Precept Tour Premiums -- A Great Buy
Written: Aug 12 '06
|
Product Rating:
|
|
|
Pros: Performance, appearance, and now price.
Cons: Nada.
The Bottom Line: These are excellent clubs, and they're moving cheaper on the secondary market than many brands they compete with. Well worth a try.
|
|
|
| davke's Full Review: Precept Tour Premium Forged Irons |
Golfers often approach me and ask me, "David, how is it that you, a man with no short game, fighting a reverse-pivot and, dare I say it, a weak grip, shoot in the mid-80s while playing only a couple of times a month and rarely practicing?" I don't respond to such questions because it's never a good idea to talk to the golfers in your head.
But I'll answer the question for you, you lucky couple-of-dozen Epinions readers. My success is all based on something my good friend Ernie Els once said to me (via a magazine article). David, he said, being careful where he put his quotation marks, "Hit the ball at 80% of your power capacity." I sipped my coffee while Ernie explained, "Most amateurs I play with tend to try to hit the ball too hard, especially off the tee. They'd be much better off swinging more gently and concentrating on making solid contact at impact."
Of course, most amateurs Ernie plays with are playing golf with Ernie Els at the moment and might be a little flustered. So one of my secrets to playing slightly-above-mediocre golf is to never play with Ernie, despite our long friendship (a friendship he might only know about if he reads this review). But another secret is to follow his advice and make a controlled swing that allows me to make more precise contact with the ball and keep it in the fairway, and from the fairway to put it on the green. Obviously, if this strategy always worked I'd be a good golfer. But then I'd have better things to do than write this review. Considering my general apathy toward practice, however, the controlled swing approach to golf is the reason I do as well as I do.
A major benefit of the controlled swing is that it allows me to play with the sort of clubs that are often described as "designed for the better player." Such are these Precepts. My set is a 4-iron through pitching wedge (I carry a 7-wood instead of a 3-iron), with 1/2-inch long True-Temper S300 shafts and Lamkin Crossline grips. The extra 1/2 inch on the shafts isn't because of my height, but rather because choking down that half inch furthers my accuracy.
Two Epinionated golfers have written reviews of this set of irons, both in a more timely manner, telling the world wide web of these excellent clubs back in 2002. I'm weighing in late but with a review geared more toward purchasing the clubs on the secondary market. As of this writing, the Precept Tour Premiums have dropped into the $100-$150 range in good condition, making them an excellent buy.
A couple of things you should be aware of before placing a bid on Ebay or some similar site: first, the Tour Premiums were expensive when they came out, meaning they were likely purchased by someone who plays a lot of golf, so the clubs you're looking at have probably been around the block a bit. Figure just a round a week, over a five year period, and you're looking at a set of irons with 260 rounds of experience. And that's a low estimate. Figure in a few hundred hours of range time, too. That leads us to the second caveat, which is that the Tour Premiums were likely played by a low handicapper. Most of the face wear, then, will be localized to a spot about the size of a dime, right where you'll be wanting to hit your balls. In short, it's important for you to see a good photograph of the face of at least the 6 or 7 iron before you make a bid.
Forged irons such as these are made from soft steel, and face wear can be substantial. The Precepts feature 1025 carbon steel, which is so soft that even dropping them into your golf bag and driving around with them in your trunk will leave marks. On the other hand, the irons can also be bent a bit at a good pro shop, so you don't need to worry if the clubs were customized for the previous owner as long as you don't need them adjusted more than two degrees in any direction.
Finally, many of these sets came with True Temper Dynamic Gold S-400 shafts. Most golfers can likely negotiate S-300 shafts, but you should probably have legal-grade evidence (witnesses and documents) before taking on S-400 shafts. (True Temper's website has a nifty little interactive shaft-fitting guide, but it's not too informative. The pro at your local golf course will be much more helpful as you try to figure out which shaft is best for you.) While S-400 shafts are only two grams heavier than S-300 shafts, they are five grams heavier than R-300 shafts which, if you've been playing R-300, is a substantial weight gain. On the other hand, S-400 shafts really keep the ball flight low, a tendency which can provide certain advantages. And the additional stiffness can increase your accuracy, although it might cost you a couple of yards.
But accuracy is what these clubs are all about. And, as you know, accuracy is what golf is all about -- moving that little ball three-and-a-half miles and fitting it into eighteen little holes along the way is sort of the point. The Precepts can help you do that.
The ball comes off the club face at a fairly low trajectory, and it tends to stay low rather than "quail" and rise in mid flight. The scoring lines on the Tour Premiums are aggressive, and the low flight doesn't translate into a lot of forward roll, even on the longer irons. Despite such tendencies, distance in the air is still good, almost exactly what I get with either of my other two sets of irons (one set of muscle backs, the other a set of progressively off-set cavity backs). But the drop and stop setup might cost you a few of yards of roll. That's easily taken care of since the set comes with several clubs and you can simply choose to move up a club to increase distance.
The Precepts also work the ball easily left or right. People will say that about most blades, but workability is increased on the Precepts because the weight is centered toward the hosel. Low punches are better negotiated than high shots, which the clubs play best with a left to right spin. The thin sole cuts through turf to really enhance the backspin off the face, but the clubs don't dig too much of a divot because of a higher heel, and because the soles are relatively wide. In short, performance is in all ways excellent. These clubs can help you execute any shot you can imagine.
For most golfers, long irons are typically more difficult to hit than short irons, but Bridgestone has addressed that issue with the Precept Tour Premiums. The design incorporates a cavity back, so that weighting is at the perimeter of the head. The point is to expand the sweet spot on the club face, making the club more forgiving on at least slightly mis-hit shots, which happen more frequently in the long irons. To that end, the cavity is deeper in the long irons than in the short irons, placing more weight around the perimeter. The system works; I've had enough good shots with bad swings that I don't mentally shudder when grabbing my 4-iron.
When addressing the ball the clubs are really beautiful. They have a thin top-line that, to my mind, makes the ball look larger, which increases my confidence. The heads are a bit longer than my muscle backs, which also enhances the sense of confidence. The Tour Premiums work best with a soft feeling ball, but even range balls produce almost no noise when your swing is on. If your swing is off, you'll receive immediate and accurate feedback. There's no need to watch your ball flight. You'll feel the shot more than see it.
I have no hesitation in giving these clubs 5 stars. They're as good as any set made in this century so far. But they are forged clubs, almost pure blades, and for many golfers that means they're "designed for the better player." I tend to think that player-improvement clubs are made for occasional golfers whose only goal is to lose as few balls as possible. The idea that forged clubs are too difficult to hit, that they're too unforgiving comes from superstition or marketing hype. I play them and, as mentioned above, I'm not that good. I think they're easier to hit from a variety of conditions than the so-called player improvement clubs, which are designed to get the ball high in the air from a nice, grassy, flat lie. Even my good friend, Ernie Els, doesn't always have the luxury of such conditions.
Besides, if you find a set in good condition on the secondary market, you're not risking much to give them a try. If you do, I think you'll find that the Precept Tour Premiums are not just "designed for the better player," but "designed to make you a better player."
Recommended:
Yes
|
|
|
|
Epinions.com ID:
davke
|
|
Member: David
Location: Greene Co., Tennessee
Reviews written: 51
Trusted by: 27 members
About Me:
I Epinions, therefore I am.
|
|
|
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.