Callaway unveils new Apex irons and hybrid
The wait is over. The highly anticipated follow
up to the first Apex irons will hit stores at the
end of October. The new Apex and Apex Pro
from Callaway will replace the original models
that earned gold from Golf Digest’s Hot List in
back-to-back years. As a nice little bonus,
Callaway is also releasing a unique Apex Hybrid
late in the year with a more iron-like design
that skilled players prefer.
When Callaway rolled out their first set of
Apex irons in 2013, many consumers wondered
if the new sticks would live up to the iconic
name. The original Ben Hogan Apex iron was a
classic blade. And it didn’t take long for some
golfers, especially those who played the old
blades or who have a fondness for nostalgia, to
chirp about Callaway’s obvious departure in
design and the inclusion of additional game
improvement features.
Once the public had a chance to hit
Callaway’s new clubs, the early criticism
dissipated and nearly everyone has since
credited Callaway for doing a bang-up job at
blending high performance (hotter faces,
tungsten weighting, vibration dampening
inserts) with that precise, forged feel that
better players desire.
So the new challenge for Callaway is to up
the ante on performance without diminishing
the compact look or sacrificing the enhanced
feel. Below is a breakdown of how they went
about it and what you can expect from the new
Apex irons and hybrid.
Apex Irons:
The new Apex irons are designed to
benefit a broader spectrum of players who
appreciate a precision-engineered iron that
offers a great blend of distance in the longer
irons with exceptional control in the scoring
clubs.
The new irons are derived from a two-
piece construction that is precision milled from
1025 mild carbon steel to produce an
exceptionally soft feel at impact. Unlike the old
Apex irons that laser welded the forged back
with a carpenter steel face plate that was
uniform in thickness, the new Apex is the very
first Callaway forged product to use face cups
to produce greater ball speeds.
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| Apex irons feature Cup 360
technology |
“In the first Apex line we used high
strength materials and introduced dampening
materials and tungsten weights in order to get
ball speed performance while retaining feel,”
said Dr. Alan Hocknell, Senior Vice President of
R&D at Callaway. “Since then you’ve seen
Callaway working on the development of cup
faces in irons and it’s no surprise to learn that
the new Apex irons feature this technology for
the first time.”
Cup 360 technology, by way of contrast to
the use of carpenter steel, varies in thickness
and is extremely flexible throughout a greater
region of the plate (relative to the original iron
design) to generate higher ball speeds across
the face. “In doing that,” Hocknell said, “we
don’t need as strong a material in the face.
We’re using the geometry [of the face cup] as
well as the material. It’s more of an elegant
solution and it’s less of a brute force method of
creating speed.”
The longer irons in the set (3-7) use the
face cups while shorter irons transition to
something that is similar in construction to the
original line. The Apex also features a thin TPU
material behind the center of the face that
tunes out unwanted audio artifacts, improving
the feel of the iron without negatively
impacting ball speed performance.
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| Apex irons:
features and benefits
|
Callaway’s Apex irons also feature
progressive offsets, variable sole widths and
adjusted CG placement throughout the set.
Longer irons of course include characteristics
that make them easier to hit while the shorter
irons emphasize a more compact shape, a
better feel and sharper control. From a design
perspective, Callaway wisely refrained from
making too many visual changes from the
original design, retaining the smooth flowing
lines of the previous model. It’s only within the
back cavity of the head where the bright
polished metal and contrasting rubberized
material clearly hint of the technical elements
that enhance this new model.
The Apex irons (3-iron through SW) will
be available for retail on October 30th. The
MSRP for the set is $1,999.99 (Steel) /
$1,399.99 (Graphite). UST Mamiya Recoil
760/780 shaft will be the stock offering in the
graphite set, while True Temper’s XP 95 will be
available in steel.
Apex Pro Irons:
As indicated by its name, the Apex Pro
irons focus on the needs of the more
accomplished player. And as you might expect,
Callaway’s tour staff had a lot of feedback
about what they liked in the original Apex Pro
and what they wanted to see changed in the
new model.
“A lot of them said that the shape and
size of the profile envelope of our X-Forged 13
was actually more preferred, but the trajectory
of the original Apex Pro was also preferred,”
said Hocknell. “Could we combine those two
things together? What that meant was we had
to stay within a particular shape envelope but
move weight around more aggressively inside
the head to create a pattern of ascending
center of gravity through the set as you go
from the long irons to the short irons.”
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| Apex Pro irons feature optimized CG
|
To meet the challenge Hocknell described,
Callaway engineers had to optimize the center
of gravity of each club to maximize the
performance gain of each iron. To do that,
Callaway drilled a series of three holes under
the “forged” plate badge in the back of the
head.
In the long irons, two of those holes are
filled with tungsten which increases the launch
angle relative to the loft of the club without
losing ball speed or adding unwanted spin.
The mid irons (the most moderate part of
the set) are filled with stainless steel instead.
They flight a little higher than the long irons
and will have noticeably more bite as you
attack the greens.
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| Apex Pro
irons: features and benefits
|
As for the scoring clubs, they’re unique in
that the holes are actually filled with air -
similar to how Callaway’s MD3 wedges are
constructed, resulting in a more controlled,
penetrating flight.
“What that does is really flight the
trajectory of the short irons,” Hocknell said.
“Better players tend to not want their short iron
shots to float up in the air with high launch and
low spin.”
Like the regular Apex model, the Apex Pro
uses an advanced quadruple net forging
process to mill the heads from 1025 mild
carbon steel for better feel. While the longer
irons in this set will have slightly more offset
than what you’ll find as you get down to the
scoring clubs, the Apex Pro offers a much more
compact chassis when compared to its more
playable cousin.
The Apex Pro irons (3-iron through AW)
will be available for purchase on October 30th
and will retail for $1,999.99 (Steel) and
$1,399.99 (Graphite). UST Mamiya Recoil
95/110 shaft will be the stock offering in the
graphite set, while True Temper’s Project X will
be available in steel.
Apex Hybrid:
Callaway is certainly no stranger to
designing hybrids, but this particular model
created to meet the unique demands of skilled
golfers, prioritizes a controlled flight over raw
distance. The head shape is more reminiscent
of an iron-like blade design that speaks to the
club’s versatility.
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| The iron-
like design of the Apex Hybrid
|
“This hybrid is a departure for us in terms
of characteristics we’re looking for in
performance,” said Hocknell. “A lot of Callaway
hybrids are derived from what you would think
of as fairway wood DNA - they’ve got fairway
wood style launch conditions (relatively low
spin and high launch) which is great for overall
distance and what most average players need.”
“However there is a school of players that
are really looking for an iron replacement
characteristic in their hybrid,” he said. “It has a
higher center of gravity which is able to
produce higher spin than you would otherwise
get; and it produces a climbing trajectory with
a steeper descent angle for more stopping
power.”
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| Apex
Hybrid: features and benefits
|
The Apex Hybrid should benefit players
who require more precise gapping needs at the
lower end of their iron set than those players
who primarily use their hybrid as a fairway
wood replacement. Although the Apex Hybrid is
going to climb higher and land softer when
attacking pins, it is still relatively long.
Callaway outfitted this model with a forged
Face Cup made from Carpenter 455 steel which
will generate faster ball speeds on both center
and off-center strikes.
The Apex Hybrid will go on sale on
December 4th and is available in four lofts (2-
5). The new club will retail for $219.99 MSRP
and will be paired with a Mitsubishi Rayon Kuro
Kage Black shaft.