventually finish T23.
Taking to X following the final round, Shin offered a frustrated and honest take on how she was feeling, posting: “Don’t think I’ll sleep well tonight. What a crappy way to finish.”
Don’t think I’ll sleep well tonight. What a crappy way to finish
— Jenny Shin (@JennyShin_LPGA) August 3, 2025
Shin has made 11 cuts in 13 starts on the LPGA Tour this season, but has been plagued by frustrating Sunday finishes throughout the year. Shin ranks 102nd on tour this year out of 155 for Round 4 scoring in 2025.
Miyu Yamashita won the 2025 AIG Women’s Open with a composed final round of 70 to win her first major of her career by two strokes.
Cameron Young won the Wyndham Championship on Sunday for his first victory on the PGA Tour.
Young dominated all weekend at TPC Sedgefield, running away from the pack to win by six strokes and put himself in contention for a Ryder Cup pick in September.
Ahead of the event, the 28-year-old switched to a Pro V1x prototype golf ball for the first time, following recent testing sessions with the Titleist Golf Ball R&D team.
Interestingly, Young played a practice round accompanied by Fordie Pitts, Titleist’s Director of Tour Research & Validation, at TPC Schedule early last week with both his usual Pro V1 Left Dot ball and the new Pro V1x prototype.
Per Titleist, by the second hole Young was exclusively hitting shots with the Pro V1x prototype.
“We weren’t sure if he was going to test it this week, but as he was warming up, he asked to hit a couple on the range,” Pitts said. “He was then curious to see some shots out on the course. Performance-wise, he was hitting tight draws everywhere. His misses were staying more in play. He hit some, what he would call ‘11 o’clock shots,’ where again he’s taking a little something off it. He had great control there.”
According to Titleist, the main validation came on Tuesday on the seventh hole of his practice round. The par 3 that played between 184 and 225 yards during the tournament called for a 5-iron from Young, or so he thought. Believing there was “no way” he could get a 6-iron to the flag with his Left Dot, Young struck a 5-iron with the Pro V1x prototype and was stunned to see the ball land right by the hole.
“He then hits this 6-iron [with the Pro V1x prototype] absolutely dead at the flag, and it lands right next to the pin, ending up just past it,” Pitts said. “And his response was, ‘remarkable.’ He couldn’t believe that he got that club there.”
Following nine holes on Tuesday and a further nine on Wednesday, Young asked the Titleist team to put the ProV1x balls in his locker. The rest, as they say, is history.
Rickie Fowler fired an opening round of one-under par on Thursday at the Wyndham Championship, as the Californian looks to make a FedEx Cup playoff push.
Fowler is currently 61st in the standings, so will need a strong couple of weeks to extend his season until the BMW Championship, where only the top 50 in the standings will tee it up.
Heading into the final stretch of the season, Fowler has made an equipment switch of note, changing into new iron shafts, as well as making a switch to his driver shaft.
The 36-year-old revealed this week that he has switched from his usual KBS Tour C-Taper 125-gram steel shafts to the graphite Aerotech SteelFiber 125cw shafts in his Cobra King Tour irons, a change he first put into play at last month’s Travelers Championship.
Speaking on the change to reporters this week, Fowler made note that the graphite shafts offer “something that’s a little easier on the body.”
“I mean, went to the week of Travelers, so been in for, I guess that’s a little over a month now. Something that’s a little easier on the body and seemed to get very similar numbers to where I was at. Yeah, it’s gone well so far.”
Fowler has also made a driver shaft change, switching out his Mitsubishi Diamana WB 73 TX for a UST Mamiya Lin-Q Proto V1 6 TX driver shaft in his Cobra DS-Adapt X, which he first implemented a couple of weeks ago at the John Deere Classic.
However, according to Fowler himself, the testing and potential changes are not done yet.
“Probably do some more testing in some different weight configurations with them once I get some time. Yeah, I feel like we’re always trying to search, one, to get better but are there ways to make things easier, whether that’s physically, mentally, whatever it may be. So yeah, I thought they were good enough to obviously put into play and looking forward to doing some more testing.”
Fowler gets his second round at TPC Sedgefield underway at 7.23 a.m ET on Friday.
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