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Kenton Oates has obtained some oddball gear requests through the years throughout his time as a Ping Tour rep. Wild grip builds. Distinctive iron grinds. Two drivers. Oates has seen all of it. Or so he thought till staffer Sahith Theegala texted him with an ask that just about didn’t appear actual.
After hitting two pictures into the water on the par-3 14th gap throughout the FedEx St. Jude Championship with a Ping Blueprint S 7-iron, Theegala needed to know if Ping may make him a 7-iron that didn’t have a 7 stamped on the only real. He was formally completed wanting on the quantity and wanted to see one thing totally different within the bag.
“[Sahith] truly talked about one thing pre-tournament concerning the [7-iron] being the worst membership in his bag,” Oates advised GOLF.com. “It was a curious remark. There’s no purpose for the 7-iron to be worse than the others. Then he hit two within the water with 7-iron on 14 in Memphis.
“He texts me Sunday evening after Memphis and says, ‘It is a ridiculous request, however I would like a 7-iron that doesn’t have a 7 stamped on it.’ I had to consider it for a second after which remembered the [Viktor Hovland] irons with the grinds. Once we grind on the only real, we find yourself having to screenprint the numbers on there.”
To accommodate Theegala’s request, Ping’s Tour division stuffed within the 7 stamped on the only real with steel, floor off a portion after which screenprinted an 8 on prime. The painless course of made it attainable for Ping to in a single day the membership to Theegala on the BMW Championship for quick testing.
“We labored on the membership Tuesday of the BMW Championship and he’s been utilizing it ever since,” Oates mentioned. “He calls it the 8-Plus. It simply reveals you that professionals are a lot nearer to us than you may assume. Even they’ve idiosyncrasies that don’t all the time make sense.”
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Whereas Theegala’s 8-Plus remains to be a bonafide 7-iron, the quantity change on the only real has labored wonders for his confidence. Through the Tour Championship, Theegala discovered himself within the combine throughout the last spherical and requested his caddie, Carl Smith, if he ought to “hit the 8-Plus” throughout a number of necessary conditions. There’s no probability he’s uttering the phrase “7-iron.”
Requested if Theegala’s request is essentially the most weird he’s ever obtained, Oates confirmed it’s proper up on the prime, together with a non-Ping staffer who routinely asks Tour reps to re-sleeve his Ping driver each three months as a result of “he feels just like the sleeve bends and strikes flatter.” (Oates confirmed the sleeve doesn’t go flatter over time.)
“You need to accommodate all requests, irrespective of how loopy they sound,” mentioned Oates. “Our job is to determine how one can make it occur. Sahith’s was positively an attention-grabbing one, but it surely’s good to see him having success with the 8-Plus iron within the bag.”