A rare golf club is making a PGA Championship appearance

Welcome to the weekly Fully Equipped Tour equipment report. Every Friday of PGA Tour week (and other times, when news warrants), GOLF content editor Jack Hirsh runs some of the biggest news surrounding golf clubs on Tour, including changes, renovations and launches.

After one round, Aronimink appears to be more difficult than initially expected, and one of the early leaders navigates that challenge with a rare golf club.

Yes, Aldrich Potgieter is playing a 1-iron this week, and it has helped him enter the PGA Championship (tied for the lead after the first round and one out of the lead at the time of writing on Friday).

Playing off the tee wasn’t much of an issue in the lead at Aronimink, which hosted the PGA for the first time in 64 years. Donald Ross’s gem measures just 7,394 yards, short by modern major tournament standards, and players have to think about techniques to bomb and bend the layout.

“There is no single best strategy,” said Rory McIlroy in a pre-tournament press conference. “You basically bash the driver down there and you understand it there. … If these traditional golf courses take out a lot of trees, it makes the strategy less of a concern.”

That comment came back to bite McIlroy, as he hit just 5 of 14 fairways and lost nearly half his shots in the green in an opening-round 74. It turned out that the rough conditions of Aronimink’s fairways made it difficult to hold. Missing the fairway was also unexpectedly punishing, as the average difference between the fairway and not on Thursday morning was about six feet worse than the average PGA Tour host course, according to Justin Ray.

While most players chose to keep their standard high-bag setup, Potgieter took the interesting approach of adding a 1-iron in addition to his usual PXG 2-iron. The slightly taller structure comes in at just over 15 degrees of loft, giving the club a touch of right-leaning.

Now, like many 1 irons you see on the PGA Tour from time to time, this is not your grandfather’s 1 iron. This is a hollow body club with a graphite shaft designed to get the ball in the air. I wouldn’t advise anyone to grab Potgieter’s 1-iron (he called it a 3-wood in the press conference) during a lightning storm.

The club is rare by PGA Tour standards and if it is ever seen, it is usually during the Open Championship or the Scottish Open.

But Potgeiter’s 1-iron has some unique abilities even among other butter knives. As PXG’s Justin Shepherd told GOLF, the new Gen 8 weight-shifting irons allowed Potgieter to add a club instead of his fairway wood because they could direct his ball flight more easily.

“Playing with the weight and the angle, like I was standing a little bit … he was actually losing the speed of the ball, so obviously he wasn’t hitting it either,” said Shepherd. “We’re back to lie angle fit, and we can work on the ball plane without changing these two things.”

Potgieter’s 1 iron weighs 12g in the heel and 7g in the toe to help him swing it. His 2 iron is neutral.

With a 1-iron, which is 5/8 of an inch longer than a 2-iron with the same Nippon Modus GOST shaft, Potgieter only carries the ball a few yards farther than a 2-iron, but it comes out about 30 yards further while achieving a ball speed of 170-172 mph.

While Potgieter hit driver 11 times on Thursday, his driving irons came in handy on three tee shots and on his way to the par-5 9th. It all added up to a share of the first-round lead.

Flatstick exchange

One thing that has been true about Aronimink’s challenge has been the difficulty of signing Donald Ross who is decorated green. Was it the reason so many players chose to make putter changes when the tweaks during the big weeks are usually subtle?

The most notable move is Brooks Koepka, who moved to the new TaylorMade 2026 Spider Tour V from his previous 2025 Spider Tour X. Koepka reportedly broke his previous putter at the One Flight Myrtle Beach Classic last week, necessitating a change. He spent a few hours working with various mallet putters on Monday before settling on the new Spider Tour V.

We still don’t know much about the new Spider Tour V, which appears to have been redesigned from the previous version in Shane Lowry’s bag. The previous Spider Tour V was the most advanced CG mallet in TaylorMade’s lineup, making it sound like an iron.

Koepka’s new Tour V looks more compact and the weight holes are towards the front of the head, which seems to reflect the same goal. Koepka is probably looking to get something that feels like his former Scotty Cameron Newport 2 Teryllium putter.

But the biggest surprise was that Alex Fitzpatrick, who just ran Cinderella three weeks after winning the Zurich Classic team event, switched putters.

Young Fitzpatrick left Odyssey Ai-ONE No. His silver 7 S went to Navy Ai-ONE No. 7 CH.

While the transition from silver to sea is interesting, it turns out that the transition from the slanted neck to the crank pipe is the key.

Odyssey Ai-DUAL #7 S Custom Putter

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Odyssey’s lawyers Harry Shih and Cody Hale handled the change because Fitzpatrick, a bare-knuckle agent, said he felt like he was leaving his face exposed for influence. In his first two events as a member of the PGA Tour, Fitzpatrick lost about half a shot in each round.

“It just gave him more awareness of the face,” Shih told GOLF. “He felt like the face was hanging open so we went to the crank so he could lift the face easily. Quintic’s data confirmed it.”

Hale added that the Crank Hosel fits his stroke cycle better.

“We also went 1 degree more in the stance to better match the plane of the shaft with his arms, which he and his pitching coach Andy Paisley like to see in his arm structure,” Hale said.

Sahith Theegala has returned to his Anser 2 player after a one-week trial with the Ally Blue H mallet.

And continuing the trend of what could be the next PGA Tour putter, Tom Hoge added the new Phantom 9.5R, the same model as the putter Cameron Young uses and Justin Thomas recently added.

Espionage goes a long way; Fowler falls short

Thursday was a back-and-forth for Jordan Spieth as he chases a Grand Slam, but it was a driver Spieth was driving, unlike 10 years ago.

ESPN coverage made much of Jordan Spieth’s improved driving today as he gained 1.5 strokes OTT and hit 11 of 13 fairways as he tied for the lead at -3.

He actually made a tweak last week on his GTS2 after playing it at Doral, going to a long 46″ … pic.twitter.com/AtZkwjPZAh

– Jack Hirsh (@JR_HIRSHey) May 14, 2026

Spieth averaged 1.93 strokes out of the field in Round 1, ranking second in the field. He missed only two roads.

Turns out he made a tweak to his GTS2 driver last week after playing it at Doral, going to a longer, 46″ Fujikura Ventus Black shaft.

Thanks to the increased stiffness of the GTS2 head he found that he was able to go longer and lower the loft (from 10 to 9) to get more speed. Spieth also has his GTS2 front weights 9g in the front and 3g in the back for more speed.

He hit .663 for the round on Cadillac but then got more than a hit a day on Truist with a long build. Since adding GTS2, he’s gone from 113th on SG: Off the Tee to 77th in just two weeks.

Titleist GTS2 Custom Driver

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But on the flip side, Rickie Fowler shortened his driver this week.

After using a 45″ driver for the past few weeks, Fowler is back and using a shorter layout, but this time at 43.25″, probably the shortest driver on the PGA Tour. In fact, the height is the same as his small driver.

Fowler has his most accurate time on the PGA Tour for driving accuracy and has used a 44.125″ driver for most of the season. He opened with an even-par 70 on Thursday.

Pride of Golf also dominates the catch count

As usual, the No. 1 surprise catch at the PGA Championship was Golf Pride.

All but 11 of the 156 players in the field at Aronimink played in Golf Pride events this week, continuing the best run of golf equipment.

check this out

This section is dedicated to the great photos we recently took on Tour, but didn’t have a reason to share until now. This week, check out Christiaan Bezuidenhout’s new PXG 0317 Tour irons.

Odds and ends

Some gear changes and notes we’re tracking this week.

Christiaan Bezuidenhout added PXG’s 0317 Tour Proto irons (above) and KBS Tour 125 S+ shafts … Lucas Glover switched to a GTS2 driver after adding fairway woods last week … Max Greyserman added Callaway’s Quantum TD driver with Ventus Blue 6-X4 … 3-hybrid to his bag … Greyserman and Ryo Hisastune switched to Vokey’s A+ grind to get through early … Haotong Li follows in Fowler and Gary Woodland footsteps by adding Scotty Cameron GOLO 7 CS … Denny McCarthy (GTS2 9.0) adds new driver Luke 9 Ticontract-GTS Fujikura leads driver shaft count with 46.2% of field … Maverick McNealy switches to Fujikura Ventus New TR Black+ 6-X in his driver.

3 things you should read/watch

A selection of GOLF content from the past week that you may be interested in.

Hideki Matsuyama is a well-known golf pro. This is what makes his bag | Bag spy – Take a deep dive into Hideki Matsuyama’s bag and see why, as he explores more than anyone, he continues to play mostly the same things.

This Aronimink feature features professionals rethinking their wedge setup on the PGA – The Aronimink is the first opportunity for PGA Tour players to see a bent grass this season. See what Vokey’s Aaron Dill says is the key to managing northeastern turf.

Cameron Young is reportedly playing a golf ball that will fit under the recoil – Cameron Young revealed Wednesday that his Titleist Pro V1x Double Dot golf ball passed a new conformance test. See what that means and whether it’s a big deal.

Want to fix your wallet in 2026? Find a club fit near you at True Spec Golf.